There was a serious case of selective amnesia induced by liberal bias on Thursday's CNN Newsroom as host Carol Costello oddly complained about women voters having labels like "soccer moms" and "welfare queens" applied to them while men supposedly escape such labeling.
But just barely a week ago on her show, Costello herself asked about "angry white men" supporting Donald Trump as she declared that it would be "kind of fun" to ask race-obsessed CNN liberal Marc Lamont Hill about this "voting block."
After introducing Thursday's segment by playing a clip of Hillary Clinton's recent appearance on the Comedy Central show Broad City, Costello brought aboard liberal author Rebecca Traister to discuss without challenge her recent writings on the subject of single women as a strongly Democratic voting block. The CNN host brought up her easily discredited perception of a labeling bias against women in her first question:
You know, we usually hear -- we usually hear labels put on women, you know, like "soccer moms" and "welfare queens" and "Beyonce voters" and "security moms." You never hear labels being applied to male voters. Why is that?
Traister went along with Costello's assumption of discrimination as she responded:
Well, because male voters are just voters, you know. In the United States, white manhood is humanity, and everything else is kind of a separate category.
It's embarrassing enough to forget about the existence of gender-specific labels like "angry white men," which originated during the 1994 midterm elections and is still used, and the more recently dubbed "NASCAR dads," but Costello actually used the "angry white men" term just eight days ago on the same show. Speaking to liberal CNN political commentator and Morehouse College Professor Marc Lamont Hill, Costello on March 9 posed:
Let me ask you this, Marc, because I want to ask you about angry white men because I just think it would be kind of fun. That block of voters, Marc, they're gravitating toward both Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. Why?
Additionally, last August, Costello interviewed Michael Kimmel, who authored a book titled Angry White Men: American Masculinity at the End of an Era for a discussion of GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump.
Returning to Thursday's show, during a discussion of younger women preferring Bernie Sanders over Hillary Clinton, Traister, who recently authored All the Single Ladies, went on to claim that "a Nordic model of a social democracy" like Sanders advocates "would be good for the new way in which Americans are organized" as often staying single for long periods of time. Traister:
Initially, Bernie had the real advantage, I think, because he was offering a more aspirationally left vision. And that is, in part, something closer to a Nordic model of a social democracy that is actually something that would be good for the new way in which Americans are organized. And I think, whether or not they are politically that this is something that unmarried women understand that some of the social programs and economic benefits that he's imagining.
Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the Thursday, March 17, CNN Newsroom with Carol Costello:
CAROL COSTELLO: They could end up being the most powerful voter in this year's presidential election. I'm talking about single women. And Hillary Clinton knows that. It's why she turned up on Comedy Central's Broad City -- a show about two single women.
[clip of Hillary Clinton appearing on show]
That's pretty funny, you have to admit. All right, that's right, this year's presidential election could come down to the single American woman. ... according to writer Rebecca Traister, the author of this powerful New York magazine article. That's because, quote, "Single women are taking up space in a world that was not designed for them. They make up a new republic, a new category of citizen. If the country is to flourish, we must make room for free women, and let go of the economic and social systems built around the presumption that no woman really counts unless she is married."With me now, author of All the Single Ladies, Rebecca Traister.
(...)
You know, we usually hear -- we usually hear labels put on women, you know, like "soccer moms" and "welfare queens" and "Beyonce voters" and "security moms." You never hear labels being applied to male voters. Why is that?
REBECCA TRAISTER, AUTHOR: Well, because male voters are just voters, you know. In the United States, white manhood is humanity, and everything else is kind of a separate category.
COSTELLO: You're not putting a label on single women voters, right? You're just-
TRAISTER: No, part of what I'm saying is that they are also human, they are also a new category of, inhabitants and citizens of the United States and that they're taking up space, and the country, it really was, its systems, its economic and social policies have been built around the assumption that we're organized into these hetero marrying units. And that's simply not the way that most Americans live anymore. And so one of the things you're seeing reflected in the issues in the presidential election is that we need to rethink our policies in terms of how we support more women living -- women and men living independently of marriage.
COSTELLO: Yeah, and I think we have to change our perception of who the single woman is because in elections past I think it was assumed that a single woman was, you know, she lived with a child and she was on welfare.
[TRAISTER]
COSTELLO: So you really think that single women could decide this election?
TRAISTER: They absolutely, well, they could play a huge part in it. In 2012, they were 23 percent of the electorate, and they voted for Barack Obama 67 percent to 31 percent over Mitt Romney. And this year there are projections that suggest there could be more unmarried women voters than married women voters. Getting them to the polls is a challenge. There are all kinds of reasons why single women have trouble voting with the consistency that married women do.
COSTELLO: Now, are you talking about single women across all age groups because, you know, there's that sentiment out there that young women are gravitating toward Bernie Sanders and they're not appealing to Hillary Clinton? But is that really true?
TRAISTER: Well, what's going to be true in the general election is that they are going to gravitate probably in enormous numbers to whichever-
COSTELLO: Democrat.
TRAISTER: -Democratic candidate is the nominee. And it really depends on the early states. Single women gravitated hugely to Bernie Sanders over Hillary Clinton. Those are of course the predominantly white states where he has found so much of his intense support. Unmarried women in South Carolina in some of the Super Tuesday states, especially non-white, single women have gravitated toward Hillary Clinton. So it's evened out a little bit.
But, yes, you know, initially Bernie had the real advantage, I think, because he was offering a more aspirationally left vision. And that is, in part, something closer to a Nordic model of a social democracy that is actually something that would be good for the new way in which Americans are organized. And I think, whether or not they are politically that this is something that unmarried women understand that some of the social programs and economic benefits that he's imagining.
COSTELLO: So are these women at all attracted to Donald Trump?
TRAISTER: Not so far. There's not a lot of reason so far for them to be. In fact, there are certainly, you know, he's trafficking in a lot of pretty blatant misogyny in terms of his campaign rhetoric, you know. It's unclear yet what his profile and approach is going to be in the general election. But, based on what we've seen so far, it doesn't seem likely to me that he's going to enjoy a lot of support from unmarried women.
