Martha Stewart For President
A Gay Opinion 8/10/02
by R. A. Melos
Martha Stewart. The name alone invokes images of pure white linen table clothes,
fine china, elegant crystal, tasteful silverware, beautiful and fragrant flora
centerpieces, and perfection. Now this pillar of good taste in everything held
dear by those who strive for perfection in their daily lives, is embroiled in
a financial scandal making world headlines. Oops! I guess that's not a good
thing.
My problem with the entire Martha Stewart mess isn't so much the allegations
of insider trading. After all, if we really analyze what it is Martha Stewart
does for a living, we will realize she is the queen of insider trading. Her
popularity soars with each little bit of inside information on where to find
the very best antiques, the very best flora arrangers, the very best linens
and bed sheets (Martha Stewart brand name, of course).
No, my problem stems more from the feeling Martha, icon of virtuous perfect
that she is, is a victim of societal double standards. Now I'm not going along
the route of successful women are a threat to the male dominated business world.
No, this is far more basic than a battle of the sexes.
Martha succeeded by doing what we are all taught to do by society. She worked
hard, and took advantage of the opportunities which presented themselves. While
she is a model of virtuosity to many, she is a real flesh and blood human being
who managed to claw her way to the top of the frivolous heap by passing on information
on distressing antiques, and growing your own strawberries.
All she did, if we are to believe the media, is take a bit of information which
came her way, and use it to her advantage. Isn't that what each and every one
of us is taught to do in school? Aren't we taught to stay alert to information
and use it to help advance our position either socially or financially.
I will admit much of this is corporate style thinking, usually resulting in
the reward of the golden key to the executive washroom, but it is put into practical
use on every level of society from boardroom, to bedroom, to the county fairs
where one-upmanship in the cake baking contests is as blood thirsty and competitive
as a hockey game.
Viewing things from this perspective, I fail to see where Martha did anything
wrong. Everyday, people profit from someone else's problems. Doesn't the banking
industry profit from foreclosing on a defaulted on loan, thus profiting from
someone's financial pain? Heck, didn't the original settlers of America profit
from the naiveté of the Native Americans by unloading a trunk load of
costume jewelry for Manhattan Island?
All Martha may have done was to act on some information innocently passed along,
perhaps over a nice meal of ginger-carrot soup, a crisp endive salad with walnut
vinaigrette dressing, delicate crab stuffed pastries, saffron rice and white
baby asparagus tips in a cream sauce, with a sweet and tempting raspberry and
blueberry torte topped with fresh whipped cream for dessert. Information served
up like that would be much too hard to ignore, and it wasn't as though she made
a pig of herself and went back for seconds.
So why does it seem the government wants to roast Martha on a spit? Is it jealousy
over the fact she did something so many of them have done in the past, and she
obviously did it better and with more style and good taste than they? Or is
it something much darker in the human psyche which causes hypocrisy to rear
up in politicos, making them wish to appear as the gate keeps of morality when
someone not socially unlike themselves, with no real political agenda, does
something of a one-upmanship maneuver causing the judges of public opinion to
award a blue ribbon of excellence to one who is not a member of that particular
club?
As I said, I fail to see where she did anything anyone one of us, when presented
with a similar situation, wouldn't do. She thought of her own best interests
first, and that is what makes America great. Oh, I know. The world changed and
we all have to think of our fellow man and how our actions will effect him.
Well, if that's the case, instead of persecuting Martha Stewart for alleged
insider trading, she should be brought up on charges of being too perfect of
an image for the rest of us to live up to.
Come on! How many of us mere mortals can bake a perfect cherry pie, from cherries
we picked in our own orchard, cut down the very tree from which the cherries
were picked and turn the wood into a charming dinette set on which we can then
serve the perfect cherry pie?
If anything, Martha Stewart finally, after decades of being above mere mortals
when it came to domesticity, has shown she is, underneath it all, one of us!
I say stop badgering her and run her for office. I'll bet she could balance
the budget and clean up the war on terrorism, and unite the entire world for
a sit down dinner for eight billion all before the ballots are counted.