Posted on 04/14/2007 12:05:10 PM PDT by aculeus
Some years ago, Cokie Roberts, faithful to her profession and to the proposition that those engaged in public discourse, at whatever level, should be left free to do as they liked, stopped short. What did it was a speech at the Radio and Television Correspondents’ Association dinner, an annual affair at which, in 1996, 3,000 guests ate and drank in the company of President and Mrs. Clinton and listened to Don Imus. After that night’s performance, Ms. Roberts changed her mind. “I really don’t think it would be appropriate for any of us to ever go back on [Imus’s show],” she said. Imus’s monologue “was profoundly rude not only to the President of the United States and the First Lady, but also to our colleagues.” Two days later we learned from Mike McCurry, the president’s press secretary, that National Public Radio’s Elizabeth Arnold, who sat between him and the First Lady on the dais, was trying to incite a mass walkout. In retrospect, McCurry wished he had backed her up instead of sitting there for 25 agonizing minutes. “I was getting prepared to send a note down the table saying, ‘Let’s go,’ when mercifully [the speech] came to an end,” McCurry later said. “I think we would have gotten a standing ovation if we’d done it.”
Well, eleven years later “it” was done to Don Imus, and the sense is of the restoration of clean air. Not universally — nothing like that. The world of hip-hop, one learns, is untouchable. The language there is heavily coarse, profane, and perverted. It is ironic that although hip-hop is disproportionately black, it was an anti-black crack that finally undid Don Imus.
(Excerpt) Read more at article.nationalreview.com ...
You know I think it would be fair to say, back when the Clintons first took office, if we had placed them all in a lineup -- well, not a lineup -- if we were to have speculated about which member of the First Family would be the first to be indicted... I don't mean indicted -- I meant to receive a subpoena -- everybody would have picked Roger. I mean, been there done that.
Well, in the past 3 years, Socks the cat has been in more jams than Roger. Roger has been a saint. The cat has peed on national treasures. Roger hasn't. Socks has thrown up hairballs. Roger hasn't. Socks got his girlfriend pregnant and hasn't... oh no, that was Roger. And as you know, nearly every incident in the lives of the first family has been made worse by each and every person in this room of radio and television correspondents -- even innocuous incidents.
For example, when Cal Ripkin broke Lou Gherig's consecutive game record, the President was at Camden Yards doin' play by play in the radio with John Miller. Bobby Bonilla hit a double, we all heard the President in his obvious excitement holler "Go Baby!" I remember commenting at the time, I bet that's not the first time he's said that. Remember the Astroturf in the pickup? And my point is, there is an innocent event, made sinister by some creep in the media.
I'd forgotten how funny that was. Okay, it was rude and wrong to question the virtue of a girls' college basketball team. If he'd been a good academic, he would have referred to them as "sex workers," and no liberals would have objected. (Since when has chastity been a virtue to liberals? But that's not the girls' fault.)
But Imus did a lot of good stuff—and puffed up a lot of liberal scum. This correspondents' dinner thing is priceless.
Imus is hardly dead. He will rise again, phoenix like, from the ashes of the fire invoked by the pious, such as yourself William.
He may have a point. But the Clintonistas helped deliver the crudity and vulgarity that coarsened American culture in the 1990s.
If this tiresome incident actually led to something, like standards of decent speech, it would almost be worth having to listen to all the nauseating blather about to fire or not to fire . . .
Of course over here at the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy we've always known that claim to be total BS., and here's Cokey Roberts and McCurry proving out our belief.
You'd think these people would be able to get around to apologizing to the rest of us for trying to "live their lie" all this time, but alas, they are made of the same scum out of which Imus oozed.
I like Buckley, but
it's intriguing that Buckley
kind of pioneered
Springer/Geraldo
style shock television with
his famous meetings
with Gore Vidal that
almost ended as boxing
on television
and did include both
"Nazi" and "queer" getting thrown
around on the air.
Both Buckley and Gore
of course freaked out with more style
than today's clowns do . . .
Who coarsened and vulgarized American culture more - Don Imus or Bill Clinton?
Hmm. That makes sense. Imus has been running hot and cold profanity for years on the radio. Why can him now? As the saying goes, the timing is suspicious.
