On the other hand I can see why someone who did not resolutely want Clinton to lose this particular race might be swayed by this little speech—and I don’t think it was the genuine emotion exactly, that’s simplifying it too much. It was the notion that she doesn’t actually like campaigning and isn’t in it for the thrill of winning per se. A few weeks ago I heard a press conference with GWB wherein he “wished the candidates good luck” and seemed rather wistful that he wasn’t campaigning himself, since he “really likes it.” It was one of the most sincere and genuine sounding set of words I’ve ever heard him say–he practically sounded human, and his voice was only minimally repulsive to me. This didnt’ really win my sympathy so much (speculating on what would have to happen to him in order for that to happen might get the SS called on me) as remind me that he has that locker room jock’s air of a guy who likes to win for its own sake–regardless of the nature of the trophy he’s winning. For better or worse a lot of the people (men, really) in both races seem to have that gamesmanship streak in them, and for some people (probably a lot of women) it’s slightly repulsive. A lot of women can easily imagine a man engaging in self destructive behavior in order to win a game merely for the sake of winning it, and completely not acknowledging the damage of the self-destructive behavior. Her little speech might have indicated to them exactly that she *is* lusting after the trophy, not the game, and that she is going through the pain of a campaign with a suffering self-awareness that they can relate to.

Of course, as you allude, it’s almost worse to have a leader who actually wants this awful trophy; a commander in chief whose hawkishness is cloaked in den-mother-real-politik is so very barely preferable to one whose hawkishness is wrapped in dick-waving machismo that it essentially doesn’t matter. All voters–not just women–are so much more educated at processing relationships, emotions, and most of all analogies than actual inputs and outputs, it’s a wonder anything got done at all ever. I blame innumeracy.