Awasiwi odenak: Far from the things of men

In a matter of days, we will be touching down on paradise. Can you feel the magic tinkling in the breeze? Can you the feel the enchantment? Do you even know where we’re going? It’s a wonderful place known only as Fantasy Island. You’re familiar with the name, no? Let me tell you about it. Fantasy Island is where you go to see your greatest wishes and deepest desires come to life, untouched by the rigors of reality and reason. The Island is positively sublime, and if you go there with an open heart, you shall know nothing but joy and fulfillment, perhaps eternally. However, if you go there in blindness or with ill-intent…Well, the possibilities are endless. Thankfully, you are not the reason we’re here today. However, the question of how we came to be on this journey remains. Let us begin with the story:

What feels like a lifetime ago, but was in fact, not so long, many people had a wish. They scraped together their pennies, their dimes, and their stock options to make that wish come true. The wish that these people shared was that they should make themselves a President. The time had come to choose again and, this time, they would be wise in their decision. Things were much harder now and so were the choices. Where these people parted ways was in the determination of what sort of person that President should be.

One large group had a desperate need for one who would work, for one who would slave tirelessly to ensure that their lives improved today and that the lives of their children would be even better tomorrow. This idea they had, though far from new, was treated as the bastard child of self-preservation, and mocked for its simplicity. Still, those people carried on in their search. With their determined ballots, they prayed; what little spare time they had to give, they shared. They who had the least gave the most. That was the kind of President they wanted and the kind they deserved. They found a candidate equal to the task and quietly took up their cause.

Another group of individuals, long and disastrous in power, wanted another kind of Chief Executive. They wanted the status quo because it had been good to them. They championed their champion, too. Unfortunately, those voters and their prayers were not with their champ. He went down and the politician they got was not the one they had in mind. This one was different, solemnly uttering a kind of rhetoric for change. They were not that sort of people; they did not want that sort of leader. They did not stand behind their candidate. They did not take up their cause.

Finally, there was one last group. A sneaky bunch, you probably caught them entering out of the corner of your eye. They were in desperate need as well. Not of a leader who would work, however, but of one who, especially, would not. What they wanted was a face and a voice. What they wanted was a string puppet. There was an agenda at work, things to do and buy and dismantle. They prayed with their attorneys and their accountants, their publicists and their very loose pocketbooks. Failing that, they prayed with Facebook. Like smoke, up rose their candidate, resplendent with strings. They didn’t stand behind them; they stood behind the curtains. Someone had to man the thing! It was perfect deception. It was their cause.

Their cause became the nation’s ideology. That ideology was cruel, remains cruel, and its means are dark, but the fantasy has been achieved. The stress-bitten fingernails of hard workers have been stamped and their sun-reddened neck whipped. The mothers of movements have forgotten where they came from and the daughters of them told not to care since they had enlightened husbands to attend to—tea cozies to knit. Ignore the shadow in the window; there’s nothing there. They promise. They lie.

Soon, my friends, we will be arriving at Fantasy Island, the place where fool s go to have their way—and the helpless are dragged along. What those that brought you fail to see is that often what they crave most is the very thing they should never have. This election, their selection, is no exception. The illusion isn’t real; it cannot last. It won’t. In the end, as in every Island tale, they will learn a fundamental lesson: Be careful what you wish for. For the puppet you guide today may move tomorrow by someone else’s strings.

'My dear guests, I am Mr. Roarke, your host. Welcome to Fantasy Island.'

In loving memory of Ricardo Montalban (1920-2009), Mr. Roarke himself, the indomitable host.

It’s that time of year again. Time to vote for the Most Liberal Weblog of 2008. You can vote once every 24 hours.

Hopefully you’ll vote for the Confluence! I’ve had the pleasure of being a front-page contributor there this past year and I’ll be the first to tell you that it’s a bastion of diverse thinking. Some people are avowed Democrats who disagree with the actions of the Party this year. Some are moderate Republicans. Some are even evangelical Christians. What we all agree on is that the prejudices that were resurrected and used as battering rams this year are unacceptable and cannot be used in the future to win elections or to power any movement worth following. Please read and judge for yourself.

Vote the Confluence for Best Liberal Weblog in 2008!

Right now we’re leading at 30.8%
ETA: We are not leading now due to an influx of votes for Wonkette, apparently invoked by some front page hate encouragement at WK. *shrug* Still, I say vote for us and be heard!

Then, pass it on.

I know it’s way to early to be thinking about New Year’s so I’m not going to look to 2009 yet.  I will, however, take a very brief look back on the emotions of the year.  That’s what I have to do in order to move past it. Forgiveness is not a personal tenet of my faith.  Forgetfulness only applies to innocuous things like class assignments. I never forget a slight and when the time comes, I will always return it.  So, backwards for a minute.

January 2008: Hillary…Bill’s wife! When did she run for things? She doesn’t look like a monster. Kind of pretty actually. And smart. Where has she been hiding that brain? I must have been looking at Bill or something because I would not have missed that brain if I’d been paying attention.

February: Hillary…way more qualified than the rest of them.  Barack Obama…that’s an interesting name.  What hole did he crawl out of and can he go back?  Shut up, John Edwards with your stupid haircut. What is wrong with CNN? You has been my one source of new coverage. What are you doing, man? Hillary didn’t say that! Or that. Leave Bill alone. What the hell?! (Stood in the rain for 2 hours to see the Big Dawg. Then had to wait standing for 2 hours more. Never regretted it.)

March:  Go, Texas, Rhode Island, and Ohio. So goes Ohio, so goes the nation! …Right?

For everyone here in Ohio and across America who’s ever been counted out but refused to be knocked out, and for everyone who has stumbled but stood right back up, and for everyone who works hard and never gives up, this one is for you.

April: Why won’t that stupid bitch quit?  Because she isn’t stupid. Oh my god, what the hell? What parallel reality is this? He is not the nominee.  Am I sleepwalking?  Democrats, say something! Bill and Hillary Clinton are not racists. Who keeps bringing up Monica? And, no, random Obot at a college campus, Chelsea doesn’t have to answer your questions. Oh, and Pennsylvania, you make my life. *high-five* That is a what a landslide looks like! Tell ‘em, Ed.

May: I have my eye on you, Gary, Indiana.  I always will. You, too, North Carolina. Kentucky & West Virginia, let me buy you some drinks. How do you feel about Presidentes?  Let’s party down with Puerto Rico. See? They get it! Guam nearly did too.

Why won’t that stupid bitch quit? Because that stupid bitch keeps winning. The media can be bought but voters are not that stupid. Least of all this one. Democrats, you can still come back with your souls intact. Don’t. Do. This. Put aside the Messiah and pick a president.

May 31: Forget I said anything. Burn for all I care. Thanks for ruining graduation day, assholes.

