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Among the Intellectualoids
Sorkin Slanders the Tea Party
And liberal culture goes into cardiac arrest.
The first season of The Newsroom, HBO’s drama about a cable news broadcast that decides to take on the Tea Party, came to a merciful end last week. The show began as a masochistic hourly ritual of pompous harangues, left-wing agitprop, clichéd love triangles, and error-riddled “news” presentations. It got even worse from there.
Much of the finale was spent in a hospital ward after news anchor and Keith Olbermann mimic Will McEvoy, played by Jeff Daniels, overdosed on antidepressants. At one point, Will jokes that his nurse is trying to euthanize him. After nine episodes, I think many of us were wishing she would.
Fortunately, in a speechifying whirlwind about Don Quixote and the evils of voter ID (and when have those things not gone together?), Will manages to rise from his bed. He’s soon back at work, reporting the news behind his anchor desk.
That’s when we’re treated to this on-air monologue:
“They can call themselves the Tea Party. They can call themselves conservatives. They can even call themselves Republicans, though Republicans certainly shouldn’t. But we should call them what they are: the American Taliban.”
That might sound like a drunken rant at your local College Democrat club. But then the scene shifts to the newsroom where Will’s producers are backslapping and hear-hearing each other, as though the French had finally sailed into Yorktown. This is perhaps the most striking feature of The Newsroom. Seeping out of every pore of its characters, embedded in every word of its dialogue, is the demand that we prostrate ourselves before its crayon-scrawled, left-wing nonsense and hail its moral courage.
The Newsroom is the brain child of Aaron Sorkin, the once-wunderkind writer behind The West Wing. He clearly intends for conservatives like me to be either outraged or intellectually swayed by his Speaking Truth to Power.
Instead it’s hard not to feel bored…even sorry for Sorkin. Will’s entire rant feels yellowed and musty. The “American Taliban”? Really? In addition to being tedious, that was also the title of a book by Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas. At this point, the savants of liberalism are even borrowing banalities from each other.
The left once expressed itself through twanging protest songs, Norman Lear television shows, and artful movies by directors like Oliver Stone. Now after decades of cultural hegemony, the liberal imagination is exhausted. The Newsroom is liberal culture sputtering, flailing, coughing up on the carpet.
There are many ways to sculpt good satire. You can use hyperbole to show the logical end of an argument. You can populate your world with stock characters to show trends. Or you can employ a wry narrator to comment on everything. Sorkin offers a new approach: having his characters read Huffington Post op-eds to each other.
Thus we get this Will McEvoy rant from the first episode of The Newsroom:
[America is] seventh in literacy, 27th in math, 22nd in science, 49th in life expectancy, 178th in infant mortality, third in median household income, fourth in labor force and fourth in exports. We lead the world in only three categories — number of incarcerated citizens per capita, number of adults who believe angels are real, and defense spending, where we spend more than the next 26 countries combined…So when you ask what makes us the greatest country in the world, I don’t know what the f*** you’re talking about.
His audience sits rapt with attention, as they usually do when Will is Refuting Right-Wing Lies. He quotes statistics! My God, we’ve been buried beneath his intellectual heft! Set aside Will’s inaccuracies and focus on just his dialogue for a second. Who the hell talks like that? Hollywood is so hermetically sealed from opposing viewpoints, Sorkin believes his characters can recite left-wing blog posts and people will cheer.
This is a major hazard when you control the culture. Because your views dominate the media and the little urban enclave where you live, you can breeze through life without ever being challenged. Opposing viewpoints are shouted down through the cultural megaphone. AMERICA IS RANKED 178TH IN INFANT MORTALITY! Well, no, it isn’t. As Kyle Smith noticed, Sorkin literally read the CIA Factbook upside-down. And unlike many other first-world countries, the United States counts neonatal deaths as infant mortalities, artificially driving up its numbers. But America’s epidemic of dying babies is now gospel in many quarters, with McEvoy’s quote being carried around the Internet like a holy tabernacle.
