You Wrinkled Old Moon

by Molly Ivors

Stoopid voters, screwing up MoDo's nicely planned column! How dare you! She's been working for months to recast Hillary Clinton as the she-Cheney, and every time there's a caucus or a vote, we keep fucking it up. Naughty voters!

Gah, let's just hope she doesn't get out her patented Debate Dominatrix Rubber Bustier for the occasion.

Yes, Ariel's growing increasingly desperate to besmirch both of the major Dem candidates with every weapon she can possibly muster, and the terms are getting, well, goofy as hell. I may have to give up this line of work if this keeps up, because it's a little like picking on Ann Althouse: when she's that batshit, it's almost mean.

But I have committed for at least a bit longer to revealing this particular shallow, divisive, and damaging form of psychosis, and so I shall.

In today's freaky installment, HRC has become the Queen of Darkness:

I think Hillary truly believes that she and Bill are the only ones tough enough to get to the White House. Jack Nicholson endorsed her as “the best man for the job,” and she told David Letterman that “in my White House, we’ll know who wears the pantsuits.” But her pitch is the color of pitch: Because she has absorbed all the hate and body blows from nasty Republicans over the years, she is the best person to absorb more hate and body blows from nasty Republicans.

Darkness seeking darkness. It’s an exhausting specter, and the reason that Tom Daschle, Ted Kennedy, Claire McCaskill and so many other Democrats are dashing for daylight and trying to break away from the pathological Clinton path.

Because, you know, it's not like she has policies or leadership or anything like that. No, because this is her psychodrama, it must by definition be their psychodrama as well.

But what's concerning me now is her lens shifting to Senator Obama, an intelligent and gifted public servant who genuinely seems to have tapped into something valuable in our body politic. But MoDo cannot see him as anything other than Baby Stewie in an Oedipal spat with bossy and oh-so-deserving-of-abuse Mother Lois. Her desire to cast him as a quixotic newbie--though she appears to be rooting for his Parsifalian, Galahadian quest, if only because she hates Hillary so much--belittles him, and sets up the New Meme: The Naif in the Woods, in Way over his Head. The shorthand for this rhetorical poison pill is "Prince Barack," which she's been using more often these days. Today, she points to the same medieval structures without invoking that term specifically, but her meaning is clear.

The relentless Hillary has been the reticent Obama’s tutor in the Political School for Scandal. He is learning how to take a punch and give one back. When she presents her mythic narrative, the dragon she has slain is the Republican attack machine. Obama told me he doesn’t think about mythic narratives, and Tuesday night in Chicago he was reaching up for “a hymn that will heal this nation and repair the world.”

But, if he wants to be president, he will still have to slay the dragon. And his dragon is the Clinton attack machine, which emerged Tuesday night, not invincible but breathing fire.

Jesus fuck. Fuck you, Maureen. Honestly.

Part of me thinks that she's just trying to calculate her way back to another Pulitzer: if she can manipulate and destroy the candidates now, she can pick who she gets to smear for the next eight years, who's likely to provide her with better fodder for her own peculiar brand of commentary. But I admit, I cringe from the cynicism such calculation would imply. To apply those terms to her writing career means that fresh material means more to her than human lives. So I ask: Are a million dead Iraqi kids worth that lactation comment, Mo? How about the 40K walking (and sometimes not walking) wounded young of our own nation? It's okay because Gore wore a brown suit and consulted with Naomi Wolff instead of you, right? And what harvest will this flurry of shallow analysis precipitate? Nuclear War in the Middle East? Modest swimwear on the beaches, courtesy of President Huckabee? Maybe 0% taxes on unearned income, because, you know, the wealthy are just such darn nice folks? And free jello molds for all!

My point all along has been that MoDo, in dealing in the most meaningless and shallow terms, makes all the Dem candidates unelectable. And look where she's focusing her eyes and pen. Don't let her do it to another Democratic candidate. She needs to be put out to pasture somewhere she can use her gifts. Joan Rivers is getting pretty long in the tooth, maybe E! needs another red carpet catty bitch. That'd be an excellent job for her. But she absolutely must stop fucking up the country from the Op-Ed page of the NY Times.

