The Salon Interview: Camille Paglia

salon $.05/share ^ | 2 7 2003 | David Talbot

[linn37]

"However, I'm extremely upset about our rush to war at the present moment. If there truly were an authentic international coalition that had been carefully built, and if the administration had demonstrated sensitivity to the fragility of international relations, I'd be 100 percent in favor of an allied military expedition to go into Iraq and find and dispose of all weapons of mass destruction."

Sorry dear we don't have the time to play slap and tickle with the pacifists this time around

[Teacher317]

Salon, now at $0.05 per share

[miss marmelstein]

I found this interview pretty appalling - and I have always been one of her biggest fans. But she is an admirer of Edward Said, the smooth Arabic writer & professor who "fudged" his Palestinian roots and was once photographed throwing stones at Israeli tanks.

It's interesting that she should site Sean Hannity as someone who doesn't travel outside America. In all my readings of Camille's work, the only travel she mentions is going to the United Kingdom to promote her books. Now, she may be a world traveler but it is not reflected in her books or articles. I'm a total supporter of this war but I'm spending next month in Sicily - not too far from the action. And Mt. Etna is blowing up!

[MamaLucci]

I've been a fan of Paglia's myself.
This is where she lost me.

Charles Rangel is quite right that the burden will be borne by a lower social class.

Camille, I thought you were smarter than that.

[jwfiv]

I'm a big Paglia fan...sharp, graceful, mostly honest dyke that she is.

However, I found this interview with her unreadable...just don't have time for flat-earthers these days...soon as someone tells me the earth is flat (repeating any Dimokrat talking point), I turn 'em off.

[headsonpikes]

She misses the bigger point-- that 'sovereign nations' are now an anachronism.

The Arab states have no particular moral right to exist as sovereign nations.

It's time for the 'breaking of nations'.

[beckett]

Good work, dennis. I sure as hell wasn't going to pay Salon to read this.

[Mr. Jeeves]

After 9/11, what should have been perfectly clear is that we need a long, slow process of reeducating the peoples of the world, to try to convince Muslims of the fundamental benevolence of American intentions.

What 9/11 made perfectly clear is that there is no time for that.

[beckett]

An influential public intellectual, with a popular following among liberals and conservatives, comes out against the war. This is not good news for the Bush administration.

[Henk]

Look, you can't just rip off the content of a pay-for-access site and post it here. It ain't right and it will get Free Republic in trouble (again).

[smith288]

"Paglia is mostly terrific, but she believes in omens, even though she says she does not believe in God, which would be the entity which sends omens. "

She's a witch!!!! Kill her!!!!! </salem witch hunt>

[Grand Old Partisan]

Let's not be hasty -- we need proof. The proper procedure is to throw suspected witches into a lake. If they float, they're witches, so then burn them.

[Moonman62]

An influential public intellectual, with a popular following among liberals and conservatives, comes out against the war. This is not good news for the Bush administration.

But, beckett, look at her "reasoning" and compare that to the highly effective speeches by Powell and Bush the past couple of days. I think she'll hardly be noticed.

[Paul Lyons]

Lets see now...
Camille Pagila is a feminist, a college professor, a self-described 'child of the sixties' and TWICE voted for Bill Clinton.
And yet you "had no idea what to expect when we phoned her earlier this week for her opinions on the Bush administration's looming war with Iraq"...
lol...Does the word discernment mean ANYTHING to you?
Hate to break this to you dude...but your stupid.

[The Iguana]

"There's just no way that Saddam's threat is equal to that of Hitler leading up to World War II. Hitler had amassed an enormous military machine and was actively seeking world domination."

That was only true by 1939.

Had the French upheld the Versailles Treaty terms confronting the German reoccupation of the Rhineland in 1936 - when the Wehrmacht consisted of 200,000 mostly ill-trained and ill-equipped troops, with little air force to speak of - the history of the 20th century would have been far different, and far better.

When the cancer has metastasized, it's too late.

Which is exactly what we face in North Korea now.

[beckett]

But, beckett, look at her "reasoning" and compare that to the highly effective speeches by Powell and Bush the past couple of days. I think she'll hardly be noticed.

Her reasoning is faulty, her influence large. I think her position will be noticed. I even think a large number of folks, especially of the libertarian persuasion, have been waiting for her to take a stand before taking one themselves.

[Bernard Marx]

I think of Paglia as the Patrick J. Moynihan of the intellectual set: she talks the talk but always winds up wanting things both ways. How can you really trust the judgment of anyone who voted for Clinton twice? A liberal opportunist, I'd say. She's all hat and no cattle.

[iconoclast]

Thanks for posting this we need loads more like it to counter balance the avalanche of jingoistic propoganda.

[dennisw]

Look, you can't just rip off the content of a pay-for-access site and post it here. It ain't right and it will get Free Republic in trouble (again).

No rip off. It can be viewed for free --->

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[dennisw]

However, I found this interview with her unreadable...just don't have time for flat-earthers these days...soon as someone tells me the earth is flat (repeating any Dimokrat talking point), I turn 'em off.

I hear ya about the flat earth types w/ the Democrat talking points.

Saddam is an amoral thug, but he's not the principal danger to American security. (So what? Iraq is near the top of the list) The real problem is a shadowy, international network of young, radical Islamic men. (We're working on that Camille. Hit Iraq and you hit them. You lay down a marker.) And we have played right into their hands since last summer by coming across as a bullying world power, (We get the shit work. The garbage collecting since other nations have wimped out. Have let their armies atrophy) threatening war with Iraq and acting completely callous to the resulting human carnage and death of innocent civilians. (Lousy excuse! Wait a few years and Iraq will go nuclear just like North Korea. Sorry about the Iraqi casualties but that's the price to be paid. Blame Saddam) That privileges American over Iraqi lives? (Perhaps enough American soldiers will die, to even the score, to make you happy) Why does the chance of American casualties through random terrorism outweigh the certain reality of Iraqi devastation in a crushing invasion? (We cannot afford to let Saddam go nuclear. We can't have him issuing threats in the MidEast and directly to American soil)