Despite all the shrieking and ringing of bells about the “Right-Wing Noise Machine” (the savvy now just abbreviate it as RWNM), it’s the left that’s deafening the culture with its volume. Take this on-air exchange between Will McEvoy and a straw-man opponent of the Ground Zero Mosque who veers into worrying about Sharia Law:
About the Author
Matt Purple is The American Spectator’s assistant managing editor.
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Joellen| 9.4.12 @ 7:01AM
Sorkin (and every leftist/marxist Hollyweird opportunist) slanders the Tea Party - but of course he does - next topic.
Alan Obama Fan Brooks | 9.4.12 @ 4:30PM
The Constitution is what matters to you guys, right? The right of a fellow to sell an album by a mass murderer whose "Sixth Amendment rights" were so wickedly violated:
"Vasquez, who was not alive when the 'Manson family' terrorized Southern California in the late 1960s with its 'Helter Skelter' killing spree, said he wanted to produce the album because he believes Manson's Sixth Amendment right to a fair trial was violated.
'I wouldn't say [he's] innocent, but he was denied his constitutional rights in court,' Vasquez said. "I wanted to raise awareness of that."
Next, the right of Terry Nichols to release
a Heavy Metal album-- it's really SEXY, like.
Stan Redmond| 9.4.12 @ 5:32PM
HUH?
Von Mises Jr| 9.4.12 @ 7:42AM
Even Rachael Maddow isn't swallowing all the bullshit any more. While I would not watch her normal propaganda that apparently pays her well, she deserves much credit for telling the truth about Obama's "prolonged detention" ambitions. This apparently even scared the snot out of liberals: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....e=youtu.be
c. j. acworth| 9.4.12 @ 7:47AM
I don't even have TV. Look what I'm missing!
Lullabys Legends and Lies| 9.4.12 @ 7:47AM
I was on Staff Duty recently (a 24-hours shift), and I got into a conversation about this show with the Specialist who was on duty with me!! He asked me if I'd seen the show yet, and then he started telling me about how much I'd love it, once he found out I hadn't seen it yet!! So he showed me the clip about the question, "what makes America the greatest Country", and this guys response to that question, to see what I thought about it!! About a half-hour later, when I finally stopped ranting about this lie-filled speech, the Specialist probably figured out by then, that I didn't like Aaron Sorkin's new show that much!! Which I can't say, because I've never seen it!! But I did watch a couple of seasons of the West Wing (hey, what can I say, I was stuck in Iraq at the time, and I was completely entertainment starved), so I think I can guess how this show's going to blame everything that sucks on the Right, and everything that's good on the Left, just like the West Wing did!! So maybe if I get deployed again, I'll watch the Newsroom then, because my standards will be lowered, and I can put up with a lot more crap, than I could ever put up with back here in "the Greatest Country On The Face Of The Earth" (EVER!!)!! So "F" Aaron Sorkin and HBO, may they only be enjoyed in Muslim Countries for years to come!!
Gary B| 9.4.12 @ 8:07AM
"But really, it all just feels exhausted."
It sure does. How far past the definition of "is" have we come? Isn't there a fable about a boy crying "Wolf!" once too often? At this point, simple ridicule is the best response. It's effective and it's fun. A twofer...
PCC| 9.4.12 @ 8:18AM
I live in a country that offers limited contemporary U.S. television programming, so I was looking forward to viewing "The Newsroom".
Now that I've seen the first two episodes, I can say that the only real entertainment is witnessing the non-stop self-important liberal drivel mouthed by every single character every single moment of the entire production.
It took Fonzie years to jump the shark. These guys do it in the opening scene and never stop!
