Last week Sen. Barbara Boxer (über-Liberal Dem — CA) attacked Secretary Condoleezza Rice for not “caring” about what happens in Iraq because she doesn’t have a personal stake in the war — she doesn’t have any children to lose in the war:
Condoleezza Rice came under a shocking Democratic attack yesterday – as a childless woman who can’t understand the sacrifices made by families of U.S. troops in Iraq. In a bitter personal assault on the secretary of state during her appearance before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, anti-war Sen. Barbara Boxer fumed that Rice didn’t com prehend the “price” of the war.
“You’re not going to pay a particular price, as I under stand it, with an immediate family,” Boxer (D- Calif.) ranted.
“Who pays the price?” she repeatedly demanded during Rice’s Capitol Hill grilling.
“I’m not going to pay a personal price. My kids are too old, and my grandchild is too young . . . So who pays the price? Not me, not you.”
When I first read this, I thought Feminist organizations would be frothing at the mouth at Sen. Boxer for attacking a strong female for choosing career over family — isn’t that what they’ve been fighting for all these years? But alas…not a peep from the Fem-Libs, because the criticism was directed towards a Conservative woman.
Fucking hypocrits.
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It looks like the Dems have decided that since the Chickenhawk meme is total bullshit (but that hasn’t stopped them from trotting it out anyway), that they’ll go with the Mommyism meme (if you don’t have children between the ages of 18-40, you don’t have the right to have an opinion on the war).
There are a lot of valid reasons to attack Sen. Boxer’s insulting and illogical attacks. But what stood out when Boxer said, “My kids are too old, and my grandchild is too young . . . So who pays the price? Not me, not you.” was the insinuation that if her kids weren’t too old or if her grandchild wasn’t too young that the progeny of this anti-war Liberal Leftard might actually join the military.
Micky Kaus at Slate had the same reaction:
Boxer also managed to leave the implication that if only her children were of the right age, they would of course be volunteering to serve their country in the military. I don’t know Boxer’s childen, but I’m skeptical.
Skeptical? It should be easy enough to verify if any of her now-too-old children (Doug and Nicole) ever did volunteer to serve when they were of age…I’m betting “NO”. And being that her grandchild is the offspring of a Boxer and a Rodham (Hillary’s brother), you can pretty safely bet that kid will never volunteer for the military either.
Can you point out where Boxer mentioned anything about children? She questioned Rice’s lack of immediate family involvement in the war- since when is that limited to children?
What Barbara Boxer did was deliberate. She may have felt passionately about her point, but she didn’t need to put a personal twist on it to include Rice. She could have left it with describing her own situation. But, then again, it’s become commonplace to be rude and insensitive in the halls of Congress these days.
When she said “immediate family”, and then followed that up by specifically mentioning her own children and grandchild, she was jabbing Rice for not having children.
Secretary Rice is an only child. She’s single. Both of her parents are dead. She doesn’t have any children. Rice doesn’t have control over the fact that she is an only child or that both parents are dead. So, Babs, couldnt’ have been criticizing her for that. The only “immediate’ family that Babs could have been referring to is the lack of children or the lack of a spouse.
Sweet! So in exactly two months and seven days, I am privied an opinion on the war… time to start planning my celebrations… Olives? check! Titos? check! 20 oz. hand-painted ‘dirty-martini’-theme glass? check-check!
Congrats, KW.
Titos? Are you in Austin, too? I don’t drink a lot of vodka…but when I do, it’s Titos.
ha! No, I’m in Houston, own a pub in Pasa(getdown)dena, and know my vodkas…