NO TEARS FOR MOLLY IVINS by Tim Siggia

NO TEARS FOR MOLLY IVINS

By Tim Siggia

February 06, 2007

On Thursday, Feb. 1, liberal columnist, hatemonger, and professional Bush-basher Molly Ivins succumbed to cancer at the age of 62. Now don't get me wrong and misinterpret what I'm saying here. I do not rejoice in anyone's death, regardless of whether or not I differed with his or her views. Even when Saddam Hussein was executed -- and I fully supported that -- I did not feel like dancing in the streets when the news of his death by hanging hit the streets. So in this column I am not singing my own version of, "Ding-Dong, The Witch Is Dead." To me, the really sobering aspect of Ivins's death was her age, 62. You see, I myself just turned 62 on Feb 3.

Feelings about Molly Ivins, syndicated columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, tended to be very similar to those about Hillary Clinton. There was no middle ground. People either loved her or detested her. There was no middle ground. This is no doubt exactly as Molly herself would have wanted it. Either reaction most likely meant that the people expressing those feelings were reading her columns. The one reaction she expressly would not want was indifference. This malady was, of course, by no means unique to her. Nearly all pundits tend to feel the same way. If they don't, they're probably in the wrong business.

Molly Ivins, of course, was far from being the only columnist who had an axe to grind for our 43rd president. With rare exceptions, it's pretty much staple fare throughout journalism. What set Molly Ivins apart from the others, is that her writing went above and beyond mere political disagreement. In her case it was pure, unbridled, personal hatred -- and the message of hate came through loud and clear in nearly every column she wrote. Because, unlike other pundits who wrote merely about the man who happened to be occupant of the Oval Office, Ivins actually knew that man. She grew up with him. She went to school with him. And the hate she felt for him no doubt extended to his entire family.

To be fair, there were probably any number of reasons why she felt as she did about George W. Bush. For one thing, he was a Bush, and therefore came from privilege. He went to Yale, and then to Harvard Business School. Also, he was a Republican -- not just a Republican, mind you, but the wrong kind. If a good many conservatives these days have trouble picturing George W. Bush as one of them, he was no liberal -- at least not in the eyes of a woman whose "progressivism", expressed by such disdain for convention as showing up for work barefoot and a penchant for profanity, proved too much even for the ultra-liberal New York Times. Then again, Ann Richards, the late Texas governor who Ivins idolized, and for whom she took a rare moment away from her usual Bush-bashing to eulogize, was unseated by George W. Bush, and Ivins never forgave Bush for that. She no doubt went to her grave totally convinced that that election was bought with Bush money and Bush family influence, rather than legitimately won. And then, of course, he became president, even as he lost the popular vote to Democrat Al Gore. Ivins, naturally, made no secret of which direction her partisanship went in that episode.

It could have been any of those, or all of them -- or, perhaps, something totally different, to which Ivins never alluded in her columns. She and "Dubya", for instance, did go to the same school, though it is highly unlikely they ever shared a classroom what with Ivins being two years older. Young Mr. Bush was undoubtedly something of a prankster in those days. Perhaps he put a tack on her seat aboard the school bus. Or tied a knot in her hair. Or popped a paper bag behind her back to startle her. Or maybe he simply just did things she would like to have done herself, but could get away with them because he was a Bush, whereas she, a mere Ivins, could not. But as little Molly grew up to be big Molly, she acquired the power of the pen, and learned to use it as an effective weapon against the man against whom she'd harbored a lifelong resentment -- the man whose very existence was a symbol of power, privilege, connections, and the wrong kind of politics.

As is his way, President Bush was gracious in his statement about the passing of Molly Ivins -- far more gracious than she had ever been with him, or would have been had the situation been the other way around. But he was no doubt at least secretly relieved as well. Not that Molly Ivins posed any real threat to either him or his presidency. After all, this was not Watergate, and Molly Ivins was no Bob Woodward or Carl Bernstein. No, Bush's relief was probably more that of one less source of irritation, much like one feels after having scratched an itch or taken antacid for an upset stomach.

To paraphrase what Secretary of War Edwin Stanton said upon the death of Abraham Lincoln, now she belongs to the ages -- though in this case it is most unlikely that the ages will remember her beyond the generation that knew her during her lifetime. And, though I am a Christian (of the Roman Catholic variety), I will not speculate as to how The Almighty might be receiving her. My wish for her at this point is that God will be as merciful to her as I would like Him to be to me when my own time comes. But though I wish Molly Ivins no eternity of torment in her afterlife, neither do I shed any tears at her passing. That is something I cannot do. I may be a Christian, but I am not a crocodile.