June 3rd: What does Hillary want? To speak the truth for herself, Associated Press. You have no standing and your reputation is in the sewer right along with the Democratic Party. That was a master stroke of Journalistic Integrity. I’m proud of that bullshit. I’m even more proud of South Dakota, which was supposed to go another way if you recall. You made the news that day, but Hillary had the victory. Never had she been more Presidential or more beautiful than she was as she stood at that podium in that brilliant cobalt blue. I saw what I wanted. I wanted Denver and I wanted the Capitol and I wanted her right hand on the Bible and the stars in her eyes. I got that smile and Terry McAuliffe with one last, “The next President of the United States: Hillary Rodham Clinton.”  And for the first time through this whole thing, I completely understood the compulsion towards Hope.

Then I woke up.

June 7th:  She mourns in black. Bill claps with bleary eyes and that proud smile he can’t suppress when he looks at her.  Chelsea will not cry where they can see her.  She gets that from her mama.  Dorothy wishes she could make it better–mommas always do. I just wish I could be there. Woulda, shoulda, coulda.  She blinks fast, points towards the heavens and talks about cracks in an immortal ceiling. We look up with her and that damned hope springs renewed in our hearts.

A cracked smile and “we must elect Barack Obama” said sixteen times so hard it nearly breaks her. It does break me and I cry for two hours before I force myself to think about something stupider and less crucial than what’s just been lost. I will not remember the sympathetic pain in her eyes as she reaches for her supporters or the slight way she leans into Chelsea when she steps on stage to embrace her mother. Chelsea was the mother then, the mother of the grown girl with her glass heart–all 18 million splinters of it. I can’t remember that or I will never move on.

You’re likeable enough, Hillary.

I will never move on.

June 26th: …Unity really is just a town in New Hampshire.  She won that one, asshole. God, don’t let this be the end. God, don’t let this be the nominee.

August 22-25th: We deserve so much better than this.  We deserve her. We had him! Are we confused? Do we not know quality anymore? Keep going? Okay.  Just wish I knew where to.

No, I do know.  This is a travesty. I can’t even breathe I’m so angry. Okay, maybe that’s the crying.

It can’t happen again. It won’t. I will not reward this with my vote. He needs to go back to Chicago. I’ll buy the plane ticket. Time to get to work. *rolls up sleeves* John, what can I do for you?

August 31st: Well, now it’s gonna be fun.  Sarah, you have a unique opporunity to do what  no other women has. Break that highest, hardest glass ceiling for us.  We tried so hard this year.  You ain’t them that brung me, but I’d still love to dance–all the way to Washington.

September-October: Shocked silence.  Smug (guilty) silence from women’s groups everywhere. I can only ask what the hell is wrong with you so many times before I get sick of the sound of my own keyboard. What. the Fuck. Is Wrong. With You? This is a woman. This is a modern, working mother. Her very life is progressive regardless of whether her politics are. She’s one of us. Come on. This is our chance to stand together and show that we will not stand for misogyny in pursuit of the highest seat of government in this country. This is our chance to make Cady, Susan, Lucretia and the gang proud of us. Gloria, Nora, Ellen? Anybody?  Doesn’t anyone care that our daughter are watching and learning who they can be from what they see us accept? Anybody?

November 4th: Guess not.

I’m sorry, John.  You worked so hard. You paid your dues and I wanted this for you as much as I wanted it for this country. You’re such a good man.

Sarah, please don’t be sad. This wasn’t you. This was every woman who nodded her head when you were called “Bible Spice” or donned her “Sarah Palin is a C**t” shirt with pride when she attended a gay pride parade.  She thought she was being cutsie and all the boys thought it was so hot how she trashed you. Something about that metaphorical catfight made him want to call her back in the morning.  Please don’t think too much about those LGBT who trashed you either, despite the fact that you did more for the than Barack has ever done for anyone. (I’ll never understand, and you’re probably in similar straits, how a woman can stand tall for another minority group but be the first to hang the rope for her own.)

Fatefully, I suppose, it seems that we don’t care about gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered people either. All those people in matching t-shirts, bumping fists and yelling epithets, didn’t share a fundamental belief.  They didn’t believe in the rights of gay men and women to marry. (Some did, but they didn’t vote downticket, so too bad for the ‘mos.) Not a huge surprise but there ya go. They came for the Messiah and left the Hebrews to drown in the Red Sea. These are the people that came out to vote. Who knew? and here I thought the Conservatives stayed home.

See, Sarah, it wasn’t you. In my not at all humble opinion, a whole lot of,  misguided, feckless jackofss got together and decided to throw you and Johnny Mac to the dogs. Many good, patriotic people worked their hearts out for another outcome. We didn’t fail. You didn’t surrender. You fought until you knew there was no victory in the night. Then, you stood under harsh lights and you waved like a queen. Not like a beauty queen, but a queen mother and wife, a queen-governor and partner.  You waved like a leader. 

When John stood at that podium and set down his dreams in that painful way he had to, he handed them to you. In that very same way, I handed mine to you when Hillary–in that oh so painful way–did the same. I handed them to you and I know that you hold them to your heart and you nourish your children with them. You’ve shown them, with all the vibrancy of your joy, that they can be whatever they want to be and that you will stand under klieg lights, at podiums, behind microphones, in front of cameras, and the world to make it a reality.  You will carry the torch of change, even if you weren’t first to feel the flames burn.  You can name every casualty and every hero of that war, just as John can name the heroes of his own.  You can be the heroine for your little girls and mine.

Or not. 

Maybe I’ve already asked too much and the scars will deter you for all time.  I’d understand if you preferred your Alaskan chaotica to the task of symbolizing a movement. (Especially one consisting of women whose stances you may be diametrically opposed to.) Sometimes the hardest thing to be is the face. Sometimes the hardest thing to be is noticed.

Sometimes, most times, the hardest thing to do is go on. I can vouch for that.

You’ll go on to bigger and better days. With 5 children and imminent grandkids, I don’t think there was any chance you wouldn’t.

John will be the Maverick and he will be re-elected in 2010.

Hillary will be Hillary and be brilliant at it.  I think you can vouch for that too.

You will all go on and so will the country. Somehow.

But I think I’ll stay in bed tomorrow.

November 24: I cannot finish this entry with abounding wishes of “hope” because that’s just not my nature.  However, I can believe, and do, that better days are ahead. I don’t know how many or how far from us they are now, but they’re there, beyond the horizon–waiting. My resolution for the year, made too early and while I still recall, is to remember that. I wish the same for everyone.

Care deeply about what you believe in. And never listen to anyone who says that you can’t or shouldn’t go on.

