Missing Mollie

The ghost of Molly Ivins seems to be following me around these days, and so I thought I would share some of her
wit, wisdom and down home, matter of fact courage.

"I don't have any children," Molly wrote, "so I've decided to claim all the future freedom-fighters and hell-raisers as my kin. I figure freedom and justice beat having your name in marble any day. Besides, if there is another life after this one, think how much we'll get to laugh watching it all.... We may not be able to take it with us, but we can still fight for freedom after we're gone."

Sadly, our dear Molly--who taught our torches to burn bright--is gone. We miss her terribly, but surely she is still fighting for freedom, and I hope that she is laughing--watching us raise hell.

Anthony D. Romero
executive director, American Civil Liberties Union

One of the truly brave hearts in journalism, Ivins had a daring that gave us courage. Like Dorothy's dog, she drew back the fancy-looking drapery of intimidation and spin to reveal the shriveled-up wicked wizards. She cut the despots down to a size that the rest of us could bear to grapple with.

Laura Flanders
Host, Radio Nation





" Molly's humor, it must be noted, had the edge it did because it had a moral core as steady and fixed as the lone star. On the too-rare occasions when she ditched the jokes and wrote from pure, tempered anger on, say, the death penalty or the Bush Administration's gutting of habeas corpus, there was no voice registering a clearer call to conscience. There are times when it hurts too much to laugh, and this is one of them.

John Nichols
Washington Correspondent, The Nation

Molly Ivins always said she wanted to write a book about the lonely experience of East Texas civil rights campaigners to be titled No One Famous Ever Came. While the television screens and newspapers told the stories of the marches, the legal battles and the victories of campaigns against segregation in Alabama and Mississippi, Ivins recalled, the foes of Jim Crow laws in the region where she came of age in the 1950s and '60s often labored in obscurity without any hope that they would be joined on the picket lines by Nobel Peace Prize winners, folk singers, Hollywood stars or senators.
And Ivins loved those righteous strugglers all the more for their willingness to carry on.
The warmest-hearted populist ever to pick up a pen with the purpose of calling the rabble to rouse ...

She also told them, even when she was battling cancer and Karl Rove, that they should relish the lucky break of their consciences and their conflicts. Speaking truth to power is the best job in any democracy, she explained. It took her to towns across this great yet battered land to say:

"So keep fightin' for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don't you forget to have fun doin' it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce. And when you get through kickin' ass and celebratin' the sheer joy of a good fight, be sure to tell those who come after how much fun it was."

Amen Molly Ivins, we shall meet you at the Rainbow Bridge dear soul. By the way...send all the light you can in the meantime ok...its still really, really dark down here and a lot of people cannot see.