After all, MoDo, the next Gorgon head might be your own.

Comments

[Ramona Quimby]

Once again, Ariel's column made me think--WTF? She is flailing at both Dems, hoping to land a blow somewhere. And yes, Molly, cynical as it is, I think Dowd cares not a whit for the good of republic. But that Pulitzer--now that's something!

[steve simels]

But I admit, I cringe from the cynicism such calculation would imply. To apply those terms to her writing career means that fresh material means more to her than human lives

I don't think you're being cynical at all. Dowd's a very bad person....

[aimai]

even worse, I think she meant its an "exhausting *spectacle* not *spectre*" but hell, the whole thing is so awful I can't make myself any angrier over word choice than I do over the fact that she is allowed to do anythign other than wash windscreens and beg for change.

aimai

[tim quick]

"Darkness seeking darkness."

C'mon that's not cynical or catty it's hilarious. She's so delusional she ought to be wearing a shower cap and pushing a shopping cart through a Brooklyn subway station muttering about where the cat went.

[Ted]

Because she has absorbed all the hate and body blows from nasty Republicans over the years, she is the best person to absorb more hate and body blows from nasty Republicans.

Because she has absorbed all the hate and body blows from nasty Republicans and Maureen Dowd over the years, she is the best person to absorb more hate and body blows from nasty Republicans and Maureen Dowd.

There. Fixed it.

[actor212]

But what's concerning me now is her lens shifting to Senator Obama, an intelligent and gifted public servant

Oh? You were able to actually find a record?

[actor212]

And his dragon is the Clinton attack machine, which emerged Tuesday night, not invincible but breathing fire.

MoDoDo makes it sound like Hillary's campaign is a 1979 Mustang, belching fumes...

[Steve M.]

I cringe from the cynicism such calculation would imply. To apply those terms to her writing career means that fresh material means more to her than human lives.

Well, I wouldn't exactly call it fresh material....

Really, her hate is what's more important to her than human lives -- that and her continued delusional belief that if she bashes the other girls (among whom I include "Obambi," who, to her, isn't truly male), she'll win favor from the guys.

[GOPmurderedconscience]

Thank you Molly I.

I read the first paragraph of that putrid column ad I immediately knew where to go find a cogent analysis of that dreck.

[Hillfan]

Thank you for saying "fuck you" in your post. It made me feel less guilty for using it in my blog. Afterall, woman over 50 aren't supposed to use that term are we/they?

I think Maureen Dowd is nuts but I've never figured out what all the hoopla is over her. What I am witnessing now in the media, the endless 'slaying' of Hillary and the endless crowning Obama as the next king of God-dom, I just walk around with my mouth hanging open. He can't do anything wrong and she can't do anything right. It is stunning and embarrassing to watch my national media, tv cable news (FOX doesn't count so let's just bitch about CNN and mostly MSNBC), be so blatantly biased as they are. They are 100% behind Obama and Hillary can't get a fair shake no matter what. If they have to report something favorable about Hillary (like she won Calif or won Mass-kenneyland), then the media ends their sentence with a "but"...

I feel like I'm personally pushing Hillary up a steep hill to get to the White House and pfewww...it's exhausting as hell.

[Me]

Someone remind me again of how much experience W had when he entered office. I mean, aside from his largely ceremonial duties as Texas governer.

[Molly Ivors]

actor212,
Well, I work on a college campus and live in a college town, and I'm telling you, the O energy out there is palpable. As regular readers know, I have genuine, policy-based issues with the guy (lest my "Molly Ivors is a Racist" troll return), but he has a lot of folks very very excited. Also, he's got an excellent street team, and that counts for a lot.

As Hillfan notes, we're still dealing with crappy media coverage--they've been emboldened, if anything, by forcing Edwards out of the race--but most people who aren't political junkies really do see the two remaining candidates as both quite good, and either fully qualified.

But honestly, Me, argue *for* your candidate, because the road you're going down here is not at all convincing.

[Uncle Kvetch]

I just figured MoDo's getting all her snark & bile out of the way now, so she can devote more time to McCain-worship later. He'll be the Daddy to her Little Girl, just like Dole and GHW Bush before him.

