Hillary's New Crusade: Feminist Hero, The Daily Beast

[Captain_Nemo]

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-06-07/hillarys-new-crusade/?cid=hp:beastoriginalsL1
Michele Goldberg

"A year ago this week, Hillary Clinton ended her presidential campaign—to the relief of many. But even her critics must admit that as secretary of State, she’s been a feminist hero to behold.
One year ago today, Hillary Clinton ended her presidential campaign, much to the relief of millions of ardent Barack Obama supporters like me. Throughout the primaries, I had been irritated and then outraged by those who argued feminism obliged women to back her. The possibility that our first female president would be a former first lady promising to continue her husband’s legacy struck me as profoundly dispiriting. During the campaign, her hardball tactics horrified me. So when she made her rousing and gracious speech in the National Building Museum, conceding defeat but celebrating "18 million cracks" in "that highest, hardest glass ceiling," I was too furious to really hear her.

Listening to it now, though, I can’t help but tear up. I’m still glad I supported Obama, who I think is proving to be a better, defter president than Clinton would have been. Nevertheless, I was wrong to mistake her political ruthlessness for a lack of principle. Just as Clinton proved her skeptics wrong upon entering the Senate in 2001 with hard and diligent work, she is now quietly remaking the State Department. That’s especially true when it comes to women’s rights. As secretary of State, Hillary Clinton has been the feminist hero of this administration."