ALLEN WEST IS AN OFFICER AND A GENTLEMAN: NOEMIE EMERY

http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/2011/07/officer-and-gentleman

An officer and a gentleman

By: Noemie Emery | Examiner Columnist | 07/26/11 8:05 PM

Rep. Allen West, R-Fla., is an officer and a gentleman, a career soldier elected to Congress in the 2010 midterms.

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., is a shrew and a feminist (perhaps we repeat ourselves), and also a demagogue, fond of blaming her foes for wanting to starve little children.

When she attacked West last week when he was not in the chamber, it set off a clash of two worlds. Wasserman Schultz belongs to (and is stuck in) the mid-1970s, steeped in the brews of groupthink and victimhood, believing pro-lifers wage wars against women and that pro-life women aren’t “women” at all.

West hails from any time between the Crusades and the late 19th century, and is the kind of officer played in films by Sean Connery, rash now and then, and quick on the trigger, but respected and loved by his men.

He descends from the honor code of the warrior, in which personal honor is everything; she from the dishonor code of identity politics, in which an attack on one person becomes a de facto attack on any sex, creed or color the person belongs to, unless the person doesn’t believe in identity politics, in which case all bets must be off.

It is sexist to criticize Wasserman Schultz, but not Sarah Palin; anti-Semitic to criticize Wasserman Schultz, but not Eric Cantor; racist to criticize Barack Obama, but not Allen West.

And indeed, the attacks upon West by Wasserman Schultz’s defenders seem out of the source book for race-baiting slanders decried by the left in times past.

Rep. Jackie Speier, D-Calif., said West’s remarks reeked of “harassment,” raising images of Emmett Till, murdered for whistling at a white woman, and Clarence Thomas, whose presence on the Supreme Court after the sisterhood failed to lynch him in spirit rankles the left to this day.

“They ought to take him to the woodshed,” said Rep. Gwen Moore, D-Wis., suggesting she thinks him an uppity n-word. “Let’s remember all the discussion about how Barack Obama had to fend off the ‘angry black man’ stereotype,” commented Ann Althouse.

“Racists: Democrats Demand Allen West Apologize for Criticizing White Woman,” posted Glenn Reynolds, wickedly adding, “I guess they figure he doesn’t know his place.”

His place, it would seem, is among the titans of literature, at least, to the Washington Post. The Reliable Source put West’s picture between those of Jane Austen and Charlotte Bronte, daring the readers to tell them apart:

“Nasty, yes — but what gorgeous 19th century prose!” the paper exulted. “Can you tell which rich disses were penned by the tea party freshman, and which by the great ladies of Bonnet Fiction? Answers below.”

And indeed the West email: “From this time forward, understand that I shall defend myself against your heinous, characterless behavior .You are [a] vile, unprofessional, and despicable member … You have proven … repeatedly that you are not a Lady, therefore shall not be rewarded due respect from me!”

That is indistinguishable in tone from the writings of Bronte and Austen, as in: “Your manners, impressing me with the fullest belief of your arrogance, your conceit, and your selfish disdain of the feelings of others, were such as to form the groundwork of disapprobation on which succeeding events have built so immovable a dislike.”

The world would be a better place (and much, much more literate) if there were more people like Allen West and Charlotte Bronte. It would be a better place, too, if every department of race/gender studies were shut down immediately, and every “professor” therein put to work cleaning toilets.

Transgender toilets, of course.

Examiner Columnist Noemie Emery is contributing editor to The Weekly Standard and author of “Great Expectations: The Troubled Lives of Political Families.”

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/2011/07/officer-and-gentleman#ixzz1TOrgpjLn

 

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