During the February 24 edition of the syndicated program The McLaughlin Group, referring to Michelle Obama, host John McLaughlin asked Chicago Tribune columnist Clarence Page: “Do you think Michelle -- do you think she leaves the impression -- not mine, but I've heard this -- that she has a chip on her shoulder?” Page responded: “I think that's BS. You know, people say that she's got a chip on her shoulder. That's like, well, she's been the B-word, which is a classic, you know, epithet against women whenever they sound aggressive or they really state their mind. ... Maybe I know her too well. She doesn't have a chip on her shoulder.” McLaughlin then asked: “You don't think she's a black militant?” Page replied: “A black militant? Well, I'm a black militant, John, and the Tribune hired me anyway. Seriously.” Several media figures have recently suggested that Obama has a “chip on her shoulder,” including VDARE.com contributor Steve Sailer, who wrote that Obama “sounds like she's got a log-sized chip on her shoulder from lucking into Princeton due to affirmative action.”

Earlier in the program, discussing the political strategies of Sens. Barack Obama's and Hillary Clinton's campaigns, conservative radio host Monica Crowley claimed that Clinton's “problem” is that, "[i]n order to win, she has to club the baby seal to death. OK? That is her entire situation. She is stuck with being a hope-squasher." Other media figures have also used violent imagery while discussing Clinton's attempts to defeat Obama, including MSNBC Hardball host Chris Matthews, who, on the January 4 edition of Hardball, remarked: "[W]hat does she do with the body? How does she get rid of a Barack Obama if she ever gets to beat him?" Additionally, on the January 24, 2007, broadcast of National Public Radio's Morning Edition, discussing the potential 2008 presidential candidates who had attended President Bush's State of the Union address, Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank asserted: “Hillary Clinton was situated immediately behind Barack Obama, making it easier for her to actually place the knife into his back, if that's what she was trying to do.”

From the February 24 edition of the syndicated program The McLaughlin Group:

McLAUGHLIN: Question: Obama is saying that his debate performances and his many endorsements fill any void in accomplishment that Hillary can point to. Did it work? Eleanor.

ELEANOR CLIFT (Newsweek contributing editor): Look, he's gotten a lot more substantive. He has a health-care plan. He has a plan to cure the economic ills. This election debate between the two of them is really not about their programs and their policies. They each agree on virtually everything. He's arguing that he would make a more inspirational leader and he could rally the country to get those policies through.

And Hillary Clinton's claims of experience have not worked. She, in a way, is the victim of her experience in American political life. This is a change election -- it's a cliché -- but she, by definition, can't be the change candidate. She's been there too long on the national stage. And she's watching Barack Obama run the 2008 version of the campaign her husband ran in 1992: change versus more of the same.

CROWLEY: Here -- here is the --

McLAUGHLIN: Do you detect policy differences between the two?

CROWLEY: Very, very minor. Here is Hillary's problem right now. In order to win, she has to club the baby seal to death. OK? That is her entire situation. She is stuck with being a hope-squasher. Right? Obama has cut into all of her constituencies deeply: women; he's picking up Hispanic voters, especially in Texas; lower income voters; senior citizens. Her entire base now is evaporating toward him. Her only hope is if there is some sort of hope backlash, where people have some sort of buyer's remorse about Barack Obama that they drank the whole bottle of champagne and it felt fizzy and great and now, they're going take a step back and say, “Well, wait a minute. Is this guy really ready?”

I think it's too late for her to be raising that question. I think he has the omentum, as we say, and her raising these questions -- she's still running on experience when it has backfired and not worked for her this entire time. She has learned nothing in this campaign.

[...]

McLAUGHLIN: Do you think Michelle -- do you think she leaves the impression -- not mine, but I've heard this -- that she has a chip on her shoulder?

PAGE: I think that's BS. You know, people say that she's got a chip on her shoulder. That's like, well, she's been the B-word, which is a classic, you know, epithet against women whenever they sound aggressive or they really state their mind. I --

McLAUGHLIN: You don't --

PAGE: I don't think that's true at all.

McLAUGHLIN: You don't think --

PAGE: Maybe I know her too well. She doesn't have a chip on her shoulder.

McLAUGHLIN: You don't think she's a black militant?

PAGE: A black militant? Well, I'm a black militant, John, and the Tribune hired me anyway. Seriously.

McLAUGHLIN: Really?

PAGE: They -- in the '60s, they said, “Well, we're going to hire that Clarence Page, but he might be a little militant for the Tribune.”

McLAUGHLIN: Well, that was in the '60s.

PAGE: You know, and because of that --

BUCHANAN: John. John --

PAGE: -- I went to Brooks Brothers and bought a suit, so I went halfway, OK?

BUCHANAN: Hey, John. John, that statement -- that statement, if you get more of those, is very problematic. It suggests a sense of entitlement and a sense that America really hasn't lived up to my standards. And what she should have done is come forth and explained it and said, “I've never been more proud of my country than right now.”