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Opinionist: Mother, Fcuked
By
Michael Malice
Published Oct 23, 2005
Modified Mar 7, 2008
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By
Michael Malice
Published Oct 23, 2005
Modified Mar 7, 2008
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On Sundays, Gothamist runs opinion pieces on issues relevant to life in New York. The views expressed below are solely those of the author.
I had never thought that I would find myself coming to the defense of the junior Senator from New York. I am a Hillary hater and I don’t understand why more people on the left aren’t Clinton haters as well. There are literally dozens of politically shrewd people in the Democratic party who would make excellent Commanders-in-Chief.
That Hillary Clinton is a fascist sounds like name-calling but is fairly straightforward observation. I don’t use fascist in the sense that most dimwits use that word, meaning "someone who I don’t like who I disagree with." I mean the parallels between her and Mussolini are many and varied: the early flirtation with far-left socialism; the cult of personality; the us v. them "conspiracy" mentality; the use of cultural conservatism to further one’s personal career; the marketing of oneself as political savior; the virulent humorlessness; the acute partisanship.
Senator Clinton would make a terrible President because she’s a terrible human being. The last two horrible people to be President, Richard Nixon and Jimmy Carter, left records that embarrassed their respective political parties for decades. She would no doubt do the same, and worse. For if Bill Clinton had a need to be liked, psychologically, Hillary Clinton only has a need to be liked politically. And once she’s ensconced in the (no doubt cigar-free) Oval Office, one can be sure that the horrors will begun. Am I the only one who can remember Clinton’s Attorney General claiming "full responsibility" for innocent women and children being burned alive, and then going on—not to prison—but to run for Governor of Florida?
But it pains me to say that there is a woman in America who is worse than Senator Clinton, and that woman is Cindy Sheehan. In the media’s ongoing attempts to assault anyone in power, they are giving air time to this terribly ugly malcontent. Earlier this week, not content to slam the President, Sheehan said, "I think [Clinton] is a political animal who believes she has to be a war hawk to keep up with the big boys." I will not touch on the blatant sexism of that statement. But I wonder why anyone on earth should care what Cindy Sheehan has to say.
The woman’s claim to fame is that she lost a son in Iraq. This is not an accomplishment of any kind; even if it were, it is one sadly shared by thousands of other mothers. A mother’s role, in a biological sense, is to raise one’s children and keep them safe. She has not done so. A soldier’s role, in an organizational sense, is to follow orders and keep your mouth shut. She is speaking, implicitly, on his behalf. She is therefore a disgrace to motherhood and has made her son a disgrace to the armed forces.
Politics is often choosing between two evils. Hillary Clinton has raised a good deal of money, gotten herself elected to the Senate, and has written the best-selling novel Living History. Cindy Sheehan has failed in her natural role as a mother, an accomplishment not out of the reach of many stray cats. One doesn’t get much lesser than that.
"Ego & Hubris: The Michael Malice Story" will be published by Ballantine in March. He edits Overheard in New York.
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