WASHINGTON – From the looks of this photo, new pals Ted Kennedy and Barack Obama are enjoying an old-boys’-club moment at the Capitol – and women are fuming at the power pair’s snub of Hillary Rodham Clinton just a few feet way.
Some female leaders, in fact, are calling the apparently contemptuous stare-down – which took place before the State of the Union Address Monday night – downright sexist.
“In general, they’ve been disre spectful, and I think that women voters are going to get very tired of seeing that,” said Marsha Pappas, who heads the New York chapter of the Na tional Organization for Women.
She said she interpreted the picture as revealing “passive- aggressive behavior” by Ken nedy and Obama.
She and others are incensed that Obama didn’t acknowledge Clinton – a breach of congressional protocol.
Speaking Tuesday on Fox News, Clinton said, “I reached out my hand in friendship and unity and my hand is still reaching out. And I look forward to shaking his hand when I see him at the debate in California” on Thursday.
Obama even nixed a proposal from Democratic leaders to sit with Clinton to display party unity, Time magazine’s Mark Halperin reported last night.
Clinton accepted the offer, but Obama didn’t, according to the report. A top Obama adviser insisted no such pitch was made.
Feelings in the Clinton camp are raw because of Kennedy’s stunning endorsement of Obama on Monday, along with his blast at the politics of “distortion” as he targeted Clinton and hubby Bill.
The slight occurred when Hillary Clinton approached the spot where Kennedy and Obama were sitting side by side. After Kennedy got her attention, Clinton shook hands and talked with him.
But Obama turned away and was in a conversation with supporter Sen. Claire McCaskill of Missouri.
Comedian Whoopi Goldberg criticized Obama on yesterday’s episode of “The View” on ABC, saying, “That’s a hard room if you’re Hillary Clinton on that day . . . because everybody knows that you’ve been exposed in a way, you know, like somebody’s snatched off your clothes.
“I was very proud of her for walking up and shaking hands, and going to take Barack’s hand, and I have to tell you, I think he was wrong to turn away.”
Obama insists he committed nothing like a snub, and eyewitnesses in the room didn’t see Clinton reach for Obama’s hand.
“Senator Clinton and I have had very cordial relations, off the floor and on the floor,” Obama told reporters yesterday after the slight turned into a full-blown flap.
“I waved at her as I was coming into the Senate chamber before we walked over last night.
“I think that there’s just a lot more tea-leaves-reading going on here than I think people are suggesting.”
Obama adviser David Axelrod said yesterday there was definitely no snub.
“I think he knew that Senator Kennedy and Senator Clinton were friends. This was obviously an awkward day from that standpoint, and I don’t think he wanted to stand there while Senator Kennedy was greeting Senator Clinton,” he said.