November 29, 2013
Leonard Pitts
The Miami Herald
3511 NW 91st Street
Miami. FL 33172

RE: Thanks be to Allah we ain’t yet run by the Taliban. Some comments on your column of 11/27/13 about the horrors, the horrors of never reaching the horizon.

Mr. Pitts,

Before I get to the good part about male misogyny – Can there be any other kind? – keeping your daughter from being all that she wants to be I have an academic/cultural question.

You say that she is an English major.

Perhaps she will know.

Is Wordsworth, despite his devotion to daffodils, still considered to be a male chauvinist pig by the elders of the feminist, hecates all, deconstructive sophists in the All Chick Literature Hall of Fame?

I am preparing for my traditional end of year book shredding. [Shredding you say? I no longer burn them. Rather, I dispose of them in an environmentally sensitive manner. It is a small thing but it’s a start to reduce my carbon foot print to help save the baby seal eating drowning polar bears. It’s the least I can do.] Who says a founding member of the “vast Right-Wing conspiracy” can’t be a fan of clean air? Send me your list.

If you tell me her favorite poet is Rod McKuen or, worse, Maya Angelou, I’ll be shocked, shocked.

But I digress.

You say

“When she launches her career [social work], she’s
likely to face barriers to advancement common to
American women – lower pay, workplace misogyny,
And that ceiling of glass through which she will be
Able to see the next step but be barred from taking it.”
The Herald
You

3 things, perhaps more.

#1 – Are you saying that if your daughter gets a degree in social work and works for the city of Fort Lauderdale, Broward County, the state of Florida or the Federal government she will be paid less because she lacks a prostate gland?

If so I know any number of underemployed lawyers who will take her case on a double contingency basis. A – If they don’t win the lawyers get bupkis and –B- If lose they will pay her. A win/ win for her.

Such is the cultural fervor for “fairness” that she would be better served, if she intends to be a litigant in the court of perpetually outraged victimhood, to get a Doctorate. It’s like Final Jeopardy without the Jeopardy. Plus, the scores can really change. So can the dough.

#2 – Workplace misogyny? I hoped that 5 years of change would have “fundamentally transformed” all that. Silly me! That’s the last time I’ll ever believe a politician.

The traditional modern American Liberal solution – See a problem? Write a law correcting it. Have Judge Draco enforce it. – may not be the best one available.

Tell her to read about Lysistrata and Antigone.

It didn’t necessarily “work” for them but after 25 centuries it still is a good conversation starter.

Tell her to think about Golda Meir and Margaret Thatcher as role models, it being a bit late for an Evita reprise.

Do you think the Incognito/Martin brouhaha is worthy of mention here?

#3 – About the impenetrable “glass ceiling”…perhaps a review of Hillary Clinton’s rise to fame, power, money [she gets $450,000 per speech], and high office is in order.

She was hired by the largest law firm in Little Rock, Arkansas the day after her husband was elected Attorney General of Arkansas.

She was made a partner by the largest law firm in Little Rock, Arkansas the day after her husband was elected Governor of Arkansas.

She was made an outside director of the largest company in Arkansas after her husband was re-elected Governor of Arkansas. [It must be noted that within hours of her resigning her seat on the board of Wal-Mart the company turned to the dark side. Worker exploitation, sexual harassment, homophobia are proudly proclaimed as company goals. Their $4 prescription plan is just a ploy to get all single moms, women of color with children in need of a good Ritalin program and Midnight Basketball, to buy prescriptions there. Once they do the price will go to the moon. Since we know that poor people cannot exercise consumer rights Wal-Mart will “own” them. Just you wait and see.]

One more thing before I go.

Perhaps your daughter – Did she go to public high school like President Bush’s daughters did and President Obama’s daughters didn’t? – may want to spend some time consulting with Clio, the Muse of History.

Her assignment is to research why the victory at Tours – the paradigmatic template for good guys beating bad guys – is the most significant military event in Western Civilization

Her starting point is to show what would have happened if the winners and the losers were reversed.

I read this morning where the WOG mullahs in Nigeria steam rolled 250,000 bottle of beer. While I night be in favor of smashing 250,000 bottles of Lite-Beer swill it is a slippery slope down which I do not want to go. At the bottom, in addition to the dreaded chilling effect, are people who want to bring back stoning as one solution to the adultery problem. Talk about social work on steroids!

Does she know that while Western theologians used to debate how many angels could dance on the head of a pin their Islamic counterparts now debate what size stones to use in their no-fault divorce courts? If the stones were too big the lady didn’t suffer long enough. If the stones were too small the lady suffered too long. The search for the right size stone, like the quest for the Holy Grail and the horizon, is never ending.
Woman’s reach must exceed her grasp or what’s the sense of it all?

I too am thankful that Malala lives. Deo volente that she “will not only endure but that she will prevail”.

All the more reason that your daughter’s potential troubles are small, indeed tiny, minuscule, compared to hers.

What a country!




Kevin Smith