The mostly female partisans Hillary Clinton has

surrounded herself with since her days as First Lady,

is now a nascent political movement. Depending on how

it is unleashed, it could make or break

Barack Obama's White House campaign

Media Misogyny

Is it a coincidence that the bubbling idiocy of “Sex and the City,” the movie, exploded upon the cultural scene at the exact same time that Hillary Clinton’s candidacy imploded?

Literally, of course, it is. Figuratively, I’m not so sure.

And before I set off an avalanche of e-mails explaining why Hillary deserved to lose, I want to make one point clear:

I am talking here not about the outcome of her candidacy – mistakes were made, and she faced a formidable opponent in Barack Obama – but rather about the climate in which her campaign was conducted.

The zeitgeist in which Hillary floundered and “Sex” is now flourishing.

It’s a cultural moment that Andrew Stephen, writing here earlier this week, characterized as a time of "gloating, unshackled sexism of the ugliest kind."

What Now for Clinton Supporters?

As Hillary Clinton said goodbye to her staff, supporters and fundraisers yesterday, the question in many minds was: how long it will be before she makes another run for the Oval Office?

Disgusted at the unfairness of it all, Hillary partisans watched Barack Obama make his annoying little fist-pump with his wife Michelle on Tuesday, as he claimed the Democratic nomination before 20,000 hysterical supporters.

Many in Hillaryland now hope he stumbles in November, allowing her another try in 2012. And if he wins, well, the most determined can always dream of 2016.

After a fiercely competitive campaign, in which she amassed an army of 18 million, now bitterly disappointed voters, and respect all round, no one expects Mrs Clinton to fade into the background.

But she seems unlikely to end up with any job in an Obama administration, still less the vice-presidency. For now, Mrs Clinton has little choice but to campaign aggressively for the party's candidate, or be branded as disloyal.

In the longer term, who knows? It could be that, like Teddy Kennedy, her political ambitions have to be confined to the Senate, where she might aspire to be majority leader one day.

Some even suggest she might accept appointment to the Supreme Court. It is too soon to tell, but there are those who believe her daughter Chelsea may be a better bet for keeping the Clinton flame alive.

That is in the future, however. What is true now is that while "Hillaryland" started out as a cute nickname for the mostly female partisans Mrs Clinton has surrounded herself with since her days as First Lady, it is now a nascent political movement. Depending on how it is unleashed, it could make or break Mr Obama's White House campaign.

Vicious Criticism of Hillary

She has had to endure months of sniping, mostly in the form of spiteful personal remarks. They said she was too old, not up to it, and some of the attacks were so vicious that they made her cry.

In the end, though, Carrie Bradshaw triumphed over Indiana Jones, with the movie version of Sex and the City taking an impressive £2.1m in British cinemas on its first day.

So much for the film critic who suggested that all four main characters were "getting on a bit" – especially 50-year-old Samantha – and compared Sarah Jessica Parker to a "skeletal transvestite".

Women don't like that kind of stuff and, contrary to popular opinion, we're intensely loyal to our heroines. Cinemas are still packed with SATC fans, cheering on 40-something Carrie and her friends.

Sadly, the story hasn't ended so well for Hillary Clinton, who yesterday announced the end of her attempt to become the first credible female candidate for the American Presidency.

The problem for her victorious rival, Barack Obama, is that Clinton's supporters include millions of middle-aged and older women who hate seeing a successful woman vilified.

They watched in disbelief as their candidate was written off before the primary season had even started; they are still seething over a campaign which wrongly suggested that she was trailing far behind Obama and had no right to be in the contest.

It took Obama five months to get the delegates and super-delegates he needed to defeat her, and last week's count showed how close it was: he won 2,158 to Clinton's 1,926.

Arguments have raged about the popular vote but it's clear that both candidates got more than 17 million, which hardly supports the idea that Clinton was a hopeless outsider.

On the contrary, it's amazing that she did so well, considering the depths to which some of her opponents stooped.

I've never been a fan of either of the Clintons, but I'm saddened by the ferocity of the attacks on the first woman in the history of the US with a real chance of becoming President.

It's fair enough to criticise her policies and her record, but that isn't what they focused on, a fact symbolised for me by the notorious nutcracker in the shape of her body. Her stainless steel thighs crack the toughest nuts, geddit?

The "Hillary is a bitch" campaign has revealed a rabid strain of misogyny; like anti-Semitism, it is visceral and illogical.

I've criticised Hillary Clinton for putting her political career on hold while her husband ran for office, but I can't see another woman in American politics who has put in the hard work and has sufficient support to run for President.

I wouldn't be surprised if a generation of younger female politicians are asking themselves whether they could take as much heat.

It's telling that the Democrats have gone for an unknown quantity, a man long on rhetoric but short on policy, rather than a woman.

Even if Obama beats John McCain in November, the last few months have been hugely damaging for the entire political process.

Even in the Democratic Party, women are still supposed to marry Mr Big, not go after the top job themselves.