In her latest screed at Salon, the hyperpartisan Joan Walsh addresses a problem among Republicans that she believes “could cost them a chance to take back the Senate” in the midterm elections in six weeks. It is that they still so-don’t-get women.
As Exhibit A, Walsh points to an ad produced by Americans for Shared Prosperity that is, in her view, “so condescending to women it might have been made by Todd Akin.” So what’s in the ad that offends Walsh’s female sensibilities and persuades her that other “real women” will be equally creeped out by it? It features, she tells us,
a lovely, latte-skinned young woman in a pink shirt and pearls is sitting on her white sofa, complaining about a man she met online: “In 2008, I fell in love. His online profile made him seem so perfect. Smart, handsome, charming, articulate.”
Finally, we get to the punchline:
We see her MacBook screen, and there he is: the cad she calls “Barack,” President Obama.
After fussing and fuming over the disrespect shown toward a president so respectful of his position that when exiting Marine One, he can’t transfer his container of latte to his free hand long enough to deliver a proper salute to the Marine waiting at the base of the steps, Walsh goes on to note, “Barack is not on the ballot, so what’s the point of the ad?”
The assumption she makes in the first clause is technically accurate. He is not on the ballot — and damned lucky he isn’t. His approval rating is so far south of 50%, he’d never get elected. Democrats who are on the ballot are putting as much distance between themselves and Obama as they can.
As to the point of the ad, Walsh answers that question herself by quoting John Jordan, the owner of the PAC that made it:
The purpose of this is to treat women voters more like adults than either Democrats or Republicans have.
Walsh glibly retorts, “If this is what they come up with when they’re treating us more like adults … imagine what they’d do if they were treating us like children?” But she never really explains what about the ad she believes talks to women.
The reality is if there is any group that condescends to women, it’s liberals, of which Walsh is a card-carrying member. The Left thinks women are so vapid that they’ll never discover the truth behind the popular Democratic myth that women earn 77% what men do for the same job.
Walsh pooh-poohs the claim by the actor in the ad that Obama “thinks the only thing I care about is free birth control,” but ignores the woman’s complaint that “he won’t even let me keep my own doctor.” Obviously, Walsh believes that her fellow females are easily duped. This ad calls her bluff, which is why she goes to such great lengths to dismiss it as condescending.
The ad follows. Feel free to judge for yourself whether it is effective.
