Sherrod Brown is the one who needs to apologize

Like White House spokesman Josh Earnest and other members of the Obama administration, I am still waiting for Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) to apologize for implying President Obama’s use of Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s (D-Mass.) first name while criticizing her on trade was sexist. This is not only completely out of line, but Brown’s misunderstanding of sexism, or crass misuse of the term, is insulting to all women.

Obama has been the opposite of sexist in criticizing Warren — calling her flat out “wrong,” and accusing her of not knowing what she’s talking about in opposing trade promotion authority and the Trans-Pacific Partnership is hardly an effort to pull his punches to spare the little lady. Is Obama’s attack harsh? Yes it is, but sexist it is not. Perhaps Brown doesn’t follow Congress too closely and may not have noticed that since 2009, Obama has frequently referred to his vice president as Joe, the current Senate majority leader as Mitch, the current House Speaker as John, his former secretary of State as Hillary, the current House minority leader as Nancy, and on and on. Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) said this week that the charge was “silly” and added, “I would be freaked out if he didn’t call me by my first name.”

{mosads}What Brown did was make the Democratic food fight over trade even more fun for conservatives than it already was. As Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol said in a tweet about Brown’s comments : “Ludicrous. But excellent.” But not only would Brown not back down when given the chance by reporters, his wife was so pleased she instantly tweeted: “funny, @sherrodbrown sounds to me like the husband of a feminist.” Then the president of the National Organization of Women jumped on the bandwagon. Ladies, p-l-e-a-s-e.

This is a good time to plug my friend Kirsten Powers’s new book, The Silencing: How the Left Is Killing Free Speech. You can read about it here.

As liberals attempt to fight Obama on trade, which it seems he may ultimately prevail on, this abuse of the charge of sexism will unfortunately only serve to indulge and inspire Hillary’s supporters — yes, that is what Hillary Clinton calls herself in all campaign posters and releases! — to cry sexism even more for the next 18 months. False charges of sexism lead to more sexism, because it fails women who are truly discriminated against or treated separately because of their gender.

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