MNpublius.com Diaries

The laundry list of reasons why John McCain is unfavorable and/or downright unqualified to serve as the U.S. President is fairly familiar to most of us…

• Growth removed from face?
• Older than The Zip Code, Nylon and Cheerios
• Confused about Iraq’s geography
• etc.

…but his relationship with his wife might be the most interesting of all! And by “interesting”, I’m sure I must mean something more like “disturbing”.

Monday, John McCain and his wife Cindy McCain made an appearance at the motorcycle rally in Sturgis South Dakota, where McCain’s speech was welcomed with applause as well as the revving of Harley engines. According to CNN “[John McCain] was surrounded by scores of beer drinking men and scantily clad women, many of whom were as thrilled to see the war hero candidate as they were to watch Kid Rock perform later in the evening.” In this fun environment, what presidential candidate wouldn’t think to volunteer his wife to participate in the debaucheries of a bike rally beauty pageant?

As reported by CNN and revisited by Ben Smith of Politico.com, John McCain is quoted as saying: “I encouraged Cindy to compete. I told her with a little luck she could be the only woman ever to serve as first lady and Miss Buffalo Chip.”

This pageant is apparently, “an infamously debauched event that’s been known to feature topless women” (and, according to an ESPN.com columnist who visited the rally, “occasionally bottomless”). Say what you will about topless women, my own concern is the beauty pageant aspect (unrealistic body image expectations, pitting women against other women, gender stereotyping and encouragement of unhealthy competition), the husband-volunteering-his-wife aspect (one should be able to make their own choice as to whether or not they wish to flash a crowd) and the questionable class commentary aspect of implying that no other woman at the rally is in any way qualified to be in the running for First Lady.

Frankly, this is just another example of John McCain’s disrespect for the woman he is married to. As brought to light by Cliff Schecter’s book The Real McCain, in 1992 McCain called his wife a “cunt” in the presence of several reporters. Yep. That’s right. Nope, he didn’t say “bitch” or “hoe” or any other of many offensive slurs, he went all the way to the end of the scale.

Here is a funny take on the incident, by the comedy writers of the “Public Service Administration.” You may want to wait until you get home from work to watch this one.

While a dialogue about sexism in politics was brought to the forefront when Hillary was in the race, it is important to remember that sexism is a very real social structure and these incidents are mere examples of its prevalence. These incidents are not uncommon, and nor should they be treated with the apparent indifference that some of the media is showing.