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.
The concept of the "common good" is actually the basis of socialism, kind of a wonder to me to hear it touted on a conservative forum. Along with the leftist argument that individual freedom is selfish.
The only "common good" palatable to a lover of freedom and liberty should be the common good of preserving that liberty. The last couple weeks are educating me to the fact that that view's not too universal among "conservatives."
Michelle Milkin the Horse
That is the funniest line in the movie! I loved that movie too!
*giggle*
LOL!
Want to bet how many posts it will take until we see "small group?"
ROTFLOL! Good one! LOL-LOL-LOL.
And now you know why I've nicknamed that subset "The Spanish Inquisition."
NOBODY expects the Spanish Inquisition! Our chief weapon is surprise!... Surprise and fear... fear and surprise... Our two weapons are fear and surprise... and ruthless efficiency! Our three weapons are fear, and surprise, and ruthless efficiency... and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope... Our four... no... Amongst our weapons... Hmf... Amongst our weaponry... are such elements as fear, surpr... I'll come in again.
'Nuff said.
Well put. I have horses, fercryinoutloud. I have ~gasp~ had to inspect and clean my horse's [whisper] penis [/whisper] as needed. I just have to look out the window to see how sex without sin is more natural than the uncomfortable, constricted, constipated existance we've created, very much pretending by day that sex doesn't exist. Animals keep you in reality.
And he's a gelding. ;~D
How dare you state your opinion on this board about Jane Fonda being there! Why some people don't like that and just have to post a snide comment to you.
Please know that we are not all like that on FR. You have a right to post your opinion.
I was sickened to see Fonda there also, not that I think Pres. Bush had anything to do with that. And no, I won't take it up with PBS! :)
He was VERY good. Laura checked her speech with him and he was very complimentry about her "delivery."
So, now your argument is that it's not "masturbation", it's just grasping and pulling the horse's penis. Thank you for that meaningful distinction, Mr. Clinton.
OK, now it comes out, you are just anti-Bush.
No, I am not "anti-Bush". I am a conservative, and agree with much of what President Bush has done to further conservative positions. I disagree with those things he has done that further liberal positions. He has done both. I distinguish myself from Bushies such as yourself who believe that the President walks on water, and that no one associated with him can do any wrong. I had great respect for the First lady before this incident. Her actions have diminished that respect. So simple that even you may be able to understand it.
Pornographer!
Thanks. Good to see you also.
Check out 528..........LOL......you're gonna have to go somoe to beat that one!
If one assumes the joke was about masturbating then that's one's own fault.
I wouldn't mind un-bunching them for her...
...OK OK that was ME having a dirtier mind than you.
If you knew what you are talking about, you would know we are not. Just because I don't attack them does not mean I agree with them.
Continue on with your snide comments, I expect no less.
I've seen female pigs do that to *gasp* other female pigs.
Is that a macro that you all pass among yourselves?
Obviously you haven't seen the show in question. It was about swear words having meaning and not just being words to throw around.
But Michelle malkin didn't either, or she would have seen that.
I love how people comment on something second or third hand, having never seen the incident in question.
PS to michelle, you're trying to be hip as well.
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