Maureen Dowd takes on Hillary's tears.

At the Portsmouth cafe on Monday, talking to a group of mostly women, she blinked back her misty dread of where Obama’s “false hopes” will lead us — “I just don’t want to see us fall backwards,” she said tremulously — in time to smack her rival: “But some of us are right and some of us are wrong. Some of us are ready and some of us are not.”

There was a poignancy about the moment, seeing Hillary crack with exhaustion from decades of yearning to be the principal rather than the plus-one. But there was a whiff of Nixonian self-pity about her choking up. What was moving her so deeply was her recognition that the country was failing to grasp how much it needs her. In a weirdly narcissistic way, she was crying for us. But it was grimly typical of her that what finally made her break down was the prospect of losing.

I am just a guy, and therefore biologically unqualified to discuss whether a woman's tears are for real or for show.

I have confronted tears multiple times, in multiple relationships, and they have usually indicated that I was winning the argument and the woman was playing her next to final card, and if I didn't immediately make peace there would be a withholding of the sex.

When I was younger it worked like a charm, but after many years in the relationship trenches I became calloused and non-responsive.

But I will admit that my first take on Hillary choking up was that it was real. But it is noteworthy that the women that I have talked to about it were much more skeptical. Much more.

Like I said, I am just a guy.