Like Obama, she is more pragmatist than liberal ideologue. Unlike Obama, she doesn’t care what you think of her. In fact, she may not even know.
* By Vanessa Grigoriadis
* Published Nov 1, 2009
... The way that Pelosi always thinks she knows the right thing to do can be very annoying to a lot of people. To conservatives, she’s the devil: “Mussolini in a skirt,” “Nancy Botox,” a “domestic enemy of the Constitution.” In August, when she and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer wrote a USA Today editorial calling town-hall shouters “un-American” for stifling national debate, a radio host said he’d like to punch her in the face; Joe the Plumber wanted to “beat the living tar” out of her; and Glenn Beck brought out a cardboard cutout of her likeness, then pretended to drink wine alongside it: “I wanted to thank you for having me over here in wine country,” he cackled. “By the way, I put poison in your—no, I look forward to all the policy discussions we’re supposed to have. You know, on health care, energy reform, and the economy. Hey, is that Sean Penn over there?” She’s a high-handed lady who needs to be “put … in her place,” as the National Republican Congressional Committee said when she questioned General McChrystal’s advice on Afghanistan. “It’s really sad. They really don’t understand how inappropriate that is,” Pelosi shot back, smirking a little and trailing a hand in the air. “That language is something I haven’t even heard in decades" ...
The face the public saw was that cartoon liberal—but in the bubble, the story is a little different. Privately, she was getting frustrated with the progressives and their whining and carping. “There they are, posing for holy pictures,” she likes to say. “Oh, they want to be sainted.” Noble aims are one thing, but this goop is quite another. To her, you can stand in the gallery and have a media moment. Or you can come into her office and pass this legislation ...
Chocolate ice cream is the staple of Pelosi’s diet: She doesn’t cook herself, so except for a salad for lunch and whatever an aide hands her for dinner, that’s what she eats. “I think that’s the first time she’s ever turned it down,” whispers her personal assistant, later. “The other day, she came in at 8:45 a.m. carrying a pint of Häagen-Dazs with an inch left in it—she’d eaten the whole thing on the way in. She handed it off to Michael, and then two hours later, she said, ‘Where’s that ice cream? Can I eat the rest of that?’ ” (At one point, when she mentions to me that she likes artisanal ice cream, I joke, “Oh, elitist ice cream,” and she shoots back: “It’s not elite. It’s not elite. It’s just a small operation.”)
Apparently, this is a serious energy booster, because Pelosi maintains a breakneck schedule, turning in at midnight and rising six hours later. She’s been doing that since she became minority whip in 2001, and even earlier, in the seventies, when she had to get up before her kids to read the New York Times. She takes the stairs in the Capitol, never the elevator, with her security huffing and puffing behind. She doesn’t curse, drink, or smoke. She does the Times crossword puzzle for a couple of hours to get a buzz. When she’s starting to get tired, she calls her grandkids, spending twenty minutes on the phone with a 3-year-old, cooing away in a preverbal trance. “That’s her power nap,” says her assistant ...
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