For conservatives in need of a laugh today, CNN has you covered, with this story: “Maxine Waters Is Having a Moment.” Yes, that Maxine Waters.
Waters, the longest-serving black woman in Congress, has attracted the kind of Internet buzz not seen since Sen. Bernie Sanders, whose rumpled look and talk of revolution endeared him to mostly white millennials, particularly young men. Waters is a favorite of the black twitterati and a fairly broad swath of progressives, who find her blunt talk of resistance and impeachment refreshing. . . .
She is now “Auntie Maxine,” a GIF-able, highly quotable and T-shirt worthy progressive darling.
An article on Elle.com declared: “Congresswoman Maxine Waters Will Read You Now.”
A Salon writer listed five reasons Maxine Waters should be our next president.
There are several other examples.
According to FiveThirtyEight.com, since shortly before Inauguration Day the 78-year-old California Democrat has mentioned impeachment nearly 25 times in public interviews. She’s mused about the scenario so recklessly even Nancy Pelosi has tried to distance herself.
But, then, this is not unusual. Waters regularly called for the impeachment of George W. Bush after the invasion of Iraq, and she was a cosponsor of the House resolution to impeach Dick Cheney.
So, what kind of leader does Waters like? In fact, she’s been an outspoken and unflagging supporter of Fidel Castro since her election to the House in 1990. In 1998, when she accidentally voted in favor of a House resolution calling on the Cuban government to extradite convicted cop-killer Assata Shakur, Waters sent a letter to Castro “clarifying” her vote: She did not support extradition; Shakur had been the victim of “illegal, clandestine political persecution.” Two years later, when the Cuban dictator — not exactly a stranger to “clandestine political persecution” – visited Harlem’s Riverside Church, Waters was there to greet him, chanting “¡Viva Fidel!” with the crowd.
It’s no surprise that peddling the political fantasy of impeachment proceedings is proving attractive in certain, dispirited quarters. But millennials really think this batty supporter of a dictatorship with a gulag is a credible voice of #TheResistance?
If you don’t laugh, you’ll cry.