Camille Paglia unleashes another fusillade against Hillary Clinton, and this time she's come down with a bad case of Maureen Dowd Disease. Symptoms include fear of strong women and the urge to feminize men who support a candidate you don't like.
Paglia and I on the same side in the Clinton/Obama race, but I don't go for gender-based rants. It's odd that someone who has promoted herself as an androgynous figure should slam Hillary for being too alpha-male in her behavior. Camille seems to dig that characteristic in Madonna - Our Lady of the Perpetual Lingerie - but apparently not so much in her cousin Hillary.
Camille says that "the male staff who Hillary attracts are slick, geeky weasels or rancid, asexual cream puffs." Apparently she forgot about Jamie Rubin, pin-up boy for the "sanctions are a legitimate tool of diplomacy" set. And what's wrong with Harold Ickes?
But it's all to the good, since it provoked Ezra Klein to link to this piece about Paglia by Molly Ivins, which I had never read. Jesus H. Christ, Molly Ivins was good. I'd hate to be on the receiving end of her wrath. Was she the best polemical writer of her generation? It's a distinct possibility.
Molly skewers Camille on, among other things, the matter of rock and roll. Her piece is entitled "I Am The Cosmos" - which, coincidentally or not, is the title of a song by Chris Bell, the heart and soul of legendary Memphis rock band Big Star. "Every night I tell myself I am the cosmos, I am the wind/but that won't get you back again ..."
Like Molly, Chris Bell died too soon, in a car accident some say was suicide and others say was an accident. Either way, the world's emptier without him. Chris was "androgynous" in style at a time and place when it took real guts - Memphis, Tennessee, circa 1972.
And Molly? I wish she were here to describe what's going on as only she can. I'd gladly submit myself to her withering scorn in return. But that won't get her back again ...
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