Dowd and Coulter: Ms. Inside, Ms. Outside

It’s hard to have much respect for Maureen Dowd after you’ve read The Daily Howler for awhile ("When you read Dowd, you're riding with Coulter"). He seems to have his facts down totally pat, too. Seems she always sees feminine weakness in Democratic male candidates: Gore relying on Naomi Wolf to show him how to be a man, becoming “so feminized he’s practically lactating,” and carrying on a conversation with his bald spot while he singing, “I feel pretty”; Kerry looking like a fool with the fabricated quote about NASCAR; Edwards “the Breck Girl”; and now Obama “in touch with his feminine side,” “Obambi,” or a “schoolboy,” “legally blond,” “Scarlett O’Hara,” “dreamboy” and “Barry” (what his mother or grandparents called him as a kid).” And by the way, as she trial-balloons various formulations for her Manhattan cocktail-crowd, how long will it take for Dowd to be justifiably skewered for calling Obama “boy?

Somery’s main point:

Speaking in her famous direct way, [Ann Coulter] tells these people that Dem males are just big girlie-men (“f*ggots”). Speaking in more mellifluous tones, Dowd sends this message to others. Repeat: Dowd and Coulter have the same message. They just send it to two different groups.

Of course, there’s the flip side: to Maureen, naturally, Hillary is butch – “in touch with her masculine side, ” her “feral” responses to the Geffen attack made it look like “Godzilla stomping on Obambi,” while her Democratic male spokesman – no spokesperson he in Dowd-speak – fitting nicely to her masculine image, is a “thug.”