TPA 2007 GOLD STARS: MOLLY IVINS

Molly Ivins.

Had Molly Ivins been born in 1984 instead of 1944, she might have been a modern-day blogger. Instead, she was an award-winning, best selling journalist, columnist and author. A Texan, a progressive, a feminist, and a survivor, Molly Ivins passing earlier this year marked the end of an era for Texans and those who loved her fiery, populist brand. Molly Ivins gave progressives a prominent, national, voice.

In honoring someone as distinguished as the late, great Molly Ivins, sometimes it's best to do so in someone else's words. In this case, Molly's:

I used to say, having once been a card-carrying Sixties radical, that if I had to be called a liberal, I'd just as soon be the worst kind of liberal -- a bleeding heart. I wound up being a liberal because I was for civil rights and against the war in Vietnam and that's what I got called. I missed the New Deal and McCarthyism and all that good business.

I've got more important things to worry about -- three-year-old kids getting raped and denied admission to a hospital because their mamas don't have any money and things like that. I carry neither brief nor guilt for the many sins of liberals past and present: there’s too much to bleed over. And laugh over.

Indeed, Molly Ivins. Indeed. For this and more, we name you a Texas Progressive Alliance 2007 Gold Star.