Wednesday, August 01, 2007

An Open Letter to Hillary Rodham

Dear Hillary,

Hillary’s graduationSo they finally dug out your super secret honors thesis from Wellesley College. No wonder you wanted to post a guard on it! “THERE IS ONLY THE FIGHT: An Analysis of the Alinsky Model“ is sure to cause a huge conflagration. And the pages of your thesis will be used to start the fire.

The funny thing is many people our age were fans of Saul Alinsky back then. He wanted people to free themselves, even if they had to do so in somewhat unorthodox ways. I remember him describing what he considered the stranglehold Eastman Kodak had on the company town of Rochester, New York. In order for poor people to put pressure on Eastman Kodak he suggested that they show up at the haunts of the wealthy and make things uncomfortable enough that they would give in to the demands for better pay, etc.

Hillary, do you recall how they were to do this? One idea he had that stands out in my mind for its simplicity was his suggestion that they start attending the Rochester Symphony, where all the bigs went - since, of course, Eastman Kodak underwrote the program. However, before they went, all these radicalized poor people were to eat a big meal of beans. Lots and lots of beans…
- - - - - - - - - -
The resulting gasses wafting through the symphony hall were sure to grab the hearts and minds of the wealthy, perhaps even generating a conversion to their way of thinking.

I don’t remember that he was ever in favor of the large government you came to love. He believed in people helping themselves by whatever legal means they could. You wrote:

“The essential difference between Alinsky and his enemies is that Alinsky really believes in democracy; he really believes that the helpless, the poor, the badly-educated can solve their own problems if given the chance and the means; he really believes that the poor and uneducated, no less than the rich and educated, have the right to decide how their lives should be run and what services should be offered instead of being ministered to like children.” [excerpt courtesy of Wally Ballou]

Those are great sentiments, Hillary. Imagine a world where people are responsible for themselves. Alinsky believed that, but he also thought that government was not the place to go for self-direction. Instead, a person fought for change where he or she lived.

You and I have moved a long way from Wellesley since then. No doubt, so has Wellesley. When you were writing your thesis, I was living within walking distance of your dorm. In fact, as a town resident I could audit classes for free at your school - a benefit I took advantage of. Back then, there was affordable housing for the police and firemen and town workers. Imagine Wellesley with an immigrant section: everyone around me spoke Greek or Italian and I learned Mediterranean cooking from my neighbors.

By now, I’m sure the town workers are imported, just as we had to bus in black children to school back then because we didn’t have any of our own. In those days, elementary school children walked home for lunch so if any children were to be bused in, there had to be a family willing to take them in for lunch time. The child I “adopted” was Wanda. I talked to her two years ago: she’s a nurse at Children’s Hospital now. She said she never forgot our family, and that her time there widened her horizons about what was possible.

But that was about people helping one another. No government grants for Wanda’s lunch. No government grants for her schooling. We just made room.

Was it your time in Washington right after college that changed you, Hillary? Were your horizons widened by your exposure to big government and the heady power of bringing your bad guys to justice? Is that when you turned?

Well, Hillary, the cat is out of the bag. Your thesis is floating around the internet. Come on - instead of trying to control the means of your exposure - celebrate the freedom of a sword that cuts both ways. After all, there you are up on You Tube, chatting with the masses. Those videos looked like a free ride, didn’t they? But they run on the same track that leads us to your earnest college writings.

Hillary, we were so earnest then, and young. And some of those radical ideas we had are worth preserving. Even now, the center of both parties could cut and paste from Alinsky’s manual to talk about self-help instead of the nanny state.For heaven’s sake, just this once have the courage of your convictions, woman.

Imagine the votes you could get that way.

Sincerely (and for old times' sake),

Dymphna

8 comments:

SC&A said...

I never understood HRC's reluctance to have her thesis hidden away.

We all have written stuff we wish we hadn't and we have written stuff that we stand by to this very day.

That paper was written a long time ago. The measure of HRC isn't what she may have written back then (and it bears repeating that applies to things said and written by every candidate for elected office), but rather, what matters are the politics and ideas the candidate espouses now.

Perhaps the best way to measure a political candidates is to examine their judgment skills.

Attempting to hide a paper written decades ago, isn't exactly the best example of what is good judgment.

Dymphna said...

Well, Siggy, Hillary has always seemed shame-based. It's what keeps her from being first rate and it's unfortunate.

If you can't laugh at your younger self, or even retrieve what was good, then whence comes wisdom?

Jeremayakovka said...

Siggy, you'll begin to understand better when you consider "reluctance" as, perhaps insead, "determination."

Killer pic of the elite valedictorienne, Dymphna!

SC&A said...

"If you can't laugh at your younger self, or even retrieve what was good, then whence comes wisdom?"

Exquisite.

Talk about the shortest between two points.

Dymphna said...

I have tremendous sympathy for Hillary Clinton. She wants the one thing she cannot retrieve: integrity.

That picture is a thousand words on senioritis: in the midst of the grind, she went to the photographer, clamped that cap on her greasy, uncombed hair, put on the gown and told him to get it over with.

That is a younger self which makes her cringe because now anyone can have it.

Her sad attempts to compete with Mrs. Fred --whose name I don't even know -- in the cleavage department makes her look like a motherless child.Okay, an older motherless child, but still someone in need of guidance.

Jeez, she must've been a hard one to raise.

Anonymous said...

Hillary has all the sympathy in the world. That's not the point. When I was in college, I didn't notice the kids going home to have lunch...I didn't notice that there were even children around. I was exploring my place in the college world and trying to define myself.

I had a professor tell me I could believe anything I wanted but I should be comfortable with it no matter what.

This led me, in my youth, to reject many of the race-hating, liberal-baiting ideas I had. As I grew older, I found that some of my "youthful ideas" were not set in stone and that, so much of this or that may not be correct on any given day. I seek now to find the middle ground much like HRC.

We can't hate each other if we truly love each other and wish to be considerate of our fellow man.

In 1950, a co-founder of a famous 12 step program said, "It all comes down to love and service." How we love and how we serve is the question.

Dymphna said...

I had a professor tell me I could believe anything I wanted but I should be comfortable with it no matter what.

right. like charlie brown said, it doesn't matter what you believe as long as you're sincere.

hillary is comfortable with big gov't; she sincerely believes socialist tax policy, and she has made herself very,very wealthy without ever leaving govt "service."

if she wereelected, i think our productivity would fall and our already confiscatory tax burden would rise.

how we love and serve is indeed the question...it is also a perspective by which to judge a person's past behavior. beginning w/ travelgate, hillary ruined some good people.

Simon de Montfort said...

Well, America survived one Deeply Troubled Person ( Nixon ) as POTUS in modern times, so perhaps it can accomodate another: Perhaps if HRC gets what she's always wanted--power and at least the appearance of control--perhaps she will love that power and Apparent Control so much that she will rule with Restraint, and only slightly increase the scope and depth and breadth of government.

Perhaps America will even emerge stronger from Clinton, Part Deux.
If a Deeply Disturbed Nixon didn't make America a worse nation ( he didn't ), then Hillary won't be a catastrophe, either

If wishes were horses,
I'd be riding all day......