The American Spectator

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Slugging It Out

12.1.06 @ 12:01AM

STINGS LIKE A DRONE
Re: R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.'s The Gentleman From Virginia:

Thanks for more on the Gentleman From Virginia. "Tempted to slug him..." was he? How I wish he had tried. President Bush probably would have decked him faster than you can say "glass jaw."

I read a lot and remember a little of it. In The Nightingale's Song enough of Jim Webb's boxing career was high-lighted to give one a pretty good idea of his character. When he faced Oliver North in the ring at Annapolis, he whined that he lost it because he was afraid he was going to hurt North. Webb's claim was that the coach favored North and tutored him on what to expect from Webb. My question is, why would anyone climb into a ring, fearing they are going to hurt the person they are fighting? North cleaned his clock on points. And, how's this for Sore Loser, Webb ambushed the coach next day, for a little post-bout pouting. Coach Smith said Webb was the only midshipman he had had words with in twenty-seven years.

All of this puts me in mind of John Kerry and the ski slope -- "I don't fall down, that s.o.b. got in my way..." Another thin-skinned loser. I love it.
-- Diane Smith
South San Francisco, California

It appears that Jim Webb has joined the ranks of what I term "Retroactively Tough-Guy Democrats." The main characteristic of this group is the assertion, always after the fact, that the person so afflicted was really, really angry in a given situation, and he or she was just able to defuse such fury in the nick of time. A variation of this is the glorious "You-May-Not-Remember-Because-It-Never-Happened-But-I-Was-So-Tough-On-(fill in the blank)" Assertion.

In the last decade, we were told by a Clinton flunky that the President had considered punching a critic of Hillary in the nose. Last year, the esteemed teenaged senator from Louisiana, Mary Landrieu, threatened that she would have physically attacked any politician, including President Bush, who had questioned the post-Katrina mess. Bill Clinton was on TV angrily telling Chris Wallace that he had "tried" to capture or kill Osama. Al Gore confidently asserts that if he had been elected in 2000, his response to September 11 would have been so much bolder than Bush's, and that he would have avoided war in Iraq. Next thing you know, Walter Mondale will reveal that he was just moments away from taking a swing at Reagan after the Gipper's classic vow to refrain from making his opponent's age an issue in the 1984 campaign!

And now we have the silly Jim Webb. Mr. Tyrrell, you are 100% correct. With this bunch in control of Congress, the next two years will be fun, fun, fun!
-- Douglass C. Nanney
Memphis, Tennessee

Most Marines can identify with the novelist Jim Webb to some degree, but he's hard, as RET describes, to really like. He has shown, over the years, a tendency to self-destruct...though I'm surprised the process has begun so early in his Senatorial incarnation. I'm predicting he will resign from the Senate just as he did as SecNav.
-- unsigned

I totally agree with your stance on rude Democrats, but your statement:

"The Republicans have a few such stinkers, for instance Newt Gingrich, but not nearly as many."

is, I believe, not helpful to the Republican cause because I see Newt as our next Reagan. He sees the world better than any other candidate, and we're going to need him in '08. Who do you see turning things around, McCain? We need a candidate we can solidly get behind, or McCain will split the GOP vote (there may even be a third party candidate, i.e., another Perot) and the Dems take the White House in a slam dunk.
-- John P.
Elmhurst, Illinois

It seems to me, as I observe my beloved country from the "cheap seats", so much of what we see, hear and read is predicated on an emerging expectation of extreme behavior and aberration. I fear this will lead us down a cultural road upon which America's critical solutions and progress are battered by cheap spectacle and selfish stalemate. Where is our overwhelming demand for reason and tangible effort... for the common good of us all?

Common sense and basic courtesy are immensely valuable traits in our everyday lives as "fellow" citizens and contributors in general. As these traits become political rarities and the Mr. Webbs become the expectation... apathy and disgust, in the cheap seats, could very easily erode a "United" States of America into ineffective fractions.

This country is a bona fide miracle and worth the effort to preserve. Sacrificing some ego and resolving to be American's, in the sense we all know we should, would be well worth the effort in results.
-- John Curtis
Paradise, California

Mr. Tyrrell is usually on the mark. Not this time. The Republicans have as many or more people who act this badly as the Democrats do. Examples:

Letter to the Editor

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