Is Hillary Clinton Really The Thing? By Dennis O’Neil
I never talked to either Jack Kirby or Stan Lee about politics, so I don’t really have any idea where they stood on the subject. My guess would be that following their political spoor wouldn’t take you very far west and that they didn’t have much sympathy for the hippie-rebels of the 60s (and here allow me to blush and hide my face). After all, they and their parents (and my parents) fought for a place in the American mainstream because, finally, acceptance meant an increased chance of survival and for those outside the tribe, who suffered the Great Depression, not surviving seemed to be a real possibility. Then here came the snotty kids with their tie-dye and their girly haircuts and their wiseass slogans saying that a place in the tribe was not worth struggling for – in fact, the tribe itself was stinking of corruption.
Both generations were, in their own way, right; both had a piece of the truth.
Stan and Jack were – are – of the first of the two generations and so they were – are – probably politically a bit to the right of me and maybe you (and my parent and most of my siblings.) But events of the past week make me guess that their greatest creations were liberals. I refer to the Fantastic Four who, along with Spider-Man co-launched Marvel Comics, as one or two of you might have heard. True FF aficionados know, and perhaps relish, the tendency of the members of this supergroup to squabble among themselves. Two of the four, The Human Torch and The Thing, seem particularly apt to indulge in petty argumentation.
Remind you of any particular political group?
Yeah, right. Liberals. Witness the recent news: Ms. Hillary Clinton’s die-hard supporters are threatening to vote for John McCain, the Republican candidate, unless Ms. Clinton’s presidential aspirations are accorded full acknowledgement at the Democratic convention, which will be soaking up media time in about two weeks. This despite the fact that Ms. Clinton has already lost the nomination to Barack Obama, whose crew must be thinking harsh and uncharitable thoughts about the Clintonites.
Want more? Okay, early last weekend the one-time contender for the Democratic nomination, John Edwards, did not manage an end run around some tabloid reporters who confirmed rumors that this upstanding Democratic paragon, who had made a mighty noise about family values and, yes, The Lord, had dallied carnally with a campaign aid, a woman hired to shoot pictures. Of course, such dalliance seems to often come with the politician’s territory; many, if not most, of our Alpha Pols dallied thus, and were good leaders anyway. But did the story have to break a fortnight before the convention and thus give Obama’s enemies a shiny distraction from matters such as a faltering economy and an unjustified war?
The Torch and The Thing bitch a lot, but they keep their pants on and when Dr. Doom is pounding the door, they unite to face the common enemy.
Any of my fellow liberals feel like reading a comic book?
RECOMMENDED READING: Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar… by Thomas Cathcart and Daniel Klein.
Dennis O’Neil is an award-winning editor and writer of Batman, The Question, Iron Man, Green Lantern, Green Arrow, and The Shadow – among others – as well as many novels, stories and articles. The Question: Epitaph For A Hero, reprinting the third six issues of his classic series with artists Denys Cowan and Rick Magyar, will be on sale in September, and his novelization of the movie The Dark Knight is on sale right now. He’ll be taking another shot at the ol’ Bat in an upcoming story-arc, too.
"Is Hillary Clinton Really The Thing?"Well, she sure as hell ain't Invisible Woman.Medusa, maybe? Would you believe Banshee?Say what you like about Republicans, but they know enough about elections not to attack each other so savagely the eventual winner isn't left as damaged goods. And we're also smart enough not to keep going after the guy who's out of the race, or the guy who isn't even running cause he already ran and won twice, and is leaving office.Clinton's followers are travelling the "everybody deserves a fair chance (especially our person)" road that starts with taking the scoreboard down at little league games, because competition is bad. Clinton LOST. She fought tooth and nail and tried everything in the playbook (effectively making it impossible to use the same plays against McCain, so thanks for that), but she LOST. Giuliani isn't grousing for a chance to speak, nor are any of the other folks who tried to get the nom and didn't. But the fervent hordes who care more about Hillary than the do the future of the country are ready and willing to cut off America's nose (which would guess is around Maine) to spite its face. Brilliant.Should McCain win in November, once again the Democrats will stand there nonplussed, unable to grasp how they lost. And they'll look at everything the Republicans did, calling it all dirty tricks, never once looking over what THEY did to scuttle their own ship.Will Rogers was right, and it hasn't changed.