Big Bob| 9.4.12 @ 10:41AM
Aaron who?? I never saw either of his shows. I am sick to death of the "backdoor" propaganda. The Tea Party is in the crosshairs. Since when have you heard of the GOP being in the crosshairs? It's been a long time, to be sure. It's clear any attempt to invoke our Constitution or our Declaration of Independence is viewed as anachronistic by our o-so sophisticated pop "analyists", such as this Sorkin guy. I'm guessing he is just like all the other guilt ridden libs who feel bad about all the money they have...but not bad enough to give it away. Funny about that. The Tea Party is diametrically opposed to sharing the wealth. The GOP not so much. Well, let's see what the Tea Party brews in the upcoming election. The outcome will be ..."unexpected" to steal a mantra from the economic wizards of smart.
Gary B| 9.4.12 @ 4:42PM
" Since when have you heard of the GOP being in the crosshairs?" Very good question. The Tea Party is being targeted by both liberals and the GOP. It's natural when you think about it. Both groups hate individual freedom. If I were the GOP, I'd be nervous.
soljerblue| 9.4.12 @ 5:35PM
The Tea Party is targeted because we are effective. We are effective because we tapped into the disgust and concern most Americans feel about the direction of the country and those who claim to be our leaders. We know -- knew going in -- that the changes we seek would take a lot longer than a couple of election cycles. We're still here; we're not going away, and we will succeed.
Gary B| 9.4.12 @ 8:23PM
"...targeted because we are effective." Exactly. Their worst fear is the prospect of the sleeping giant waking up. The Tea Party is that giant.
Said it before...
Step One - Get The Muslim out of the White House by electing Romney.
Step Two - Start beating the sh!t out of the Republicans to get them to pay attention. They must be made to understand it's not the same shakedown game any more. The peasants are really pissed and there are A LOT of them (us) out there.
Big Bob| 9.4.12 @ 11:55AM
Lying has various levels of pathology. A 2- or 3-year old usually lies cuz he/she don't want a whoopin. A teenager might lie to impress a peer. An unfaithful spouse lies to avoid be caught, which is different from worrying about the punishment, as a 2-year old might. On the other hand, a serial liar has very very different pathology. After watching dinesh's movie, 2016, this president's lying is pathological in the purest sense of the word. He is angry, bitter, jealous, and selfish, all at once. Some might label him a narcissist. But whatever the pathology, the lies are there to promote an agenda he is committed to that he would NEVER be able to advance if he told the truth. The American public has been caught offguard, (or some of them have been, anyway) and have a very difficult time believing that one person could lie so easily and quickly without any shame whatsoever. We thought Billy Clinton had the corner on that. But he couldn't hold a candle ideologically to Mr. Clinton. Thus, we have a little boy, still trying to convince someone that he counts, trying to run a country into the ground in order to satisfy a childhood insecurity. At the most primeval understanding, I think that's what we have. Shame on us if we give him another 4 years to try to prove himself.
Life-lover| 9.4.12 @ 12:30PM
Regarding American taliban, the most prominent madrasah talib I can think of is Pres. Obama.
vitaglubet| 9.4.12 @ 2:44PM
Good read Matt. Mr. Sorkin is talented but not too high on the reasoning scale. Seems true about many in Hollywood.
Stan Redmond| 9.4.12 @ 5:38PM
Who cares. Let Sorkin write his stupid show for the lefties that will gobble up his bile. It will keep the rabid lefties glued to their TVs and off the streets. The show is nothing but mental masturbation for a bunch of brain dead occupoopers. I've watched youtube clips in shock. The vapidness and cliches are astounding but that's as deep as a leftist like Sorkin and his fellow travellers at MSNBC. And with shows like this to feed them what they are craving they will imagine this fantasyland is the way it ought to be. With each episode their resentments and anger will build and build all the while they are left behind in the ahstray of burned out socialist dogma.
Mike W| 9.4.12 @ 5:46PM
The writer lost it when he got off on the Sharia law thing. Even though I am a conservative, I don't stay awake at night worrying about Sharia taking over. Makes him look like a paranoid nut.
The part about Hussein building the mosque was absolutely ridiculous. Hussein was a muslim in name only. Is the author seriously trying to imply that Hussein was part of the greater muslim war on the west? He loses credibility with such nonsense.
Otherwise, an interesting article.
