Gypsy & Willy - The Original Libertarian Bloggers

How Can You Laugh at a Time Like This?

Gypsy & Willy

No. 240

Oprah for President?

September 27, 1999

About a week ago, Paul Larsen...an old friend and minor official in the RP...and, yes, he is also the Paul Larsen that started the Web Poetry Corner several years ago...called us in the evening and posed the following puzzle. "What person could best pull off a 'Jesse' at the national level? Remember, it would have to be someone who is a nationally known celebrity, who is honest to a fault and who could win the presidency." He asked us to think about it and call him in the morning to tell him our choice.

Gypsy and Willy spent about a half hour discussing this, but the only name we could come up with was Oprah...THE Oprah Winfrey of daytime television talk show and movie star fame. Like Paul, we are extremely disgusted with the thought of Pat Buchanan or Donald Trump as the RP candidate...even more so with the possibility of either of these two actually winning. Still, we expected that Oprah would not be his choice...but...

When we called him in the morning and named Ms. Winfrey, he shouted "BINGO!" since that was exactly whom he had in mind! It seems that he had already been floating this idea with other members of the Minnesota RP and, to a person, they thought that she would be a spectacularly good choice! Most importantly, that Oprah has a good chance of WINNING! Already, a few members have resolved to get Governor Ventura behind the idea.

Similarly, when Gypsy asked people in the diner where she works, or when Willy emailed friends on the Net, while most of them did not immediately think of Oprah, when we mentioned her name, they either said "Of course!" or "Why didn't I think of her?" Some of them did not think she could win...because of her race and/or gender...but again...TO THE PERSON...they thought she was a wonderful candidate.

Given this amount of instant enthusiasm, we agreed to help build an Web site...in order to sign up the army of volunteers that will be necessary to draft her for the nomination...and even became members ourselves of the MNRP. Meanwhile Paul is working the base of the RP to raise support and generating great excitement wherever he brings up the subject.

Consider all the things that Oprah has going for her:

She has enormous name recognition and, it is fair to say, she is beloved among a very large segment of the population, especially women.



She daily demonstrates, in front of her huge television audience, that she is in touch with the day-to-day concerns of the average citizen.



She is as open and honest as anybody in the public eye, having admitted many mistakes during her life, but also demonstrating that she has learned well from experience. She is definitely NOT a CEBBTO!



She is very intelligent and thinks extremely well on her feet and under pressure. Most importantly, she displays uncommonly wise common sense!



While not as rich as Bill Gates, she is one of the wealthier women in American show business and has no ties to any particular special interest, not even show business, which has not always treated her with the utmost respect.



While she has never been elected to office, her experience running the organization behind her show demonstrates her executive abilities.



But these are only minor details compared to what her presidency might mean to the American people and to the world. We know that Oprah has declared at times that she would never run for political office, but we beg her to reconsider in light of the following facts.

If she succeeded in being elected President of the United States of America in the year 2000, she would become the VERY FIRST American Chief Executive of the Third Millennium. She would also become the VERY FIRST African-American president, the VERY FIRST female president and one of the VERY FIRST citizen-presidents (as opposed to lawyer-presidents) of modern times. At a time when the world, with U.S. leadership, desperately needs to get away from the male dominated politics of the past, she could provide the breath of fresh air that begins the process of humankind becoming truly civilized, truly able to replace "war, war, war" with "talk, talk, talk."

Given that she served two terms, she would appoint at least two, perhaps three, new supreme court justices. Like Governor Ventura in Minnesota, she could turn the lemon of having little or no up-front support in the congress into the lemonade of true non-partisan compromise on the crucial issues facing our country in the next millennium. Unlike the Lyin' King, who brings us only the APPEARANCE of being in touch with our concerns...or the two S.O.B.s ("Son Of a Bush" and "Somewhat Of a Bore") vying for the Pooblioob and Demidupe coronations (bringing us back to "royal" succession)...Oprah Winfrey will leave no doubt that she is, at heart, one of us.

For the women of the world she could demolish the glass ceiling. For non-whites, she could deliver on the promises of the end of slavery. For EVERYONE, she would be living proof that democracy works.

But all of this pales beside what she could bring to the children of the world. If she were elected president of our great nation, it would never again be in doubt that the American Dream is for EVERYONE. Every little girl hitting the books after school, every child with skin darker than the pale shade of pink, every parent hoping and striving for "The Best" for his or her children...everyone of them would know that the sky is now the limit.

It is very difficult for us freedom lovers to sell the American "revolution" to the rest of the world as long as our testosterone drenched leadership insists on bombing errant countries to "save them." As long as we behave like arrogant imperial jerks, it will be dreadfully difficult to convince anyone outside our borders that we care about them or THEIR dreams. We believe that a President Winfrey would go a long way toward restoring American greatness. What do you think?

Talk to you later...

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