Mark Penn and Karl Rove can get together and have a giant cookie party1 Argh!I'm trying to maintain that sense of optimism I felt six months ago. I used to like John McCain. I used to respect him. Now he's taking advice from Karl Rove, the same man who engineered rumors that McCain had fathered a bastard black child. Talk about getting in bed with a snake! Is that how McCain will lead, by selling out his principles? In the last two weeks McCain has mocked Obama for being popular, both within our nation and internationally. (What is wrong with popularity in a Democracy? That's how we elect people, with a popular vote!) He's mocked Obama's energy policy, by handing out "Obama Tire Guages," missing the fact that if Americans kept their tires properly inflated and their engines properly tuned that would make MORE of an impact cutting our consumption of foreign oil than off shore drilling EVER will! Just to compound how stupid he looks, McCain offered up a chagrined Cindy McCain for the "Miss Buffalo Chip" competition at the Sturgis Biker Rally. For those who don't know, "Miss Buffalo Chip" makes wet t-shirt contests look staid and old fashioned. It was an all too graphic example of a Political Candidate willing to sell out what is near and dear to him just to ingratiate himself with a constituency he doesn't understand or have any real appreciation for, the lowest of hypocrisy. McCain has become snide. Blech.I used to like Hilary Clinton more. I used to respect her more too. But Clinton couldn't even lead her own campaign staff away from in-fighting, back biting and petty squabbling. She focused her energies on trying to keep the force one of the most powerful political engines behind her, while she let the grass roots get swept out from under her. Clinton got beat because she got beat. Obama outplayed Clinton politically by being more charismatic, having a better understanding of what America wants, with a better plan for getting us there. He was able to connect and resonate with grass roots politics in ways that confuse both Clinton and McCain. He also demonstrated that he is ready to lead by being a stronger leader of his own campaign staff.Who is ready to lead on day one? Obama's never had the financial difficulties of the McCain or Clinton campaigns. Both McCain and Clinton took HUGE loans from their spouses to keep their campaigns afloat. The Clinton and McCain families are worth HUNDREDS of millions of dollars. But Obama is the elitist? Obama's outspent both McCain and Clinton because he was willing to make the INVESTMENT where it counts, in courting large numbers of small contributors over small numbers of large contributors. Obama has been better organized, more inspiring and gotten more popular support. If being a presidential candidate is a test of leadership, then Obama is very ready to lead.Who knows what Kirby's politics were! Captain America is the the ultimate symbol of comics jingoism. But he died fighting for the rights of individuals OVER arguments of national security. And The Forever People were comics ultimate hippy-dippy love children. They also died, but I hear they are getting resurrected as goth art students.
According to Mark Evanier, Jack Kirby was more on the lines of a liberal Democrat: http://www.povonline.com/jackfaq/JackFaq1.htm (at the bottom of the page). Either way, it doesn't really matter to me what his views were (though I do agree about distrusting those with a "Cult of Personality"). If you look at some more of the F.A.Q. you'll see where Kirby's stance was on people trying to inject their politics into Captain America.
re: Edwards… The story broke when the story broke, 2 weeks before the convention, 2 months after the convention, whatever. The Raleigh News & Observer a couple of weeks ago had to defend itself for *not* digging in to the story; I think they were trying to bend over backwards to avoid being seen as digging in the same mud as the National Enquirer. But are you really saying the timing of the disclosure is further evidence of the Dems eating their own? Wouldn't that be giving credence to the right wing fantasy that the press is just an extension of the Dems (or the Libs, take your pick?). And it's cute to make light of the all-the-greats-do-it dalliances. What about the idea that he knew he had this skeleton kicking around his closet and went ahead to seek the nomination anyway? Can you imagine the circus if Edwards had actually *won* and was on his way to be nominated at the convention and *then* this stuff comes out? I think there's a whole class of (male) politicians that only gets into the biz as a way to get some extra tail on the side. Thankfully I think both Obama and McCain seem to be exceptions to this.
