Posted on 05/04/2005 5:59:04 AM PDT by OESY
I'll get to First Lady Laura Bush's bawdy stand-up routine in a minute. But I want to highlight a related new book out about how young conservatives are shaking up the dominant liberal media culture. It's called "South Park Conservatives." My name is listed on the cover along with many other (mostly) right-leaning pundits, websites, and bloggers, but I must confess to having mixed feelings about the honor.
The best-selling book's author, Brian C. Anderson of the Manhattan Institute, writes a fun, breezy survey documenting the rise of talk radio, FOX News, the Internet, conservative publishing, and college Republican activism. Anderson's chapter on the success of conservative talk radio and the abysmal failure of liberal Air America to replicate it is incisive. Another chapter on the blogosphere (alone worth the price of the book) gives readers a useful history of the explosion of news, opinion, and political websites that have smashed the left-wing media monopoly.
But how did such a wide-ranging list of individuals and organizations -- Anderson's book cover includes the names of conservative-leaning Internet pioneer Matt Drudge and center-left journalist Mickey Kaus, the libertarian Tech Central Station, the culturally conservative WorldNetDaily, political upstart Arnold Schwarzenegger and political chameleon Andrew Sullivan, plus Ann Coulter, Laura Ingraham, and myself, along with a feature blurb from Jonah Goldberg -- all get lumped under the umbrella term "South Park Conservatives"?
Anderson argues that Comedy Central's cartoon series "South Park" embodies the "fiercely anti-liberal comedic spirit" of the "new media" from Kaus to Coulter. The cartoon, he writes, reflects a "post-liberal counterculture" that is "particularly appealing to the young, however much it might offend older conservatives."
Well, I'm 34 and no fan of "South Park." I have many good friends who are indeed huge boosters of the show, but I find that the characters' foul language overwhelms any entertainment I might otherwise derive from the show's occasional, right-leaning iconoclastic themes.
"South Park" may be "politically incorrect." But "politically incorrect" is not always a synonym for "conservative."
My discomfort with "South Park's" increasingly mainstream vulgarity is not a matter of nitpicking. We're not just talking about a stray curse word here or there. As liberal New York Times columnist Frank Rich points out, "South Park" "holds the record for the largest number of bleeped-out repetitions (162) of a single four-letter expletive in a single television half-hour." That's probably about the same number of profanities uttered at John Kerry's infamous New York City celebrity fundraiser last summer, which Republicans rightly condemned for its excessive obscenities.
Rich is wrong about most things, but he's painfully on target in noting the incongruous pandering now taking place by some in the cool-kids clique on the Right. Conservatives criticize Hollywood relentlessly, but as Rich notes, "the embarrassing reality is that they want to be hip, too."
Which brings me to Mrs. Bush. She demonstrated at the celebrity-studded White House Correspondents' Dinner this weekend that you can entertain without being profane. Most of her humor was just right: Edgy but not over the edge. But her off-color stripper and horse jokes crossed the line. Can you blame Howard Stern for feeling peeved and perplexed? And let's face it: If Teresa ("I'm cheeky!") Heinz Kerry had delivered Mrs. Bush's First Lady Gone Mildly Wild routine, social conservative pundits would be up in arms over her bad taste and lack of dignity.
The First Lady resorting to horse masturbation jokes is not much better than Whoopi Goldberg trafficking in dumb puns on the Bush family name. It was wholly unnecessary.
Self-censorship is a conservative value. In a brilliant commencement speech at Hillsdale College last year, Heritage Foundation president Ed Feulner called on his audience to resist the coarsened rhetoric of our time: "If we are to prevail as a free, self-governing people, we must first govern our tongues and our pens. Restoring civility to public discourse is not an option. It is a necessity."
Lighten up, you say? No thanks. I'd rather be a G-rated conservative who can only make my kids giggle than a "South Park"/"Desperate Housewives" conservative whose goal is getting Richard Gere and Jane Fonda to snicker. Giving the Hollyweird Left the last laugh is not my idea of success.
Lets just say that it's like watching "Island of the Lost Hunks"
Call me shallow, but they sure are purty ;)
I've never seen one minute of South Park, so the term "SP Conservative" is lost on me, and I don't give a rip. I found nothing vulgar in Laura's remarks. It was a ROAST, for grown ups, and her husband loved it.
