October 6, 2008--The Real Mavericks
Near the end of the vice presidential debate, clearly exasperated that Sarah Palin had called her running mate and herself a maverick at least a half dozen times—including once labeling McCain as “the consummate maverick” and the two of them “a team of mavericks—Joe Biden blew. This time appropriately.
He in effect said, “I’ve had it with this maverick business. I know John McCain and he’s no maverick when it comes to issues that closely affect the American people. He’s no maverick when it comes to the war; he’s no maverick when it comes to expanding health care for children; he’s no maverick when it comes to improving education. Since 2000 McCain has supported Bush more than 90 percent of the times. Some maverick.”
Sarah Palin chirped on but the point stuck. Post debate polls indicated that Biden had won by a wide margin.
And now it seems that there are other reasons not to let McCain and Palin get away with strutting around calling themselves mavericks.
I had not known until yesterday when the New York Times noted that the word “maverick” itself comes from the name of a literal family of Marvericks, one of the earliest of whom, Samuel Augustus Maverick, a Texas cattle rancher, who, back in the 1800s, became well known for not branding his cattle since he cared more about keeping track of his land than his cattle. Which, as unbranded, were called “Mavericks.”
Thus, one version of the dictionary definition of “maverick”—one who doesn’t bear another’s brand.
S.A. Maverick’s predecessors and descendents were also by that definition true mavericks. Back in the 1600s, in Boston, an ancestor got in all sorts of trouble when he agitated in favor of granting rights to indentured servants.
In fact, politically, for generations, they have been of the decidedly liberal persuasion. So much so that 82 year-old San Antonio native, Terrellita Maverick, whose brother is a board member of the ACLU of Texas, fumed that John McCain, who voted almost always with his party, “is in no way a maverick, in uppercase or lowercase. It’s just incredible—the nerve!—to suggest that he’s not part of that Republican herd.” “Every time we hear [him or her] claim to be mavericks all my children and I and all my family shrink a little and say, ‘Oh, my God, he’s said it again.’ He’s a Republican,” she said. “He’s branded.”
She may be 82 but she sure knows her metaphors.
He in effect said, “I’ve had it with this maverick business. I know John McCain and he’s no maverick when it comes to issues that closely affect the American people. He’s no maverick when it comes to the war; he’s no maverick when it comes to expanding health care for children; he’s no maverick when it comes to improving education. Since 2000 McCain has supported Bush more than 90 percent of the times. Some maverick.”
Sarah Palin chirped on but the point stuck. Post debate polls indicated that Biden had won by a wide margin.
And now it seems that there are other reasons not to let McCain and Palin get away with strutting around calling themselves mavericks.
I had not known until yesterday when the New York Times noted that the word “maverick” itself comes from the name of a literal family of Marvericks, one of the earliest of whom, Samuel Augustus Maverick, a Texas cattle rancher, who, back in the 1800s, became well known for not branding his cattle since he cared more about keeping track of his land than his cattle. Which, as unbranded, were called “Mavericks.”
Thus, one version of the dictionary definition of “maverick”—one who doesn’t bear another’s brand.
S.A. Maverick’s predecessors and descendents were also by that definition true mavericks. Back in the 1600s, in Boston, an ancestor got in all sorts of trouble when he agitated in favor of granting rights to indentured servants.
In fact, politically, for generations, they have been of the decidedly liberal persuasion. So much so that 82 year-old San Antonio native, Terrellita Maverick, whose brother is a board member of the ACLU of Texas, fumed that John McCain, who voted almost always with his party, “is in no way a maverick, in uppercase or lowercase. It’s just incredible—the nerve!—to suggest that he’s not part of that Republican herd.” “Every time we hear [him or her] claim to be mavericks all my children and I and all my family shrink a little and say, ‘Oh, my God, he’s said it again.’ He’s a Republican,” she said. “He’s branded.”
She may be 82 but she sure knows her metaphors.
posted by Steven Zwerling at
6:02 AM
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