More on Molly, Goliath-Slayer

I lifted the following from Paul Krugman's column on Molly in the NY Times today (I'd link you to the column but it's available only for a price):

"[O]bituaries that mostly stressed her satirical gifts missed the main point. Yes, she liked to poke fun at the powerful, and was very good at it. But her satire was only the means to an end: holding the powerful accountable.

"She explained her philosophy in a stinging 1995 article in Mother Jones magazine about Rush Limbaugh. 'Satire ... has historically been the weapon of powerless people aimed at the powerful,' she wrote. 'When you use satire against powerless people ... it is like kicking a cripple.'

"Molly never lost sight of two eternal truths: rulers lie, and the times when people are most afraid to challenge authority are also the times when it’s most important to do just that."

That column by Molly was the first I recall reading, and I immediately became a fan. Even when I had trouble getting it online, Mandy would provide it for me in LEO, the Louisville Eccentric Observer. The column had an accompanying cartoon of Limbaugh fitting perfectly into the lard-assed Nazi butcher Hermann Goering's uniform. The resemblance is striking, physically and otherwise. (In case I'm being too subtle, I invite you to conclude that I despise Rush Limbaugh.)

That column, in which Molly likened Rush's idea of sport to "kicking a cripple," was inspired in part by Rush's stunt on his (now happily discontinued) TV show: he said that the Clintons had not only a cat (remember Socks?) in the White House but also a dog. Silence. Then he held up a picture of Chelsea Clinton. She was thirteen then.

I know that there are two parallel universes of American politics. But I can't imagine that Al Franken, the nearest counterpart to Rush in this, the good universe, would ever attack Barbara and Jenna Bush (who some would not hesitate to call the First Sluts). It's conceivable that Al would poke fun at them now, but they are, as many a blogger likes to say, quite eligible to serve in Iraq instead of globetrotting and carousing and making ugly faces at photographers, and, at their age, fully capable of defending themselves.

I've always favored the underdog, and Molly always took on George Dubya Shrub, from the time he was top dog in Texas, pointing out his mange, rabies, and distemper, in spite of his supposed pedigree. Molly was the David to his Goliath.

I urge whomever might read this drivel to reflect on what Krugman said was one of Molly's "eternal truths": "the times when people are most afraid to challenge authority are also the times when it’s most important to do just that."

What are we waiting for? Let's have an impeachment -- a series of them. And let's not make them "non-binding."