March 28, 2005 by s.z.

Cinema Monday Mister Snitch! notes that this summer's movies will explore the origins of both Batman and Darth Vadar, so he does a little Compare/Contrast piece. Oh, and scroll up to the top of the page to see an Amazon Health & Personal Care product that seems like it would make a fine companion to AborbShun ... 6:32:29 AM

Girls Just Want to Be Bimbos "Conservative political commentator, columnist," lawyer, and "long-time member of MENSA" Debbie Schlussel serves up one of the silliest columns to ever appear at FrontPageMag (which is quite a feat). It's about how the Disney movie Ice Princess says that women want to be figure skaters instead of bothering their pretty little heads with that icky, old math stuff, and yet it didn't get called on the carpet like Larry Summers did.  At first one thinks that Debbie is claiming that Disney's "princess" movies offer poor lessons to our daughters, which isn't all that wingnutty a position to take.  But no, Debbie's position is that the movie is proof that girls want just to wear skimpy clothes and flirt with zamboni drivers (not get tenured positions in Harvard's math department), because that's what Mother Nature designed them to do, thus vindicating Larry.  So, it's astoundingly stupid.  Here, see for yourself: Ice Princess” is the story every Harvard chick prof and assorted other feminists would despise.  Casey Carlyle, a high-school geek genius, is on the fast track to Harvard and a prestigious scholarship and career in physics.  Other girls are spending their summers going to the beach, seeing movies, and doing other things normal teen-age girls do, but not Casey.  She’s doing a summer project on the physics of ice-skating moves. But like any normal red-blooded, teen-aged American girl—not the abnormal kind about which Harvard chick profs fantasize—Casey soon becomes enchanted by the girlish ice-skating moves, costumes, and make-up.  More enchanted with those than the unsexy, unfeminine boredom of studying physics—at Harvard or elsewhere.  While Casey’s unglamorous, hardened feminist single mother rants against the form-fitting, short-skirted ice-skating outfits that “set us women back fifty years,” Casey is secretly wearing one of those outfits and loving it and the boy Zamboni driver a whole lot more than physics. [...] Woe is the Harvard female academic set.  They may be able to attack Lawrence Summers with their butch angst.  But they and their holy science can’t compete with Mother Nature and the natural appeal of girlish things, like ice-skating, short skirts, make-up, and boys.  The appeal of this movie proves that.  If Casey Carlyle remained a geeky, awkward science nerd and went to Harvard, there would be no movie – except maybe at Young Lesbians of America vegan potluck meetings (tofu dessert).  While there’s nothing wrong with women pursuing careers in science, there’s a reason most of them don’t:  their natural tendencies are toward other things.  Most women in America don’t want to grow up being bitter, ugly feminist biddies, like Casey’s pushy Harvard-loving mother (played by Joan Cusack).  They’d rather grow up to be like Casey’s attractive skating coach (minus the deceit), played by “Sex & the City’s” Kim Catrall (minus the sex).  They want to be glamorous and feminine, be mothers and wear make-up. So, girls, your only choices are (a) be smart, bitter, ugly, and unpopular, and die alone; or (b) be cute, airheaded, and flirty (but never go all the way), and get married and have babies.  Hey, the movie Ice Princess says so, and who can argue with movies?. Oh, and while it's a movie that features an Olympic sport, it's not a SPORTS movie, because girls don't like getting sweaty and developing muscles and stuff -- no, it's just a movie about being a princess, and about ice skating, ("the only women’s sport that’s actually feminine"), so it's okay to let girls watch it.  And girls, even though Michelle Kwan did win gold medals for her participation in this "sport," she isn't a real athlete, because she had a boob job ("The most risqué shot in this movie is a cameo of Michelle Kwan in a low-cut short displaying a silicone valley of deep cleavage"), thus proving that how you look is more important than what you do. The column concludes with a diatribe against feminists because the movie doesn't feature any fathers who aren't jerks.  Anyway, if you want to learn more about Debbie, go here to read the longest bio of any columnist I've ever seen.  It includes this interesting statement: Her online fan club is the Internet’s second largest for a political personality (behind only Ann Coulter’s) At the suggestion of one of of you (I'm sorry I can't give him credit -- I can't remember who it was, and I lost his email in a computer crash), I checked out the debbieschlusselfanclub.  You have to love a group that includes this description: "Debbie is proof positive that 'Dumb Blonde' is an oxymoron."  I suspect that Debbie wrote it herself. And while the Debbie fans don't seem to be as talkative as Ann's fans (only 50 or so messages have been posted this month), those messages do include such gems as this one, which begins: Pornography is just one of the means of the Communists and the internationalists to destroy traditional Western culture, religion,and morals. So, I think Debbie Schlussel is a wingnut we'll be watching. 5:41:45 AM

