Posted on 04/04/2005 9:14:42 PM PDT by CHARLITE
The only anti-Vietnam War protester that can tick off a Vietnam veteran more than John Kerry is Jane Fonda. In her interview by Leslie Stahl on CBS' "60 Minutes" Sunday, April 3, Jane Fonda characterized such reactions to her as "ill-placed anger." In one respect, she may be correct.
It may be "ill-placed anger" neither because her anti-Vietnam War activities deserve praise nor because she makes an exceedingly partial recantation now. It may be "ill-placed anger" simply because of her current irrelevance and because of our moral compunction to attend to more important matters, including bettering our own decencies.
There is no doubt that Jane Fonda's anti-Vietnam war activities were treacherous, if not treasonous. There is no repentance in her continued prideful defense of her anti-Vietnam War activities. In 1972, having accused the U.S. of committing "genocide" by fighting communist takeover of South Vietnam, she volunteered for 10 vehement propaganda broadcasts for Radio Hanoi that called President Nixon a "new-type Hitler" and encouraged South Vietnamese soldiers to desert being "cannon fodder for U.S. imperialism," asserted U.S. pilots' bombing "makes one a war criminal," and she gleefully appeared around the world filmed in the firing seat of a North Vietnamese anti-air gun.
This piece of film she now admits was a "betrayal of the country that gave me privilege."
The hypocrisy and shallowness of this admission was quickly exposed when Jane Fonda defiantly added "I won't apologize" for her propaganda appearance with U.S. POWs, showing no remorse for some tortured for refusing to appear with her, by explaining in her morally blind view "both sides were using POWs for propaganda."
This Fonda effrontery mirrors her 1990 comment to Barbara Walters that she was simply "popping off" when in 1973 she called the returning POWs "hypocrites and liars." In 1975, she applauded the success of the North Vietnamese invasion of South Vietnam with the armaments and tanks supplied to North Vietnam by the Soviet Union (compared to the cut-off of promised arms and support from the U.S.), by going to Moscow to thank them "for sending assistance which the Soviet people are sending to Vietnam."
Even in 1979, when the world was aware of the millions of Vietnamese and Cambodians murdered and starved to death by their communist victors, when even Joan Baez protested the Khmer Rouge slaughter, Jane Fonda refused to join in. As she then told the National Press Club, she was unable to confirm the accuracy of the charges.
Like today, in trying to promote her autobiography with a faint and partial apology for "betrayal" only for her anti-air gun appearance, in 1988 Jane Fonda similarly tried to promote her film career. Vietnam veteran protestors disrupted filming of her latest movie in New England. She said she was "sorry that I hurt them" because "there were times I was thoughtless and careless," fairly vacuous without any recantation of her actions and without any reflection on the evils committed by her communist heroes.
Now, having reviewed Jane Fonda's past and current treachery, moral blindness, and self-serving commercial promotion, and much more could be added to the litany of her sins, why would I say that I tend to agree those who oppose her may display "ill-placed anger"?
I agree, not because anger, even pity for her life of insipid self-delusion, is unjustified. I agree because it is "ill-placed." Her movie career is about over. Only Hollywood gossip reporters, fervent for anything to fill columns with news of her ilk, feign interest in her views of anything. It is "ill-placed" because she is irrelevant, and has earned that irrelevancy and disregard.
She considers herself heroic: "I'm a brave woman. I can go to Vietnam. I can challenge my government." An escorted, choreographed, anti-U.S. propaganda tour by the North Vietnamese during wartime is hardly heroic. It is pathetic, even moreso 33 years later to take pride in it when any idiot should know better.
One may reasonably argue that ignoring her is to forgive her transgressions. It is not. She has not repented, necessary by scruples, before forgiveness is granted. Religious scruples, and common sense, however, call upon us to not poison our own soul with bitterness that has little effect, as she is oblivious to the depth of her sins, and that distract from matters of greater importance. Anger is "ill-placed" just because she is not worth it, and we are. Let's just forget her. She deserves to be forgotten and ignored. Nothing else could so deflate her self-image of being of any worth, and punish her.
Bruce Kesler ChFC REBC RHU CLU
Comments: letters@augustafreepress.com.
Hanoi Jane is washed up finally...THANK GOD...I just wish the communist agenda would die with her career:(
He has it.
I agree with you. Excellent article!
She deserves to be convicted of treason by a military court and spend the rest of her miserable days in solitary. Her exercise would consist of being drilled by the mp's running up and down stairs double-time.
Thanks for the ping!
I saw her on the Sunday night interview, she was still defensive after admiting she was wrong. Sounds like the men in her life have given her plenty of punishment.
Reportedly, even with spicing up her self-delusional yarn with three-some sex and sordid Ted Turner affairs this book will fail miserably at the stores. IMHO, by giving the MSM the titilating details of the affairs and sexcapades she is taking a page from Clinton's handbook - Disguise treason with sex and you'll get away with the treason.
Regards,
TS
So is Jane broke??? Too old to exercise??? Amazing that she still does not get it.
(Thanks to Gene Pitney - "Town Without Pity)
When you're young and really dumb as me
And bewildered by the world I see
Why do people hate me so
Only Viet Vets would know
What a clown without pity can do
If we stop to shoot up at a plane
People talk about Hanoi Jane
Mine was not an easy age
I was a princess in a a cage
What a clown without pity can do
I had some problems Many problems
I had a commie sympathy heart
Why didn't they help me, try to help me
Before my stupid assed career fell apart
Take these eager thighs and hold me fast
My menopause just came too fast
How can I keep love alive
How can my marriage survive
When Ted is getting nooners at two
What a clown without pity can do
Not by me. I thought she was really hot in Klute, interesting if wierd in Barbarella, but those are the only two things of her's I've seen and both came out before she went to North Vietnam. I shouldn't have seen Klute, but I was ignorant in those days and I didn't know of her anti US activities prior to that time.
My daughter appologized to me for buying one of her workout tapes. I blew my top, but fairly quietly.
BUMP!!!!!!!!!!
Thanks for the ping. I'm glad I didn't miss this excellent summary by Bruce Kesler.
Jane Fonda and John Kerry should have been arrested and tried for treason. I have not forgiven them.
I don't believe my anger is ill-placed, but it is ill-advised because it hurts me and not them.
Likewise, I don't pity them. They knew (and still know) exactly what they were (and are) doing.
I am watching them warily as they fade away, as I would watch poisonous snakes grow old, but the evil they fostered continues to be relevant and dangerous.
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