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Wednesday, January 10, 2007
Ben Shapiro :: Townhall.com Columnist
Shock story: Nancy Pelosi is a woman
by Ben Shapiro
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Apparently, Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) is a woman. Coming on the heels of other shocking revelations, such as John Kerry's service in Vietnam and Barack Obama's racial background, Pelosi's womanhood is a true stunner. Next we'll be hearing that Hillary Clinton has a famous husband.

On January 4, Pelosi took the gavel as speaker of the House of Representatives. She was escorted to the podium by her six grandchildren, including a sleeping baby she carried with her. After thanking her family for helping her move from the "kitchen to the Congress," Pelosi humbly chortled over her own achievement. "For our daughters and granddaughters, today we have broken the marble ceiling," she crowed. "For our daughters and our granddaughters, today the sky is the limit."

The media would hammer any Republican congresswoman who dragged her grandchildren with her to work; it would rightly be considered a political ploy with children as props. Nancy Pelosi, however, could breastfeed on the speaker's podium and receive the plaudits of the mainstream media. "It seemed the ultimate in multitasking: taking care of the children and the country," fawned Charlie Gibson of ABC News. The paternalism of the left has reached new lows -- taking care of children and taking care of Americans are now two sides of the same coin.

No woman in the history of politics has used her womb like Nancy Pelosi. According to Pelosi, the power of childbearing gives her extra-special abilities when it comes to recognizing national security threats. When asked on CBS's "60 Minutes" what qualified her for leadership on national security, she answered: "I, as a mother and a grandmother, 14 years on the intelligence committee. Don't tell me I have any underestimation of what the threat is to our country." Obviously, cleaning up spit-up prepared Pelosi to clean up terrorism.

In defending herself from charges of San Francisco liberalism, Pelosi relies once again on her ovaries. On September 21, 2006, Jim Lehrer interviewed Pelosi. "Finally, as you know -- I'm sure you know -- the Republicans running in these congressional races in November, you're a target of a lot of this -- speaking of focus -- and they say, 'Do you really want to turn the House of Representatives over to a liberal Democrat from San Francisco?' How do you respond to that sort of thing?" he asked. "An Italian Catholic mother of five, grandmother of five, going on six," Pelosi quickly responded. Pelosi is ardently pro-abortion, pro-homosexuality, soft on crime, soft on drugs, soft on illegal immigration, anti-gun rights, anti-religion and anti-welfare reform. She wants to dramatically escalate taxes and doesn't believe that we're currently engaged in a war on Islamism. But she used the Lamaze method, so don't you dare call her a San Francisco liberal!

How will Pelosi control the House? With her "mother-of-five voice." How will she bully others into doing her will? The same way she clubbed Republicans over the head about the Mark Foley scandal -- by invoking her super-duper authority as "a mother and grandmother and the leader of the House Democrats."

This is absurd. There are literally billions of mothers in the world. I love motherhood as much as the next fellow, but it has absolutely nothing to do with running the House of Representatives. Lady Macbeth had a child (Act I, Scene 7), but she wouldn't be my first choice to run a country. It is no less offensive for Pelosi to run based on her uterus than it would be for a man to campaign based on his working prostate.

When Nancy Pelosi uses her womanhood and motherhood as a gimmick, it insults both women and men. It insults women by stating that their special qualification for inclusion in politics springs from their genitalia. It insults men by stating that estrogen makes for superior political know-how. It insults children by making them pawns to be used for Nancy Pelosi's political machinations. And it insults voters: only babbling idiots would buy such claptrap. Politics is politics. It is not changing diapers, burping the baby or driving to soccer practice.

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About The Author
Ben Shapiro is a regular guest on dozens of radio shows around the United States and Canada and author of Project President: Bad Hair and Botox on the Road to the White House.
 
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©Creators Syndicate
What a disappointment!
I read this article because I thought the title was funny and interesting. The article wasn't. Reading the thread, Critical Bill seems a whole lot brighter than the author. While I certainly have to agree that it is simply shocking how some people who proclaim themselves Christians behave in Christ's name, I don't think Pamela is an example of this. To me, she seems like the "Christian" poster most likely to actually please Christ. That said, I do have to answer her question: "Or is it now name-calling to say "spade" to or about a spade?"

Yes, Pamela, unless you are talking to/about a garden tool, it is indeed name-calling to call a person a spade. This old traditional nugget of "wisdom" is rooted in racism. While it is classier to call "them" spades than the N-word, thinking that knowing a person's skin color tells you anything more than that is a sad error. Your own "name-calling" of Nancy P. struck me as entirely civil and well within "Christian" bounds. I see your words as intended to express the truth as you see it, rather than to demean her out of fear, anger, and hatred. It comes down to a matter of displaying real respect for everyone. Killing the enemy is one thing, systematically demeaning him is another. That's why the prison scandals are so horrifying. We've let Bush lead us so far from a path of grace that the entire world may pay the ultimate price. What are we going to do about it?


Nancy Pelosi
Pelosi's bold opening moves suggest that she's yet to face the fact that she's not dealing with two parties but with a large number of individuals, each with his or her own constituents, concerns, ambitions and baggage. Her efforts to herd this bunch of cats may well be frustrating and, in the end, futile, with much of the difficulty coming from within her own party. She is likely to go down in history as "Squeeker of the House" if her leadership efforts prove as futile as I predict.
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