Sexism in the Senate

WASHINGTON -- "Man bites dog" is the classic definition of news. By that standard, "Male senator says something offensively sexist to female colleague" ought to be no news at all. If you're surprised or skeptical about the remarks recounted by New York Democrat Kirsten Gillibrand -- well, there's only one explanation.

You must be a man.

Women reading Gillibrand's account -- this woman, certainly -- think: Yup. Been there. Heard that.

Gillibrand's book, "Off the Sidelines," comes out next month, and the requisite pre-publication People magazine profile features some of the sexier -- and sexist-ier -- tidbits. At one point, Gillibrand writes of being in the House gym, "where an older, male colleague told her, 'Good thing you're working out, because you wouldn't want to get porky!'"

Another time, after she lost 50 pounds, People's Tara Fowler and Sandra Sobieraj Westfall recount, "one of her fellow Senate members approached her, squeezed her stomach, and said, 'Don't lose too much weight now. I like my girls chubby.'"

And this delectably sexist morsel from a Southern congressman "who said, as he held my arm, walking me down the center aisle of the House chamber, 'You know Kirsten, you're even pretty when you're fat.'"

Would they talk that way to a male colleague? Of course not. That President Obama caused a Twitterstorm by wearing a tan suit to a news conference is not a welcome sign of gender equity -- it's the exception proving the immutable rule that women in public life face more scrutiny of their appearance. Ask Hillary Clinton how long it takes to get ready for the campaign trail.

Are Gillibrand's colleagues intending to be demeaning? Not exactly. They find themselves around a younger female colleague and they don't entirely know how to handle it. I can't vouch for any other body parts, but their brains stop working.

As when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid called Gillibrand "the hottest member" of the Senate at a fundraiser. "Harry was just trying to be nice," Gillibrand said, being nice.

As she was about the rest of the nonsense she recounted. "It was all statements that were being made by men who were well into their 60s, 70s or 80s," Gillibrand told People. "They had no clue that those are inappropriate things to say to a pregnant woman or a woman who just had a baby or to women in general."

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