They will say Barack Obama is the JFK of our generation.  But we’ll know better because we have already seen what a man like JFK can do.  And this man that they gift with his name is no JFK.

He doesn’t have the courage of his convictions-even late, when the damage is done and the jail cells are locked.   He doesn’t have the uneasy silences as he attempts to beat out the best course of action; as he tries to decide what’s right at the height of a crisis, when the missiles are armed and it’s do or die.  He doesn’t have the foresight to know he’s out of his depth, nor the hindsight to know when he’s gone too far.  He will say he is a symbol of America’s possibility.  They will say that he’s an American hero-even if nobody “sunk [his] battleship.”

If not that, they will say that he is Robert F. Kennedy then, but we’ll know better still, because we have seen what a man like Robert F. Kennedy can do-and this man that they try to paint in his colors is no Robert F. Kennedy.

Barack Obama, unlike another man he isn’t, does not have the heart to reach out to a people he’s never known, set foot in their shoes, and learn the dark hours of their lives.  He does not have the strength of will to tolerate being vilified by the powerful but beloved by the “small.” He does not have the resolve to come to life’s battles late and yet dare to compete. He does not have the nerve to shout   what is unpopular in the face of overwhelming opposition or to do the things that may cost him but that are fundamentally right.  He is not the man that no one living is.  He does not “dream things that never were and say, ‘Why not?’”

And yet, it would be a lie to say that no one has arisen with the gravitas and the knowledge to carry on the great progress that his brother began, Lyndon B. Johnson continued, and that given the grace Bobby himself might have brought to completion.  Many a politician with a particular flair for speech and for moving votes has been hailed as the new knight of a fallen throne, the fresh son of Camelot. Too often, they were proven false and the good deeds gone undone for so long simply fell, forgotten, to the wayside.

Once more a man gave a speech and the country fell in love with a fairy tale, surrendering their faith without question.  And when the family made so great by two lost sons said that it would be this man that would carry on their legacy, the People believed them, and surrendered their votes to the same. In sad imitation of so many times before, those people that fell in love fell out, only to see that the man that promised them Camelot is the one who burned it down.  Barack Obama is no Bobby Kennedy, certainly no John, and he never was.

It does a disservice to his memory to say that any human being who dares to open his mouth and speak a moving sentence is the RFK of his generation.  It takes more than having the ability to speak aloud to step into the shoes of a political lion and not trip on the shoe strings left unknotted by time.  Robert F. Kennedy is not a mere archetype of a profile in courage.  He is no more an expendable placeholder for history than his brother, John.  He was a man and he lived only once.  There was only one.

In the final speech of his life Robert Francis Kennedy said, “Fear not the path of truth for the lack of people walking on it.” June 6th, 1968, the hope of a nation, the son of a father, and the brother and torch-bearer of a legacy fell for good.  Many of the dreams he shouldered by way of a ballot have come true yet many still wait and gather dust in the catacombs of his story and the story of this great country.   Just as the annals of human progress were deprived of their innovation and courage, the tumultuous times were deprived of their leadership-in action and inaction, and perhaps, as we will never know, the future is the worse for it.

“The future does not belong to those who are

content with today, apathetic toward common

problems and their fellow man alike, timid and

fearful in the face of bold projects and new ideas.

Rather, it will belong to those who can blend passion,

reason and courage in a personal commitment to the

great enterprises and ideals of American society.”

No man or woman stepped forward to fill the slowly cooling mold of John Fitzgerald Kennedy and so it was never filled.  Sadly, we never got our RFK either.  The darkest moments of the present invoke us to think fondly on days gone by, but most especially of those that never were.

There are people in every time and every land who want to stop history in its tracks. They fear the future, mistrust the present, and invoke the security of the comfortable past which, in fact, never existed.

–Robert F. Kennedy, 6-8-64

It is easy and convenient to convince ourselves that we are facing the future, but when we have to reach back in order to assure ourselves that tomorrow has to come some way, somehow, we’ aren’t fooling anyone.  We seek still to find martyred men and warriors in the eyes of people here today because this day and age is new, and we still can’t stop hoping.

Without belittling the courage with which men

have died, we should not forget those acts of

courage with which men…have lived.  The

courage of life is often a less dramatic

spectacle than the courage of a final moment;

but it is no less a magnificent mixture of

triumph and tragedy.

JFK, Profiles in Courage, 1956

This night, as so many painful ones before, we know the loud pang of tragedy.  When faced with History reproached, recycled, reviled, and revised, this is what we’ve got.  It isn’t beautiful or quote-worthy. It will not lift whole houses clear off the ground.  It doesn’t even give us hope that anything will change. It won’t.

But there is something to be won. We know ourselves. We know our allies, we know our mission and we know our truth.  Only one person truly carried the banner of Camelot proudly above their head. Only one person dared step into sacrosanct shoes of Robert Kennedy and only one person dreamed of how things could be and said, “I can .”  We’ve seen a person like him, a woman like him, who can sit in his seat and inspire his masses. She could do what he could do.  She could do what he never could.  If any one person embodies the man Robert F. Kennedy was, it’s Hillary Rodham Clinton, the junior Senator from New York.

And just as we were denied our Bobby, we never got our Hillary either and that wound will sting the young when they’re aching with age and the old when they look back in those last seconds and think, “What could have been.”

Yet we can never surrender to hopelessness when there is one thing left to accomplish.  And when I think about giving up and sitting down, I remember this:

“Although we weren’t able to shatter that highest, hardest glass ceiling this time, thanks to you, it’s got about 18 million cracks in it. And the light is shining through like never before, filling us all with the hope and the sure knowledge that the path will be a little easier next time… “

Just keep going. Someday our day will come.

And with I conclude my year-long foray into Presidential Politics. I got what I paid for. I guess I just wasn’t rich enough. Good luck, America, and Godspeed.

Like many of the directives handed down this campaign age (because it’s been too damned long to be just a year), I missed that memo that we should take the time to write about our voting strategies. Yes, I thought it was interesting to see such a consistent thread of thoughts from several different people, but, then again, Barack Obama happened so maybe I’ve adapted and learned not to question-much of any aspect of human behavior, actually.

            That’s the last in a long line of me just not questioning anything anymore and accepting questionable things as truth.  Why? Not because it’s easy but because it’s easiest.  If I had to ask myself why any number of intelligent, noteworthy people have thrown themselves on the altar of His Holiness, I’d be very tempted to throw myself off the top of some altar since there is clearly no method to that madness.  I’m smarter than ACORN’s average voting nine-year old but this election wouldn’t be the first pseudo-intellectual “joke” that I just didn’t get. I thought it must have been me.

            Probably was.

            That’s pretty hilarious since in the realm of humor, I’m the type that if you stick me with a stickpin, I’ll come at you with a “steak knife.”  It’s all relative and it’s all personal to me.  And frankly, it’s all funny.

