December 2, 2004 by s.z.

Townhall Review Okay, I'm a day late (and several dollars short), and my betters (TBogg, Roger Ailes, Pandagon, etc.) have already done a great job reporting on these columns, but that's no reason not to have a brief Townhall Review, is it?  Well, IS IT??? Anyway, the theme of this edition is: Going to Hell in a Hand Basket. Except Ben didn't get the memo. 1.  Ben Shapiro Ben claims that the reason that Oliver Stone's Alexander the Great didn't do as well at the box office last week as The Incredibles or Polar Express is because we all became moral on November 5th, and so we no longer want to see movies about homosexuals. A large part of “Alexander”’s downfall is attributable to the moral distastefulness of the subject matter.  Alexander the Great is played as a mop-top, indecisive bisexual by Farrell. During the course of the movie, Farrell kisses a eunuch full on the mouth, and exchanges numerous lingering glances with boyhood chum and grown-up gay lover Hephaiston (played by an eye-liner-wearing Jared Leto).  Anthony Hopkins, playing Ptolemy, intones: ““It was said . . . that Alexander was never defeated, except by Hephaistion’s thighs.” This stuff doesn’t go over well with most Americans.  Frankly, we don’t want to hear about it, and we’re definitely not going to pay money to see it. Well, Ben paid money to see it, but that's because he had to take notes on that full-mouthed kiss, and Hephasiston's muscular, strong thighs.  You know, for his column. 2.   Walter E. Williams Walter did get the memo, and so is eager to tell us that Janet Jackson's boobie, Nicolette Sheridan's dropped towel, and the Pistons/Pacers ruckus are signs that civilization has been steadily going down the toilet over the past several years.  Why in Walter's day, not only did men give up their seats to women on the street car, but children didn't address adults by their first names!  And Walter tied an onion to his belt, which was the style at the time. Customs, traditions, moral values and rules of etiquette, not laws and government regulations, are what make for a civilized society. These behavioral norms, mostly transmitted by example, word of mouth, and religious teachings, represent a body of wisdom distilled through ages of experience, trial and error, and looking at what works and what doesn't. And who are today's young people to decide that time-honored traditions like cutting of the hands of thieves, beheading apostates, and stoning adulteresses, don't work? 3.   Brent Bozell Brent explains that we're going to the hot place in that hand basket because the media liberal bias won't go away when Rather and Brocow retire. Just like CBS, the succession at NBC is no reason to suspect the liberal bias problem is going away. After all the helpful public-relations spin that Brian Williams knew Dale Earnhardt and loves NASCAR races, his on-air record over the years suggests a blue-state mindset will remain. After all, how NASCAR-sensitive is it for Williams to suggest it should be seen as "downright unpatriotic" to drive an SUV, as he said in a 2002 newscast? And anybody who would impugn gas-guzzling SUVs clearly isn't a NASCAR kind of guy, and therefore must be a snob, and thus a liberal and a sinner.  And Brent hates those guys! 4.   Kathleen Parker It will all be TV's fault if Kathleen's children grow up to be unmannered louts, serial killers, or even worse, Howard Stern fans. Parents struggling to raise decent, well-mannered children in this swamp know, of course, that everything matters. Even the words we use. When we ignore the little niceties - tolerating coarse language or behavior in public - we invite larger fractures in civilization, which is a fragile facade after all. Talking like this, of course, will get you labeled a rube, a prude, or worse - a censor. Aw, Kathleen, we labeled you a rube and a prude long before this! 5.   Linda Chavez Even though the International Committee of the Red Cross has accused the United States of torturing prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, it wasn't REAL torture, in that no iron maidens were used.  And anyway, wouldn't we be justified in brutalizing everybody in the Middle East if it could save one American puppy's life? What if one of these men had information that might prevent a nuclear attack on an American city? Would it be unthinkable to force him into uncomfortable physical positions? What about keeping him too warm or too cold in his cell, or blaring loud noises at him while he tries to sleep? Would it be immoral to make him fearful by playing on his phobias, or by depriving him of human contact for days or even months on end? Those are exactly the types of methods the ICRC describes as torture. And what if the information we were seeking could only prevent the loss of a hundred lives, or a dozen, or even one? And even if resulted in no useful imformation at all (which it basically didn't), wouldn't it be fun to do it anyway?  And what's so bad about having fun? 6.   Gary Aldrich Medical Marijuana initiatives are part of that hand basket, in that their supporters are just dope-using, spoiled liberal babies who don't care that people who use marijuana go on to become heroin addicts and dope fiends.  And anyway, it's all Bill Clinton's fault.  Cut your hair, hippie! There is a good chance the medical pot-heads will eventually win this cultural battle. Their victory will be achieved if Conservatives have forgotten how to frame their arguments so as to ensure victory.  