It is fairly self evident that if you work for someone who was caught on tape bragging about grabbing women by their genitals, you lose your moral authority when it comes to calling out sexism. This was apparently lost on Kellyanne Conway, who went on Fox & Friends to imply that Cory Booker is a sexist because he wants to run for president.
“I would ask him a couple questions today as he runs from my native New Jersey,” said Conway in response to Booker’s announcement that he will be seeking the Democratic nomination for president.
“One is, what is wrong with the candidates that are already in there? What is your objection to Kamala Harris running, Elizabeth Warren, Kirsten Gillibrand, these others who have already announced, Tulsi Gabbard maybe? If he were a Republican running against them, they immediately would call him a sexist for running against these women in the Democratic field.”
There you have it: Cory Booker must have a problem with women because he wants to run against some of them for president. By that logic, Trump was a sexist because he ran against Carly Fiorina in the Republican primaries in 2016 (and not because he said no one would vote for her because of her face). Every other male candidate in the Republican field must have been sexist too, given Fiorina was running. In fact, any male candidate who has ever run in any political contest against a woman must by default, be sexist.
Of course Conway doesn’t believe this to be true — she is simply trying to score childish political points against the Democrats in an attempt to distract the country over the colossal failures of her boss.
Conway gets away with this type of brazen hypocrisy and idiocy because, let’s be honest, the people watching her on Fox & Friends really aren’t too bright. Conway used exactly the same tactics when Trump was running for president. Whenever questioned about Trump’s disgusting misogyny and history of alleged sexual assault, Conway immediately pivoted to Hillary Clinton, who was apparently far worse than Trump because she was married to Bill Clinton.
Conway’s particular brand of puerile “gotcha” politics is extremely potent in the Trump era, where most of the audience she speaks to believe President Obama is a Muslim born in another country. Thirty years ago, con artists like Conway would be consigned to hawking skincare products on QVC, but now she is a nationally important figure speaking on behalf of the president of the United States.
Conway’s argument that Cory Booker is sexist because he wants to run for office is really a sign of how desperate the Trump administration is, and how afraid they are of the talent emerging in the Democratic Party. Conway is clearly very, very worried about candidates like Cory Booker, who would, as even Chris Christie acknowledged, have an extremely good chance of beating Trump in 2020.
Perhaps the real reason Conway is attacking Booker is because she believes Democratic women do not have what it takes to beat Donald Trump, and Booker does. It could be that Conway has so deeply internalized the misogyny of her boss that she does not think women can ever beat men. Conway worked relentlessly to stop the first woman in American history becoming president, and did so on behalf of a man who was not only accused of raping his own wife, but sexually assaulting dozens of other women over the years.
Conway’s performance also highlighted what we can expect to see when it comes to the Trump administration’s tactics against the Democratic presidential field. They are going to accuse the Democratic candidates of all the things Trump is guilty of; sexism, incompetence, and — wait for it — lack of experience.
“I’d also ask him [Booker] what exactly you accomplished qualifies you to be commander-in-chief and president of the United States?” Conway later said of the former two term Mayor of Newark, and two term US Senator.
If anything, you have to admire the shamelessness.