printJournalism just gets less inquisitive and more far-fetched and fatuous by the day. This Christian Science Monitor “writer” believes that when White House communications director Anita Dunn delivered (earlier this year) a long, labored, meaningless address to students, in which she referred to Mao Tse Tung as a favorite “philosopher”—she was merely using irony in the best of Socratic tradition.
This is insane. The woman, Dunn, was incoherent—not an individual capable of deploying subtle rhetorical devices. And she was perfectly serious. She quoted Mao’s meanderings for her sub-intelligent message, and proceeded to draw life’s lessons from the Chairman’s asinine utterance. This was for real. She had “crafted” the message.
The clip (below) was an ugly thing to behold. Like a lizard (or like Larry King), Dunn kept licking her lips and flicking her tongue as she mouthed Mao’s wisdom. Our liberal literati’s explanation? Dunn may have been speaking above Glenn’s head.
Here are the dunderhead’s exact words:
“The third lesson and tip actually comes from two of my favorite political philosophers: Mao Tse-tung and Mother Theresa — not often coupled with each other, but the two people I turn to most to basically deliver a simple point which is ‘you’re going to make choices; you’re going to challenge; you’re going to say why not; you’re going to figure out how to do things that have never been done before.”
What bellies Dunn’s attempt at a retraction is that she coupled Mao and MT as her favorite political philosophers; she made one statement and applied it to both individuals. If she was being ironic about Mao being her Man, then she was also being ironic about Mother. The CSM writer is too stupid to analyze the simplest of texts. Moreover, if she was deploying irony, why would she deliver a lesson to her audience based on the mindless (and menacing) Mao quote? Was the “do it your own way” (à la Uncle Mao) also a twist of irony?
These days stupidity is the default position.
Update (Oct. 19): Writes Roger Kimball:
“Jeremiah Wright. William Ayers. Van Jones. Where does the rogues’ gallery of Barack Obama’s radical friends end? These people are not liberals. They are not ‘progressives.’ They are radicals who hate America and in many cases have advocated or even perpetrated violence in an effort to destroy it.
Thanks to Glenn Beck, the American public has now been introduced to yet another radical member of Obama’s inner circle: Anita Dunn, Interim White House Communications Director, former top advisor to Obama’s political campaign, and wife of Obama’s personal lawyer, Robert Bauer. …”
“Dunn may have been was speaking above Glenn’s head.” typo? [Fixed; thanks.]
“Like a lizard (or like Larry King), Dunn kept licking her lips and flicking her tongue as she mouthed Mao’s wisdom.” Ilana
I noticed that too. Very disturbing. Drugs? [No; just ugly, unfeminine, dog-like behavior.]
I did like the Mao quote along the line “You fight your way and I’ll fight my way”. Surely that is sound wisdom.
As for all the millions the Commies killed, consider that Communism got its start as a reaction to the so-called “business cycle” which should actually be called “the fractional reserve banking cycle.” (See Rothbard, Mises, etc.)
[I understand and appreciate your wholly justified passions, but you have to stop reducing arguments to your one issue. It’s an error—this reductionism prevents you from applying your good head to a myriad of issues.]
“White House communications director Anita Dunn” Appears to be a good representative of the White House and the President’s Cabinet’s spokesperson. Have we seen anything better come from the President’s own lips when he is not repeating a canned speech? Surrounded by kooks that were discredited twenty years ago and resurface now because there is a new generation that don’t know them, she fits right in. I understood her point that a person should seek new ways to do a job that the old way says is impossible. Aristotle proved that when he refuted some of the old ways in Greek Philosophy. Then Isaac Newton refuted some of Aristotle’s Philosophy for science furthering the concept. But Mao and Mother Theresa were not Philosophers in the first place and to call either a Philosopher is a misnomer. Personally I find the concept of a person having two very diverse personalities as mentors curious. What does a person who dedicates their life to serving humanity have in common with someone who dedicated his life to the excitation of personal power over others? But then we have a administration that promised ‘change’ by providing even larger amounts of ‘more of the same.’
Well, in one week the name of Mother Theresa is associated with shameful people: President Obama as recepient of a Nobel Price for “Peace” and Mao in the pathetic association made by Dunn…
Thank God there is a heavenly reward for being slandered!