            Until isn’t.  Until it wasn’t.  This election got damned unfunny damned fast.

            In a space of time when there’s very little left to find humor in, I will not put aside my own personal litmus test to decide who I want to lead me and my country.

            “Can she admit she stumbles?”

            Can he?

            “Can she admit she is imperfect?”

            Can he?

            “Does she think that there is anything wrong with America that can’t be fixed by what’s right with America?”  A heady question to be sure, but I reserve the right to ask.

            Does he?

            “Can she laugh at herself?”

            Does he even know what that means?

            As anyone can see, the questions are hardly equal in importance and some are definitely loaded; some are probably even tilted in the favor of one candidate over another-c’est la vie. I’ve already made my choice-one the media is certainly familiar with-that objectivity is for other people.  I don’t have to pretend that I don’t know what I’m going to do because I’ve already done it.  The truth is there was never much of a chance that I’d do anything different.

            On October 23^rd, I walked into a voting booth and early voted for Sarah Palin and John McCain. I did not wait in line because there wasn’t one, I did not cry.  (This past Saturday I did, but that’s for other reasons and that’s grief for another post.)  I didn’t even hold my nose.  I breathed deeply after the realization that I would never have to smell this scent again.  And that scent was regret.

            With regret, I spun the dial; I chose the women, the minorities, the Republicans; and yes, even one lone Libertarian.  I gave many, many people the chance to serve and if they do to me as their predecessors already have, it’s the last chance I’ll give them.  I didn’t quite get to fulfill a dream with this vote-not quite, no, but I got to do something that felt right at its heart.

            I got to vote for a woman who had to apologize a dozen times for never being wrong-even though her name wasn’t there.

            I got to vote for a woman who admitted that she cared too much, and showed it in the hangdog tiredness in her eyes and the sometimes hoarse tenor of her voice.  Even though her name wasn’t there.

            I got to vote for a woman who believed to very roots of her being that this country is already great-but it can be better.  And, no, her name wasn’t there.

            I voted for Sarah Palin too, and her devotion, and her brilliance.  I got to vote for her humility and her humor and her laugh.  I got to vote for the great things she’s done-there are many-and that great things she will do-she’s never feared high expectations.  It was a good, earnest vote.

            (Not just for her, but for the “cackle” that became before.  And the pantsuit.  And the joke.  And the perseverance.  Although it stung to do it in absentia, it was certainly a vote for her.)

             Steak knife or stick pin, this year, they’re all protruding from my heart this time, but it just isn’t funny.  And you know I can always laugh.

             Someone must have already dropped the punch line, but I guess I just wasn’t looking.

I had the funny experience tonight of being locked out of a post. It wasn’t intentional and I have no reason to believe anything other than crappy Vista is at fault but for the 45 minutes it took for me to get the attention of the usual suspects and bring the Party to the only room I could get to, I felt a little bit panicked and very alone.  Here’s  why:

These last 11 months I’ve dedicated myself pretty solely to one goal and that goal was to see Hillary Rodham Clinton become President of the United States. I don’t need to give you the long narrative. You’ve read it from me once or four times; you could probably ghost-write my story under power of hypnosis. I won’t bore you with that.  I will say what it’s done to me though.

Because of the sheer anxiety of this election, I lost 15 lbs.  Don’t misunderstand me, I was glad to see them go. I’ve been trying to lose weight since I was 5 and this was the first step in a positive direction I’ve ever taken but I don’t think the doctor wanted me to lose them like this.  Any day of the week, these many months you could find me screaming at my television; pacing the length of my hallway; or tapping away at my keyboard for one partisan, single-minded cause.  It was sunrise to sunset to sunrise again. I’ve never had much use for sleep and I learned how to function on even less during the Democratic Primary.

I also learned how to function on high-blood pressure and a racing heart.  Not a day went buy that I wouldn’t sit in my class in abject terror that the election was going to come up. It was all over the radio waves and the television broadcasts. It was all over the internet. There was no escaping it; and who was I to want to escape it? I lived for this election. And yet, at the same time, I dreaded having to face my friends and call them wrong, to face my teachers–some of whom have choice words for me now that they know where I stand–and call them ill-informed, though they were.  I used to shake in my seat like a leaf, or maybe that was just my heart. I knew I was in the minority of my senior class to prefer Hillary and I wasn’t so bothered by that. It was the stories that bothered me, the stories I’d read nationwide over how people had been treated for voicing their decision to support the competent woman over the lackluster man. Maybe I feared that one of those events would befall me. Sometimes, like now, I still do.

And yet, shutting up has never really been a strong suit of mine. I can’t do it. People around me know I can’t do it. In fact, when a subject close to my heart comes up, they seem to freeze up themselves as they as slowly cast their eyes in my direction to see what I will do.  Over the last year, Hillary Clinton has become such a subject.  When the primary was afoot here in Texas, ABC 13 decided to do a special on first-time voters from Houston-Area schools. (I wish the link still worked but unfortunately it seems to have expired.) As a rather outspoken advocate of Hillary’s, I was asked to speak on behalf of my school, along with students from other well-established school here. I spoke at length about how their plans differed, about how the media was biased, about how it mattered who we elected. I got a standing ovation even though I felt like I was going to pass out inside. I thought, here’s my chance to do some of the good that Hillary has done. I can finally start returning a lifetime of favors. If only my gratitude hadn’t ended up on the cutting room floor.

I saw the clips many, many times over the course of the next few weeks. You could say I was something of a celebrity at my school, having made it to network television three times in 4 months.  That was nice, but what wasn’t nice was what was lost in the final edit of my appearance. I was reduced to a “tearful” moment and a rather angry soundbite.  That should have prepared me for an ordeal of lost context, but it didn’t.  I was just glad Hillary won my state anyway. I was there that night, at the caucus, watching abnormalities take place, watching and not f-ing tolerating the bullying that was happening in the sanctuary of a local church. I was sitting next to my father and his new wife, my grandparents were on the other side of them and I just knew that in this place of all places, we were totally alone. It wasn’t a new feeling; even in the familiar halls of my school I was wary of wearing the three or four pins that made my preference clear. The hostility wasn’t outright but it was there.  In the chapel, it wasn’t even stifled.