Gary B| 9.4.12 @ 6:12PM
With all due respect, Mike, Sharia Law is a significant threat. You can get an American Muslim to denounce violence, but not Sharia Law. And, worse, when American judges start incorporating its principles in their decisions the camel's nose under the tent. In my humble opinion we can lay most of our troubles at the feet of progressive judges, who have ushered political correctness into our legal code. So-called hate crimes, for example. Can Sharia Law be far behind.
Kwan| 9.4.12 @ 6:46PM
Hitler had Leni Riefenstahl (Triumph of the Will) the American Left has Aaron Sorkin. Yes you can trust that a Sorkin dramatization will attempt to persuade us that a leftist-rat politician is a hero of the people, and any conservative is a Scrooge-like villain. Sorkin is a useful idiot, and like Riefenstahl is divorced from reality. Sorkin actually believes that big, bigger, more bigger, and much more bigger government will solve all our problems and lead us all to the promised land. Obama's three+ years of failure disproves this nonsense.
RJ| 9.5.12 @ 1:43AM
Sorkin, in the West Wing for Clinton loyalists and Newsroom for Obama loyalists, creates an artificial reality for the liberals when their failed empire crashes down on them. It is easy to get delusional when you are hunkered-down in the bunker with no realistic way out. Newsroom gives the Obamaistas a way to get through the day before the fall. Do you think this show will be back after the election? I doubt it.
Albert Constantine Jr.| 9.4.12 @ 9:55PM
"He'll insist that it's high entertainment."
Given Mr. Sorkin's well documented affection for controlled substances, it very likely is.
orange-ghoti| 9.4.12 @ 10:37PM
I've seen all the episodes of The Newsroom and I'll admit, I'm not impressed. The entire reason I wanted to read this article is because I was looking forward to a systematic breakdown of the shortfalls of this very imperfect show, but instead I was treated to disappointment.
For any who have seen the show - and I challenge you to watch it, if for no other reason than ideas and beliefs become stronger and better reasoned when you take the time to challenge them rather than wallow in them - you'll come across many, MANY faults. Over-use of expository dialogue, weak and ill-portrayed female characters, hackneyed plot devices (e.g. the "love triangle"), and many more. However, this article just seems to say that The Newsroom is bad "because I said so" and "oh yeah, LIBERAL" as if that word had some sort of natural pejorative meaning.
The article even misses excellent opportunities to provide point-counterpoint. The quoted paragraph above from the series premiere may very well contain factual inaccuracies, but this article does little to correct them. We get the rhetorical equivalent of "nuh-uh!".
As much as I would enjoy taking the time to refute the various incorrect or just negligent parts of this article, how could I possibly take the time to appropriately critique an article that doesn't give the same treatment to the subject it criticizes?
I suspect the author can do better and I hope he will in the future.
Poppakap| 9.5.12 @ 11:07AM
But since you make the claim without actually refuting specific points, you're guilty of the same offense.
In rhetoric, one who makes a claim shoulders the responsibility of providing evidence. Otherwise, commentary is cheap, even well-written commentary.
orange-ghoti| 9.6.12 @ 11:05AM
Fair enough, although this is an offense to which I readily admit in my original comment.
The 1500 characters given in this space is hardly enough for a full treatment. I had to edit my comment above just so it would post in the first place. But if for no other reason than it would make an interesting exercise, I'll make it a subject of a blog post in the near future and provide a link to it if you're so inclined.
CforUS| 9.5.12 @ 10:34AM
The world according to the American entertainment industry. Even Alice would have been been shocked and afraid of their wonderland.
pomdter| 9.5.12 @ 10:54AM
Someone just posted a clip of the rant you refer to on my facebook page a few days ago. I commented that it was one of the funniest things I've seen making fun of left wing idiocy. The poster pointed out that I was missing the point, and, after visiting the shows web site, I realized it wasn't trying to be funny, it was trying to be serious! There were all these viewer comments congratulating and fawning over the rant. The big laugh now just scares me. What's wrong with these people? Can they be fixed?