[va]

Darkness seeking darkness.

This seems like a novelty for MoDo. She calls it "pathological" later but "darkness seeking darkness" is metaphysical. Fittingly, it's metaphysics at the level of horcruxes in Harry Potter, but still.

[Bitter Scribe]

Dowd has the highest ratio of brains to substance of any commentator I've ever seen.

[K. Ron Silkwood]

because it's a little like picking on Ann Althouse: when she's that batshit, it's almost mean.

***

They are both possessed by demonic forces. It is your duty as a Christian to help with the exorcism.

[El Gato Negro!]

"Celebrity distorts democracy by giving the rich, beautiful, and famous more authority than they deserve." ~ Maureen Dowd, U.S. journalist. The New York Times, “Giant Puppet Show,” (September 10, 1995)

Dowd has no clue that she has become one of the causes of the distortion, eh?

Pffft.

[Me]

But honestly, Me, argue *for* your candidate, because the road you're going down here is not at all convincing.

All I meant to say, actually, was that it's amusing to see Dowd bring up Obama's inexperience.

[Molly Ivors]

Dowd has the highest ratio of brains to substance of any commentator I've ever seen.

You need to get out more. Let me introduce you to her pagemates, Paul Krugman and Bob Herbert, for example. They hardly ever talk about candidates in terms of royalty.

[Molly Ivors]

Dowd has no clue that she has become one of the causes of the distortion, eh?

She has as much self-reflection as a vampire.

[uppity kitty]

"Clinton attack machine, which emerged Tuesday night, not invincible but breathing fire."

Sounds like the movie scenario of Shreck 4 to me.

Great rant Molly! Please make them stop printing her in my local rag.

[bobbo]

All her condescension towards Obama has to make you wonder - what would she have said about the Kennedys? Would she have mocked them as naive little princes? Or would their Irish Catholicism have saved them from her wrath?

[jawbone]

Thank goodness MoDo was too young to do damage to the Kennedys!

[spocko]

Who is MoDo for? What audience is she designed to reach? How to we convince the editors that be that her time is up, her insights lame and worthless?

Think a back to any examples of someone who maintains a horrible narrative and is BAD for the country has every gone away? How did that happen? Why did that happen? How do we make that that come true for her?

[Milo Johnson]

We can all take advantage of this bit of a tipping point if we all collectively start to refer to her as "Britney Dowd," as per Somerby's post today. It will reinforce the understanding that she is unbalanced and will further accelerate her downfall.

[Rmj, Vox Threaduli]

Ariel? For some reason, I keep thinking Caliban.

[JenJen]

"Darkness seeking darkness. It’s an exhausting specter."

Look, Mo's getting all autobiographical on us.

Honestly, Molly, nobody takes down this Heather better than you do. Thank you.

[Jay B.]

Darkness seeking darkness she cribbed that from Stone's Nixon. Some character described Tricky Dick as the "darkness reaching out to the darkness" or some such bullshit.

[actor212]

Well, I work on a college campus and live in a college town, and I'm telling you, the O energy out there is palpable. As regular readers know, I have genuine, policy-based issues with the guy (lest my "Molly Ivors is a Racist" troll return), but he has a lot of folks very very excited. Also, he's got an excellent street team, and that counts for a lot.

You don't have to tell me, Molly. Obama won just one county in New York. Thompson.

Thompson county is where Cornell is located.

The problem with exciting candidates is they inevitably let you down in the end. Obama, for all his charm and charisma, cannot do what he says he will.

It's the same inertia that stops a third party candidate from winning elected office. Look what great things Jesse Ventura did in Minnesota.

*crickets chirping*

My point, precisely. Politicians have to work with other politicians. End of discussion. Obama's lack of legislative record was enough for me to endorse Hillary.

[actor212]

Ariel? For some reason, I keep thinking Caliban.

Disney, not Shakespeare. Look at her hair.

[Triton]

A vote for Hilary is a vote for the war. It's that simple. Why is everyone in such denial about that simple fact? Her husband was a hawk, her advisors are hawks, why would I believe that Hilary is not a hawk? McCain vs. Clinton is a disaster for the country - how can the two most pro-war candidates of their respective parties be leading when 75% of the country wants out? Are we all fools or are we being fooled?

