At the Weekly Standard, Matt Labash greatly amuses with Hillary Goes to Wal-Mart. I can't even begin to summarize the goodness, but here are some excerpts:
Fairfax, VirginiaWait until Bubba hits the book circuit, he won't be able to resist personal inscriptions.
It's hard to describe the electricity one feels when crossing this Northern Virginia strip-mall parking lot to attend Hillary Clinton's "Living History" book-signing. But I haven't been this excited about Wal-Mart since my one-hour photos came back in 25 minutes. It makes me feel all sprightly and young again--as if it were 1998.
Hillary has yet to arrive, but already, her fans and detractors are sparring. On one side of the street, snaking out of the store through the lawn'n'garden section, are the Hillaryites. They carry umbrellas and folding chairs and squeeze-bottles. They look like public librarians and NPR pledge-drivers. They arrive as early as 9 A.M. to snatch up all 2,000 books and be in place to get them signed at 7:30 that evening. They are a patient, trusting people. And they will need patience to endure the taunts of their opponents, standing across the way on a median strip.
...
The Hillaryites are frustrated, but a bellicose, heavyset woman starts trying to rally the troops by screaming "Bozo! Bush is a BOZO!" I scramble over to her and try to conduct an interview. But she's tasted blood and finds it difficult to stop. She tries to respond to questions and wage war at the same time. The effect is that of a Tourette's sufferer short of medication: "My name is Tina, and those are BOZO LOVERS! BUSH IS BOZO THE CLOWN! Hi, who you with? BOZO! Who do you write for? DOWN WITH BOZO!"
Across the street, Freepers are getting satisfaction. "Do you feel the love?" smiles one of them. But they up the ante with the announcement of a "Hillary Book Toss." It's done in homage to Hillary, who reportedly once chucked an ashtray at her husband's head. Whoever throws the book farthest gets to keep it and get it signed by Hillary. Just as the Freepers announce this, Wal-Mart security moves in and tells them they will have to conduct the book toss over to the side, on a grassy knoll. Safety comes first. Initially, I think security just wants to ensure that nobody sustains a head injury by getting clipped with the 562-page behemoth. But after reading it, I see the less obvious concern: If the book had fallen open to page 465, where Hillary tells a friend, "My husband may have his faults, but he has never lied to me," someone might have laughed himself to death.
...
But Hillary greets everyone with a smile, as her eyes bulge big--so big that the whites attain 360-degree clearance around her irises.
To the people assembled, this expression means different things. To her fans, her eyes say, "I'm one of you--just a gal who likes to stop by Wal-Mart for a Sam's Choice cola and a $1.78 Nacho Chile Pie." To her moderate critics, they say, "Look at me, I'm almost human." To her Freeper-style critics, the eyes say, "Back off, or I'll ice you, just like I iced Vince Foster." To me, they don't say much of anything, since her staffers won't let reporters near her.
Instead, I swim around the plastic flip-flop racks and Prayer Bear stuffed animals, to interview her supporters in line. Just for kicks, and to see if they are as gullible as Hillary purports to be, I ask when exactly during impeachment year they finally believed that Bill Clinton had had a relationship with Monica Lewinsky. Here are their verbatim responses: Hillaryite 1: "When he said so." Hillaryite 2: "I don't remember." Hillaryite 3: "I don't remember." Hillaryite 4: "When he admitted it." Hillaryite 5: "I think he was set up by the Republicans."
Hitting the other end of the line, I grab a Hillaryite to ask how his signing went. "She's pure evil," he says. "She's a cancer on America." It turns out he's not a Hillary fan at all. But he stood in line for nearly four hours just to try to get her to inscribe his book, "To BJ," which stands for . . . well, her husband knows. He also wanted to get his picture taken with her--as he flipped her the bird. He didn't succeed, and now he's kicking himself: "It was something my grandchildren might have said, 'You know, I'm proud of granddad.'"
