June 03, 2008 - 8:42 AM.

The good fight

I was going to entitle this entry "Swan Song," but there has been nothing ethereal or fairy-tale-like about my gal Hillary's good fight.

I am so sorry she is done. I knew it would be happening, of course. All the frightened Obama voters who were so terrified that somehow we Hillary voters were doing something wrong by voting for the candidate we want, missed one crucial reason for Hillary Rodham Clinton staying in this race until the last primary was done.

No, it wasn't to "split the party." It wasn't to piss anyone off. It wasn't to rub her husband's presidency in anyone's face, or to make herself look crazy, or even to prove over and over that the electoral college system can be manipulated.

I believe she stayed in so that every woman in the country who wanted a chance to vote for a good woman, no matter how late their primary, would have a chance to do it.

There are 80-year-old feminists in Oregon today who know with absolute certainty, that they will never get another chance in their lives to vote for a truly viable woman presidential candidate. Hell, I'm 42, and I am sure this is MY only chance. And bless her into eternity, Hillary Rodham has gracefully and gutsily run the gauntlet of sexist, shrieking, desperate punditry, running a real risk of being harmed bodily, heard the most disgusting things said about her and her family, for almost two years now -- so that every last one of us would have a chance to vote for HER. To cast a meaningful vote for someone good who shares my pronoun. And she was not willing to leave any of us behind, not even those "meaningless" June 3 voters.

Oh, I guess I would have ended up in tears either way about this. Just thinking about an inauguration that would have included the address of "Madame President" has been making me misty for months. And now I am in tears over the end of it all. But I don't care about all my potential political disagreement with her, about how much money she has, even about the admittedly odd RFK comment. That woman knows how to survive the fight, and I am glad I had her on my side as long as she was able to stay. I'm sorry she won't be allowed to admit part of her motivation for staying, without us and her being derided, but I feel sure I know it in my heart.

I guess that young guy will make an OK president -- probably not worse than any other. It's just a little hard to swallow all the blind stupid "HOPE!" shit that his voters yammer on about all the damn time -- yeah yeah, you idiot optimists, don't you remember in 1992 when another pretty boy flashed that word around too? Yeah, he did fine, but don't forget that he also did things like granting Most Favored Nation trade status to China. Nobody's perfect once they hit the White House, and I don't look forward to having to be the shoulder that disillusioned Obama voters end up crying on when they are shocked to discover his feet of political clay.

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