MOPPING UP

Now you might think that some things are really clear but you would be wrong. There seems to be some scientific agreement that there are two genders in the human race. Unfortunately most do not subscribe to this, but that is only because women have not been diligent about mopping up the word opposite.

The prime mopper-upper for the White House is without a doubt, Ari Fleischer, who must constantly translate exactly what Dubya said. And also what Cheney, Powell, Ashcroft or Rumsfeld meant or why the Democrats and the foreign media are un-American terrorists.

However he recently "attempted to shoot the moon" himself and leaned a bit too far into the White House mop-up jar. He pulled out the perennial whipping boy, Bill Clinton, as the person who caused all the Mid East problems. Went much too far even for a Bushie and had to come out to the press core and eat a liberal helping of crow. So by mopping up a mopping up of a mopping up he accomplished a mopping up trifecta.

Of course it's all about words and phrases. There are several Bushie mega-bloopers still hanging out there shivering in the winds and causing the White House tons of public embarrassment. These make the project of cleaning up toxic waste sites look like a kindergarten exercise.

There's that evil axis thing. There has been a raft of explanations about why that was said, why it shouldn't have been said and who put it in the speech for Dubya to say (that speechwriter got fired.) But it won't go away. It led inexorably to the North Korean government calling Dubya "a politically backward child."

And since this description dovetails so completely with most of the political cartoons showing Dubya as a child in Cheney's lap, it is a difficult phrase to launch a counterattack against.

Then there is the recently revealed, Office of Strategic Influence. We learn that the military created it to plant false stories in the foreign press. Just Rummy's way of making the war sexier so everyone would like Dubya's plans better and stop writing the truth about his cowboy diplomacy.

When some unusually diligent reporter uncovered the OSI and its nefarious purpose, the media got really upset because they were being lied to. Then the great mopping up games began, culminating in Rummy closing the office. However, no amount of mopping up has been able to hang a loincloth over the naked truth that Rummy and his military junta lie to us.

It confirmed what has long been suspected, the Bushies run a "don't ask, don't tell" administration. They don't ask! They operate like a dictatorship without regard for Congress or the Constitution. They don't tell! They hide their deliberations and actions behind closed doors from Congress and the American voters.

You could hear the clicking tisk tisk's all over the Bible belt when Colin Powell advised the use of condoms to combat AIDS. How could he NOT know that God had put AIDS on earth to punish homosexuals? Many GOPpers want Colin taken to the woodshed and thrashed for using that C word. Sieg heil!

Ashcroft, of course, is still in there fighting for more mendacity and less baring of the breast. A team player to the end he drapes the statues of anatomically correct women and men in the Department of Justice. Gawd! What would happen to this world if it ever got out that people had sexual parts! Mop that!

As for the gender enigma, it all started eons ago when those of the male gender considered themselves human beings and considered women as their property just like their animals and dwellings. During those many years, men defined themselves as strong, intelligent, brave and leader.

When the time came that women asserted themselves and demanded equal rights to a HUMAN gender of their own, they were labeled the OPPOSITE sex or gender. The opposite of the male sex or gender were defined as weak, stupid, cowardly and follower.

Of course many women defy that definition but the conditioning of the eons has not been mopped up sufficiently to erase the attitude of most males toward most females or for that matter, many females toward their own gender.

Maureen Dowd writes in her piece, "Mean, Nasty and Missing":

"Could it be that alpha men do not want to share their alpha zone with alpha women?

Could it be that they don't want women to challenge them, question them or, heaven forbid, outmaneuver them?

Could it be that they prefer the less competitive and more appreciative company of beta, gamma and va- voom girls?"

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/27/opinion/27DOWD.html

twanda@gendergappers.org       

2002-009

Copyright 2002 Renee T. Louise and Ruth M. Sprague, Ph.D. These articles may be republished for noncommercial use only, provided that they are copied intact, and that this copyright notice is attached. Address all queries to: twanda@gendergappers.org.