WASHINGTON, Jan 12 — A passing exchange during a Senate hearing on Thursday turned into a political flashpoint overnight as Senator Barbara Boxer, the California Democrat, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice accused one another of insensitivity in comments about motherhood and the war in Iraq.And just where are all those hairy-legged feminists on this issue? They're nowhere to be found. Had a Republican made an accusation that it was somehow wrong to be a single woman in a position of such importance, they'd be burning their bras (if they still have any) on the steps of Capital Hill. However, they don't dare speak up against a liberal icon like Boxer.
In an interview this afternoon with The New York Times, Ms. Rice suggested that the California Democrat had set back feminism by suggesting during the hearing that the childless Ms. Rice had paid no price in the Iraq war.
“I thought it was okay to be single,” Ms. Rice said. “I thought it was okay to not have children, and I thought you could still make good decisions on behalf of the country if you were single and didn’t have children.”
During the Thursday hearing, Ms. Boxer told Ms. Rice: “You’re not going to pay any particular price, as I understand it, with an immediate family.”
In a separate interview, Senator Boxer said her comments had been misunderstood and were now being turned against her by the White House and other Republicans. “What I was trying to do in this exchange was to find common ground with Condi Rice,” Ms. Boxer said, adding that “my whole point was to focus on the military families who pay the price.”
“They’re getting this off on a non-existent thing that I didn’t say,” Ms. Boxer said. “I’m saying, she’s like me, we do not have families who are in the military. What they are doing is a really tortured way to attack a United States Senator who voted against the war.”
Hypocrites.
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