Opinion | Hating the Word ‘Hate’ – by Maureen Dowd – The New York Times

“When Rosen asked, “Do you hate the president, Madam Speaker?” Pelosi wagged her finger and retorted, “I don’t hate anybody.”

With more to say, she strode back to the microphones: “As a Catholic, I resent your using the word ‘hate’ in a sentence that addresses me. I don’t hate anyone. I was raised in a way that is a heart full of love and always pray for the president.” Before walking off, she delivered the coup de grâce to a chastened Rosen: “So don’t mess with me when it comes to words like that.”

Within the hour, the president had predictably tweet-trashed her, saying she had “a nervous fit,” returning to the threadbare canard of women as hysterics. He said he did not believe that Pelosi prayed for him.

But she does. I talked to her about it in August, when she was still keeping impeachment at bay, after we visited the chapel at Trinity, where she went to college.

She said that she prays for the president at night in her apartment in Georgetown and in church on Sunday. “The prayer,” she said, “is that God will open his heart to meet the needs of the American people.”

She said that she even complained to her pastor that her prayers were not working.

“Maybe you’re not praying hard enough,” the priest replied.”

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