Maybe we should listen to the wisdom of Mother: “Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person” (not a very socialistic approach), “Spread love everywhere you go. Let no one ever come to you without leaving happier” (not a governement run program) and “If you judge people, you have no time to love them” (what would be for me tempted to judge the above-mentioned characters)
Patrik Jonsson, in his article, manages to get in: Oxford (albeit the dictionary), Harvard, Yale, Socrates, Mount Holyoke(?), and a China scholar. That he should dedicate brigade level defense in an attempt at Pyrrhic victory says just as much about him as the “communications director” Ms. Dunn’s revelations said about her.
Perhaps trying to spin this as irony is the author’s own attempt at irony — can any sane person actually discern any attempt at irony in the Mao speech?
Maybe the joke is on the reader, and the whole article is tongue-in-cheek.
Nah. He really is that stupid. And he really is disdainful of the fact that we will call them out for the deaths their philosophy causes.
Obama’s administration are furious at Fox news for pointing out that there are leftist ideologues in his administration. A few have had to step down. Of course, if his appointee’s were vetted by congress like the constitution says they should be, they wouldn’t have been appointed in the first place. Instead Obama has appointed dozens of “czars” that have alarmed no less than Bob Byrd of West Virginia with his flagrant end-run around the constitution. My suspicion is that the only difference between Obama and Van Jones or other leftist nuts is that Obama is much better at hiding his true colors.
Was I the only one that thought that Ms. Dunn looked like a cow chewing its cud?
It says something that the White House feels compelled to massage the context of Dunn’s speech. It means the WH is paying attention and they were concerned enough to respond with this ludicrous ‘being ironic’ context which amounts to “I’m just keeeding”.
She was speaking to high school students. She was giving a meaningful speech and she had arrived at her Robin Williams “Dead Poets” moment of triumph, imparting the lesson of finding your own dream and doing it your way. It’s absurd to think a social liberal who believes in the feel-good mantra would suddenly at a climactic moment find irony in what was, clearly for her, a sincere, earnest and heartfelt delivery. To say she was being ironic at just that moment is to throw the well-intentioned aura of (social) liberalism under the bus.
No, she was being 100% authentic. And that’s bizarre to me. Mao?! That’s who you choose? Mao?! To illustrate the idea of “you fight your war and I’ll fight mine”, she chooses Mao? What? Was Gandhi too 1983? Was Martin Luther King too obvious? Was George Washington too American and military?
Heck, for the sake of a smaller body count she could have gone with that great darling of socialism, El Che!
Was she deliberately juxtaposing Mao and Mother Theresa simply for the sake of an argumentative contrast? (“Oh, I’m so clever! For my next act I will use Pol Pot and Marie Curie to illustrate the concept of “never giving up on your dreams”. Please.) Isn’t that an excessive flourish for a speech to high school graduates? A bit unnecessary and intellectually vain and flaccid all at once (her boss must see a spiritual ally).
I’d rather she’d just recited lyrics from Sinatra’s “I did it my way” or Fleetwood Mac’s “You can go your own way”.
But we can’t hold poor judgment against her. She clearly doesn’t give many speeches. Because if she did she’d know to bring bottled water with her to the podium for that dry mouth problem.
[Frankly, having listened to the same address as you all did, it alarms me that anyone could pair “intellectual” with Dunn’s outpouring.]
Well, honestly, this President’s campaign was framed on some notion that we were electing a cultured, thoughtful, intellectual leader. Our standards for what qualifies (..as Nobel worthy, ..as “intellectual”, ..as “ironic”, ..for a housing loan, ..as individual freedom, ..an economic “crisis”) have fallen drastically.
[Not on this blog. Check out my Barack Obama blog and Articles archives to read about BO on these spaces.]
Ironically, the Mass Murdering Mao was a student of history, unlike most Americans (including Anita Dunn). She Dunn-know that one of the most famous insurgents in all history was none other than George Washington who defeated the best army and richest country’s mercenaries. But then, sad to say, the founders of our Republic are more alien to the current “intelligensia” of the media, school “teachers”, and government as Klaatu. Che and Fidel are more meaningful to this bunch of clowns than Ben Franklin and Thomas Jefferson.