I further sat and watched as the Precinct Chair was about to let the lot of the group leave without counting out the delegates or verifying a thing. If I hadn’t been there our precinct wouldn’t have gotten any delegates at all because no one knew  how many we were supposed to have. No one knew the math. I did.  They didn’t trust me; I threatened to let them all lose their delegates.  They left me be–for a while. When things got too complex someone tried to give Obama all of 20 delegates from our precinct. I wasn’t having it and neither was my father, who, for once, was actually there to come to my defense.  Hillary walked away with 2 delegates, Barack with 18.  They never let me see the verified registration–which an eight-year old was gleefully assisting in as I was leaving the chapel. I don’t think I’ve ever felt a more acute sense of indignation than I did that night. Old women, hispanic women, middle-aged black men, all 12 of us sat in the choir stands to show our support of Hillary. We didn’t deserve the loathing we had directed at us. We had all come for one purpose and that purpose was not to elect Barack Obama, contrary to what the other 186 folks in attendance seemed to believe.

That wasn’t the worst of what it felt like to be a minor force in the face of something terrible and great in size. Please, don’t ask me about the County Convention at TSU. I don’t ever want to feel that way again. I can’t even think about it without crying.  Never had I watched Democracy be trampled by the very people who claimed to desperately need it–but I got used to watching it, and watching it again.  It got so bad that I literally had to abandon my place with my precinct to get away from the heckling. Adults! were heckling like they’d never had a lesson in good manners in their lives. All they talked about was what Sheila Jackson-Lee needed to do to get back in their good graces, like she’d have them–and like they’d have her if she tried.  They were merciless and it hurt so bad because I knew some of these people. My mother had grown up with them and they’d claimed to know me. That didn’t stop them from insulting her to my face or me.  These were the people we’d struggled alongside, the bastards, and they were drawing their own soup lines.  I’d never felt so lonely in my life…I walked away a County Alternate.

I didn’t make it to Austin and with they had Chelsea saying by then, I’m glad I didn’t.  I was heartsick for a number of reasons. I didn’t need to see one up close.  We all know what happened in Denver.  And where was I? My first night in my dorm away from home, reading up on everything that was happening, trying very hard not feel like every dream I’d had over those prior months was a cruel trick being played by some bastardly higher  power.  There she went again–Democracy on Vacation.

In the days that followed, I couldn’t hide from Election Coverage no matter how I tried. Boy, did I try! I hid in my dorm and refused most invitations to go out. I couldn’t bear to see the Party’s “nominee” splashed over every surface, tasteful and otherwise. There it was, that same old tension from High School. I felt the election all around my like an airborne plague, and the only possible cure had been sent to the incinerator.  I felt burned and burned out. I didn’t want to talk about that and that was all that anyone seemed to talk about. I didn’t go a week without outing myself as an Obama opponent in a study group. For my effort, I learned that Sarah Palin was “domineering”–bad in a woman, commanding in a man!–and that Hillary Clinton was a “psycho bitch.” Unsurprisingly enough, I didn’t learn why.  Democrats good, Republicans bad; I learned that, too.  Mainly, I learned that, in my generation, we learn what our parents teach us, but that sometimes our teachers are idiots.

Means the outcome shouldn’t be so surprising to me. Sigh. Sometimes I just can’t stop hoping that we’ll wake up. We have a certain cruelty to our age that chills me. We talk about about John McCain’s facial scars with such a cutting casualty that I wonder exactly who we are when we’re not mocking him.  He dares to smile and we pointedly grimace as if his bouts with war, fire, and cancer have exempted him from the right to show joy.  Who are we between moments like that? I don’t know but I keep daring to ask in the expectation that someone will finally have to ask himself or herself that same question.

It came up in class just last week. It was Thursday, the day after the debate. The class was Human Situation and our rather politically-incorrect teacher had to ask. The fairly handsome Latino fellow to my right made a mocking remark about how McCain seemed hurt that Obama didn’t defend him against Lewis’ off-color remarks equating his campaign with something George Wallace would partake in. All the weeks of me saying nothing when the topic of demagogues and democracies in name only came to a head and I just could not stop it. I could not take one more moment of the bullshit talking point that every and all persons must defend Barack Obama but cannot be defended in turn. I raised my voice, I lost my temper, I wagged my finger. I said what I needed to. They were silent when I was done.  The man sitting beside me had this to say, “But he doesn’t work for Obama, right, because that’s what he said.” And me, I scoffed and told him that it was the same damned excuse, different damned perpetrator.  The professor said, let’s move on, and we did.

I have no regrets about speaking my mind then or on any other occasion where I might have the chance. I’ll take the increased respiration, the cold sweats. I don’t mind that in spite of my discomfort.  The sign on my window that says “Hillary for President” went up yesterday.  She’s my choice whoever I pick next. My McPalin t-shirt arrived at home today along with the buttons I ordered. I imagine it won’t be long before they join my “Women for Hillary” and “Clinton-Gore for New Leadership” pins on my backpack.  This place is Obama Central, and admittedly I live in fear and anticipation of the day someone says something to me about the decision I’ve so clearly made.  Will I choke and shrug like I’ve never had an original thought in my life? Will I invoke the Wonk I know so well and tell them why they have no right to question me any more than Barack Obama has the right to be President?

I don’t know what I will do, only what I’ve done. I still spend countless nights tossing and turning over what should’ve been. I confess that I still cry.  I still hide from the television in the dining hall that blares CNN at all hours of the day. I haven’t got the stomach for it or the stomach for what the others have to say. I don’t have the stomach for so many people to be so blithely wrong. I run down, pack my meal, and run back to my dorm where it’s safe.  Here, I don’t have to risk talking about it anymore. Here, I don’t have to make excuses for why Barack Obama is not the man he swears he is and why he really is not the same as Hillary on anything.  Here, I can just wait on pins-and-needles on my own for November 4th to come and go. I’ve hardly made a friend since I got here; I’m too afraid I’ll start to despise them if they’re on the other side or that they’ll start to despise me.  Caring that much is exhausting.  Seclusion is lonely as hell but at least I can say what I want to the people I do talk to. It’s not insanity yet.  But if the November 5th sun rises to the worst of all possibilities, I don’t think it’ll take long.

I miss being who I was: friendly, outspoken, outgoing. I miss caring about other things. I miss being able to attend lectures about Greek Classics without going stiff at the word “politics.”  I miss being able to go outdoors without seeing the “inevitable” Barack “Jesus Christ” Obama emblazoned on every chest and backpack I see.  God, I miss breathing deeply because I just don’t anymore.  It’s insane to be that involved, to care that much, but I do.  This election matters and I just can’t be silent.  And if that’s not healthy, if that’s not safe, I’d rather be neither seen nor heard, if it will really make no difference.

I have a lifetime of debt to repay and I start every day by snapping on a button.

One last pathetic scholarship plug. I’m trying to do the “blogging for progress” scholarship in which I have to blog at progressiveu.com about issues affecting young people.  So far I’m reposting the posts I’ve made over the last few months. In order for me to qualify to win I need points. I accrue points when people read my post (ie, just click in) or leave comments (but you have to register to do that, so no need). I know I’m a pain in the ass, Clinton-obsessed nutbar, but this nutbar needs scholarship money. Can you guys please click onto my progressiveU blog. You don’t have to read it; you’ve already read it, just click in, click out and go on about your day. It’s $1000 that I could really do with.

