Arguments of plus sized proportions

In a new war of political heavy-weight or light-weight bloggers, Felicity Spector applauds Meghan McCain, the daughter of the former Republican presidential candidate.

Way to go, Meghan McCain, or perhaps that should be 'weigh to go'. The political wonkette and daughter of the former Presidential nominee has hit back at right wing talk show host Laura Ingraham's spiteful attack on her weight.

For no discernible reason - but then, is there ever - Ingraham laid into Ms McCain on her radio show, describing her as 'just another Valley girl gone awry' who wouldn't get a job on MTV because 'they don't like plus size models'.

McCain is hardly plus size. At a US size 8-10 she is actually on the slimmer side of average. Not that it matters. There is no weight limit for political bloggers, no requirement to conform to the skinny-pipe cleaner lollipop girl look so beloved of Hollywood.

She says she can't believe Ingraham attacked her over her size. Appearing on The View, she asked what kind of a message this sent out to young women. "It infuriates me. I'm a political writer on a blog and all of a sudden I'm too fat to write?"

She even took to Twitter to declare: "To all the curvy girls out there, don't let anyone make you feel bad about your body. I love my curves and you should love yours too."

In her column in the Daily Beast, she described how her weight had been constantly criticised during the Presidential campaign.

"Taking shots at a woman's weight has become one of the last frontiers in socially accepted prejudice," she said.

Of course, we've seen all this before from the rabid Right. Hillary Clinton was constantly criticised over her clothes, her figure, even her cleavage.

Meghan McCain points out that her mother Cindy, always impeccably groomed and a former beauty queen, was criticised for being too thin.

The teenage Chelsea Clinton was famously pilloried by the media for her awkwardly frizzy hair and the braces on her teeth.

And even the widely admired Michelle Obama can't escape, as the hottest debate about the First Lady has been the sculpted state of her upper arms.

It turns out that Meghan McCain had incurred the wrath of the right wing blogosphere by daring to criticise Ann Coulter in her blog, suggesting she was the unacceptable face of Republicanism.

This unleashed a tide of nasty sniping, not worthy of repetition here or anywhere else, sadly given national amplification by Ingraham's intervention.

C'mon folks. This is a new political era after all. With Obama in the White House, we are all meant to be grown ups, now. Plus there are way more important things to get snippy about than someone's physical appearance.

So good on you, Meghan McCain, for hitting back and declaring on The View: "Kiss my fat a**'!"

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