As eBay’s Meg Whitman becomes co-chair of Sen. John McCain’s national campaign, she talks to our Lesley Stahl about retiring from the business world and about her future. The following is part IV of a VII-part, exclusive interview that took place on Tuesday, March 11. To read the entire interview, click the links at the end of the article.

LESLEY: Sexism. Let’s talk about sexism. And this campaign, this very exciting campaign, plays out with Hillary Clinton running. Much has been written and much has been chewed over about sexism and misogyny, and what I keep hearing is a sense out there that racist comments and descriptions are verboten. But making fun of Hillary as a "hag" or "a bitch" or whatever is acceptable. What are your observations about that?

MEG: Well, on the campaign, I wouldn’t say that it is acceptable to make negative comments about women. But, you know, in some ways I am surprised, in 2008 in politics, how many negative comments are made about everything.

LESLEY: Yeah. Hello.

MEG: It may sound a bit naive. But I worked for Mitt Romney and he took tremendous – really quite pointed and negative comments – about being a Mormon. And in many ways it surprised me because this is 2008. This country was founded on freedom of religion. People came here because they wanted to get away from religious persecution. And they wanted to worship in their own way. So it was surprising to me how many negative comments were made about Mitt’s religion. You know, comments are made that I think are just inappropriate across the board.

I don’t know whether I would say people feel a little freer to criticize Hillary than perhaps Barack Obama. I just hope that over time we try to play to our better selves. I mean, one of the things that I think Obama has done nicely in his campaign is try to take the rhetoric to a new level. He’s tried to play to our better selves. I think that’s something that we should all aspire to.

LESLEY: Yeah, but it seems to be falling apart. You know, the old politics seem to be winning, no?

MEG: Mmmm, we’ll see. You may be right. And I think, frankly, members of the media can do a lot to call this out, you know? I think the media can do a lot to say, "Hey, listen. What kind of political system do we actually want here? What kind of rhetoric do we really want?" And I think it’s better, but we’ve got a long way to go. There’s no question about it.

LESLEY: You know, I feel that we’re living through instant replay, because I think that we do this every four years. Candidates say, "We’re not going to have negative campaigning." They say it. It starts. And then we find out that negative campaigning works. And so, then, all the promises go away and they all do it because it does work. And then – we just saw it – we’re watching this play out right now.

MEG: Yeah. No, I know. And it’s …

LESLEY: … pathetic …

MEG: … in some ways. It’s disappointing.

Meg Whitman on What’s Next After eBay (Part I)
Meg Whitman: ‘Oh, Gosh. People Put Up Anything You Can Imagine’ (Part II)
Meg Whitman on ‘Security 101’: ‘Consumers Deserve to Know’ (Part III)
Meg Whitman: ‘We Took Turns Sabotaging Each Others’ Careers’ (Part V)
Meg Whitman: ‘Glam, She’s Not?’ (Part VI)
Meg Whitman on Running a Household and Thoughts on the Economy (Part VII)