Fox News host Andrea Tantaros suggested on Tuesday that Hillary Clinton visited the Mexican restaurant chain Chipotle while on the campaign trail this week in an effort to appeal to Hispanic voters. Tantaros and her “Outnumbered” co-host Lisa Kennedy Montgomery discussed Clinton’s stop at a Chipotle outside of Toledo, Ohio where Clinton reportedly wasn’t recognized. Tantaros said that Twitter users said Clinton, alongside campaign advisor Huma Abedin, appeared to be “hungover.” Tantaros dubbed the meal stop “the incognito burrito” before Montgomery chimed in with her analysis…. “It’s just so real,” Montgomery said. “She’s like ‘Listen, I want some food of the people, but I don’t want it to be icky. I don’t want it to be too — ethnic. Is there some middle ground we can find?’ And Huma went, ‘Yeah, let’s go to Chipotle. Gotta eat off this hangover.’ Yeah, I think what that says is the first lady is quite ordinary looking in person.”
When it comes to the mainstream media, women have a significant bone to pick when it comes to sexism and misogyny. Women are not equal players or partners in media circles; when you turn on a TV news channel, more often than not you’ll still see a White male reading the news.
An even bigger problem is that sometimes the sexism and misogyny come from women in the media. By far the worst offender is Fox News Channel, which long ago gave up on journalism and hard news to focus on character assassination and the politics of personal destruction. My generalized disdain for Andrea Tantaros is no secret, and Lisa Kennedy Montgomery is another in a long list of talking skirts with nothing of substance or value to offer. Both of them manage to do the heavy lifting of those who believe that politics is a man’s world and that those women who dare try to break the mold deserved to be pilloried mercilessly.
The only reason I’m even dignifying Tantaros’ and Montgomery’s (not so very) witty bon mot is that they are engaging in exactly what so many women in the media fight everyday. Instead of attacking Clinton for her policy stands- a legitimate target- Tantaros and Montgomery default to the old Right-wing standard, her looks. Throw in a few witty asides about Mrs. Clinton’s choice of cuisine, and everyone gets a good laugh, right? “Hispanic outreach?” Funny in another context, perhaps; gratuitously insulting in this instance.
Hillary Clinton and Huma Abedin went to Chipotle, which in today’s media circus is evidently what counts for news. Except that in this case, Tantaros and Montgomery demonstrated themselves willing to publicly embarrass themselves in the never-ending Right-wing hategasm directed at Mrs. Clinton.
There was an “important Latino political story” making news on Tuesday, but as Jon Stewart pointed out on “The Daily Show,” it wasn’t the one the media covered.
While Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) was announcing his decision to run for the GOP nomination, Hillary Clinton was eating at a Chipotle restaurant, and the media seemed to be focused on every detail of her order.
For the record, it was a chicken burrito bowl.
“How could Rubio have known that on the exact same day he was launching his candidacy, Hillary Clinton would eat lunch?” Stewart said.
If this is the sort of facile, brain-dead, meaningless coverage we can look forward to for the next 18+ months, I may as well just start drinking heavily now. Welcome to our new idiocracy, eh?
The truth is that journalism is hard work. Analysis and reporting take time, legwork, and reflection, and in today’s hyper-competitive media environment, who can afford that luxury when reaction trumps analysis and conjecture defeats facts? It’s SO much easier to go with whatever silliness is vomited up on a particular day. Yesterday, Hillary Clinton goes to Chipotle, tomorrow she’s taken to task for having the temerity to go to Dairy Queen (Everything they serve is so white; what message is she sending to minorities?).
There’s no disputing the inequality of the sexes when it comes to our news media. What’s sad is when women are the ones responsible for damaging their own cause by tossing cheap, gratuitous ridicule at strong women who dare to break the mold. I’d say that Tantaros and Montgomery should be ashamed of themselves, but that would (likely mistakenly) presume they possess the capacity to feel shame.
I’d say that we deserve better, but when you consider that millions consider Fox News Channel their news and information source of choice, we clearly have the level of (anti)intellectual discourse we deserve. It would appear the Confedracy of Dunces some had feared snuck up on us when we weren’t paying attention…and now the idiots rule.
We have exactly the quality of leadership (and information) we deserve.
