It’s hard to enter a feminism feud between Sarah Palin and Gloria Steinem with low expectation’s for the latter’s thoughts, if only given the extra three decades Steinem has studying the subject and being at the vanguard of the feminist movement. And yet, on Fox News today with Megyn Kelly, Palin tore the feminist mantle out from under Steinem, somewhat disgruntled that the latter had made sex an issue and dismissing her claim Palin was bad for women as a relic of another era.

Charlie Sheen. John Galliano. Julian Assange. Muammar Gaddafi. What do all these names have in common in the week that was? Somehow, in one way or another and to varying degrees, they ended up saying something totally offensive about Jewish people. To Bill Maher, it appeared that there was no facet of the news cycle this week in which Jewish people were not maligned, and he put it to his panel to figure out whether there was something in the air.

Shortly after I posted about my disappointment regarding Stephen Colbert‘s interview with Gloria Steinem last night, Katie Couric‘s online show @katiecouric when live with this lengthy interview she’d just completed with Steinem. Ask and you shall receive! Here’s what Steinem had to say about Sarah Palin‘s recent declaration that she is a feminist:

Gloria Steinem returned to The Colbert Report last night to talk about the end of men.What she didn’t get a chance to discuss, alas, is the recent surge of Republican female candidates (aka “momma grizzlies”) nor the one topic it would be most interesting to hear her expound upon, namely Sarah Palin.

Five days into the new decade and David Brooks, in what sounds like an alternate preamble to Beyond the Thunderdome, is predicting that it will be known as the Tea Party Teens. Why? Tea Partiers are the natural successors to hippies and feminists, of course.

It’s not really a secret around here that I am a big fan of New York Times op-ed columnist and author Gail Collins. Collins, whose witty and sharp columns often add a measure of levity to the Times op-ed pages — particularly during last year’s sometimes fraught campaign season — has brought those same talents [...]

Who: Gloria Steinem and Farai Chideya, moderated by Gail Collins (New York Times)
What: TimesTalks’ “Changes in Women’s Lives”
Where: The Times Center
When: October 13, 2009
Thumbs: Up