RIP Molly Ivins

Molly Ivins has died of cancer. Ivins brought humor and plain language as an antidote to the false erudition of the gasbags who dominate the opinion columns of most newspapers. Ivins lived the lonely life of a Texas liberal, laboring on in a state dominated by knee-jerk reactionaries that produced perhaps the most sad spectacles of our epoch, the idiot-king George Bush II.

Here's a bit from a 2001 column, but it's amazing apt to describe the current drive of the Bush regime:

Karl Rove, the man known as "Bush's Brain," would never do anything mean, dirty, petty or tacky. I say this because one of the things I have learned from Rove and Karen Hughes--counselor to His Bushness and also known as Nurse Ratchet--is that if you say something often enough, like "compassionate conservative" or "leave no child behind," the reality makes no difference; people remember only the slogan. (One of the funnier slogans, from Bush's last run for governor, was "end social promotion." Social promotion is the story of Bush's life. The Lege [Texas Legislature]just ended ending social promotion--it doesn't work.)

Just as true now as then...

Now we're left with stuffed shirt frauds like George Will. God help us all.