What about the sidekick McGuirk that actually started all this? -
According to MediaMatters.com, which posted a transcript and a video on its site, the "Imus in the Morning" conversation went this way:
IMUS: So, I watched the basketball game last night between -- a little bit of Rutgers and Tennessee, the women's final.
ROSENBERG: Yeah, Tennessee won last night -- seventh championship for [Tennessee coach] Pat Summitt, I-Man. They beat Rutgers by 13 points.
IMUS: That's some rough girls from Rutgers. Man, they got tattoos and --
McGUIRK: Some hard-core hos.
IMUS: That's some nappy-headed hos there. I'm gonna tell you that now, man, that's some -- woo. And the girls from Tennessee, they all look cute, you know, so, like -- kinda like -- I don't know.
McGUIRK: A Spike Lee thing.
IMUS: Yeah.
McGUIRK: The Jigaboos vs. the Wannabes -- that movie that he had.
IMUS: Yeah, it was a tough --
McCORD: "Do The Right Thing."
McGUIRK: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
IMUS: I don't know if I'd have wanted to beat Rutgers or not, but they did, right?
ROSENBERG: It was a tough watch. The more I look at Rutgers, they look exactly like the Toronto Raptors.
IMUS: Well, I guess, yeah.
RUFFINO: Only tougher.
McGUIRK: The [Memphis] Grizzlies would be more appropriate.
Imus apologized on his show Friday morning, which is broadcast simultaneously on WFAN-AM and MSNBC, saying his remarks were “insensitive and ill-conceived.” Imus’ critics, however, said his contrition is too little, too late.
Yes, I can’t say I like Imus but if his ‘targe’ had been Bush these same people would have him up for some journalism reward.
she said. Imus’s monologue “was profoundly rude not only to the President of the United States and the First Lady,.....
Bingo....there is the answer
You stole my thunder.
If Buckley did the Vidal debate today and his foil was either Bill Maher, Rosie O'Donnell or the Reverend Al or Jesse, the outcome would be much different than in the 60's.
For better or for worse, Imus got away with a lot more when he had his two funny men/writers always on the show (Rob Bartlet was one). Totally un-PC, but they were funny at times. Without them he came across and an angry ole' coot.
Actually, a lot of the speech is made up of barbs against the press (and against Clinton's opponents), rather than against Clinton, and those jabs at anchormen and reporters may account for the reaction against him at the time. Whatever the Clintons' thought, you can bet Rather, Jennings, and Brokaw didn't want to hear from him again.
The Imus comments at the '96 Correspondents Dinner were rather tame in terms of anti-Clinton humor in the 1990s. Anyone remember the SNL TV FUNHOUSE parody of Clinton's testimony in the Starr investigation? ( TV FUNHOUSE Clinton )
The argument to be made against the coarsening of American culture in the media would have to cast a wide net and include the Clintons, network television, Hollywood, liberals, etc. Imus may be the focus now but the vulgarization continues. Were any prominent liberals on center stage complaining about the perverted and degrading "ho" misogyny in lyrics before the Imus incident? What about the skanky porn high school kids now upload on to their websites? There is a lot more to this issue than Don Imus.
Well, that’s the old conservative party dinosaur writing. Don Imus was one of the few voices in radio who would strip the bark off any public official regardless of race, creed, sexual orientation, party or otherwise. And he did with a biting sarcasm that made people laugh. He’ll be back, because we still want that.
Now that's series.
My suspicion is
among many liberals
there is racism
that is uglier
than Imus, but unspoken.
I think liberals
accept that white folks
have to speak right because whites
can understand "right"
but liberals think
whites have to put up with blacks
and "their" hip-hop crap
because "They're blacks and
black people must be held to
lower standards than
white people." No one
would say that but that appears
to be their thinking.
Those words were from a Spike Lee movie!! That’s why you didn’t hear anything about them.
While I agree with Buckley that Imus got what he deserved, that screed in front of Hitlery for the White House Correspondents’ Dinner was just a bit of pay-back for the role Imus played in playing footsie with Clinton after the 1992 60 Minutes Appearance. That interview on the Imus show probably helped Clinton win the NY Primary and then the presidency. Imus helped Bubba as much as any media figure that year — it’s about time he paid the piper.
which is more EVIL?
1. foul speech protected under the 1st amendment of the u.s. constitution.
or
2. pc of the universities that harkens back to nazi germany and the soviet union.
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