Maureen Dowd and the bigot’s impulse!

TUESDAY, MARCH 20, 2012

Mormons and menstruation: Over the past twenty-five years, Maureen Dowd has played an extremely destructive role in our journalistic culture.

On Sunday, Dowd was clowning again, pretending to worry her small tiny brain about the size of Candidate Romney’s home. Yesterday, we helped you recall the days when she played this same stupid game with respect to Candidate Kerry. (See THE DAILY HOWLER, 3/19/12.)

We also helped you recall the way Dowd went after Candidate Kerry’s wife. Kerry’s wife was an obvious bitch, a point Maureen Dowd enjoyed stressing.

Of course, Maureen Dowd has slimed a long list of major male Democrats’ wives—and the career liberal world always sat there and took it. Finally, in June 2008, public editor Clark Hoyt savaged Dowd for an offshoot of this repellent conduct, right in her own New York Times. (See THE DAILY HOWLER, 3/14/12.)

A public editor finally spoke. For the previous decade, the career liberal world had been notable for its silence. Pitifully, Dowd is a very big deal. Career players give her wide berth.

In his overdue takedown, Hoyt specifically hammered Dowd for “the relentless nature of her gender-laden assault on [Hillary] Clinton”—an assault he traced to “28 of 44 columns [by Dowd] since” the start of 2008. Since that time, Dowd has largely cleaned up her act with respect to Democratic candidates’ wives, most of whom had previously been pretty obvious bitches.

But Maureen Dowd’s extremely small brain contains a multitude of demons. In Sunday’s column, she opened with Candidate Romney’s big house, then moved on to his scary religion. In the process, we’d have to say she again showed the bigot’s impulse.

We’ll say this for Dowd—her brain isn’t subtle. In an almost comical manner, her first reference to Romney’s religion involved an image of murder:

DOWD (3/18/12): His two-year missionary stint in France taught Mitt to steel himself against rejection. Still, he must feel awful heading into Illinois (where Joseph Smith, the Mormon Church founder, was running for president when he was killed by a mob), spending so much money to buy so little affection.

Who put Dowd would think this way? Romney “must feel awful” heading to Illinois! After all, the last guy who went there got murdered!

Only Dowd would structure a column that way. But this is the way the broken mind of this broken-souled columnist works.

Sunday’s column was at least the fifth full piece Dowd has devoted to trashing and mocking Mormonism—the fifth full column in which she has played the bigot’s role in this area. (See THE DAILY HOWLER, 1/17/12.) As the bigot will often do, Dowd pretended to have real concerns about Romney’s faith. She hid behind that pretense.

In fact, Dowd was doing the things the bigot will do in such situations—she was trying to fill you with fear about the scary strangeness of The Other. And of course, she searched for ways to give us our kicks, as she did in the good old days—the days when she would entertain us by mocking all the bitches.

On Sunday, she strapped Anne Frank to the roof of her car, something she has done in the past. She gave us a taste of Marilyn Monroe. She even worked Elvis into her headline!

Most comically, she discussed Mormons and menstruation. No, really—she did! Just go look.

We’ll explain her reference tomorrow.

Dowd pretended to have real concerns about Romney’s troubling religion. But in each instance, as the bigot will do, she clipped and spun her presentations, keeping us a little bit clueless, helping us learn to fear Those People.

Dowd has been a deeply destructive presence in our journalistic culture. In 1992, Katherine Boo dared to stand and warn the world about the “creeping Dowdism.”

Sixteen years later, Clark Hoyt challenged Dowd’s gruesome misogyny.

But for the most part, the career liberal world has looked away from this broken-souled person’s bad conduct. That’s what the career liberal world does today as she plays her next stupid card.

Go ahead! Reread the things Dowd told you about Candidate Romney’s troubling religion.

Dowd is almost always a fool—but she’s also playing the bigot’s role here. Tomorrow, we explore why.