Ben Her

I guess we can pry that gun out of Charlton Heston's hands right about now. Hillary Clinton has picked up the mantle for him. The mayor of Philadelphia, a Clinton supporter, has proposed sweeping new laws to get the most lethal automatic weapons off the streets, and at the same time, Hillary is making speeches about learning to shoot out back of Grandpa's barn. Is it too far-fetched to imagine her showing up next in a camouflage pantsuit and orange vest with something dead strapped to the hood of her pick-em-up truck? This woman, who has been a sponsor of gun restrictions in the past, is suddenly praising Pennsylvania's rich gun culture that has been passed down from father to son. Hell, my great-grandfather used to shit in an out-house until they invented indoor plumbing. Killing animals in the wild should have gone the same way, but someone forgot to tell the hunters about that new thing, the grocery store. I suppose snuffing out wildlife was just too damn much fun for the "gun culture" though, so they decided to call it "sport." Only, the mayor of Philadelphia says he's just tired of people getting shot.

Has anyone but me noticed the two movies set in Pennsylvania that Hillary is re-enacting? She began her campaign invoking "Rocky," but it has rapidly turned into "The Deerhunter." Set in rural Pennsylvania and seeminly going on forever, a group of young patriots go to Vietnam and come home bitter. "Fuckin' A." They gather in the local bar to knock back shots of whiskey with beer chasers, but they only succeed in getting drunk and more bitter. Hillary knocked down a Crown Royal yesterday along with a frosted mug. The last presidential candidate to do that was U.S. Grant. They tried to persuade her to have a few more, but her assistant interceded and reminded everyone that when Hillary gets a buzz on, she goes on and on about Bill and his women and hallucinates about being under sniper fire. But she was at the bar and the cameras were on, so she took it like a man. I'll bet the last time Hillary took a shot of straight whiskey was Jan. 17, 1998, right after she read the Drudge Report. If this campaign continues much longer, the movie will morph into "Misery," with Hillary starring as Kathy Bates and Obama as James Caan.

The only thing "bitter" Obama said about people in small towns abandoned by their government was the truth. The mainstream media is hyperventilating over this as if it matters. If it gets a six point or a ten point win for Hillary in the Pennsylvania primary, it will be forgotten by the time the media focuses on Obama's twenty point lead in North Carolina. Still, it amuses me to see the Clintons, who attempted to portray Obama as a House Negro in South Carolina, now try to paint him as an "elitist," out of touch with the average Joe or Jane. The last time Hillary Clinton held a job without government support was as a lawyer for the Rose Law Firm in Little Rock. Then for the next twenty-odd years she was, in turn, First Lady of Arkansas and then of the United States, with no official duties other than those delegated to her by her husband. Being stoic under public humiliation won her a New York senate seat, and her voting record, which would make a liberal gag, is supposed to win her the affection of the working man. But her tax return says the Clintons made $104 million in the last few years. That beats minimum wage. It also beats someone who only recently finished paying off their student loans.

Perhaps attending Harvard makes you an elitist. If so, I know several and am related to a few. Hillary did go to Yale, and took a shot at Harvard man Al Gore during CNN's "Compassion Summit," where Clinton alternated between personas resembling Our Lady of Fatima and Linda Blair. Bill's been unleashed and back on the stump reminding voters that his wife may be 60 and forgetful, but she's a woman of the people. By the time the Pope arrives, she'll be a Catholic. This primary can't get here quickly enough for me. I have Clinton fatigue and I'm ready for Hill and Bill to pack up the magic show, face reality, and stop doing the Republicans' dirty work for them. The dismissal of Mark Penn as her advisor for lobbying for a trade deal she opposes may have stopped him, but what about Bubba, who's accepted nearly a million dollars from the government of Columbia for pushing for the same deal?

If you'll allow me a boxing analogy, I'm reminded of the great Cuban welterweight of the early 60s, Benny "Kid" Paret, who died in the ring at the hands of Emile Griffith. In fact, it was the first death shown on live TV until Lee Harvey Oswald came along. In the twelfth round, Griffith pummelled Paret unconscious, but his body was held up by the ropes and before the referee finally stepped in, Griffith had hit him thirteen more times. Paret's lifeless body slumped into a comatose crouch and he died of his injuries a few hours later. The referee said that Paret was known for absorbing punches, but in his previous bout, he had fought the great Gene Fullmer and was knocked down three times while taking a brutal beating. Some boxing analysts say that Paret would not have been murdered in the ring had not he first been softened up by Gene Fullmer and then rushed into the championship fight. In my analogy, Hillary is Gene Fullmer, Obama is Benny "Kid" Paret, and John McCain, playing the part of Emile Griffith, is waiting in the wings. Griffith was a haunted man and never the same after the Paret fight. In this case, though, we can prevent a foreseeable tragedy. Unlike referee Ruby Goldstein, who stepped in too late to save Benny Paret, we have the power to say, "Enough!" and stop this foolish fight before it becomes fatal. It's time for Hillary to hang up the gloves.