LET'S DECLARE AUGUST 8 "MOLLYDAY"

by Steve Young

I beseech writers and websites all over the world to make August 8th, Molly Ivin's birthday, a day of satire. A day where they drop their on-the-money reflections and replace them with cleverly-worded, insightful, and inciting, columns and blogs that give readers credit for being able to think past the words. A day in which the Albion Monitor might take the lead, honoring Molly's legacy by allowing only satirically poignant posts.

And if I might up the ante just a bit, we can do more.

Molly Ivin's far-too-hasty exit left a huge humorless hole in the world of the sharp-as-a-knife written word. Countless tributes from reader's and writers' hearts reminded us of what important, satirical gold she provided during her life, but homage to her demands a far headier task for writer and reader alike. Paying genuine tribute to this word smith who courageously challenged authority calls for taking up the fight. And it won't be easy.

Yesterday, (Warning: Humongous Name Drop Ahead) Penny Marshall told me, "Satire scares me." It should. Exposing hypocrisy carries with it enormous responsibility. It's like admitting to someone else that we need to lose weight. We're on record. Now if we don't do something about it, we can't ever see that "someone else" ever again until we actually lose weight, because, if we didn't, it would expose ourselves as hypocrites.

But also, when you punch holes in the emperor's facade, you could end up a target yourself, with a prevaricating Vice Emperor taking deadly aim at your credibility. 'Course his Lords of Loud would carry that message 24/7 across the airwaves until the liberal mainstream town criers would legitimize it reporting it as the other half of the truth.

Why would the powerful take such offense to what their lock-steppers would deem only as, at best, an off-the-mark joke from some wise guy? Because they know that imbedded in the satirist's assaults are bullets of truth that can injure far worse than a scattershot shotgun in the hands of a Vice Emperor. The powerful will do everything to label naysayers as uninformed buffoons. For if they ever did accept the satirist's premise, they would be faced with the worst their therapists are paid to reveal...

....everything they believe has been wrong.

But that's what Molly fearlessly did and we can only give her just due by doing more of the same.

In my upcoming book, "The Power of Satire...The Left's Secret Weapon And How It Will Affect, And In All Possibility, Win The 2008 Election For The Candidate Who Is Less Of A Joke Than The One He or She Is Running Against," I make the argument for a call to words.

While I am working feverishly to shorten the title, I'm working just as hard to point out that the Left has a sword that should be used, deftly, honestly, to cut an illuminating hole in the oh-too-carefully-crafted balderdash that candidates on both sides use as justification to be elected.

My suspicion is that by the 2008 election we will be so entirely fed up with the gibberish and deception that we will be ready to admit that our past blind faith in the what we had hoped was the truth, but was never intended to be, needs to be put out to pasture with the rest of the manure.

But it will take a healthy and unremitting effort on the part of writers (and "performers"). Done right it will not only begin a heart and soul cleansing for the public, but it will deliver a pungent warning to those who are determined to continue the masquerade. In 2008, whenever they attempt to pass off blather as truth, satire must raise its side-splitting smarts, revealing those who try to makes fools of us, as the biggest fools -- and on the first Tuesday of November -- losers.

Molly wouldn't accept any less.