There's really just one good answer to any Chris Matthews question: "F*ck you, Tweetie"

[BurtWorm]

Kate Michelman should feel free to use it next time Matthews invites her onto his gasfest.

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2008/02/08/chris_matthews/

What I really wanted to say to Chris Matthews

The "Hardball" host wanted to know how a feminist like me could support someone other than Hillary Clinton. Well, here's how.

By Kate Michelman


Chris Matthews and Kate Michelman

Feb. 8, 2008 | As the red light atop the camera went dark on Monday night, there was still much more I wanted to say to Chris Matthews, much more that I needed to say.

So for the moment, my time on "Hardball" continues here.

Knowing that I had just announced my support for Barack Obama for president after having earlier supported my old friend John Edwards, Matthews had me on his show Monday. His first Hardball to me was one of his typical zingers: "Kate Michelman, how does it feel to have abandoned the cause of your life?"

The simple answer, Chris, is that I haven't -- in fact, my endorsement of Barack, just like my earlier embrace of John Edwards, is all about exalting the causes of my life. Not about repudiating them.

I haven't abandoned my commitment to the women's movement -- and anyone who knows me understands I never will. My endorsement of Barack Obama is actually a celebration of that commitment, and an honest reflection of what I have been fighting for for over 40 years.

The women's movement is about free choice, self-determination and challenging a status quo that fails a lot of Americans, not just women. And it is not about going along. It's about transcending, about having the freedom to follow one's heart, about creating and pursuing new opportunities, and about the American dream being for all Americans.

Chris' gotcha-type question to me and the semi-criticism implicit in it -- that as a woman I have some biological obligation to unreservedly support whatever woman is running -- are exactly the sentiments I faced when I first started working for a woman's right to choose. If women who vote for men are traitors, then are men who vote for women also traitors? What about African-Americans who vote for whites? Or whites who vote for African-Americans?

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