Regency’s Progressive U blog

Thank you to those who can.

/end pimping.

There’s a love story I want to tell you about. It was told to me by someone old and wise.  This person loved two people, two people so very different that their differences tore her life apart. The names have been changed to protect the innocent and the hapless.

            The first one was named “Hope.”  Hope was a great man, mighty with a resounding voice.  When he spoke, her heart hammered in her chest and she just knew she could fly.

            The second was a woman named “Action.” Action was a clever one; had made plans on top of plans for the life they would have.  She was sharp as a tack, but perhaps a little dull to some. My friend didn’t want dull; she wanted excitement and spontaneity. Thus, she did what the young normally do…She left Action behind to follow Hope.

            And follow him she did. Around the country, around the world.  They were chased out of countries around the world. Seems that not everyone was ready to come home to “Hope.”  She didn’t understand, but still she followed him.  His words still made her spirit soar a lifetime later, when Action was relegated to a footnote in history.

            At the end of that lifetime, she came home to a frail cot in a homeless shelter—because you see, the foreclosure crisis had gone nuclear in her absence.  She coughed sickly into a Kleenex—because she was one of the unlucky 15 million, but she understood!  And wrapped her arms around her surviving children—those that weren’t serving in Europe, the site of the newest world war.  She realized that a lifetime of hope alone had led to a lifetime of grief. When she thought of the ozone, of the poverty, and of the fear, she often missed that second love, she missed a woman called “Action.”

            She said to me that if she could go back in time, she would turn away from the easy gamble. She’d turn away the pretty words and the fluttering heartbeat.  She’d stick with the love that was sure to last, that wouldn’t disappoint.  She missed the sincere devotion, she missed the certainty of a good plan, of a worthwhile lifetime.  She’d chosen to follow Hope, which like smoke was impossible to hold.  The Action she left went on to do great things in her own stead. No one chased Action out of countries around the world; they embraced her and she laughed.

            As she lay dying, Action to came to visit my friend.  No hard feelings, of course.  Action had always been too noble for her own good. She never said, You should’ve’ followed me. But my friend did.  Action patted her hand and told her that in life the only chance you get is the first one—and it’s gone in a heartbeat.

            As a friend of a friend, I’m telling you, your only chance is the first one.  Which love will you choose?

I have been a Democrat all my life.  I admit that life is only 18 years old, but you have to admit these last two decades have been a couple for the record books.  I’ve lived to see an illegitimate president run the country right into the ground as he cleared brush from his Texas ranch 154 days out of the year.  I watched a decade of prosperity and peace crash down in unholy flames in the middle of New York when I was just 10 years old.  I watched the fraudulent Commander-in-Chief trick the country into a war it didn’t need against a people that didn’t deserve it when I was 11.  I watched that same huckster be told by the historic first female Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, that “impeachment [was] off the table” when I was 16.  A man who had facilitated unprecedented war crimes had gotten off scot-free.  And it had been my party that let it happen.

I lived in this country during the 1990s.  I knew the Clintons.  I grew up worshipping Bill Clinton, that Bubba from a place called Hope with an affinity for Big Macs and a little bit of “soul” in his soul.  Always having been precocious, I knew what he had done—and I didn’t like it. I didn’t forgive him for it and I don’t to this day, but that isn’t my job and never has been.  Bill Clinton never needed redemption from me; he got it from the only people who had any right to offer it to him.  Chelsea and Hillary Rodham Clinton evidently did just that and I stand by ‘em for it.  If I had any reason at all to be upset, he was absolved by the good work he had done throughout his years in Office.  Millions of new jobs created throughout this country.  Millions raised from poverty to hallowed middle-class status.  Even with the battles he couldn’t win—like the Defense of Marriage Act, which he abhorred but that prevented the passage of a Federal Gay-Marriage Ban; like Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell that as best it could prevented an outright ban of gays and lesbians in the military—things were a little better, positive steps in positive directions had been taken.  In that decade, it was good to be alive in America.  And it was my party that had made it so.

I don’t know where that Party is today.  I can’t find the path to the Third Way anymore.  I remember that Way.  It was innovative and new, and compassionate. It made sense in a time very different from when the last Democrat reigned. “The Third Way works to build inclusive, multiethnic societies based on common allegiance to democratic values.”  It made sense, doing great things the democratically.  I don’t just remember the Way, I remember the man who led it.

I remember the man who cried as those around him struggled and deigned to share their struggles with him. I remember the President who apologized for the Tuskegee Experiment and asked that those still standing in its wake found it in their battered hearts to forgive a nation whose morality once stood so terribly bigoted. I remember the man who helped to re-enact the March on Selma because it meant so much to him.  I remember a President who walked into Office on day one ready to lead, only to be stabbed in the back by the very people that brought him—but he soldiered on.  That was the Way I was a part of, the Way that “embraces ‘tolerant traditionalism,’ honoring traditional moral and family values while resisting attempts to impose them on others.”  There was no battle too small to undertake, no cause unworthy of effort or tears, nobody left behind.  Anybody who “worked hard and played by the rules” got ahead, because no way was William Jefferson Clinton going to leave them in the dust.  There it goes again, my party.  Don’t know where that is now.

I think I was born a Democrat.  I was brought up wrinkling my nose and gagging at the word “Republican,” so I know I wasn’t one of those.  I didn’t really understand what an Independent was so chances are good I wasn’t that either.  All that was left in my head was Democrat.  Bill Clinton was a Democrat and I liked him, so I picked that.  When it came time for me to vote, I still picked that.  What I didn’t know when I came up to bat was how far from the ideal the rest of the body had fallen.  I’d been spoiled for eight years—and tormented for another seven.   I was blind to it until I started to listen; then I found that my President filled with soul wasn’t the rule but the exception to the rule.  My life, which was so bettered by his presence in the White House, didn’t really matter at all.  My vote, which moved to send him back there at the behest of his frankly brilliant and wonkish wife, didn’t really matter either.  What I wanted—what I needed, the Third Way, was really just a movement of a few devoted people who desired to change the world.  I hadn’t known that the letter D they carried after their names signified an organization of men and women devoted to doing the very opposite—not changing a thing.  And to accomplish their mission, they would destroy my ideal; they would destroy my hero.  Can you believe it? That was my party.

