War Like Life - Is Not A Movie (Mark Steyn Reconsiders "Deliverance" In 2007 Alert)

Orange County Register ^ | 10/27/2007 | Mark Steyn

[goldstategop]

That's the real flaw in Christopher Dickey's "Deliverance" metaphor: If Cheney is Burt Reynolds, and the rest of America is Jon Voight, and the river is Iraq, who are the hillbillies? Well, presumably (for he doesn't spell it out) they're the dark forces you make yourself vulnerable to when you blunder into somewhere you shouldn't be. When the quartet returns to Atlanta a man short, they may understand how thin the veneer of civilization is, but they don't have to worry that their suburban cul-de-sacs will be overrun and reduced to the same state of nature as the backwoods.

That's the flaw in the thesis: Robert D. Kaplan, a shrewd observer of global affairs, has referred to the jihadist redoubts and other lawless fringes of the map as "Indian territory." It's a cute joke but a misleading one. The difference between the old Indian territory and the new is this: No one had to worry about the Sioux riding down Fifth Avenue, just as Burt Reynolds never had to worry about the mountain man breaking into his rec room. But Iran has put bounties on London novelists, assassinated dissidents in Paris, blown up community centers in Buenos Aires, seeded proxy terror groups in Lebanon and Palestine, radicalized Muslim populations throughout Central Asia – and it's now going nuclear. The leaders of North Korea, Sudan and Syria are not stump-toothed Appalachian losers: Their emissaries wear suits and dine in Manhattan restaurants every night.

[goldstategop]

Deliverance is a great man vs nature survival classic. The 1972 film though offers no lessons on how to fight jihadism. Nature will never overrun us completely. In contrast, the pathology of Islamofascism has the potential of killing millions given its global reach. As Mark Steyn notes, a Hollywood movie made in 1972 doesn't tell us how to respond to threats pace 2007. Its a different world now.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[samtheman]

As usual, another great piece from MS. As usual, the people who could learn the most from it -- all those "big brains" in the drive-by media -- will never read it, and will look down on it without having read it, and feel vastly superior to it without having considered for even one second any of it's beautifully stated and tightly linked ideas.

And after it was all over, after I got to the end of the piece, I noticed this tacked on by the OC Register:

From the editor: Many of you have expressed concerns about some of the harsh anonymous comments from readers. To remedy that, we are introducing new features. You can create your own blog, publish your news and share your photos with the community. Once you fill out a simple form and leave a verifiable e-mail address, you can set up your profile page. It will display all of your contributions and allow you to track issues and easily connect with others.

How much simpler for them -- and how much more educational for their readers -- if they had just included a link to FR.

[Kozak]

What a great country! In how many other political cultures can a fellow identify himself with a stump-toothed inbred psycho hillbilly homosexual rapist as an applause line?

Best Line Ever.

[goldstategop]

Deliverance is also the quintessential male bonding story. It wouldn't be made today but its about men having to rely on each other as well as on themselves to get through a situation that turns from a weekend adventure into a harrowing ordeal. Its key lesson that stays with one after the final reel runs out is to expect the unexpected. In life, things don't always go as planned or have a happy ever aftering ending. That's why its conservatives who are fond of it. There are things in life as liberals are slow to learn, that even government can't protect you from and then you have to fall back on yourself to survive.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[Nasty McPhilthy]

I saw a bumper sticker in Hendersonville, NC the other day that read- “Paddle Faster. I Hear Banjos Playing”.

[goldstategop]

Southerners are just stump-toothed hillbillies with the IQ of cavemen. That's how liberals see the guys from Atlanta: as stupid oafs who failed to secure a government nanny before heading out for a weekend trip in the backwoods.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[usmcobra]

All I know is America will be Ned Beatty if Islam-o-fascists have there way with us.

[goldstategop]

We deserve to be killed because its all our fault. Haven't we paid dearly with 3,000 dead Americans? Not according to the Left.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[Buckhead]

Now, that right there is funny.

[chasio649]

I have a shirt that says “Hike Faster, I hear banjo music”...i will be up in those mountains come tuesday on a 40 mile hike :)

[livius]

Christopher Dickey paints with a broad brush: "On a grand scale they [the administration] could reinterpret the Constitution until it became meaningless." (Monitoring jihadist phone logs being the reinterpretation into meaninglessness, unlike, say, partial-birth abortion, which is merely an ancient constitutional right the founders had cannily anticipated a need for.)

Good article! The left thrives on a delusional paranoia about all the wrong things. There's a lot to paranoid about (namely, the billion or so Muslims out there!), but they prefer to scare themselves with Dick Cheney masks.

[goldstategop]

They really do think the present danger to the Republic is from our President and Vice President and not from our external enemies. The Left has taken leave of its senses.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[Hardastarboard]

Take the Scott Thomas Beauchamp debacle at the New Republic, in which the magazine ran an atrocity-a-go-go Baghdad diary piece by a serving soldier about dehumanized troops desecrating graves, abusing disfigured women, etc. It smelled phony from the get-go – except to the professional media class from whose ranks the New Republic's editors are drawn: To them, it smelled great, because it aligned reality with the movie looping endlessly through the windmills of their mind, a nonstop Coppola-Stone retrospective in which ill-educated conscripts are the dupes of a nutso officer class.

I especially liked the above quote, the last sentence in particular. This man can write.

[Bommer]

If Cheney is Burt Reynolds, and the rest of America is Jon Voight, and the river is Iraq, who are the hillbillies?

Thats easy! They are liberals. Always looking to F the US up the @ss. Now replace the bow and arrow that Burt Reynolds killed one of the hillbillies with and replace it with a gun, and you got Cheney!

[Mercat]

“it’s the difference between hanging upside down in your dominatrix’s bondage parlor after work on Friday and enduring the real thing for years on end in Saddam’s prisons.”

Sounds like Mark has personal experience of this and assumes his readers do too. Too bad it’s too long for a tag line.

[samtheman]

Mark Steyn is truly brilliant. He’s one of the top political writers of our era. His articles should be required reading for all cabinet secretaries in the current administration... and (hopefully) in the Republican administration that begins in Jan ‘09.

[McGarrett]

You’re right about those in their DC & NY towers looking down upon all sounterners as ignorant at best and evil at worst. This seems another extension of Steyn’s point and that made by Peggy Noonan in the weekend WSJ. Big media honchos no longer have the hard knocks experience of old time reporters and editors. They only know what they’ve seen in the movies.

[Lucas McCain]

“James Carville looks like he was sired in the love scene from Deliverance.” —unknown.

[JLS]

He really is brilliant. He saw thru Dickey the son’s shallow analysis pretty easily. He comparison of Friday night at the Dominatrix and the real thing is inspired.

[JLS]

He really is brilliant. He saw thru Dickey the son’s shallow analysis pretty easily. He comparison of Friday night at the Dominatrix and the real thing is inspired.