Cindy McCain: Media Picking on Palin Because She’s a Woman

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin would not be facing as high of scrutiny if she were a male candidate, potential First Lady Cindy McCain said in an interview Tuesday.

“I think if she were a man wearing a suit, they wouldn’t have hit her as hard. I think it’s been extremely unfair,” Cindy McCain told FOX News’s Greta Van Susteren. “I think that if she were a man instead of a woman, they wouldn’t have picked on her this way.”

Mrs. McCain also stuck up for Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.), saying that she thought the press also treated Clinton unfair because of her gender during the Democratic primaries. “Some of the questions and some of the things that were said would not have been asked of her if she were a man,” McCain said.

McCain also said she was surprised at the “viciousness” of the media toward her husband, John McCain, during the presidential campaign. “[T]his has taken on a different tenor,” she said, comparing her husband’s 2000 race to 2008’s. “And I don’t know why and what’s caused that, and I’m sorry for it because I think it turns a lot of young people off.”

–Michael O’Brien