America's Zimbabwe

When Sen. Hillary Clinton first announced her candidacy for president, there was optimism in some quarters. Many people believed that a female presidential candidate would be innately better than a male. Many believe that women make better politicians because they are supposedly more humane and have better people skills.

Sadly, Clinton has repeatedly demonstrated to female politicians can be just as disgraceful as their male counterparts.

Why people believed the myth of female superiority is beyond me. Granted, this is a small sample, but only three women in modern times have been elected to lead a world power: India's Indira Gandhi, Israel's Golda Meir and Britain's Margaret Thatcher.

Every one of them ruled with as much, if not more, machismo than any male. And this isn't surprising. A male leader that shows restraint is praised for wisdom (perhaps not in this country). A female leader that shows restraint is condemned for weakness.

Thus, it's no surprise that Clinton has waged a far more aggressive, obnoxious, one might say masculine, campaign than Sen. Barack Obama.

While you may not need testicles to be commander-in-chief, apparently you need to act like you do. The phrase 'more Catholic than the Pope' seems to apply here.

Too bad there is no requirement for there to be a relationship between a candidate's brain and mouth.

Earlier this week, she invoked the assassination of Bobby Kennedy to justify her continued presence in the race.

Both Kennedy and Clinton came from other states to New York for the sole purpose of becoming US Senator as a stepping stone to what they felt was their God-given right to the presidency.

But that's about all they had in common. Kennedy inspired people. Clinton divides people.

I suppose this isn't quite scandalous, even if it's a lame attempt by a corporate candidate to invoke a liberal icon. It is a historical fact that the 1968 Democratic primary season extended into June, which was her point.

But then she tried a weasely 'apology' with a transparent attempt to suck up to liberals who've never taken to her corporate campaign.

"The Kennedys have been much on my mind the last days because of Senator Kennedy," she added, referring to Sen. Edward M. Kennedy's recent diagnosis of a brain tumor. "I regret that if my referencing that moment of trauma for our entire nation and in particular the Kennedy family was in any way offensive. I certainly had no intention of that whatsoever."

If you believe that, I have some oceanfront property in Zimbabwe to sell you.

Then, much like her Bosnia fantasies, she decided to invent history again.

Clinton said "it is unprecedented in history" for political activists to urge a candidate to withdraw when his or her chances of winning the nomination appear remote. In fact, such events have happened several times.

I'm surprised she didn't claim to be at RFK's side when he was shot.

But far and away the most outrageous attempt this totally disgraced candidate to remain relevant was Hillary's remarks comparing Florida to Zimbabwe.

As you may know, the Florida Democratic Party decided to hold its primary earlier than allowed by the rules of the national Democratic Party. So the national party is rejecting Florida's delegates because the state party refused to follow the rules that all Democrats agreed to before the nomination process started.

Zimbabwe, by contrast, is a country where is voting rigged by a brutal dictator and his mafia. A place where the dictatorship maintains brainwashing concentration camps. It organizes mobs that beat, and even murder, opponents. It hijacks food aid away from opposition areas. It trumps up treason charges against opposition leaders. It bombs non-compliant media outlets. It bans foreign journalists. Its brutality and stupidity has caused a thorough economic meltdown and created millions of political and economic refugees.

I'm no fan of Gov. Jeb Bush, but anyone who has the audacity to compare Florida to Zimbabwe should be immediately disqualified for any important office, either on the grounds of stupidity (if the candidate actually believes the comparison) or grotesque shamelessness (if she doesn't).

There are people starving to death in Zimbabwe. There are people being beaten by lynch mobs. The stupidity of the Florida Democratic Party is beyond trivial by comparison.