Molly Ivins: A Tribute to that Feisty Old Broad Who Wouldn't Shut Up, Thank Gawd

The world lost another strong woman last month, but not before she said what she had to say. Her name was Molly Ivins, and after 62 feisty years, cancer was the only thing that could shut her up.

There's a saying that well behaved women rarely make history and Molly Ivins was living proof. She was nothing if not a hell raiser. As a political humorist known for a trademark Texan vocabulary that often spilled into her hard hitting, left leaning editorials, Ivins was best known for coining the nickname "Shrub" to refer to our current periwinkle of a president.

In her prolific writing career, she wrote for the Houston Chronicle, the Texas Observer, the New York Times, Minneapolis Tribune, the Dallas Times Herald, and Time Magazine and her freelance work has appeared in Esquire, Atlantic, The Nation, Harper's, and TV Guide, to name a few. Four times she was a best selling author and three times a Pulitzer prize finalist.

But all that's not to say she was what she might've called a high-falutin bigwig reporter or even a career oriented modern day conventional woman. Quite the contrary, Molly was as down to earth as they come. Perhaps even a bit too down to earth. When she worked for the New York Times, she had a habit of going barefoot in the office. And among her two greatest honors? When the Minneapolis police force named its mascot pig after her and when she was once banned from the campus of Texas A&M.

Molly was never one to pull any punches and as an outspoken feminist, she collected her share of controversy. Her first column for the Star-Telegram began as such:

"Should you happen to contravene a law made by the only politicians we've got, this too will become a matter of some moment to you. For example, if you happen to possess six or more phallic sex toys, you are a felon under Texas law. In their boundless wisdom, our solons decided that five or fewer of the devices make you a mere hobbyist."

Only her first choice of words instead of "phallic sex toys" was dildo, not to be confused with the first name of our current CIA name leaking vice president.