Thursday, October 22, 2009

Four More   [Jay Nordlinger]

Not years: points following on from my post below (“O’s (Latest) Insult”).

1) People such as Obama say that Democrats and liberals are independent-minded, thinking and acting for themselves; Republicans and conservatives, on the other hand, are all lined up, an army to command (ignorant army, I should say, in tribute to Arnold). (I’m not talkin’ Schwarzenegger.) I think about what I call the “shaping institutions.” For the last several decades, virtually all of them have been controlled or dominated by the Left — meaning, education, K through grad school; the movies; entertainment television; popular music; the big newspapers; the small newspapers (!); television news; etc.

Conservatives have to swim against a pretty strong stream. And we’re the ones who are supposed to drift along? I don’t think so.

2) You remember those lil’ schoolkids, who gained attention the other week? The ones made to chant praises to President Obama? I wouldn’t call that a great tribute to independence of mind. Would you?

3) Over the years, I have interviewed many a young conservative, especially those seeking a National Review internship. I have sometimes asked them, “How did you become a conservative?” More than a few said — sometimes sheepishly — “I listened to Rush Limbaugh.” And some of them added, “Behind my parents’ back.”

It can be daring to be a dittohead, you know — and a real act of dissent.

4) Recall what President Obama said to his New York donors: “Democrats are an opinionated bunch. You know, the other side, they just kinda sometimes do what they’re told. Democrats, y’all thinkin’ for yourselves.” Then, those thinking-for-themselves Democrats applauded — applauded for Obama, and, mainly, I guess, for themselves.

I thought of something: Let me share with you a letter I published in Impromptus, my NRO column, last year. It had to do with hissing, which was a subject about which I had just written a piece:

Sometime in the late ’70s, Norman Mailer came to Zellerbach Hall at UC-Berkeley to give a talk. The place was sold out. This was during the period when he was writing pieces refuting Germaine Greer. He walked onstage wearing cowboy boots, Levis, and a shirt and jacket . . . and he had a rolling sort of John Wayne gait.

As he stepped up to the microphone, he said approximately the following: “I know that about half of you here tonight hate my guts because of my stand on feminism. So let’s get that out of the way. I want you to hiss me. I want you to let all of your feelings toward me out. Come on, hiss me!”

And the most spine-chilling hiss arose from the audience. It lasted ten seconds. I’d never heard anything like it before, and I haven’t since. It was authentic and deeply felt. And when it subsided, Mailer leaned into the microphone and said, softly, “Obedient bitches.”

5) Let me sneak in a fifth point: Readers have been sending me lots of examples of ordinary Republicans’ breaking from their leadership: President Bush’s immigration proposal; his nomination of Harriet Miers; this current congressional race upstate in New York — and so on.

Sing along, add your own verses . . .

10/22 03:01 PMShare