They did the impossible.  They sapped the “soul” out of the man from Hope.  They quieted his raucous laugh.  They besmirched his empathetic tears.  They made a fool out of the Third Way—and, by extension, a fool of me.  I had never been called a fool before of all the insults that have been leveled at me in life.  I had never been belittled for my gender as much as the color my skin.  I had never been called stupid for having the audacity to believe.  I’ve been called cynical and racist for doing what anyone with a third of the self-awareness could do: I voted!  My life’s philosophy and love of people has been referred to as Republican chicanery.  I have lived here all along and yet suddenly, in my own party, I am the intruder; I am the interloper.  I’m the one who doesn’t belong.

It didn’t take an insult to lose me.  It hurt, don’t misunderstand, but such is life. Sticks and stones can cut me, but words can only make me cry.  I could only cry for so long before the hurt became fury.  I wanted answers, I wanted accountability. I got a lie for question and laughter for my effort.  I couldn’t live in a place like that.  That was the Democratic Party, suddenly, a place where those who’d given their hard-earned dollars and their time were of no consequence.   It should’ve been obvious.  If the only two-term Democratic President since Franklin Delano Roosevelt was fair game to be scorned, I should’ve battened down the hatches at first dawn.  I hadn’t learned the right lesson yet.  I get it now.

Hope is merchandise to be sold, not a place, or a man to be believed in.  Hope is the not the look in the eyes of a woman with the answers.  It’s the speech on a teleprompter of a man without them.  Change was not the peaceful transition from the last Democratic decade of the 20th century to the first Democratic decade of the 21st century.  It’s the silent strained pretend of a meeting on May 31st set to derail the course of history—and not for the good.  Change isn’t watching relief come in the form of a woman with roots everywhere she sets foot raising her right hand to accept the hardest job in the world.  It’s watching more of the same thing we’ve always had.

I’ve come to realize that being a Democrat nowadays means accepting these realities with no complaint.  I can no longer do that and sleep at night.  I can no longer spy echoes of the Third Way without a wistful sigh.  I can no longer be quiet while we pretend that the best days gone by weren’t the best at all.  I haven’t lived long, but I’ve lived smart.  I still believe in the truth, a principle long since abandoned by progressives.  What I want to see is the truth spoken out loud again and not treated like a scandal, even if it is scandalous.  I want History to stop being a four-letter word.  I want respect to be a necessity again, not a luxury.  But most of all, I want the Third Way back.

Happiness, which the Democrats seem to have come into the business of supplying, is not a political platform.  One can’t govern for the sake of happiness.   This isn’t a “Brave New World.” It can’t be, not when so many people have reason to be afraid. They’re at risk everyday of losing the things they love. They may lose their home, their car, their job, even their life.  This is the world they live in, not the good old days when the Third Way ruled the roost.  This is the reality the new Democratic Party chose; it wasn’t brave at all.

I don’t know who these men and women are, that masquerade about, pretending they are allies of working folks while selling their jobs over the farthest sea.  I recognize the duplicity, but not the perpetrators.  The Democrats cannot govern as simply another variation on corrupt.  It’s time to remember people like me who’ve worked their hearts out, people like me who always will.  If they choose to forget us they will have become every bit the thing they purport to despise: Republicans.

They’ve lost sight of the path that led to prosperity for all, themselves included.  They’ve forgotten that the ballots that decide their fates don’t stand alone, but are connected and bound to people who are counting on them to sweat and bleed for a better day in America.  They’ve chosen the glamorous path and eschewed compassion entirely.  They threw the baby out with the bathwater; the future out with the past; and the “little people” out with the Big Dawg.

I don’t know what’s left huddling under the Big Tent that used to be my home.  The political trail I’ve lived my life by doesn’t lead there anymore.  More and more, I find my old friends blazing the trail with me, but they’re a little lost too.  They still remember the Third Way paved with silver quickly turning to gold.  They still remember a place called Hope, and they want to go back; if only they could remember how.

Who better to guide us than the man who hails from there himself?  Somebody, somewhere unzip the tent and let the man out! He’s got work to do in this country he lifted; we’ve fallen to all new lows since he’s been gone.  Time to clear the brush on the path less traveled by powerful men and take it again—with a woman this time.  He’ll be there to point out landmarks and relics left behind, sure; he’ll kick the weeds from the overgrown roads with those size 13s, because it’s easy and he can; then, he’ll step aside for the new leader and it’ll be her turn to lead the Way going forward.  While she’s in the White House reintroducing the country to prosperity, I hope, and easier days, Bill Clinton will be there on the sidelines to remind us that when we work hard and lift each other, the only way left to travel is up.  Just like that, history stops being a four-letter word.

And it could be my party that does it.

“The Third Way approach to economic opportunity and security stresses technological innovation, competitive enterprise, and education rather than top- down redistribution or laissez faire. On questions of values, it embraces “tolerant traditionalism,” honoring traditional moral and family values while resisting attempts to impose them on others. It favors an enabling rather than a bureaucratic government, expanding choices for citizens, using market means to achieve public ends and encouraging civic and community institutions to play a larger role in public life. The Third Way works to build inclusive, multiethnic societies based on common allegiance to democratic values. ”

All primary season long, I’ve heard a particular saying—or at least, a particular inference—repeated doggedly and it’s begun to irk me a bit.

“You must be the better woman.”

“Hillary has to be the bigger ma—woman and think of the party.”

“Don’t step out of line lest she be judged with you.”

No, those aren’t exact quotes but they are exact connotations.  I’ve stifled the urge for some time to say anything about it, but I’ve about reached the zenith of my good manners.  Now that the primary season is essentially “over”—which is up for debate as far as I’m concerned, but that’s another conversation—I still hear the call for me to act the good woman and be a shining example of civility for all.  This begs the questions: What does it take for me to be the “good woman” and why the hell should I want to be?

I’ve known a good woman, a few actually.  One is my mother, who raised me as well as she could, and I think did fairly well.  Another is my grandmother, who raised her to be the self-reliant woman she eventually became in time for my birth.  Those are just two, but this fight doesn’t dance around the two of them.  It dances around someone of another caliber, but made of that same stern stuff.

Her name’s Hillary Rodham Clinton and, in case you didn’t know, she ran for President this go-round.  She did damn well considering she had to do it gagged and blindfolded.  Like a good little soldier, all season long, she spouted the party line, she pumped up the masses to see another big “D” in the White House, she embraced those masses, she embodied UNITY—big letters.  She did all the things a good Democrat does to be a team player.  What she didn’t do was play the “good woman.”

You see, it’s come loudly to my attention that being the good woman now means understanding that being six times as smart as your male opposition is just enough to get in on the ground floor—no higher, mind you, but you’re in.  I have learned through observation that knowing what you’re talking about and being fearless in your knowledge is akin to “being no fun” and “not inspirational at all.”  And everyone knows being good is all about inspiration.  Unless you’re a woman named Hillary Rodham Clinton.