We also can lose because, like children, Liberals never have learned to respond properly to the word, “No!” And, like so many parents, we get worn down and weary of arguing with people who act like children. The Liberals or Libertarians argue that pot is not such a bad drug, and they are, in turn, supported by the millions of Americans who tried pot in high school or college and didn’t turn into drug-crazed monsters.  Their lives were not destroyed, and, in fact, many enjoyed the experience enough to do it over and over again, thus risking arrest and their chance to take a federal job or go to a military academy where their drug use could become an major issue in a background investigation. Even so, after eight years of the man who “never inhaled,” Bill Clinton, and his staff, upwards of 25%, who had some illegal drugs experience (some were still “using” on the day Clinton was inaugurated), employment policies concerning the experimental use of pot had to be relaxed out of necessity.  Did prior drug use contribute to the overall lack of attention to laws, policies, and procedures in the dysfunctional Clinton White House? It could not have helped. And that is why people dying of cancer who need marijuana to help with the chemo side-effects shouldn't get it: because some of Bill Clinton's staff had used marijuana, and look what happened to Clinton! Marijuana is also a sneaky drug.  It’s considered a gateway drug because once the casual user smokes it and enjoys its “benefits” without a serious consequence, the user concludes that the same could be true for other, more serious drugs.  Thus the escalation begins and, for so many poor souls, their lives completely unravel.  Some of them even die.  Of cancer! This message was brought to you by Joe Friday and the makers of Reefer Madness, who want to remind you that Bill Clinton is responsible for everything that wrong with America -- including the fact that Hillary is allowed to live here. 3:18:01 AM

Who Said It? Bob from Alaska (and the rest of you) quickly identified yesterday's Mystery Guest as the lovely and talented Lynne Cheney.  We want to thank Mrs. Tarquin Biscuitbarrel for providing a valuable public service by transcribing this work for our edification and titillation (at her bad writing, of course). Here's another snippet for you: Sophie looked up from the book, thinking of the way the world associated Elizabeth Barrett Browning with her husband and their romance. But there were passages in her poem “Aurora Leigh” about how comforting it could be for a woman to love another woman.  [...] Sophie sensed someone standing beside her. She looked up and saw Lydia Swerdlow. “I don’t know how I didn’t see it before,” Sophie said. “Perhaps you were blinded by thinking women incapable of bonding fast together,” Lydia said. “Much of the world is. [...] As they walked into the house together, Sophie spoke of Helen. “It’s odd, but the more I find out about the differences in our lives, the less I feel we are different.” Lydia was thoughtful a moment. “I’ve heard it said the hardest thing any human being can do is fully to acknowledge the actuality of another. To admit, truly admit, that their thoughts and cares, their ardors and aversions are—or were—as real as our own.” But hey, they better not want to get married like us, because their ardors really AREN'T as real as our own if we need the homophobe votes! Now, who said this? [T]he LAT's value to upscale Southern California readers who already get the NYT would be precisely in coverage of more local stories the big East Coast papers won't carry, including crime stories. Duh! ... P.P.S.:This may explain why the LAT has gotten oddly less compelling as it has become a much better paper under its new Chicago Tribune management. It used to at least be entertainingly, uniquely bad. Now it's just a 90-percent-as-good New York Times or WaPo. ... P.P.P.S.: I still resist bringing the thing into the house. It's what you should never be in California--namely fat. Too much newsprint to recycle! They should pay me to read all those ads. ... And so on, until there's a "P" shortage at the mag. 2:10:32 AM

Deep Thoughts, by Peggy Noonan As usual, Peggy is in maroon, and the actual Deep Thoughts by Jack Handey are in blue. In response to overwhelming demand, in this week's column Peggy tells us what she thinks of Dan Rather -- and it turns out to be: he worked hard and stuff, but it was all for nothing, because he is a liberal. I like to try to understand the past, try to put it together in a way that makes sense to me. This can involve judging not only your own actions and decisions but those of others, which can be hard.  I don't think God put me on this planet to judge others. I think he put me on this planet to gather specimens and take them back to my home planet. Peggy explains that everybody she knows keeps asking her what she thinks of Dan's retirement.  It happens that she thinks a lot of things.  A LOT OF THINGS, buster! Which gets me to Dan Rather, who was once my boss, and who of course has announced his retirement from the anchor chair at CBS News. Everyone I know is asking me what I think of it. I think a lot of things. I think a funny thing would be if you had to give a speech on pasteurized milk, but you got mixed up and kept calling it "bastardized milk."  