OPINION:
John Conyers, under fire from women who’ve accused him of sexual misconduct, may have stepped aside from his ranking Judiciary Committee position.
But to left-leaning notables like MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Conyers is still an “icon,” worthy and deserving of political admiration and support.
The Democrats: The Party of Bill Clinton.
Scarborough, as the Daily Caller noted: “Tell me, what do you call this person before this happened, a guy who was a Korean war veteran, a guy who when he got into Congress there were four black members in Congress, a guy who single-handedly started the Congressional Black Caucus. … I would call that an icon, I would call that an icon and if you’re offended by that … well let me just say that you remind me an awful lot of the Bible thumpers I grew up with.”
Hmm.
Pelosi, meanwhile, said over the weekend that Conyers “is an icon in our country” who has “done a great deal to protect women.”
From himself?
She didn’t say. But she did talk about the Violence Against Women Act that Conyers supported — as if that blots out sexual harassment.
“But he is still an icon,” Scarborough’s co-host, Mike Brzezinski, said.
Conyers, meanwhile, has stepped down from his leadership Judiciary slot — albeit, while admitting nothing.
“I deny these allegations,” he said, CNN reported, “many of which were raised by documents reportedly paid for by a partisan alt-right blogger. I very much look forward to vindicating myself and my family before the House Committee on Ethics.”
What’s interesting is the meaning of icon.
Technically, Scarborough and Pelosi are quite correct. Conyers is an icon — he is, as Dictionary.com defines, “a sign or representation that stands for its object by virtue of a resemblance or analogy to it.”
It’s just that his iconic status isn’t so much one of civil justice, but now, of sexual harassment.
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