For that woman, being good was exactly about knowing her stuff. It was about her knowing her issues and the issues of the common American so well she could debate them in the throes of death.  Being good meant she had to have a thick resume and fine record of service.  She had that.  Her record was comparable to any of those around her and she knew that.  She also knew she wasn’t nearly so inspirational as the others were capable of being; so she played the wonk instead. She couldn’t quite beat a man at his charismatic game, so she beat him on competence.  Instead of checking her brain at the door, she brought it to the table.  Funnily enough, somewhere along the way she learned how to be inspirational, too. That’s not something “good women” do.

In watching her shoot and defend tirelessly day after day, I learned another lesson about women who don’t play “good.”  They engender vitriol from the oddest of sources.  You know them, those people who talk for a living, on television and radio, but normally know exactly nothing about which they speak.  It’s those people who can’t stand women like Hillary Rodham Clinton. It’s those people—who know so little– who have the most to say about why it matters not how smart you, or how much you know, or how—in the real world, where people live—how likeable you really are.  Because you know, if they have anything to say about you, you’ve done something right, you’ve played the good politician and left the “good woman” behind.

Hillary did that this time.  She’s been doing it for a while actually, most of her life.  It started with her making a decision that only she could, a decade ago: she forgave her husband his trespasses against her.  Although one would think that her very desire to stand by her man would make her the epitome of the “good woman,” the personalities on talk radio and news networks disagreed—and did so loudly, and with sound effects.  Apparently, their definition of a good woman was one who allowed the media to determine when her marriage was over and when her family should dissolve.  She wouldn’t allow that and thus became a “bad woman” and a bad feminist—if a rather shrewd, calculating politician– in their eyes.

At least twice now, thanks to that female-loving mainstream press, the meme of the “pity politician” has reared its ugly head.  That meme states that Hillary Clinton won her Senate seat because New Yorkers pitied her.  She won because he cheated.  Chris Matthews said it on television and no one worth their salt raised an ounce of hell.  She was relegated to the role of the “good woman” then, since, when a woman is slapped down, nobody ever yells.

But she came back, bright and proud, in November 2006 when she won her re-election with 67% of the vote.  They may have voted for her the first time because she was wronged, but they voted for her again because she’d done something right.  She’d done her job—and a damn sight better than the Democrats she came to run against.  She stood tall on that record and they demurred, snarling.  Why was she so certain and how dare she ignore me? Oh, she had many reason to remain above the fray, but one in particular: Hillary Clinton had a promise.  It was a promise, a pledge, made by the Democratic Leadership that they would stand behind her.  That pledge reached back as far as 2004 when the Democratic field was sparse and uninspiring.  They begged, they pleaded for Hillary to run for President in 2004.  She refused.  She had made a promise as well, this one to her constituents.  She hadn’t come to the Senate to be President; she had come to be just that, a Senator.  And for six years, that’s exactly what she was.

2008 finally rolled around and the Democrats found themselves in similar dire straits. There were too many contenders but no sure thing.  So, what did they do? They turned to their one sure thing in thirty years, and this one had the name Clinton, too.  They begged again, appealing to her sense of Party and Country.  She considered it.  They promised her everything, a cakewalk, the moon.  She weighed her options, convened an exploratory committee, and took them at their word.  Like the “good woman,” she had trustingly believed their word was any good. That may have been the last time she played the good woman, because she learned pretty quickly that no one was playing the “good man” in return.  Most certainly not her competitors and particularly not the leadership that had sworn so very earnestly to support her.

Therefore, she had to play a different part, be a different person than the one who’d been deceived.  She played the good pol with the good, hard-working woman underneath and she won the hearts of more voters than any candidate in primary history—but somehow she still “lost” the nomination.  Thereafter, calls came left and right for her to be a good sport, for her not to be a sore loser, for her to be gracious in spite of the fact that more people in this country had thrown their lot in with her than had thrown it in with the other guy, but the party leadership had still so brazenly chosen him.  The people who had dragged her to the scene turned their backs on her.  She was then asked to swallow her pride at her treatment by her opponents, by her party, and by the press in order to put forth the ultimate—united—front.  She did it, regardless of having earned the right to do something very different.  She was gracious in “defeat.”

“Of course,” as Bitterpoliticz poster HypeJersey said weeks after Clinton’s suspension, “she shouldn’t have [had] to be ‘gracious.’ Women are always expected to be ‘gracious’ when they win and [when] they lose. Lots of ‘gracious’ women fill the ranks of assistants to the lackluster men they support.”

More and more, as the party moves incontrovertibly towards a fictitious realization of unity, Senator Clinton has become the face of all those ‘gracious women,’ women smart enough by a dozen measures to do the jobs of the men they bolster—and better. Senator Obama, the man for whom she was passed over, grows more uninspiring and lackluster by the day.  He isn’t half the man he was expected to be—not a quarter of the ‘good man’ promised most certainly.  Yet, Hillary Clinton, the junior Senator from New York, smiles and stands enthusiastically by, cheering him, playing the “good woman” to a tee.

All it took for her to be the “good woman” was for her to sit down and shut up like they’d always wanted.  Accept that no matter infinitely qualified she was that she would never ever be better than any man, even one with only the basest qualifications.  All it took was for her to clap at his victory like a trained seal, to allow him to hover over her shoulder as though she needed a ventriloquist to help her speak; to not flinch quite so obviously when the man who was rewarded the position she had earned touched her like he had every right and she had no right to refuse.  The “good woman” had to pretend these things didn’t bother her to get through this latest injustice.  She couldn’t accomplish anything by crying, no matter how much she’d earned the breakdown.  She couldn’t win that way, the politician in her knew. “Good” men had assured that if they had their way, she couldn’t win at all, regardless of how she fought.

So, I find that this “good woman” has earned nothing for her fair play and I wonder why I should hope to be similarly rewarded for playing a comparable role. I like to be allowed the victories that I’ve earned. I like to see my accomplishments noted in historic record when they’re worth that much.  If I’ve achieved greatness, I want my greatness; not to be told that I’ve earned it squarely but that it’s being awarded to a lesser being because I was good, just not that good.  If being the “good woman,” the better woman, means always holding the inadequate man’s coat, I don’t need the title.  I won’t carry his coat or his water; I won’t do his work and I won’t let him take the credit for mine.

Hillary Rodham Clinton is a damned good woman and someday she will make a damned fine president, but I’m not her—I’m not the better woman at all.  Even in the unlikely event that she’ll feel the sting, I’ll continue to say what I want and mean every word.

She may be the better woman, but at least I can speak.

HypeJersey // June 18, 2008 at 9:26 pm Said : Of course, she shouldn’t have to be “gracious.” Women are always expected to be “gracious” when they win and win they lose. Lots of “gracious” women fill the ranks of assistants to the lackluster men they support

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