Nancy Pelosi = Pussy Galore?

By Michael J.W. Stickings

You just can't make this shit up, not with the RNC (and the Republican Party generally) sinking to yet another new low:

She's the 69-year-old speaker of the House of Representatives, second in the line of succession and the most powerful woman in U.S. history.

But when you see Nancy Pelosi, the Republican National Committee wants you to think "Pussy Galore." At least that's the takeaway from a video released by the committee this week – a video that puts Pelosi side-by-side with the aforementioned villainess from the 1964 James Bond film "Goldfinger."

The RNC video, which begins with the speaker's head in the iconic spy-series gun sight, implies that Pelosi has used her feminine wiles to dodge the truth about whether or not she was briefed by the CIA on the use of waterboarding in 2002. While the P-word is never mentioned directly, in one section the speaker appears in a split screen alongside the Bond nemesis – and the video's tagline is "Democrats Galore."

The video, of course, is deeply sexist, but perhaps most of all it's just plain stupid. Obviously, the intent is to cast Pelosi not just as a villain but as a dangerous woman with her hands on the levers of power -- and yet, also, as a pussy. (I'm sure Republicans prefer the 'c' word, but even they wouldn't go there publicly.) To characterize not just one of the leaders of the Democratic Party but also one of the most powerful women in American history is shameful -- and all-too-typical for the Republican Party. (Steve Benen has more on what else Pelosi is being called on the right.)

And it goes further than that -- although I'm not sure, beyond the obvious, what the makers of the video know of the Pussy Galore character, both in the book and in the movie (Goldfinger, one of the best Bonds). (Check out Wikipedia.) She runs an organized crime ring, but she's also a lesbian -- hence the sexual subtext, not so hidden, bubbling beneath the surface of the RNC video, intentional or not. And, at first, she is indeed a Bond "nemesis," a "villainess." The thing is, she ends up switching sides, turning on Goldfinger and helping Bond thwart his plan to rob Fort Knox. And, of course, she ends up with Bond at the end, a lesbian no more, or at least not in the arms of Sean Connery.

Again, the video is sexist and stupid -- and ridiculously obvious in its vicious intent.

Perhaps the next RNC effort will be a follow-up with Pelosi as Alotta Fagina.

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Taylor Marsh notes that the video currently up on the RNC website (see below) is somewhat different than the one that first appeared.

But even this new one is pretty bad: