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The Current Crisis
Dangerous Zanies
The road from Midge Costanza to Anita Dunn.
WASHINGTON — We are at that delicious moment in a modern Democratic presidential administration when the bizarre fantasticos who decorate each chaotic regime make their painful appearance — though this administration is bringing a whiff of the ominous. Let me explain.
In the Carter Administration there was Midge Costanza, the White House aide who sent crazy memos to the White House staff insisting that they visit the Jefferson and Lincoln memorials to “reenergize.” She did it herself in the early hours, and at 4:00 AM at the Jefferson Memorial, the Washington Post reported, she became characteristically hysterical: “Every time I came across ‘man’ or ‘men’ I changed it mentally. I said ‘IT WAS PERSON, TOM. IT WAS PERSON! OKAY, TOM. ISN’T IT IRONIC THAT IT TOOK A WOMAN TO BE REENERGIZED RIGHT HERE?’” Then she lamented to the Post that Mr. Jefferson was “brilliant,” though “he wasn’t fully informed.” Soon she resigned. Also in the Carter Administration there was the delightful Dr. Peter Bourne, special assistant to the President for health [!] issues, whose visit to a nocturnal cocaine party attended by Hunter Thompson and David Kennedy (now dead of cocaine abuse) was leaked to the press. Bourne survived that sticky wicket, but he did not survive once it was reported that he was issuing bogus prescriptions for controlled drugs. He resigned.
In the Clinton years the list was longer, but my favorite was Dr. Joycelyn Elders. Her indiscretions were many until her comic finale, the very public espousal of her fellow sex educators’ latest progressive cause, masturbation! She was an expert on the subject and very eloquent. Now we have environmental czar Van Jones, National Endowment for the Arts spokesman Yosi Sergant, and — yet to resign —White House communications director Anita Dunn. Their eccentricities are beyond masturbation, beyond shouting at stone monuments, beyond cocaine with the famous. Jones joined the Communist Party in the 1990s, not the 1890s; and he implicated the Bush Administration in 9/11 or at least raised it as a possibility. Sergant exhorted artists on a conference call to provide governmentally funded propaganda for the President. Dunn extolled Mao Zedong as one of her two favorite “political philosophers,” though neither was a philosopher. One was a saint, and Mao was a sadist.
He was also a bloodthirsty tyrant responsible for the death, imprisonment and torture of at least 70 million people. In a fatuous address to young people she never mentioned any of this. Dunn’s outburst is a first. Of all the brutal murderers of the 20th century — say, Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, or Castro — none has been mentioned as an exemplar by any other White House staffer, save today’s White House communications director. Allow me a prediction. This administration is going to turn out more zanies than the last two Democratic administrations combined. Yet — and here is the ominous part — they are going to present a real threat to liberties that Americans take for granted, particularly freedom of speech.
Dunn’s other controversial outburst is her singling out Fox News as a political enemy against whom the White House will push back. She is not the only member of this administration to speak this way. Chief of staff Rahm Emanuel has denied that Fox is a “legitimate news organization,” and White House senior advisor David Axelrod has said Fox is “not really a news organization.” The threat here from these government officials is to freedom of speech.
It is all of a piece with the assault on Rush Limbaugh during various leading Democratic supporters’ and — amazingly — journalists’ efforts to deny him part ownership of a professional football team. The charges against Limbaugh that circulated freely through the media were false. He never spoke approvingly or even jokingly about slavery. He never spoke positively about James Earl Ray. He, actually, does not talk much about race. Two of the improbable moral forces who spoke out against him, Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, have on the record made racist statements, particularly anti-Semitic statements, and been caught in scandals that they never should have survived (Tawana Brawley, the Atlanta murders Jackson that blamed on a nationwide conspiracy — to name but two).
Limbaugh was very perceptive in responding to the brouhaha by saying in the Wall Street Journal that it represented a hatred of conservatives and an attempt to keep them from “participating in the full array of opportunities this nation otherwise affords each of us.” But there is a more general threat here. It is against the First Amendment. Journalists had better take note. It was a surprising spectacle to see journalists advancing the assault on Limbaugh. More surprisingly was how many of the self-appointed journalistic monitors, for instance the Washington Post’s Howard Kurtz, took it all in stride.
About the Author
R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr. is the founder and editor in chief of The American Spectator. He is the author of The Death of Liberalism, published by Thomas Nelson Inc. His previous books include the New York Times bestseller Boy Clinton: the Political Biography; The Impeachment of William Jefferson Clinton; The Liberal Crack-Up; The Conservative Crack-Up; Public Nuisances; The Future that Doesn’t Work: Social Democracy’s Failure in Britain; Madame Hillary: The Dark Road to the White House; The Clinton Crack-Up; and After the Hangover: The Conservatives’ Road to Recovery.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (31) | Leave a comment
More Articles by R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.
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Appleby| 10.22.09 @ 6:53AM
Ms. Dunn is a test to gauge the effectiveness of the evisceration of the school curriculum in her praise of Mao. Should she get effective pushback she was fully prepared to shout *it was a joke, maaaaan!* which is the hypnotic signal to blank-out everything she just said. Kids used to do that kind of thing to shock their parents. We have now arrived at the point where the parents are just as stupid as the children and nothing shocks anybody. But the Apparatchiks have to keep testing the water temperature to make sure that the frogs do not notice that they are being boiled.
Howard| 10.22.09 @ 7:33AM
I believe Obama is even more thin skinned than Nixon. Fox is the only conservative news outlet. The rest of the big time universe; CBS, NBC, ABC, NPR, NYT, Washington Post, etc are liberal. So, Obama has an inherent advantage over Nixon. However, his team of loonies is ballistic over one outlet. Those "tolerant" liberals prefer a Pravda like compliant monopoly. Be scared, be real scared.
Robert Rosencrans| 10.22.09 @ 9:17AM
In a way, liberals would naturally flock to Mao. By killing 70 million people he protected polar bears, saved energy and eliminated their carbon footprint.
Vern Crisler| 10.22.09 @ 9:40AM
Excellent essay! These appointments, of course, reflect the political likes & dislikes of our President. They represent present indicators of future results.
howard lohmuller| 10.22.09 @ 10:37AM
Yesterday, a writer for Politico attacked Drudge for putting too many stories about the declining dollar on his website. Reading between the lines, the piece suggested that Drudge was criticizing President Obama and his Administration for causing the decline. Never mind that the public thinks the most important issues facing the Country are the economy and the debt which have caused the Dollar's decline.
My guess is that the Administration asked the writer to do the piece and that Drudge will soon be in the dock with Rush, Beck and Fox.
Anthony| 10.22.09 @ 10:49AM
Bob, You have fought the good fight for decades, so I'll not take too much exception to your labeling this tinderbox situation Obama and his fellow Marxists are creating, in calling this a "delicious moment". I'd say distasteful is way to tepid a description of what's going on here.
Furthermore, there is more than just a "whiff" of the ominous going on here, especially with the leftist MSM's assistance in the marginalization of conservatives.
America will be lucky to survive the Obama Administration without a reprisal of the '60s, or worse.
Turk| 10.22.09 @ 11:28AM
Throughout all of the revelations exposing the marxist and worse of the those who surround the abomination currently residing in our White House, what has NOT been written about, is the fact that we ALL knew about him and these derelicts, well before we elected him/them last November!! The govt media suppressed the information but it was there for all but the lamest of brains. Soooo, to all of this I say--where's the surprise??
In a special time for the nation, the scuminess of him and his merry band was offset by the quirky rino the media gave us that insured the disaster that befell us. Now we must avoid like the plague, anymore rino's or their syncophants( that means YOU Newt)!!
Ken (Old Texican)| 10.22.09 @ 11:32AM
Mr. Tyrell
Sometimes you are simply too polite.
I am trying to come up with an alternative title to your article:
"Dangerous Maoists"?
"Dangerous Commisars"?
"Admirers of Murderers"?
"Would-be Commissars"?
I just don't believe these people are "zany". I believe they are Psychopaths.
Yosemeti Sam| 10.22.09 @ 11:43AM
" ... Dunn's other controversial outburst is her singling out Fox News as a political enemy against whom the White House will push back. She is not the only member of this administration to speak this way. Chief of staff Rahm Emanuel has denied that Fox is a "legitimate news organization," and White House senior advisor David Axelrod has said Fox is "not really a news organization." The threat here from these government officials is to freedom of speech...."
Face it gentle folks - they are foxtroting, nay,
quickstepping to their prophetic cliff! And,
over!
LOL.
Al Adab| 10.22.09 @ 11:49AM
Why should any of us be surprised? After all we knew who these people ran with BEFORE the 2008 election.
Current events simply demonstrate the takeover by the one world, elitist, centralizing left who believe that only the annointed (themselves) have the knowledge and ability to make decisions for us plebs. We are expected to just shut up and follow them picking up scraps from master's table and enjoying our bread and circuses.
That is their vision of the future, that is what we fight. Any similarity between the United States and the late Roman republic is purely historical. All we await is our Marius. We don't have to like it, but there it is.
Now, the question is: how do we stop them and restore our Constitution?
Kent Lyon| 10.22.09 @ 12:30PM
Mr.Tyrrell apparently missed the Politico report yesterday by Vandehei and Allen, which among other things, reported the following:
"Privately, officials have talked with relish for months of the potential to isolate the GOP as a narrow party of white, Southern conservatives with little appeal to independent-minded voters."
It appears that Obama is so desirous of achieving Lincolnian status that he is willing to incite a civil war to do so, while subjugating white conservatives to subordinate status (a significant step beyond freeing Blacks from slavery, an accomplishment of the Party of Lincoln..excuse me, the party of white Southern conservatives--I didn't know Illinois was classed as a Southern state--indeed, it appears that Obama plans to make every other demographic the lord and master of white conservatives forever--let's see how they like picking cotton!). Rush Limbaugh (Conservative, Missouri) certainly fits the target description. It looks like Obama is an "anything-but-caucasian" superiorist, or is that supremacist? Will the South rise again? Or will God damn all those evil white conservatives that enslaved Blacks and ran the country into the ground, so that now their chickens are coming home to roost? Bizarre fantasticos hardly begins to adequately characterize the functionaries of the Obama administration. Too bad Roger Cone isn't available to head the faith-based initiatives office.
Ken in People's Republic of MD| 10.22.09 @ 1:36PM
People, all of you are missing the point. These people are not a threat, they are an opportunity.
Don't you realize that the very people they seek to demonize are the very people who will stop them, using the very tools they seek to destroy? "Vote the bastards out" is not just a cliche, it is an imperative.
Dunn, Jones, et al do not just represent a differing political philosophy, they represent a totally different way of thinking. Regardless of what Obama says, conservatives can and will consider differing points of view. But in this case, the differing points of view represent a cataclysmic departure from what is good and just about this country. We cannot let this happen.
People of good faith everywhere will take action, and I believe this includes rank and file democrats who will, for the most part, see the folly.
In a most ironic way, the Dunns, Joneses and Sergants will unify the country against them, even though they would cringe at being called "unifiers". Should Obama's hit squads push forward with their ridiculous agendas, no doubt this country will band against them, I don't think even the most democratic democrats will stomach their ideas. And even if they do, no matter. Conservatives will finally have the incentive and motivation to mobilize into a powerhouse capable of re-taking this country and re-affirming the values and opportunities available to everyone, if they chose them.
Obama has been compared to Hitler, and Hitler signed his death warrant when he declared war on the United States. Obama's people, by continuing on with their misguided paths, also signed their death warrants when declaring war on the United States. They will soon see their reign of terror come to an end.
I say to Anita Dunn, David Axelrod, Rahm Emmanual and their cronies, bring it on!!! Because The Revolution starts here and it starts now.
KyMouse| 10.22.09 @ 2:27PM
Next year, with the census and the elections taking place, promises to be a zoo. And with Obama in control of the White House, Congress and almost all of the press, all of the animals will be out of their cages.
Cpm | 10.22.09 @ 3:33PM
I remember the widespread consternation and ridicule when then candidate GW Bush said his favorite philosopher was Jesus Christ. Yet a top Obama functionary praises arguably the world's worst mass murderer as one of her favorite philosophers and it is met with vitual silence by the Drive Bys. They are taking their orders from the administration to ignore and marginalize conservative voices. Absolutely chilling.
Pingback| 10.22.09 @ 5:26PM
Twitter Trackbacks for The American Spectator : Dangerous Zanies [spectator.org] on links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
bobmontgomery| 10.22.09 @ 10:58PM
First, they came for Rush Limbaugh. It had nothing to do with us. We had always been very fair and balanced.........
Marc Jeric| 10.23.09 @ 5:41AM
I think thatit is all over with the USA. We have gone irretrevably into embedded marxist communist regime. We have a President who is Community Organizer-in-Chief, Abu Hussein from Kenya, a resolute communist brought up by Davis and Alinsky; we have his 35 czars or rather komissars in charge of all government departments (secretaries are just figureheads); we have a system of local soviets in ACORN brownshirts, SEIU and teacher union thugs; we have nationalized several banks and insurance companies, Fannie May and Freddie Mac, GM and Chrysler, rail transport for public, and pretty soon health insurance companies, hospital companies, oil& gas companies, electric utility companies, Ginnie May, ... and of course the tenured marxists at our universities and in our media (ABC, CBS, NBC, NPR, CNN, MCNBC, NYT, WASH. POST, etc) are making sure to praise these developments with daily indoctrination. Teacher unions have produced 3 generations so far of illiterate nincompoops full of self-esteem voting for redistribution of money, many dependent on various form of welfare, taught that capitalism is evil. That's enough for now.
Pingback| 10.23.09 @ 7:24PM
Steynian 392 « Free Canuckistan! links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
nohype | 10.24.09 @ 9:18AM
Isn't what we are seeing in this Administration a simple outgrowth of political correctness? The purpose of political correctness is to stigmatize opposing beliefs as repulsive and not worthy of consideration. Innocent minds need to be protected from anything that is racist, sexist, homophobic, etc. Political correctness allows its possessor to be completely intolerant while professing complete tolerance: "We are open to all ideas, but of course we cannot tolerate the intolerable."
tgs| 10.24.09 @ 5:02PM
Folks, it is very disturbing to read the comments of those who are rightly agitated about the attack on our Constitutional Republic and its Constitution to see that none of you even mention the idea of asking God for help and support in retaking our country. George Washington at Valley Forge was not above falling on his knees and asking God for help at a very dark moment and later crediting God for making our revolution against King George successful. If we want to make this fight successful we should all follow in Washington's footsteps and ask God to bless our efforts and to bless America and then get up off our knees and continue the fight just as he did.
Richard Baker| 10.24.09 @ 7:20PM
tgs:
Noble sentiments. I have that famous painting of him kneeling in the snow at Valley Forge on my wall. As he'd have said, "We need to seek the guidance of Providence." Thanks for the reminder.