Take Your Boobs to the White House Watch

[Content Note: Misogyny; rape culture.]

This piece in Politico by Maggie Haberman is incredible—and a perfect example of why this series exists:

For Democrats, there is no fallback: It's Hillary Clinton or probably a long bout of depression ahead of 2016.

That is the opening fucking line. If Hillary Clinton doesn't run for president, everyone will be depressed, and it will be her fault! Wow.

Let me say again that I realize Hillary Clinton has unfathomably thick skin at this point, and I strongly suspect if she had any reaction to that kind of garbage, it would be "HA HA FUCK YOU." I don't imagine Clinton needs me to personally defend her, nor do I believe her decision about whether to run for the presidency will be significantly influenced by this kind of media, but I am deeply contemptuous that any woman in public life would be spoken about and written about in such coercive way.

The hope of retaining the White House in an open-seat election is very real — and the letdown that will set in among Democratic activists and operatives will be very deep if Clinton takes a pass on a campaign, as she may well do.

She's going to let people down! Doesn't she know that women aren't allowed to disappoint people?

She has said she has yet to make up her mind, but few in the party believe that.

Come on, baby—your mouth is saying maybe, but we all know that means yes.

The Clintons' ambition and the chance to make history as the first female president, they figure, will overpower any reticence about another grueling campaign or spending her golden years carrying the burdens of the world's weightiest job.

Everyone knows how ambitious that bitch woman is. I mean, shit, that was the very thing we used to say she shouldn't be president last time around! "She'll stop at nothing!" Ha ha yeah, that does look kind of ironic now that we want her to run whoooooops.

"We would be at sea in a lifeboat with no food, no water, and no land in sight," said one veteran Democratic operative who has worked on presidential campaigns, and who, like most people interviewed for this story, asked for anonymity to speak candidly about the former first lady. "There is no Plan B." It would be, the operative said, a "gut punch" to the Democratic party.

If Hillary Clinton doesn't run, she will abandon us at sea to DIE! But not before punching us! IN OUR GUTS!

If she doesn't run, there will be stages of grief.

Because not only will she have murdered us, but murdered our HOPES and DREAMS!

Republicans would be rallying around the idea of reclaiming the White House after eight years, just as Democrats would be sifting through their second-tier options. Clinton, meanwhile, would have to carefully manage carefully her role as a towering Democratic figure who shattered the hopes of the party.

See?

The piece goes on to talk about how, if she doesn't run, she then stands to overshadow whomever does run. And how nobody can get elected without her, because they will need her endorsement and to help "organize women across the country." Which she is obliged to do. So you know, so she might as well just run already SHEEEEEEESH!

To recap: The leaders of the party in which Hillary Clinton has loyally served as a public servant for most of her life told her, during the 2008 primary, that they wanted to make history, but not with her, and she needed to get out of the way for Obama and go the fuck home. (Sort of.) The media literally demonized her, and, when she refused to drop out while she still had a chance to win, the chattering classes, with an assist from members of her own party, called her ruthless and destructive and narcissistic, and made reprehensible accusations that she was so hellbent on winning that she would implode the Democratic Convention in order to try to win. Instead, she gracefully accepted defeat and got behind Obama, encouraging her supporters, donors, and delegates to do the same. And then she went on the campaign trail with him. And then she accepted a role in his administration. And then the same people who had literally called her a devil expressed surprise that she isn't one. And now, six years later, the same people who told her to go home are telling her to COME BACK, because now we're ready to make history with YOU, and if you don't come serve some more at our demand, then you—YOU, HILLARY CLINTON—are a dream-shattering asshole.

I hope that is something that makes her laugh, even if mirthlessly. I hope that it doesn't bother her, because it sure as fuck bothers me.