It takes a village idiot
It only takes a bumper sticker-reading comprehension level to figure out that the first lady is about as popular in Texas as road construction. So when Paul Hoffman wore his Hillary Clinton T-shirt to a recent political gathering, he was more than a little anxious.
"That took some guts," he remembers with a shudder. "I had to dig way down and say, 'We'll get through this.'"
As the coordinator of the Dallas-Fort Worth Chapter of the Hillary Clinton Fan Club nervously made his way through the room, he got some nasty looks. "Some of those good ol' boys looked at me kind of funny. It's not a macho thing to be cruising around with a Hillary T-shirt."
Before you say, What did he expect? keep in mind this was at the Democratic State Convention.
But for Hoffman, a Terrell insurance salesman, it was just part of being a Hillary fan. Already a party activist in Kaufman County, Hoffman was drawn to H.R.C. because she's "a modern-day woman." "I think a lot of guys are intimidated by her," he says.
A suggested recruiting tip gives insight into the group: "Enlighten people by speaking sincerely and with only positive remarks about Hillary. Let them know that you honor, support, and believe that our first lady is doing a remarkable job. It's so much fun to see the surprise on peoples' faces when they hear there is actually an H.R.C. Fan Club...and some want to join!"
Uh-huh.
If Buzz was surprised that a Hillary Clinton T-shirt would be questionable attire at a Democratic love-in, it made us vertiginous to learn that Hillary's fan club has GOP members. Lifelong Republican Kathleen Peterson, for example, was drawn to Hillary because she finds the first lady a good role model.
"Her husband is a whole other ball of wax," Peterson says. "But I can still support Hillary." Which, of course, presents an interesting dilemma. How do you support the divine Ms. H as Senora Numero Uno without supporting her formerly cheatin' husband? "I'm pleading the Fifth as far as this partisan stuff," Peterson says.
And Brooklyn's an outlet mall
Oak Cliff has enough problems without being slandered by a pseudosophisticated New York magazine: potholes, drive-by shootings, the odd tornado, and being the hometown of the Bulls' Dennis Rodman. (Come to think of it, what do Cliffhangers make of a favorite son who denied a very special sexual favor to Madonna, is working his way through the spectrum of hair dyes, grooves to Pearl Jam, and shares with us that to "put on a sequined halter top makes me feel like a total person"?)
In a recent New Yorker article on our beloved former D/FW Airport janitor, the final insult was delivered: "Rodman grew up in Oak Cliff, a dismal housing project in Dallas."
Get it right. It's a dismal neighborhood.
Sheesh.
