Kathleen Parker Makes the Case for Hillary. Or Does She?

Hopefully, Kathleen Parker was writing a satire. James Taranto hinted that perhaps she did not want to be taken seriously, but if she did, she has written a profoundly vapid column to make the case for a Hillary Clinton presidency.

When a friend embarrasses himself, you cover him up. If a Pulitzer Prize winning columnist starts sounding like a fool,  you must assume that she could not possibly have meant it. It’s the gentlemanly thing to do.

Parker’s case for Hillary sounds all too familiar. She suggests that Hillary is the Messiah and that she will save the world.

Were it not for the fact that America was sold on the idea of electing a Messiah in 2008 and 2012 we would all be having a good laugh over the idea of Hillary the Messiah.

Those who traffic in Messiahs might be telling us that since Barack Obama did not usher in a new era of racial harmony, we need to recycle the idea and declare that Hillary will bring peace to the planet because she will inspire women everywhere to throw off their shackles, take charge of their lives and abolish warfare.

Were it not for the fact that large numbers of Americas actually believe this you would by now be rolling on the floor in laughter.

Parker seems to be channeling advanced feminist double talk because she buttresses her point by offering us a blizzard of sexual stereotypes. By now, we have been led to believe that women were really just the same as men, that all sexual differences were just social constructs and that the greatest achievement of the Obama administration was putting women into combat. But, if this is true, how can you sell Hillary as the ultimate Peacemonger? Happily, advanced feminist theorists reject logical consistency. They are trying to sell a product and will say whatever they have to say to make the sale.

If you think about it, the argument for Hillary the Messiah says that she will do for the world what she has done for Egypt or Syria or Libya. In those places the former Secretary of State worked her rough diplomatic magic. How’s that working out, Egyptians? How’s your life been, Syrians?

Let’s not even think about her “reset” of relations between America and Russia.

If Parker is channeling the mind of a mindless Hillary supporter she is doing a great job. When such supporters advance the argument that their candidate will save the world they are saying what Barack Obama’s supporters were saying: the candidate has such a thin resume, so few real accomplishments that we need to believe that he or she was sent by God to lift us out of our despondency.

Since Hillary Clinton has no real accomplishments, just a bunch of titles, her supporters are going to argue that she is uniquely qualified to save the world’s women, to deliver them from bondage and sexist repression, to restore their rights and dignity.

To my mind, these paragraphs from Parker cannot be serious:

Rewinding the tape to 1995 at the U.N.’sFourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, then-first lady Hillary Clinton empowered women as never before with just a few words: “Human rights are women’s rights and women’s rights are human rights, once and for all.”

Imagine that. Well, of course, we can imagine that. Our Founding Fathers created the instruments to codify this concept, even if it took a while to imprint on our psyches and to be reflected in our laws. But elsewhere, in places where women are tortured, abused, sold into slavery and disfigured, all to the “glory” of men, it was a trumpet blast from heaven’s gate that caused the earth to tremble: Women are human beings, too.

How do you say “wow” in Lingala?

For those who do not know, Lingala is a Bantu language spoken in part of the Congo.

Now you have the first great Hillary for President bumper sticker: Elect Hillary; Save the Bantus.

Does anyone seriously believe that Hillary’s declaration that “women are human beings, too” was “a trumpet blast” from God?

And what about Hillary’s trumpet blast about the “vast right wing conspiracy” or her obscene and pathetic dismissal of the Benghazi murders: “What difference, at this point, does it make?”

When it comes to high concept Hillary fails.

And what are we to make of this, from Parker:

While Americans obsess about Hillary’s hair and married life, others have been studying her for inspiration. To millions, she is a role model and a warrior for women’s right to self-determination.

It may be the case—I haven’t taken a poll—that Hillary is a role model for women around the world. But still, how many women would want her marriage? How many women would allow themselves to being repeatedly humiliated by their husbands?

Will they all be inspired, like Hillary’s chief aide, Huma Abedin and make themselves over into martyr for the cause of humiliation?

It is reasonable for people to think about Hillary’s married life because she owes her resume to her husband, Bill Clinton. If her name were Fordyce, we would not know she existed.

Putingt all of the rights-talk aside, what has Hillary done for women’s self-respect. Would any self-respecting woman have tolerated Bill Clinton’s behavior? Would any self-respecting woman have tolerated Anthony Weiner’s behavior?

Apparently, Bill Clinton’s behavior was not leavened by being married to a champion for women’s rights. A man who cheats that much and that often, who makes only the most minimal effort to be discreet is trying to tell you something about his wife. Disregard it at your peril.

Beyond that, a nation that still has a modicum of pride does not elect, as president, a woman who suffered repeated public humiliations. 

When it comes to symbolic gestures in support of women’s rights—as opposed to empty rhetoric—we are reminded of the fact that when the rabid misogynist and anti-Semite Mohamed Morsi was elected president of Egypt, the first foreign leader to visit him in person and to bless his election was Hillary Clinton. Way to stand up for women’s self-respect.

Finally, as Taranto explains Parker’s column assumes a world without men. It assumes stereotypically that women are less prone to violence and it assumes that our enemies will be led by women who are similarly inclined.

If that does not make it a parody, I don’t know what would.

If you don’t believe me, take a look at the women-centered and women-dominant families in America’s inner cities. How has that been working out?

It suggests that the feminist dunce that Parker has been channeling does not want to think about what happens to young men who grow up in homes where there is no father present?