I think there's a perspective that many of us are missing on this whole Cynthia McKinney debacle -- and no, I don't think we should just "stop talking about it," because the MSM is already making an enormous deal about it and I think it's clear that we as a community need to know how to deal with this.
So, I am proposing an Alternate Universe scenario: What if it had been Katherine Harris who hit a Capitol cop with her cell phone?
OK guys...breaking news, this is hysterical. did you hear that KOOKY KATHERINE HARRIS just HIT A COP because he wouldn't let her into the Capitol without some badge she had to wear???? man, i bet she's too obsessed with her makeup to even remember to wear a badge!! Or maybe she left it at home because she spent the night at Dennis Hastert's house (hehehehehehehehe). But really, HIT THE COP?!? She must have the world's worst PMS to do something that dumb. that's some good Xtian virtue she shows. hey, maybe he was another one of her "clients."
Way to go Cruella!!!!!!!! What a piece of Panhandle-fried trailer trash. Now try to beat Bill Nelson in November, hahahaha.
Could you imagine reading something like that on a leftist message board? I could.
Let's jump into an alternate universe for a second, where it was not Cynthia McKinney who hit a cop, but rather everyone's favorite Florida representative, Katherine Harris. Inevitably, the left would be filled with laughter involving boob jobs, trashy makeup, and extra blow jobs for multiple Bush brothers in order to get off the hook. The right, on the other hand, would be crying "SEXISM!" over the other side's attempt to make Ms. Harris look like a third-rate Las Vegas prostitute.
A lot of you are not going to like this analogy: I think that, in more ways than one, Cynthia McKinney is to the left what Katherine Harris is to the right. Both have been labeled as unnecessarily partisan, self-serving, and rude. Whether or not those allegations are true would require a deeper level of research, though many Kossacks have attested to attitude problems on the part of McKinney (and, if you check out the references on Wikipedia, you can see that this was hardly a first offense for her).
What I'm trying to emphasize is this. Both Congresswomen have provoked the opposite side to react in such a way that makes the Congresswoman's own side retaliate with allegations of hate -- sexism, racism, classism, what-have-you-ism. Like it or not, when we make fun of Kiss-Me Kate's bright red lipstick or her tendency to wear shirts that show off her eerily perfect bust, Michelle Malkin is going to call it "liberal sexism." It was a terrible thing when a right-wing radio host called Cynthia McKinney a "ghetto slut." But is it much better to be using the label "trailer trash" in "tit-hugging spandex" to describe a Southern woman like Katherine Harris?
There is one major difference that I really should note: yes, Katherine Harris is white. For some people, that will make comparing her to Cynthia McKinney like comparing apples and oranges. For me, it does not. They are both national politicians with a history of self-serving egotism, and it does not do the Democratic party any good to be saying things like, "But she's a black woman! He must have been insulting her!" just as we laugh endlessly at the Republicans when they say that Katherine Harris is a beautiful woman who's not afraid to show off her physical assets. If the Republicans cried racism every time we made fun of Condoleezza Rice or Alan Keyes here at dKos (which we do a lot -- though Ms. Rice isn't exactly much for drawing attention to herself unless she's shoe-shopping) we would just laugh right back at them because we'd see the ridiculous nature of it.
That's because we aren't being racists when we make fun of Condi Rice's expensive shoe habit, and likewise, we have no evidence that racism was involved in the McKinney incident. We don't know who the security cop was. We don't know whether or not he would've let in Tom DeLay without a badge. When we victimize her so early, we're jumping the gun just as Republicans are when they say we hate Katherine Harris because she's Christian. There are mean-spirited comments on both sides of a viciously partisan debate. I'm not trashing the Kossacks who make fun of Katherine Harris (heck, I'm very guilty of it myself...but I try to keep the humor free of Southern stereotypes) and I'm not trying to legitimize hateful comments about "ghetto sluts." I'm just hoping that this will help some people put this all into perspective.