There's nothing wrong with looking!
Because they are the acts of consensual adults and do not interfere with rights of others. Therefore, murder is a crime -- it interferes with the rights of others. Pornography should not be a crime. Assuming the models are not forced, everything involved is a consensual transaction for God, not the state to judge.
Adultery is actually a tough call for me. Marriage is essentially a contract and, unless the adulterer has permission of his or her spouse, the adultery is a breaking of the contract without one party's consent.
Abortion comes down to when you think the fetus becomes a child with a right to life. Personally, I think it's viability -- I'm not going to argue why here -- so I'm pro-choice before than and pro-life afterward. However, there are decent arguments stating that a fetus gets the right to live earlier than that and those who believe it should oppose abortion.
Euthanasia is a tough call, too. On the one hand, out-and-out suicide is usually insanity and therefore not the act of a consenting adult. OTOH, many people have risked and sacrificed their lives to save others. We don't call them insane -- we call them heroes. There may be a point where one must step back and say, "You are suffering so much that, if you want to end your life, you should be allowed to," but I haven't found a point I'm comfortable with yet.
But the overriding point is that God gave us free will. It seems to me, in that light, that to be compelled to virtue counts little, if any to our credit. Those acts that are consensual ought to be a matter between God and the individual. Indeed, we are imperfect and can easily have misinterpreted God's word; therefore to interfere in such a manner -- even if we think we are acting on a moral basis -- runs the risk of crossing God's will.
You're right. I don't see it either as being something about 'horse masterbation.' That didn't even enter my mind.
That is what I understood the joke as. However, it seems that the unending indignity and pontificating about this little harmless joke is really got people unfocused.
On top of that, a lot of people from Texas have a vulgar sense of humor but are still as moral or religious as they come.
President Bush loved it so much, he said her middle name was Leno.
Well, mary, there MUST be something wrong with you, too!
I would simply ask, would it have been appropriate, say, twenty or forty years ago? Is it sufficient for the GOP to remain a few steps behind the Dems in the drift to a coarser society, even if they are now occupying a zone that used to be considered inappropriate? Does that contribute to the incremental creep - or, as you say, is it inconsequential towards such?
I agree that you can't blame the Bush Admin for MSM guests.
What is with the masturbation stuff? If Laura Bush had said the word "masturbation", then I might be in agreement with the folks who said the First Lady had crossed a line. However, she simply made a joke about how her husband couldn't tell the difference between a male horse and a female cow. As a child, I would have gotten the joke. It's the folks with their minds in the gutter who have such a problem with the joke.
For me this is rather enlightening about the minds of some who would equate milk with the stuff on Monica Lewinsky's blue dress. Gutter minds. Laura Bush is probably aghast that these folks have taken her joke in such a way. I would be. And, yes, I would tell such a joke. In front of my innocent children. They would get it. And they would "get" the humor. My teenagers might see some perversion possibilities. That is the way I was as a teenager. Then I grew up.
Thank you for the ping and that great post. I'm a "stick in the mud" for old-fashioned values, esspecially where the kiddies are concerned, but there's a time to laugh, and time to flip the channel.
Off-color humor are as old as humanity. I'll bet the first cave man joke involved fire and flatulence.
>>With a screen name of by melancholy,Rule 1218 states "you cannot post on a thread about humor"<<
With a screen name of woofie, rule 1218A states "You cannot post on a thread about animals.
Not only that, but the woman from Texas who IS vulgar is that old bag GWB knocked out of the Governorship: Ann Richard/Richards.
I think it has more to do with being very in touch with nature via ranching, horses, livestock etc.
Animals don't hold back, they do it all, right there in front of you. So being dainty and 'oohhhh myyy' is sorta silly when you're out there workin' around it all day.
Hrmpt,
Right now in my aviary, the all I need is 'boom boom chucka chucka' music playing cuz it's spring and the parakeets are frisky!
Yes, it was appropriate and funny when Nancy Reagan poked fun at Ronald Reagan in 1982, more than 20 years ago.
I'll address the rest of your comment after lunch. Bye for now.
Ya know, I think you're on to something with that statement.
I'd really like to know why it's different.
Did he? LOL - I hadn;t read or heard that.
Your #484:
THAT was eloquent.
Thank you.
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