Mark Finkelstein ranted in a July 1 NewsBusters post:
On her MSNBC show this afternoon, the sexist Nicolle Wallace slighted Kayleigh McEnany, President Trump’s spokesperson, as a “spokesgal.”
It actually got worse. Wallace noted that Keir Simmons, the NBC reporter with whom she was speaking, had spoken with Vladimir Putin’s “right-hand man,” and that he sounded similar to President Trump’s “right-hand spokesgal.”
So according to Nicolle Wallace’s sexist standards, a senior male aide to Putin is a “man.” But a senior female aide is a “gal.”
I’m guessing Harvard Law grad McEnany will let the slight by this liberal lightweight roll off her back. But it’s a fascinating take for someone who complains Trump “bullies female reporters.”
But imagine the MSM fainting spells if a conservative like Rush Limbaugh had said the same about a Democrat spokeswoman? Or called Nicolle a “spokesgal” for Biden?
Would Finkelstein faint if he know that his employer engaged in the very same behavior he’s attacking Wallace for? Because it did.
The lead sexist perpetrator here is MRC writer Gabriel Hays, who loves to bandy the word “gals” around to demean women:
- In a February 2019 post, he wrote: “For tennis legend and gay rights activist Martina Navratilova, it’s clear that she’s far from being the hippest gal on the LGBTQ scene.”
- In March 2019, Hays mocked Anita Hill and singer Katy Perry for getting awards, declaring that it meant “acknowledging women who write bubblegum pop songs for tweens with self-esteem issues and those gals around the world trying to smear the good name of potential SCOTUS nominees. “
- Hays followed that with a July 2019 post mocking the U.S. women’s soccer team for seeking pay that reflected their on-field success: “Hot off the heels of the U.S. Women’s World Cup victory, Hollywood and the media jumped at the pseudo-issue that is a pay disparity between women and men players, parroting the line that the gals are being shafted in their salaries.
- Hays also huffed in an October 2019 post: “[Bette] Midler’s the kind of quality gal who, upon hearing news of pro-life legislation being passed, will tweet things like, ‘Buy stock in coat hangers! Here we go, 60 years, back to the back alleys!'” In another October post, Hays sneered that Chrissy Teigen “sure ain’t no brave, righteous gal” for responding in kind to a nasty attack from President Trump.
He’s not the only one, of course. In August 2017, Curtis Houck attacked Wallace as among the “guys and gals … who loved what Jim Acosta did in treating a poem at the base of the Statue of Liberty like it’s the law of the land.”
And Matt Philbin sniffed in an April 30 post attacking those concerned about women being vulnerable to coronavirus: “Women are, by the authors’ admission, more likely to be “essential workers” (70% of healthcare workers are women) and so they haven’t had their livelihoods destroyed. But okay, let’s talk about the plight of gals.”
If Finkelstein had the guts to call out Hays and his fellow MRCers doing the same thing he furiously denounced Wallace for doing, he would be a profile in courage. On the other hand, he likely wouldn’t be writing for the MRC anymore.