Well, Good For Michelle Wolf, Anyway
Things are happening at warp speed these days, and maybe you’ve already moved on from comedian Michelle Wolf’s performance at last weekend’s White House Correspondents’ Association dinner. Alas, I haven’t. Not just yet. The annual dinner is that one night of the year when Washington journalists try to act as if it were perfectly normal […]
Greetings From This ‘Career Obsessed Banshee’ Feminist
Thanks to recent national coverage of Missouri Senate candidate Courtland Sykes and his self-declared expertise on “nail-biting manophobic hell-bent feminist she devils,” we’re all getting a glimpse into the darker recesses of his mind. It’s as if he threw open the doors to his cranial cellar and yelled, “C’mon in, folks!” I’m here to lead […]
Dear Trump Voters: Now, Maybe You Try To Understand Us
I don’t want to coddle Trump voters, in the thin hope that this will coax out your regret for electing the most dangerous man to ever inhabit the White House. This would do nothing to mitigate the harm Trump is daily inflicting on this country.
Trump Speaks, Children Listen
Earlier this summer, I was walking through the Miami airport with my 8-year-old grandson when I looked around and noticed I suddenly wasn’t. I saw him a few feet away, walked over, and looked up to see a familiar CNN clip of Donald Trump’s interview with Jake Tapper.
Voting Like a Woman
“We women have moved on, you see, and one of the things we left behind is men like Donald Trump.” Sometimes it’s true that women think alike. Because every time Donald Trump makes such statements about women, millions of us look at him and think the same thing: Oh, I know you.
That Hillary
My mother was no different from so many women you think you know. They’re full of dreams and other secrets they keep to themselves out of modesty and a certainty that no one would care anyway. But this week, because of Hillary Clinton, their stories are seeping out.
RNC Message: Be Very Afraid
The Republican rhetoric worked its magic, and voters lived in constant fear for their families’ lives. They also seemed likelier to vote for Republican candidates because, not remotely coincidentally, the Republican Party was vowing to protect them from this nonexistent danger.
Here Comes Trump
For weeks now, many of us who live in Cleveland have been fielding questions about how safe we feel about the Republican National Convention’s coming to our city next week. What they’re really asking is whether we’re worried about Donald Trump and the trouble his brand of campaigning may bring with him.
It’s Summer, The Season For Grandparents
This was to be our final big-family dinner before my grandson and his parents whittled our numbers by moving far, far away to a new job awaiting his father — formerly known as my son, before he announced he was moving my grandson far, far away. Away from me, I want to emphasize.
Here In Cleveland, You Gotta Respect The Scars
Right now, we are an entire region of people whose toes haven’t touched the ground since that final buzzer in Sunday’s game against the Golden State Warriors. “Everybody’s friendly, no matter where you go,” the air conditioner repairman told me yesterday as he stood in my kitchen writing out the receipt. “It’s like no one can stop smiling.”
After Orlando, a Small-Town Pastor Finds Her Voice
When the Rev. Robin LaBolt saw the news on Sunday morning, she knew the challenge waiting for her at Sycamore United Church of Christ. “We’re a small town,” she said. “It’s not exactly an LGBT-friendly area. Not that anyone says bad things about them. They’d just rather not talk about it.”
Our Milestone Moment
We should show more understanding toward those who are disappointed, the critics said. We should not “rub it in.” We were “gloating.” We were “insensitive.” We should be “more gracious.” I leaned back from my computer in the wee hours of Wednesday morning and thought, “Why does this feel so familiar?”
Trump’s Whining Strategy
Earlier this week, the presumptive Republican nominee initiated yet another attack on journalists, this time for having the audacity to report that he had failed to make good on a promise in January to donate $1 million to a veterans charity.
It’s Time For You To Speak Out Against Trump
This campaign season has been a harrowing initiation for a whole lot of women who had no idea just how quickly strangers — and people who are supposed to love them — can turn on a woman for speaking her mind.
Dear Bernie Bullies, I’m So Over You
I support Clinton for a long list of reasons. The Sanders bullies say that makes me part of the “establishment.” I wish my working-class parents had lived long enough to hear that. How they would have howled. There was a time when I got worked up over those voices of superiority telling me who I am because I don’t want what they do. I couldn’t care less now.
Girls Don’t Need Help Discovering Their Inner Critics
The magazine Discovery Girls pitches itself as a publication that aims to help empower girls from ages 8 to 12. Much of the time, judging by its website, it manages to do just that. In the latest issue, though, the magazine offered to help its young readers discover their inner critics with a two-page illustrated spread on how to pick a swimsuit that best flatters their bodies.
As Journalists, Let Us Not Tiptoe Around Trump, The Nominee
I’m going to watch this coverage with the fierce focus of a hound on the hunt, and I am confident that I will not be the only columnist or the only woman to do so. As I’ve written a number of times in recent months, this is not the misogyny of the 2008 campaign, but only because so many of us women are older now and we are so done with this.
Cleveland Police Union Chief’s Rhetoric Is a Growing Danger
If I’ve learned anything about Steve Loomis from our long, meandering interviews, it’s his certainty that there’s nothing wrong with the Cleveland police force that a more appreciative, compliant population wouldn’t fix.
Same Misogyny, Different Season
Hillary Clinton’s ascendancy in the race for president has provided an opportunity for the rest of us women to step back and assess our standing in America.
‘I’m a Girl’
“I know you’ve talked about whether I’m a boy or a girl,” she said. “I’m a girl. My name is Rebecca.”
Hope Lives
If ever a person lived up to the promise of her name, it was my friend Hope.
Oh, Susan Sarandon
This Democratic primary is starting to feel like the family reunion that should have ended weeks ago in a house full of relatives who refuse to leave.
A Happy Ending, Perhaps, To The Trump Lounge Act
At his February rally in Biloxi, Mississippi, Trump repeatedly pointed to the cameraman — readily identifiable to the crowd — and shouted: “Turn it. Turn it. Turn it. Spin it. Spin the camera. Spin the camera. Look at the guy in the middle. Look at the guy in the middle. Why aren’t you turning the camera? Why aren’t you turning the camera? Terrible. It’s so terrible. Look at him — he doesn’t turn the camera. It’s a disgusting — I tell you, it’s disgusting…”
Hey, Hillary: Smile, Girl
Now, by “girl,” I mean a former U.S. senator and secretary of state who is likely to be the first female president of these allegedly united states.
Abortions, With No Regrets
More than 100 women filed supporting briefs full of stories about the abortions that made it possible for them — and often their families — to live safe and productive lives.