Pirate's Cove

One has to wonder when the same will be applied to Hillary Clinton, and all her myriad issues, going all the way back to White Water

Fiorina defends rocky tenure as HP CEO

Carly Fiorina’s political future depends on whether she can defend her record as CEO of Hewlett-Packard.

The likely GOP presidential candidate is aiming to do just that in her new book Rising to the Challenge, set to be released May 5, a day after the expected launch of her 2016 campaign. Fiorina now claims the company’s decision to fire her in 2005, after a turbulent six-year tenure, was a result of a dysfunctional board of directors and not her leadership.

In an interview with The Hill, Fiorina said members of her own board leaked confidential information to the media to undermine her decisions, though she stopped short of alleging outright sexism. She was the first female CEO of a Fortune 20 company.

“Men understand other men’s need for respect, but they don’t always understand women’s need for respect,” Fiorina said. “The situation that transpired in the boardroom was all about certain board members wanting to protect their position when they felt threatened, because their behavior was against the code of conduct, and they knew that I as a leader would not tolerate that conduct.”

When asked again if she thought underlying sexism contributed to her firing, she said, “There’s no question that women in positions of authority are scrutinized differently, criticized differently and characterized different.”

It’s interesting that she has to prove herself in a manner that Clinton doesn’t. This same media is not demanding that Hillary answer questions. They are barely wondering exactly what Clinton accomplished during her time as Secretary of State. They aren’t demanding that Hillary explain what she did as Sec of State. Of course, we can all see that she essentially was a failure. Nor are the media asking her questions about Benghazi, nor did they really spend time questioning her in the immediate aftermath of Benghazi. Some are investigating the Clinton Foundation, but not like sharks smelling blood in the water, as would happen were Hillary named, say, Sarah Palin.

If this article was written about a Democrat woman, it would be immediately deemed sexist, let’s be clear on that.

But her business record has resurfaced as she’s stepped back into the media limelight. Earlier this month, MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” co-host Mika Brzezinski confronted Fiorina about her business record during a contentious appearance.

“You had a tenure at Hewlett-Packard that a lot of people describe as extremely rocky, destroying jobs and destroying the company’s reputation. Are you really the right person to be criticizing Hillary Clinton’s accomplishments or lack thereof?” Brzezinski asked.

Interstingly, Mika has failed to ask Hillary similar tough questions, and has been a defender of Hillary. Of course, Hillary won’t actually give Mika, or any other news media folks, the chance.

There’s no doubt that Fiorina should be asked tough questions, and should have to answer them. The same with all the other Republicans running. The same standard should be applied to all the Democrats running, especially front-runner Hillary Clinton. But, we know it won’t.