Molly RIP

So, Pete woke me up this morning with the news that Molly Ivins had died. 

OHHHHH NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! I sighed loudly and called the dog back upstairs to cuddle with in bed. 

What a loss.  What a sad fucking loss to cancer.  We'd read a few days ago that she'd been battling the third recurrence of breast cancer.  We were shocked to have heard it and this morning just devastated to imagine a world without her righteous, funny, anger at the power elites.

If you're not very familiar with Ivins' work, please take the time to find out about her.  I first learned of Ivins from her book, Molly Ivins Can't Say That which was mostly about the Texas Legislature.  It was one of the funniest pieces of political writing I'd come across.  It also cemented my understanding of what was really wrong with Texas.  Horribly wrong.  She was writing at the time for the Dallas Times-Herald -- since gobbled up by the right-wing bird-cage liner the Dallas Morning "News."  -- If you want to know what's wrong with the city of Dallas -- home of the future "George W. Bush Presidential Library" (and if that name doesn't elicit a guffaw nothing could) -- its transformation into a single-paper city with the right-wing rag like the News triumphant is a major reason.  I remember being stranded in Dallas for a week while my father was hospitalized.  The hospital left copies of the Morning News in front of each room and every morning I asked myself, "What am I supposed to do with this?"  A sad waste of trees indeed.

Of course Molly had a keen sense of Dallas' character long before that.  I've used one of her lines about Dallas many times ("rhymes with 'malice' and that's not much of a coincidence").  But this morning's obit in the New York Times acquainted me with another gem ("the kind of city that would have rooted for Goliath over David").  In her estimation I could remember why I consider South Texas and even culturally Austin my hometown before the asphalted confines of "Big D."

Her later work in Shrub: The Short But Happy Political Life of George W. Bush was an informative introduction to George Bush, Rove and the schemers and liars that had scratched their way up to power.

David Corn from The Nation has a great piece about her work, quoting from Ivins' own recollection of an icon that she "was there for the workers and the unions, she was there for the African-Americans, she was there for the Hispanics, she was there for the women, she was there for the gays. And this wasn't all high-minded, oh, we-should-all-be-kinder-to-one-another. This was tough, down, gritty, political trench warfare; money against people. She bullied her way to the table of power, and then she used that place to get everybody else there, too. If you ain't ready to sweat, and you ain't smart enough to deal, you can't play in her league."

That certainly describes Ivins' own work.

It is such a blow to know that we've lost Ann Richards and Molly Ivins in such a close succession.  Two people who actually cared about people.  To Texans that made you proud to be from that state (unlike the Connecticut-born Bush and his ilk who've exported the worst of that state to DC).

In her very last column urging people to fight against Bush's troop surge, (the column's here) she wrote:

We are the people who run this country. We are the deciders. And every single day, every single one of us needs to step outside and take some action to help stop this war. Raise hell. Think of something to make the ridiculous look ridiculous. Make our troops know we're for them and trying to get them out of there. Hit the streets to protest Bush's proposed surge. If you can, go to the peace march in Washington on Jan. 27. We need people in the streets, banging pots and pans and demanding, "Stop it, now!"

So, take a moment to read some of the obits and remember a witty, passionate champion for truth and the rights of those out of power.

• New York Times obit is here.
• Washington Post obit is here.
• NPR has a remembrance and a few of her audio essays here.
• The Houston Chronicle has some of her more memorable quotes here.
• The Texas Observer the paper she championed, has a moving tribute here.
• The Nation obit is here.

And again, her last column is here.