Is there a cure? A pill? A magic elixir to pour over some childhood wound? An herbal remedy from an ancient Chinese wise man with a long beard? Something, people. What is it?
I just wrote to a fellow blogger that I never discuss politics unless I am dressed in full riot gear and carrying a large club, but this isn’t even politics now. It’s personal. It’s woman territory: humiliation. And, I can’t simply freakin’ believe it.
If you know the cure for humiliation, email Hillary Clinton at, well, we all heard her, at hillaryclinton.com. She said she wanted to hear from us. So, here I go.
The only drive stronger than your ambition for the White House is your appetite for humiliation. You chose a man and have chosen to stay with a man who over the course of your life has delivered a brand of humiliation that many women know about, but you know about in ways that would have left our entrails (and his) on the front lawn. You have endured an epoch public humiliation through the impeachment process, a world stage public humiliation that really only you know how you survived it. Just as most women died a little bit for you during the Monica thing, we can only die a little bit more with you this morning.
Was there no voice around you that had your back? A voice that said to you, “If you say this, on this night, tomorrow twenty six of your most loyal supporters and people who love you and who have stood by you will call you on a conference call and have to tell you what you should already have known: you have to let go. You are hurting us. You are embarrassing yourself.”
You will be reduced to saying quietly, “That makes sense” and then announcing you’d suspend your campaign with such speed that some of your staffers didn’t even know and learned about it by watching television.
Was there no such voice around you? I think there was. I just don’t think you can listen to such a voice. I don’t think it was your husband because he’s not exactly a reality guy when it comes to boundaries, but I think it was someone. And, whoever it was, listen to them the next time, will you? Because they see your true value. They see your gifts. They see your future.
You’ll need to listen to them because on your own you just can’t seem to break this cycle. And, I don’t think there’s an apothecary in the world that has a pill for it–even if you did have health care insurance.
© Pat Coakley 2008
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Wow. Pat, this is amazing. I have been trying to decide if I’m going to write something about Obama suddenly (finally?) finding himself the presumptive nominee (can you sense my ambivalence?) … and then I decided to check in with your blog …
I’m still processing this whole storyline, still trying to make sense of the fairytale comment, the RFK comment and Geraldine Ferraro. Still taking issue with the depiction of Michelle Obama in the Newsweek article, still taking issue with the cable news creeps who thought political reporting included calling Hillary a bitch or discussing her cleavage. I have such a headache.
Your photo is wonderful, so ‘other world.’
Thanks, Stacie. I guess I stay on the sidelines till I could stand it no more. I’ll be checking your site to see if you decide to write something. I hope you do as I’d love to read it. But, I understand your ambivalence, the headache of it all. I don’t listen to the talking media heads anymore as whatever number of Excedrin I’ve popped, they manage to undue any pharmaceutical ease and comfort that comes my way! I’m happy you stopped by! Pat
What really bugs me about how the media has portrayed the two Democratic candidates is that it has been playing a “smoke and mirrors” game of distraction, with the facts. Sort of like the old joke sales pitch of the cloth merchant.
“Never mind the quality, feel the width!”
Instead of focusing on the substance of what the candidates stood for, most of the media has focused on the superficial issues of gender and race.
Gender and race, superficial?
The Razzbuffnik says, “HELL YEH!”
When are people going to catch on to the fact that it’s the brain in the body that’s the driver of policy, not the skin colour or sex of that body? Sure race and gender influences what a person has experienced but it’s the way how the brain works and how it expresses itself that makes the person.
Sure, I think that Hillary and Barack are trail blazers on a certain level but the really important thing is the policies that they each stand for.
I’m not trying to be politically correct here (I couldn’t be, even if I tried. Wouldn’t know how) but I’m so heartily sick of people basing their opinions and the way how they treat people on things like race or gender. It’s who the person IS, that really matters.
On the other hand, people who live down to a stereotype of any kind need to take a good hard look at themselves and think about how they really want to be treated.
Stereotypes are a cultural short-cut for the intellectually challenged.
In short, if one is gravely ill and needs help, who gives a “rats arse” (as we like to say over here) what gender or race your doctor is? It’s how skillful the doctor is, that is the really important issue.
I would posit that the psyche of America is ill and is in desperate need of a skillful healer.
Razzman, a skillful healer is just what we need. Failing that, cinnamon buns work on an individual basis if you are so inclined. If I ran for office, I’d bake buns for votes. The sweet aroma would produce a landslide.
One of your bloggers, Shane, visited my site today and mentioned this writer I’d never heard of, Terry Pratchett. So, I googled him and read this most amazing short speech he gave to an Alzheimer’s Research Group. He apparently has just been diagnosed with early Alzheimer’s himself at 58 years old. It was so wonderful, funny, heartbreaking. Here’s the link:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1986843/posts
What treasures I’ve discovered with this blogging!! And, everywhere I went today, by the way, the Razzman had left a comment or two! When do you sleep?
Very interesting link. I sometimes wonder if Alzheimer’s would be a mercy. I envy animals in that they aren’t conscious of the fact they will, one day, die.
One can’t contemplate their impending mortality (something I do every day) when they’ve lost their reason.
As for when do I sleep? Between posts of course, silly!
All joking aside, it’s a small world and “birds of a feather, flock together”. It would seem that the blogging communities has it’s various ghettos where people of similar interests congregate.
For instance I first became aware of Girlgriot’s site when I read a blog about Iceland (a place I’m totally fascinated with), where she’d left a comment, several months before I stumbled onto this blog. Naturally I check out other commenter’s bloggs if I find what they say is interesting.
I’ve found that just about everything written on this blog (including the comments) makes me think…… and I like that.
I found your blog the same way, following a comment you left on the WordPress anniversary post. I’ve generally found that thinking comments lead to thinking bloggers. I was late for my knitting group this morning because I couldn’t get out of Single for a Reason and Razzbuffnik’s places.