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Skriven 2006-03-08 18:52:00 av VERN HUMPHREY (1:123/140)
Ärende: I knew I liked him
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By Ben Stein
Published 3/6/2006 2:08:21 AM
Now for a few humble thoughts about the Oscars.

I did not see every second of it, but my wife did, and she joins me in
noting that there was not one word of tribute, not one breath, to our
fighting men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan or to their families or
their widows or orphans. There were pitifully dishonest calls for peace
-- as if the people we are fighting were interested in any peace for us
but the peace of the grave. But not one word for the hundreds of
thousands who have served and are serving, not one prayer or moment of
silence for the dead and maimed.

Basically, the sad truth is that Hollywood does not think of itself as
part of America, and so, to Hollywood, the war to save freedom from
Islamic terrorists is happening to someone else. It does not concern
them except insofar as it offers occasion to mock or criticize George
Bush. They live in dreamland and cannot be gracious enough to thank the
men and women who pay with their lives for the stars' ability to live in
dreamland. This is shameful.

The idea that it is brave to stand up for gays in Hollywood, to stand up
against Joe McCarthy in Hollywood (fifty years after his death), to say
that rich white people are bad, that oil companies are evil -- this is
nonsense. All of these are mainstream ideas in Hollywood, always have
been, always will be. For the people who made movies denouncing Big Oil,
worshiping gays, mocking the rich to think of themselves as brave --
this is pathetic, childish narcissism.

The brave guy in Hollywood will be the one who says that this is a
fabulously great country where we treat gays, blacks, and everyone else
as equal. The courageous writer in Hollywood will be the one who says
the oil companies do their best in a very hostile world to bring us
energy cheaply and efficiently and with a minimum of corruption. The
producer who really has guts will be the one who says that Wall Street,
despite its flaws, has done the best job of democratizing wealth ever in
the history of mankind.

No doubt the men and women who came to the Oscars in gowns that cost
more than an Army Sergeant makes in a year, in limousines with champagne
in the back seat, think they are working class heroes to attack America
-- which has made it all possible for them. They are not. They would be
heroes if they said that Moslem extremists are the worst threat to human
decency since Hitler and Stalin. But someone might yell at them or even
attack them with a knife if they said that, so they never will.

Hollywood is above all about self: self-congratulation, self-promotion,
and above all, self-protection. This is human and basic, but let's not
kid ourselves. There is no greatness there in the Kodak theater. The
greatness is on patrol in Kirkuk. The greatness lies unable to sleep
worrying about her man in Mosul. The greatness sleeps at Arlington
National Cemetery and lies waiting for death in VA Hospitals. God help
us that we have sunk so low as to confuse foolish and petty boasting
with the real courage that keeps this nation and the many fools in it
alive and flourishing on national TV.
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