Well, well, well. No one doubts that Don Imus made a horrible mistake of morality and decency by referring to the gallant Rutgers women’s basketball squad as “nappy headed ho’s.” There was just no excuse for such cruelty. But to watch Imus being grilled on TV by the likes of Al Sharpton was truly beyond belief . Of course he was a huge part of the Tawana Brawley charade which wrecked the lives of perfectly innocent New York policemen. Of course he never made a meaningful apology. But what you might now know is this: that in years past, when the Central Park Jogger rape case was in court, Sharpton picketed outside the office of the New York sex crimes prosecutor, Linda Alice Fairstein, in Manhattan. “Day after day,” Linda — a dear friend — told me, “he would shout out to me and call me a ‘Jew bitch.’ He never even remotely apologized.” For this man to be sitting in moral judgment on anyone at all is incomprehensible. For the media to take Sharpton seriously is unbelievable.
And in the same sad vein, I see photos on TV of Tom Lantos (D-Ca.), a Holocaust survivor, accompanying the pitifully face-lifted Nancy Pelosi (I would bet a lot she’s had a breast job, too–can you imagine that we have a Speaker of the House, third in line for the White House, so vain and superficial that at her age she has her breasts done?) to Damascus and bowing– yes, BOWING — to Bashir Assad, sworn enemy of Israel, killer of Israelis and Americans. Tom Lantos used to be my favorite Congressman for his steadfast support of America and Israel. Now he is just an old pol, doing anything to get in front of the cameras. Vanity, vanity, all is vanity. But did he have to bow to one of the world’s leading anti-Semites?
And at the other end of the moral and intelligence spectrum, run, don’t walk, RUN, to Amazon to buy A Strictly Right: William F. Buckley Jr. and the American Conservative Movement. It is by my old pal John R. Coyne Jr., and Linda Bridges, a long-time colleague of the great Mr. B. Well-written, compelling, amusing, insightful, comprehensive–you do not know Buckley and you do not know the American conservative movement until you have read this book. It is published this week and you’re not a real conservative if you have not read it.