MAILER BLASTS BACK AT COMIC

NY Post: Page Six ^ | Richard Johnson

[Pharmboy]

May 9, 2003 -- DON'T invite Dennis Miller and Norman Mailer to the same party.

Miller trashed Mailer in a May 5 op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal for the novelist's arguments against President Bush's liberation of Iraq. And now Mailer has responded with a "Dear Dennis" letter, published in the Journal yesterday.

[RJayneJ]

Thanks for the nomination! };^D )

[an amused spectator]

Too bad Vonnegut can't write as well as Kilgore Trout.

LOL! Actually, you gave me a brain-jog and I remembered another writer who I haven't thought about in a loooonnng time:

Trout Fishing In America

Dreaming Of Babylon and The Hawkline Monster were waayyy out there, but I liked the quality of the writing.

Time to go find out what happened to him. I think he died quite a while ago.

[CoolPapaBoze]

I obviously don't know you, but WOW, you are right on. That was as succint a summary of what these, and many other idiots like them, have become. They aren't slowed one bit by the reality that the ideals and principals they expound have been proven time and time again to be failures, the combined cost of which is measured in tens of millions of lives. Extremely well said bravo.

[WaterDragon]

Of the two -- Miller and Mailer -- I'd say Miller is the one NOT suffering from clogged cranial arteries.

[Lawgvr1955]

Such a pity... I was a great admirer of Vonnegut in my liberal teenage years. However, the more I read his books, the more I began to view them as simply novel-length rants-- with Breakfast of Champions being exhibit A.

I have to disagree. In many of Vonnegut's stories a moral message can be found, even at times a conservative message. Though I can't recall the name of the short story, in one the government forced everyone to be "equal". People who were athletic had to carry around great weights, people with great intellect had to wear a hearing aid that regularly blasted their ears with loud noises so they couldn't keep a train of thought for more than 5 seconds, beautiful people had to wear hideous face masks, etc. It was great satire of 60's attempts at "forced equality".

I can cut some slack for elders who are more liberal in their outlook. It seems part of the human condition that many people become that way later in life. People like Mailer and Vidal have long been left wingnuts even as younger men IMHO.

[Lawgvr1955]

Too bad Vonnegut can't write as well as Kilgore Trout.

Whatever you do, don't stand to close to a "leak", you could fall into the next universe. My brothers and I were such KV/KT fans as kids that we entered into an agreement to see that the last line of our obituaries is "So it goes".

[PeoplesRepublicOfWashington]

Where does one go to read the Mailer blast?

[aristeides]

Just about everyone in their 80's is a WWII veteran.

Robert Byrd is not.

[Hildy]

He did say some scathing things about his ex son-in-law, Jerry Rivers (aka Geraldo Rivera)

[MightyMouseToSaveThe Day]

Agreed. Miller was quite witty in his zingers; Mailer is just nasty. Too bad he doesn't remember how to be witty in his comebacks. I guess liberalism makes you bitter like that.

[Pharmboy]

Where does one go to read the Mailer blast?

To the Wall St Journal subscription web site, or, Thursday's print edition Wall St. Journal. But, since you asked (and my wife has not thrown out the Journal yet), I will type the letter out for you exactly as it was printed:

Read It Again, Dennis

The following letter is in response to the May 5 editorial-page piece "Why Are We in Iraq?" by comedian Dennis Miller.)

Dear Dennis,

Just because the two big guys who flanked you on Monday Night Football took away your balls and left you with a giggle in replacement doesn't mean you have to suck up to the Wall Street Journal.

But thanks for appreciating my fine use of "keen."

Keen up, then, to my piece and read it again without panic. You're too good to become squalid and kiss-ass for so little.

Cheers, blessings,

Norman Mailer
Provincetown, Mass.

[PeoplesRepublicOfWashington]

Thanks. But, that's a blast? How does one infer that Miller's op-ed is a result of him losing his manhood? Miller said nothing effeminate, and the 'Rat Party is the party of feminization of the male. Mailer seems to be the one kissing ass. Anyone who could fabricate a reason of the type he did for the Battle of Iraq has got to be beholding to someone or something.

[Pharmboy]

Mailer is beholden only unto himself, and his right to be an artiste every effin minute of the day and in every effin thing he does and says.

He is an elitist POS in the same vein as Woody Allen and countless others. (I specifically mention Allen because he spells out this philosphy--i.e., the one that gives artists license to do stuff that we commoners don't have--in his movies).

[freedumb2003]

here here!

I raise my hand for a vote for QOTD!

Great and piercing rant!

[Valin]

Read it again, Dennis (Dennis Miller Alert)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/908277/posts

This is going to be good.

[Valin]

That's the guy!

[Mr. Mojo]

Vonnegut, at least, has not fallen prey to the grotesque attempts on the part of the other two to project a macho image

The fruitcake Vidal has attempted to project a macho imagine? If by macho you mean "macho, macho man .....I'm gonna be, a macho man" (by the Village People), then I see your point.

[the_doc]

Bump for that post.

[Mr. Mojo]

Robert Byrd is not [a WW2 vet].

Did he have a legitimate excuse (like a physical disability), or did his Grand Kleagle responsibilities keep him out of action?

[an amused spectator]

Though I can't recall the name of the short story, in one the government forced everyone to be "equal".

Harrison Bergeron. ;-)