Wingnuts: a Two-Edged Sword From the USA Today piece Anger at Bushes as time grows short for Schiavo: Last week's unity among the demonstrators had splintered, and an undercurrent of anger ran through them. Their ire was directed at Michael Schiavo, Terri's husband, who successfully petitioned the courts to have her feeding tube removed; at state judge George Greer, who has ruled consistently in his favor; and increasingly, at President Bush and Florida Gov. Jeb Bush. I hope the Bushes have learned that using nutters from the religious right is like playing with matches: fun at first, but you'll get burnt if you keep it up. "If Gov. Bush wants to be the man that his brother is, he needs to step up to the plate like President Bush did when the United Nations told him not to go into Iraq," Randall Terry, a protest organizer, said of the governor. "Be a man. Put politics aside." Poor Jeb.  He used to be considered the good brother.  Oh, Knight Ridder reported that Larry Klayman, founder of Judicial Watch, claimed that Jeb was "bound by moral duty to intervene," and that Larry had urged Jeb to "step up to the plate, be a man, put politics aside and do his job."  And the Palm Beach Post said that Klayman, "a former Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate from Florida," had stated that Jeb "has to do what his brother did when the United Nations told him he couldn't go into Iraq." So, either Randall is plagiarizing Klayman, or else it appears that taunting Jeb about not being a man and trying to goad him into invading Pinellas Park are part of the new wingnut talking points.  Back to the USA Today report: Among the messages on protest signs Sunday: "Barbara Bush: Are you proud of your sons now?" I think we can assume that Barbara "the Enforcer" Bush knows better than anyone else what miserable disapointments her sons have turned out to be. Tension mounted outside Woodside Hospice here, where Schiavo was in her 10th day without food or water. Bobby Schindler, Schiavo's brother, told the protesters they aren't helping his family by getting arrested. Karl Henderson, 25, of Denver Bible Church, took issue with Schindler. "We should be able to take her water if she's dying," he said. The fact that Terri would either choke or aspirate the water into her lungs is no reason not to let Henderson proceed with his mission of mercy. But here's more about Karl from the Palm Beach Post: The demonstrations turned rowdier when two men from Denver heckled police officers, calling them "cowards" for heeding court orders and not allowing demonstrators to take food and water to the 41-year-old woman. "She is being murdered with your protection," hollered Karl Henderson, 25, of Denver Bible Church, who was visiting with Doug McBurney, 36. And Karl's older compansion, Doug McBurney, had his own time in the spotlight.  Here's part of the Orlando Sentinel's report on the cranky hospice protesters: "You Nazis are defending Terri from my water," one man yelled.  [My guess is that man was Karl.] Then Doug McBurney, 36, approached. Unlike most of the three dozen or so demonstrators arrested during the past nine days, he struggled, and as he was hauled away, turned back to the crowd and screamed: "Give her water! Don't murder her! Bring her water! Don't murder her with tranquillity!" With the hostility mounting, the crowd picked up the chant. But what the papers don't mention is that Doug McBurney isn't just any old nut -- he is the "right-hand man" of Denver radio personality (and major wingnut) Bob Enyart.  Per a 1999 Westword article, Doug serves as Enyart's "business manager and fellow Internet revolutionary."  Doug even conducted Bob's show for him while Bob was in jail for child abuse.  And Bob, who has been described as "Denver's Rush Limbaugh," is also the pastor of the Denver Bible Church (so he has Rush beat, because Rush hasn't yet claimed that his Dittoheads constitute a church). Here's a little more info about Bob from Westword: He's a protest veteran -- the Christian zealot (and proud of it!) who spent 25 grand on O.J. Simpson memorabilia in February in order to set it ablaze; the religious kook (like that's a bad thing!) who traveled all the way to New Zealand in September simply to be arrested for greeting the President of the United States with "Clinton is a Rapist" banners; the right-wing zany (a noble calling!) who's been able to slip his radical views under the anti-Christian radar with the aid of programs like ABC's Politically Incorrect, on which he's appeared three times in the past six months. So, it's quite probable that Doug's arrest was a stunt devised by Bob, in order to  both gen up publicity and further the wingnut cause.   And here's some more info about Bob Enyart, courtesy of Apologetics Index: Outspoken Denver, Colorado broadcaster, known as much for his ultraconservative fundamentalism as for his bluntness and rudeness (as well as some rather ill-advised actions) that reflect poorly on the Gospel of Jesus Christ. [...] Enyart is a theonomist - someone who believes that Old Testament Law is as valid and applicable today as it was in Old Testament times. He is, therefore, a vocal death penalty proponent. Enyart was, justifiably, listed on the late Hatewatch.org site for his outspoken hatred of homosexuals. Enyart believes the best form of government is a "constitutional monarchy," and that democracy is the worst form of government. He is the lead spokesperson for ShadowGov.com. [...] In the opinion of the publisher of Apologetics Index, people like Mr. Enyart live like enemies of the cross and Gospel of Jesus Christ. Fortunately, Mr. Enyart's perverse version of Christianity is the exception, and not the norm. Apologetics provides a link Enyart's novel, "The First Five Days."  Only the First Day is available online, but in that portion, the government of the United States is taken over by the Christian religious right, and becomes a theocracy.  The new rulers decree that everyone on death row is to be executed the next day. Lethal injection and other painless execution techniques are permanently prohibited. Prosecution witnesses, victims’ family members and friends may participate in the execution if so desired. The novel features one family's discussion about whether they want to stab, strangle, or shoot the man who killed their daughter.   And the new shadow government announces that performing an abortion is now a capital crime.  As the chapter ends, Pat Schroeder and Gloria Alred are arrested for "Conspiracy to Murder" for having spoken out in favor of legalized abortion.   Per religoustolerance.org, on the Second Day, our new rulers announce that "Anyone performing homosexual behavior, upon conviction, will be executed."   Which seems to fit right in with Bob's philosophy, as depicted in this little essay on homosexuals, which features the repeated line, "The only rights homos should have is the right to a fair and speedy trial."   Bob Enyart used to be a member of Randall Terry's Operation Rescue -- so,  his followers Doug and Karl are probably just the kind of people that Terry wants there protesting in Pinellas Park.   And they are just the kind of supporters-turned-opponents whom the Bush brothers deserve too.  . Damn, this would all be as funny as hell if they all weren't using this poor woman's body as their prop for all this nonsense.   4:10:13 AM