Dec 30, 2008 12:52 PM
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New York, 11:10 AM
Wed Feb 10
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Alternate-universe President-elect Cynthia McKinney hopped on a boat to Gaza with 3 tons of medical supplies and then they were rammed by Israelis and forced to dock in Lebanon, where CNN cameras were waiting.
Cynthia McKinney, whose slight off-her-rocker-ness is matched and often beaten by a good dozen of her former colleagues in America's House of Representatives, from Ron Paul through Michelle Bachmann, but who is invariably mocked and marginalized because she is a nutty antiwar leftist and not a baby-farming lunatic religious fruitcake moron (Bachmann) or a H. G. Wellsian 18th century time traveler in a world he didn't create (Paul), is famous mostly for punching a Capitol Policeman in 2006.
Here's the deal with that: McKinney had been a Representative for 13 years. Representatives are allowed to bypass the Capitol metal detectors and security line. It helps if they wear their member pins, but not all of them do so, obviously. McKinney had a history with the capitol police—during her first term they tried to arrest her as she entered the capitol and skipped the metal detector, because they didn't recognize her. So then for years afterwards, there was a photo of her hanging on the office wall, to remind Capitol cops that this crazy-looking black woman was actually a member! This didn't stop them from assuming her 23-year-old white aide was the congresswoman a few years later.
Then, in 2006, she got a haircut. Now the Cap Police had no clue who this woman is and so, obviously, they chased her down the hall and attempted to stop her from entering the building. And she either hit a cop with a cell phone or "a closed fist," depending on whether you believe the police report (closed fist) or early media reports (cell phone). Either way, it was probably not a knockout blow, coming from this 50-year-old firebrand. McKinney apologized and the cop threatened to press charges, he was so furious about the poke he suffered after stopping the seven-term congresswoman for attempting to legislate while black.
Now McKinney is decidedly nutty, what with filing lawsuits to dispute the results of the following primary election that ended her congressional career and so on, but, you know, she means well.
Anyway. She recently hopped on a medical supply boat and attempted to head to Gaza, and some Israeli gunboats rammed them three times (Israeli Foreign Ministry officials say the boat was struck accidentally) out in international waters, forcing them to dock in Lebanon, where McKinney gave another insane press conference. Her boat was called The Dignity.
Send an email to Alex Pareene, the author of this post, at alexp@gawker.com.
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