QUESTION:  As a woman, I know it's hard to get out of the house and to get ready. And my question is very personal. How do you do it?

SENATOR HILLARY CLINTON:  It's not easy. It's not easy. And, and I couldn't do it if I just didn't, you know, passionately believe it was the right thing to do. You know, I have so many opportunities from this country. I just don't want to see us fall backwards, you know? So, you know, this, this is very personal for me. It's not just political. It's not just public. I see what's happening, and we have to reverse it.

And some people think elections are a game. They think it's like who's up or who's down. It's about our country. It's about our kids' futures. And it's really about all of us together.

Some of us put ourselves out there and do this against some pretty difficult odds. And we do it, each one of us, because we care about our country.

But some of us are right and some of us are wrong. Some of us are ready and some of us are not. Some of us know what we will do on day one, and some of us haven't really thought that through enough.

Those were the words that accompanied Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s widely-publicized tears during a campaign appearance two days before the New Hampshire primary.

The tears were over-analyzed. They demonstrated that women remain unfit to govern because they are too emotional. They proved that Clinton is inauthentic, able to conjure up tears at will to impress voters. They signified that the Clinton presidential campaign was over, or, alternatively, they merely indicated that the presidential race sets an exhausting pace for candidates. They proved that Hillary is warm and human, or instead confirmed her narcissism (because the only thing that made her cry was the end of her presidential ambitions). They caused her victory in New Hampshire. And so forth. Meanwhile, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush cry in public all the time without challenge.

Those tears did not prevent Clinton from answering the question with the coherent set of words set out above. Her words were neglected, however, especially the sentence where Clinton choked up the most: “I just don't want to see us fall backwards.” Her words express a well-justified concern. At the end of Bill Clinton’s presidency, the Supreme Court had two women justices; now there is one. The new Court has already restricted abortion rights, relying on the paternalistic argument that the government may restrict access to abortion because some women come to regret their choice to abort the infant life. After Hillary Clinton lost the Iowa caucuses, a torrent of ill-disguised hatred and resentment unleashed toward a briefly weakened Clinton, an attitude unimaginable toward a male candidate. During a debate the day before the tears, the moderator questioned Clinton about her lack of likability, which kind of felt like a high school girl being asked what she’d tell potential suitors who were ‘hesitating on the dating issue,’ and, then, compounding the indignity, her leading male opponent told her with some disdain:  “You’re likable enough, Hillary.”

When Hillary Rodham addressed her graduating class at Wellesley College in 1969, she explained that we arrived at Wellesley and we found, as all of us have found, that there was a gap between expectation and realities. But it wasn’t a discouraging gap and it didn't turn us into cynical, bitter old women at the age of 18. Almost forty years later, it must be discouraging to see the gap between our expectations and the realities of women’s equality. It is sad enough to make any woman cry. Nonetheless, the tears did not prevent Hillary from enunciating the important words that the media missed: I see what's happening, and we have to reverse it.  Whereas Senator Clinton could see what was happening through her tears—or, more accurately, was brought to tears by her vision—the media could see only the tears, or, was blinded by the tears and therefore failed to recognize that its own reaction to the tears is part of “what's happening, and we have to reverse it.”