McCain separated from his first wife in January of 1980. They filed for divorce in February of 1980. By April they were divorced. And in May of 1980 John McCain married Cindy Lou Hensley, a school teacher he had been seeing since 1979. Cindy Lou shouldn't be seen as a home-wrecker. John McCain's first marriage had already been on the rocks with a series of extramarital affairs by him in the mid 70s. McCain has admitted this.I'm not sure how much McCain's dalliances 30 years ago should affect your opinion of his ability to lead this country. I'm not sure how much credibility can be placed in recent rumors of an affair with a lobbyist. I just don't think McCain should be seen as having an exceptionally stellar record when it come marital fidelity. In this area he's not a paragon of virtue, hardly the exception to the rule Zonker thinks he is.
Not promoting McCain as a paragon of anything, just an exception to the enters-politics-chases-skirts motivation I ascribe to Bill Clinton, John Edwards, Gary Hart and the various Kennedy men. During the time you mention, McCain was still in the Navy (yeah, I know, conduct unbecoming and all that). He first got elected in '82.
So, since Cindy Lou Who and 1982, John McCain has been faithful and true. True to his wife, and me and you. True to the good ol' Red, White and Blue. Filled with virtue. Home for curfew.McCain (speaking on infidelity): You know … that's an area that I never get into. Because I think that people make judgments, and … everybody has a different view. [That bit's from the CBS News.]
I could give a goddamn what Edwards or Clinton or Kennedy or Jefferson did or does with their penis. That's not the countries problem that's the problem of their wives. Don't give me that 'they betrayed America crap' because when the right tried to impeach Clinton because of his penis antics the country rose up, took a look at the state of the nation (which was great) and said "Leave Clinton alone." We ALL know that if the tenor of the country was against Clinton he would have been out of office before you could say; 'Don't worry Monica a little club soda and that will come right out." I'm as liberal as I am black and I LOVED McCain-that is before he started his bullshit ' Let's scare America' right wing crap. Now I'm truly sad to see this American Icon reduced to stupid fear tactics. Up until Hillary Clinton's campaign started their child like attacks on Obama I was going to vote for her. This election is more High School than High School ever was. Some Clinton's supporters who are most likely pro choice would rater vote for McCain to send a message that they are pissed. HOW FREAKING CRAZY IS THAT?? They will put in REAL jeopardy their right to choose to make a point. That is the single stupidest event in the history of politics for my money. I'm almost positive there is going to be floor fight that the convention in a few weeks that will doom the parties hope of winning the White House. The Clinton Family has a wonderful place in History RIGHT NOW but if a convention fight destroys the party then that place in history will be tarnished beyond belief.And it will serve them right. In fact all it will do is SERVE the right.
Speaking of Hillary Clinton:There is bad news about her husband.It is opined that Bill Clinton committed racist hate crimes, and I am not free to say anything further about it. Respectfully Submitted by Andrew Y. Wang, J.D. CandidateB.S., Summa Cum Laude, 1996Messiah College, Grantham, PALower Merion High School, Ardmore, PA, 1993(I can type 90 words per minute, and there are probably thousands of copies on the Internet indicating the content of this post.)_________________"If only it were possible to ban invention that bottled up memories so they never got stale and faded." Off the top of my head-it came from my Lower Merion High School yearbook.
It is opined that Messrs Wang has spammed this load of B.S. anywhere he could Google up the names Hilary or Bill Clinton along with an unmoderated comment box. (B.S. Candidate is right.)I just don't get why someone would include snipits of unsubstantiated slander along with their tiny partial resume. Or a tiny resume along with their snipits of slander. What's the connection? I don't know what to make of this. This just seems like a sad and lonely cry for help thrown out to ANYBODY who might have known Andy Wang in the 90s.
Both Stan Lee and Jack Kirby were left-leaning, but yeah probably to the right of the renowned Dennis O’Neil…however Dennis O’Neil is probably a lightly more right than I am, so I guess it shows you how subjective the political spectrum can be.
This is an old post now, but I’d like to see Dennis O’Neil’s thoughts on the current political scene at the moment. Being an outsider to American politics, who defines themselves as a leftist rather than a liberal, I am not a great fan of Obama. But, I think Mitt Romney is a Grade-A creep who puts even many right-wingers off. I think Obama will easily win the next election.