# How Does Maureen Dowd Keep her Goddamn Job? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 7, 2008, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523 "2008-09-07T19:30:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2008, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523/1 "2008-09-07T19:30:05Z")
Maureen Dowd, Wednesday/Sunday op-ed columnist for the _New York Times_. Here’s today’s piece o’crap. > **[Opinion | Clash of the Titans (Published 2008)](https://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/07/opinion/07dowd.html?_r=1&oref=slogin)** > > It’s delicious imagining the debate between Big Mama, as Bill’s male aides called Hillary Clinton, and “Hottie Granny,” as People magazine will doubtless dub Sarah Palin. You can poke back through her last several columns, too. Okay, I hate _Times_ op-ed kids Billy Kristol and David Brooks, but only because they’re a sneaky pair of right-wing tools. Dowd seems to dislike _everyone_ in D.C., having written nasty pieces about Bush, both Bill & Hil Clinton, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Obama, etc. But what galls me is her _tone_. Her crappy, snotty, schoolyard _tone_. Picking on personal idiosyncracies instead of calling politicians out on the real issues. Bawling silly names like a monkey flinging poo. With Gail Collins appearing twice weekly, you can’t claim Mo is holding down the essential role of “token woman” any more. Can’t we please get rid of her? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2008, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523/2 "2008-09-07T19:33:42Z")
Maybe the newer _Times_ editors have her confused with Molly Ivins? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2008, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523/3 "2008-09-07T19:37:45Z")
Look dude, that is grossly unfair. Monkeys in the wild do not fling poo. Only monkeys wrongfully imprisoned for life do that, and not all of them. It’s a form of political protest. And if Maureen Dowd did not rhetorically fling poo on the op-ed pages of the New York times, she would be out of a job and starve to death, or be on the welfare roles for up to two years at a time, five lifetime maximum. The publishers of the NYT are doing a public service by keeping her off the streets. You don’t have to read it. You can read William Kristol columns instead, or watch Billy Crystal movies. ---
**Author:** ![eleanorigby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ee7513/32.png) [@eleanorigby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eleanorigby)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2008, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523/4 "2008-09-07T19:40:25Z")
I think it’s supposed to be humor. Either it works or it doesn’t. I vote for doesn’t. ---
**Author:** ![Ukulele\_Ike](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/df788c/32.png) [@Ukulele\_Ike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ukulele_Ike)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2008, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523/5 "2008-09-08T01:06:22Z")
> [@The\_Second\_Stone](#): > > You don’t have to read it. Well, the NYT only does two regular columnists daily, so I usually skim them, at least. Brooks and Kristol piss me off by the second graf, but I get halfway through Dowd before I peter out. And hey, she wouldn’t _starve_. There’s all kinds of jobs out there. Do you know how many small slaughterhouses are going out of business in upstate New York? Give Mo a full-length apron, and she could handle a bolt-gun with the best of 'em. ---
**Author:** ![Hyperelastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Hyperelastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hyperelastic)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2008, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523/6 "2008-09-08T01:14:09Z")
For Dowd it’s all about personalities and who said what about who. What’s funny is how stereotypically female that is coming from someone who wrote a book called _Are Men Necessary?_ ---
**Author:** ![appleciders](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@appleciders](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/appleciders)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2008, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523/7 "2008-09-08T01:24:59Z")
She’s alright when she isn’t trying to be funny. And, you know, when she lets Stephen Colbert write her column. When that happened, I was pleased but puzzled- what, did she need a day off? ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2008, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523/8 "2008-09-08T03:55:24Z")
As far as today’s column goes, Dowd should’ve quit after the line about a “Ma Barker-Sarah Barracuda” debate. I have to say that while I generally don’t like Dowd’s contentless venom, I actually enjoyed reading a couple of her columns earlier this year torching Hillary Clinton and John Edwards. It was nice having a counterpoint to Gail Collins’ Hillary-fawning/Obama-bashing. ---
**Author:** ![Runs\_With\_Scissors](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/278dde/32.png) [@Runs\_With\_Scissors](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Runs_With_Scissors)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2008, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523/9 "2008-09-08T06:22:08Z")
Her most recent one is pretty lame. Sometimes she’s funny. Most of the time, she comes across as petty and snarky. Ever hear her interviewed? I can’t remember where I did once…it was on the radio. She seems really cool in person. ---
**Author:** ![neutron\_star](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/51bf81/32.png) [@neutron\_star](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/neutron_star)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2008, 10:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523/10 "2008-09-08T10:04:09Z")
I usually like her column when it appears in my local paper (plus she’s hot even when her picture is a one-inch, barely-color square) but that could be because all I have to compare her to is local idiots ranting about PA Turnpike privatization. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2008, 12:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523/11 "2008-09-08T12:33:21Z")
Actually, the Dowd column cited was pretty funny & I would love to see that debate, tho I think Palin would do a lot better than that. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2008, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-maureen-dowd-keep-her-goddamn-job/462523/12 "2008-09-08T14:16:15Z")
I find that she always seems more tolerable when she’s savaging somebody I don’t like and seems obnoxious when she’s saving somebody I do like. I think peple like snark and that’s why they read her. I also think she’s an undeniably talented writer, and they like people who can write in the New York media elite.