Let's Hear It for Molly!

Every once in awhile someone stands up at the back of the room and says something startling. It’s not the ideas they espouse – these are usually self-evident. It’s the words they use, the fortitude they embody, the attitude they express and the fighting spirit they represent.

The person in this case is Molly Ives and the statement was Not. Backing. Hillary.

In a remarkable film some years ago, Michael Douglas as The American President was persuaded by the woman he loved to stand up for his political principles, even if it should cost him his job. The film’s climax comes with the president’s speech, in which he faces his critics and accusers, turning their criticism and accusations into political virtues, avowing and defending them as principles in which he believes.

With this article, Molly Ives has done something similar. She has pushed aside once and for all the equivocating, imitative stances taken by some Democratic leaders, including Hillary, and launched an offensive in the name of integrity. Stand up for what you believe, Democrats. Listen to what people are saying, Democrats. Don’t be afraid to say the things that need to be said. Face your political enemies in the marketplace of ideas. Hold up your opponents’ fraudulent ideas and corrupt policies for what they are: prevarication and pretence, fantasy and skullduggery.

Bush, Cheney and Co. will continue to play the patriotic bully card just as long as you let them. I've said it before: War brings out the patriotic bullies. In World War I, they went around kicking dachshunds on the grounds that dachshunds were "German dogs." They did not, however, go around kicking German shepherds. The MINUTE someone impugns your patriotism for opposing this war, turn on them like a snarling dog and explain what loving your country really means. That, or you could just piss on them elegantly, as Rep. John Murtha did. Or eviscerate them with wit (look up Mark Twain on the war in the Philippines). Or point out the latest in the endless "string of bad news."
Do not sit there cowering and pretending the only way to win is as Republican-lite. If the Washington-based party can't get up and fight, we'll find someone who can.

Here is Molly Ives at her best. Don’t second guess the American people, Democrats. Fight the insidious tactics of your opponents. Throw their deceptions in the rubbish bin of history where they belong. Stand up for your beliefs.

The ultimate measure of a person is not where s/he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where s/he stands at times of challenge and controversy.
-- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

File under: Molly Ives, politics, Democrats, integrity