[Phoenix Woman]

Um, actor212? New York is Hillary's home state and chief firewall. If she'd lost that one to Obama, she may as well have wrapped it up right there.

As for Obama's record: Oh, not much -- he just spent a quarter-century on Chicago's South Side as an organizer and local politican before he sought national office, which he's held for six years now. He wasn't a corporate lawyer like Hillary.

You wanna talk CVs? Hillary's spent much more time working for the union-busters at Rose Law than she has working for little kids. Not all experience is of the good kind. (All of her vaunted experience didn't stop her from voting to invade Iraq.)

[commie atheist]

"Dowd has the highest ratio of brains to substance of any commentator I've ever seen."

You need to get out more. Let me introduce you to her pagemates, Paul Krugman and Bob Herbert, for example. They hardly ever talk about candidates in terms of royalty.

Actually, if you consider that her substance is zero, and that she possesses a fair amount of intelligence, then the equation seems about right.

[Molly Ivors]

Well, this isn't really about the war or community organizing or anything like that. Both are excellent candidates; neither is a perfect candidate.

But Maureen Dowd is just fucking weird, and I stand by that.

[w0551]

She's also a terrible writer.

Her pitch is the color of pitch.

Every column has at least five parallel sentences like this -- and they're almost always tone-deaf, rhythmically unsound, and logically absurd.

[champ]

Im a U.S. citizen living overseas. Dowd WAS one of the columnist I use to look forward to reading on the net. I stopped reading her column a year or so back. I cant read it at all now. I can still vote in the U.S.
Richardson, Kucinich and Edwards were my first choices - in that order. I am now for HRC. I love hearing Obama speak but "cant we all just get along" dont work. Some do not want to get along and they will obstruct all the time.

[Raya]

Um, Phoenix Woman, Obama's only held his national office for 3 years.

[Batocchio]

Thanks again, Molly.

Sadly, I think MoDo is exactly that shallow. Fiddling while DC and Baghdad burn, pick your metaphor. What she lacks in insight she makes up in viciousness, I guess.

[madamab]

Ahhhhh, thank you, Molly. My evil stepmother, who is an Obamaniac of the 99th degree, sent me her column yesterday to try and convince me to give up my foolish, delusional support of the Demon Hillary.

What she fails to understand is that if Obama becomes the candidate, Dowd will turn on him like the wolverine she is...as will the rest of the traditional media.

[JenJen]

Oh, this is good:

"Maureen Dowd accused of mistaking black Times columnist for Michelle Obama."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/02/07/maureen-dowd-accused-of-m_n_85460.html

I think my favorite part is where the columnist talks about Dowd being sickly-sweet and sucking up to her.

Molly... this is so rich, it deserves a separate column. :-)

[tim quick]

Damn, this is the thread that won't quit. Hurry, Molly, Thers, write something else.

[AJ]

There's gotta be some sort of deep Miss Havisham-esque freudian problems there. For the last couple of years I always imagine Dowdy types her columns in a dried up wedding dress she never got to wear, and a sepia toned picture of her 'tough cop' dead father smeared by harlot red lipstick in front if her.

[Bitter Scribe]

Actually, if you consider that her substance is zero, and that she possesses a fair amount of intelligence, then the equation seems about right.

Thank you, Commie Atheist, that's exactly what I meant. It's too bad that Dowd uses her considerable skills to trivialize elections and politics.

[actor212]

A vote for Hilary is a vote for the war.

Ditto a vote for Obama. Or McCain.

Sorry, man, but you ought to research the voting records first.

[actor212]

Um, actor212? New York is Hillary's home state and chief firewall. If she'd lost that one to Obama, she may as well have wrapped it up right there.

Hillary won a dozen counties in Illinois. Obama not ONE in New York. That's all you need to know about relative strengths.

[Mo MoDo]

Maureen Dowd has the power to single-handedly ruin the campaign of the most wooden uncharismatic candidate ever? Now who is suffering from psychosis?