LEFT-WING RANT: America Too Patriotic, Says Norman Mailer (three-bag barf)

Reuters | February 6, 2002

[Liz]

London (Reuters) American writer Norman Mailer has criticized the ``patriotic fever'' gripping the United States following the Sept. 11 attacks.

``What happened on Sept. 11 was horrific, but this patriotic fever can go too far,'' Britain's Daily Telegraph quoted Mailer, 79, as saying Wednesday.

``America has an almost obscene infatuation with itself. Has there ever been a big powerful country that is as patriotic as America?'' Mailer asked in an interview.

``You'd really think we were some poor little republic, and that if one person lost his religion for one hour, the whole thing would crumble. America is the real religion in this country.''

Mailer, renowned for his macho image and stabbing the second of his six wives 40 years ago, said America's right wing had benefited from the attacks on Sept. 11.

``The right wing benefited so much from Sept. 11 that, if I were still a conspiratorialist, I would believe they'd done it,'' he said.

Mailer is widely recognized as pioneering the genre known as New Journalism, where writers such as Tom Wolfe, Hunter S. Thompson and Joan Didion blurred the distinction between fact and fiction and peppered prose with their own opinions.

Mailer's best known works include ``The Executioner's Song'' and ``The Armies of the Night.''

[Liz]

NORM'S WEARING HIS TIN FOIL HAT: ``The right wing benefited so much from Sept. 11 that, if I were still a conspiratorialist, I would believe they'd done it,'' he said.

BTW, Norm, did you see a black helicopter on the lawn, too?

[syriacus]

Mailer's thinking is somewhat skewed. Here's another example of the muddledness of Mailer's thinking.

Mailer helped secure the release of convicted murderer Jack Henry Abbott, whose letters to Mailer were published as "In the Belly of the Beast." Shortly after his release, Abbott murdered again.

[GenXFreedomFighter]

Mailer, renowned for his macho image and stabbing the second of his six wives 40 years ago, said America's right wing had benefited from the attacks on Sept. 11.

He sounds like one of those guys that need leftist trash like Bill Clinton in the Oval Office to justify his own rotten life.

[Liz]

Mailer's thinking is somewhat skewed.

I've read most of his output. I admit "Executioner's Song" was a major work.
But a lot of his stuff - like the book on MM - is a paen to his erotic dreams.

[Liz]

He sounds like one of those guys that need leftist trash like Bill
Clinton in the Oval Office to justify his own rotten life.

He is one of those self-deluded characters - like BillyBoy - who mistakenly
believe the universe revolves around them and their self-involved moves.

[SpinyNorman]

Why is this moron hiding in London? C'mon over to Ground Zero and spout this crap to some firefighters and see how "macho" you are! Better yet, go to some Islamic state and continue your career of stabbing women. It's probably legal there, and you can get your jollies and rant all you want.

Wotta pig.

[chachacha]

``You'd really think we were some poor little republic

Norman said "WE", does this mean he considers himself a proud, patriotic American? Ha, Ha, ha. He's a withered Joke!

[Texbob]

Screw Norman Mailer and all the terroist supporters like him.

[bonfire]

Too Patriotic? The libs are running out of things to write about.

[Liz]

Screw Norman Mailer and all the terroist supporters like him.

Hate crime in action.....this lefty hater'd be yelling for the
ACLU if the right dared to suggest 9/11 was the left's fault.

[Liz]

Why is this moron hiding in London...........go to some Islamic state and continue your career
of stabbing women. It's probably legal there, and you can get your jollies and rant all you want.

Probably prefers women in bourkas......LOL

[StriperSniper]

Mailer is widely recognized as pioneering the genre known as New Journalism, where writers such as Tom Wolfe, Hunter S. Thompson and Joan Didion blurred the distinction between fact and fiction and peppered prose with their own opinions.

'Fuzzy Journalism', how 'progressive'.

[cardinal4]

London appears to be the exile of choice for the liberal America haters.(Altman)Now if we could just get Hillary and Bill to go......

[skeeter]

Alot of Europeans must like to hear this prattle, as leftwing elitists like Altman, Mailer never miss an opportunity to score suck-up points with them.

Somebody ought to tell these relics about the internet - now the folks back home can now read their anti-US rantings almost as fast as their beloved target audience. A point Clinton never seemed to grasp, either.

I'm sure I'm not the only American who's list of banned leftwing jaggoffs grows longer every day.

[monkey]

Mailer, renowned for his macho image

Mailer has never had a macho image. He worshipped Hemingway, suggesting in Advertisements for Myself that H. should run for president.

He fashioned himself as a 5'3" tough guy, but despite his slap fights with Gore Vidal and his boxing match with Ryan O'Neil (which he lost) and his occasional street fight (all of which he lost) and his writing about boxing (which was terrible and had nothing to do with boxing), and his cultivation of a convict, he has never created a persona other than an Elmer Fudd-like clown who whispers to his opponent, "No hitting in the face, right?".

[Liz]

Somebody ought to tell these relics about the internet - now the folks back home can now read their anti-US
rantings almost as fast as their beloved target audience. A point Clinton never seemed to grasp, either.

Clinton never grasped that? His own VP invented the net {{{{{{snicker}}}}} for God's sake?
LOL. Guess the problem was Klintoon was "grasping" a lot of other things......{{{{giggle}}}}}

[goodnesswins]

WHO is Norman Mailer????? OK, just kidding, but honestly I've never been moved to read ANYTHING he's written....including what's been posted here, lately. But, thanks to everyone for their comments.....confirms what I already thought.

[Liz]

(Mailer was a self-styled ) 5'3" tough guy.....

Mailer's a victim, don't you know? LOL. I guess he can blame his
insecurity about his height for all of his aberrations, including this rant.

[Texaggie79]

Someone is trying to gain some international brownie points.

[TimSkalaBim]

This is quite a change from Mailer's initial take on the terrorist attack. At first, he called the terrorists "brilliant." Mailer must have figured the terrorists were folks more in tune to his way of thinking because he never would have complimented "the right wing" with such praise. Mailer: "We had to realize that the people that did this were brilliant."

The attack by Mailer's "brilliant" friends obviously backfired, as Mailer now sees.