Category Archives: Media

From Bondage to Freedom

Islam, Israel, Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Media, Middle East

Fox Correspondent Steve Centanni and cameraman Olaf Wiig were freed, after being held in Palestinian captivity for two weeks. Hostage taking is a developing industry in the PA, an import from “liberated” Iraq, it would seem. Better that than, say, working for a living.

I don’t mean to criticize the two men. They had to placate their captors. I fully understand and sympathize with that. I’m just not quite clear on the conclusions Centanni and Wiig drew from their harrowing ordeal:

Said Centanni: “the Palestinian people are very beautiful and kind-hearted,” a sentiment Wiig reiterated by expressing his fear that the plight of the Beauteous Ones would be left untold if such unlovely acts proliferated. (No such luck: the most rehashed story ever will continue to be rehashed, and the resolution of the so-called Palestinian problem tied to every treaty or agreement imaginable. I hear Pigmy tribes won’t parcel out a piece of rain forest without a promise that the plight of the Palestinian people be solved.)

Centanni related that they “were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint.” But incase viewers took issue with Centanni’s use of the word “forced,” or if they understood him to mean he would not have converted voluntarily, Centanni quickly qualified: “Don’t get me wrong here,” he told Fox. “I have the highest respect for Islam, and I learned a lot of good things about it, but it was something we felt we had to do because they had the guns…”

Despite the oddly inverse conclusions the two freed media men drew from the experience, they hastily departed for Israel through the northern Erez border crossing. As the old adage goes, actions speak louder than words.

Fem’s Feral Fangs Exposed

Feminism, Gender, Media

My column tonight is about MAC’s new mug. To those who want to watch the object of my philippic, knock yourself out. But be warned: it’s ugly (tonight’s column will salve, I promise). In any event, the unpleasant sub-topic of my column being ugly mouths, I’ve noticed that so many American women are cursed with those. If it’s not “misshapen, bulbous lips,” acquired in the rooms of plastic surgeons, to quote my forthcoming column, then it’s a snarling upper lip stretched over exposed teeth, so that while the woman yaps, her fangs are exposed like those of a feral animal. Now I’m not talking about the commendable American attention to dentitionyou know, that Austin Powers look. (Here are some amusing comments about the “Anglo-American dental gap.”) That’s a good thing; a function of our wealth. What I’m speaking of is a kind of deformity of facial bones, really, or at least an unappealing feature, conjuring painter Willem de Kooning’s portrayals. Paula Zahn, Monica Crawley, Sheryl Crow (who seems as sweet as she is untalented), Margaret Carlson, and many otherswatch them speak. They struggle to zip their lips over their (formidably big) teeth when talking.

Fem's Feral Fangs Exposed

Feminism, Gender, Media

My column tonight is about MAC’s new mug. To those who want to watch the object of my philippic, knock yourself out. But be warned: it’s ugly (tonight’s column will salve, I promise). In any event, the unpleasant sub-topic of my column being ugly mouths, I’ve noticed that so many American women are cursed with those. If it’s not “misshapen, bulbous lips,” acquired in the rooms of plastic surgeons, to quote my forthcoming column, then it’s a snarling upper lip stretched over exposed teeth, so that while the woman yaps, her fangs are exposed like those of a feral animal. Now I’m not talking about the commendable American attention to dentitionyou know, that Austin Powers look. (Here are some amusing comments about the “Anglo-American dental gap.”) That’s a good thing; a function of our wealth. What I’m speaking of is a kind of deformity of facial bones, really, or at least an unappealing feature, conjuring painter Willem de Kooning’s portrayals. Paula Zahn, Monica Crawley, Sheryl Crow (who seems as sweet as she is untalented), Margaret Carlson, and many otherswatch them speak. They struggle to zip their lips over their (formidably big) teeth when talking.

King Cuts Coulter Down

Ann Coulter, Homosexuality, Media, The Zeitgeist

Florence King leaves most pipsqueak contemporary “writers” standing (they’re syndicated, however, she’s not). The famous misanthrope and recluse saw fit to emerge from hibernation to kick Ann coulter around in a column for National Review. Some other conservatives crawled from under dank rocks and attempted to respond to King’s studied contempt. Here’s a taste of why they failed so miserably:

Coulter’s sexual remarks are at once grim and flippant. Commenting on a psychologist’s plan to teach children about gay sex in a loving way, she said: ‘How can you teach children about anal sex in a loving way? Or any sodomy, for that matter?”
I am not saying that everyone has to be witty and original and overflowing with dazzling bons mots — after all, Coulter is a lawyer and I wouldn’t want to see her let down the side. I am just curious to know why she was content to call Katie Couric “the affable Eva Braun of morning TV.” Couldn’t she come up with something better? How about Simper Fidelis?…
At her best, Coulter writes well, but the chief source of her success is that she is a perfect match for the American ideal: smart as a whip but dumb as a post, educated but not learned, sexy but not sensuous, all at the same time. She would not hesitate to choose a sledgehammer over a stiletto because her instincts would pull her back from what the 18th century called ‘demolishing your enemies without raising your voice.’ She would know that if a writer uses a stiletto, a lot of people might not get the point, but they would definitely get the loftiness that accompanies irony and understatement. And so, knowing that being called an elitist spells ruin, she opted for a sledgehammer and raised the roof instead.
Her timing was perfect, putting her before the television cameras just in time to take advantage of the whoosh. That’s the sound cable news uses to signal each new 15-second segment in a roundup. They report the latest border debacle, then they go whoosh! and start talking about midwestern floods. When they finish the floods there’s another whoosh! and the subject changes to the stock market. Gone are the days when a break was signaled by a soft rattle of the host’s fake papers and a murmured ‘We’ll be back in a moment.’ Now, if a revered philosopher came on a show, the host would say, ‘Hold your thought, Plato,’ and cut to whoosh.
CNN has the loudest whoosh, a harsh wheezing sound so labored that at first I thought it was me. After all, I made my NR debut 16 years ago with a cover story called ‘I’d Rather Smoke Than Kiss.’ But no. The whoosh is television’s way of telling us that we are being swept up and borne aloft on gusty torrents of swirling excitement. To train us to gasp, they walk us through it by gasping for us.
The whoosh needs a blowhard and it has gotten Ann Coulter, a one-woman Hyde Park Corner who, love her or hate her, is saving television from itself by never uttering Guestisms — those gummy little nothings that guests keep saying over and over without thinking until everybody thinks they have said something thoughtful.”

King’s complete column, “Watch Ann Go Whoosh!,” is here. And here is my “Coughing Up Some Coulter Fur Balls.”