Then when you started describing pasteurization, every other word is a filthy, four-letter one. Sometimes I think you have to march right in and demand your rights, even if you don't know what your rights are, or who the person is you're talking to. Then on the way out, slam the door. Sometimes I think I'd be better off dead. No, wait, not me, you. While it's not fair that all anyone will remember of Dan's career is that the noble yeoman bloggers proved he used forged documents in a partisan attack on George Bush, nobody remembers that Nixon was a good guy for framing commies -- so it really IS fair after all. I think the bitterness of Nixon's presidential years, the personal darkness he seemed to display, was in part a product of simple human pain, and the pain was the result of this: He had been right and brave and done the right thing in the 1950s, and the American left and its cousin the American establishment would never forgive him for it. "Who was that bum you were just talking to?" said Tim. "That 'bum,' as you call him, just happens to be the former president of the United States," I said. "Yeah, right," said Tim.  "Which president?" "Jimmy Cantwell," I said. "There was no President Jimmy Cantwell," he said. I turned to ask President Cantwell about it, but he was running away, down the street. Hey, Dan's downfall is merely karma, in that when he covered Watergate, he was mean to poor President Nixon.  And then, 30 years later, Dan was brought down by Richard Nixon and his SwiftVets, who revealed that Dan himself had been one of the Watergate burglers.  Or something like that. One of those who picked it up and used it against him was Dan Rather. There is an amazing and unseen circularity to life. I believe that things happen over and over again, in cycles, which is why you can never really fire me. Dan was a great boss.  Sure, he was a volatile, overly emotional prima donna, but he was still great.  And since he had Peggy writing his material, everybody thought he was a great news guy.  Peggy always makes her bosses look good. When I had been doing the show for a few weeks I could see that my work was not good--uneven, without voice, without a clear point of view. I thought I knew the reason. I had become increasingly a political conservative. If I come back as an animal in my next lifetime, I hope it's some sort of parasite, because this is the part where I take it easy! Peggy recalls the delirious time when St. Ronald Reagan beat Jimmy Carter, the most evil man who ever lived.  The fact that the liberal snoots at CBS didn't rejoice with her only proves that they have everything backwards, and they serve Satan instead of God. I was happy, and the blue-collar workers--the cameramen who were bringing up families on Long Island, the secretaries from Queens--were delirious. Finally someone would lower their taxes--payroll taxes on overtime were killing them--and stop the humiliation in Iran. But the white-collar workers, the producers and writers and on-air talent--oh what a sad and depressed lot they were. The forces of evil had won. Uncle Joe was the preacher of the family.  He used to tell us we were going to hell if we didn't repent.  After we all repented, he said we were going to hell if we didn't buy him a new car.  After we said we weren't going to buy him a new car, he said we were going to hell if we didn't get him a big glass of lemonade anytime he asked for one.  I think we got him two glasses of lemonade, and that seemed to satisfy him.  But then, right before he died, he told us were we all going to hell anyway. Dan's career covers the assassination of JFK, the civil rights movement, the Vietnam war, and then  ... Watergate. And then Watergate. More and more I think that scandal will be remembered as a kind of hysteria, a virus that jumped from reporter to reporter, newsroom to newsroom, raising temperatures to fever pitch. Dan was one of the reporters who went after Nixon, et al., with a vengeance. Looking back one might ask: Why?  If a child asks you where rain comes from, tell them it's God crying. If they ask why He's crying, tell them it's probably because of something they did Peggy then gives us her summation of Dan Rather: he was a stupid hick who sold out, jettisoning his honest Texan-American viewpoints to achieve "success" from the liberal establishment -- only to be brought down in the end by stupid hicks.  (Well, Peggy's version is a lot longer, but then she's getting paid by the word.)  Ultimately this is what I think was true about Dan and his career. It's not very nice but I think it is true. He was a young, modestly educated Texas boy from nowhere, with no connections and a humble background. He had great gifts, though: physical strength, attractiveness, ambition, commitment and drive. He wanted to be a star. He was willing to learn and willing to pay his dues. He covered hurricanes and demonstrations, and when they got him to New York they let him know, as only an establishment can, what was the right way to think, the intelligent enlightened way, the Eastern way, the Ivy League way, the Murrow School of Social Justice way. They let him know his simple Texan American assumptions were not so much wrong as not fully thought through, not fully nuanced, not fully appreciative of the multilayered nature of international political realities. He swallowed it whole. [...] Those stories he covered that touched on politics were unfortunately and consistently marred by liberal political bias, and in this he was like too many in his profession. But this is changing. The old hegemony has given way. The old dominance is over. Good thing. Great thing. Onward. Sometimes it's hard to tell if something is actually a memory, or you just dreamed it.  So I asked my boss if I called him a lying, stinking, thief, or if I just dreamed it, and he said I just dreamed it.  Whew, that was close. 12:30:14 AM