THE WAR OF BUSH'S LIP

What's your opinion about Rummy boy, aka Bush's lip? The other day the liberal columnist Nicholas Kristof surprised himself by "Sticking Up for Rumsfeld." He wrote that demands for Rummy boy's resignation struck him as "unfair and premature," even though he has "presided over the most foolish conflict since the War of Jenkins' Ear in the 18th century."

(Don't remember that war? It pitted England against Spain over territorial claims in the southern colonies and got its name from Robert Jenkins, the master of the British ship Rebecca, who claimed his ear had been cut off by Spanish guards. The carefully preserved ear was shown in the British Parliament and became a rallying point for anti-Spanish propagandists.)

At any rate, the online liberal advocacy group moveon.org not only wants Rummy boy fired. It has written a script for a TV ad promoting that point of view and is asking the public to help put the ad on the air. Here's the script:

[Video]

THE CAMERA IS MOVING AROUND THE BASE AND UP THE SIDE OF THE STATUE OF LIBERTY. WE SEE THAT THE STATUE HAS A HOOD OVER ITS HEAD. WE THEN SEE A PICTURE OF DONALD RUMSFELD AND PRESIDENT BUSH.

[Audio: Announcer Voice-Over]

They said we were going to Iraq to bring American values: democracy, liberty, justice. But something has gone terribly wrong.

It's been reported that Donald Rumsfeld initiated a plan that encouraged the physical coercion and sexual humiliation of prisoners, violations of international law. Rumsfeld has placed the men under his command in even more danger.

Why hasn't George Bush fired this man?

You remember moveon.org's Bush in 30 seconds political campaign ad contest, doncha? Remember the winner, "Child's Pay," which was meant to air during the Super Bowl but wasn't allowed to? And the runner-up, "What are we teaching our children?" And the funniest ad, "If Parents Acted Like Bush"? And the best animated ad, "What I Been Up To ..."? And the best youth ad, "Bring It On"?

If you don't, just click the links. We offer them as an antidote to tonight's free White House ad, excuse me, presidential speech.

May 24, 2004 11:38 AM |

Categories:

Me Elsewhere

'WILD SIDE' STILL ROCKS 

Nelson Algren was one of the great American authors of the 20th century, it is no exaggeration to say, and among the most neglected. Consider his underrated classic, "A Walk on the Wild Side." The title -- popularized and co-opted as an idiomatic phrase by Hollywood and Madison Avenue (institutions Algren loathed) -- is familiar to most anyone who speaks English or knows Lou Reed's lyrics. But the novel itself? Hardly.

BUSTER KEATON REVISITED 
Buster Keaton: Tempest in a Flat Hat is not a biography. "This book is merely a fan's notes," Edward McPherson writes in the introduction, although his publisher ignores the disclaimer and calls it a biography on the cover. In fact, the book is a bit of both, a difficult combination to bring off unless you're David Thomson, who set the standard with Rosebud, his penetrating rumination on the life and career of Orson Welles, which was nothing if not a distillation of every obsessive thought he ever had about the myth and the man and all his movies.
LAUREN BACALL, STILL SALTY AT 80 
When Lauren Bacall writes that her singing voice ranges "somewhere between B minus sharp and outer space," she's being candid and funny. It's not every stage star with two Tony Awards for best actress in a musical whose vocal talent offers so little promise. (OK, Harvey Fierstein excepted.) Still less would one admit it.
THE STARS ACCORDING TO BOGDANOVICH 
Peter Bogdanovich's superb collection of movie-star profiles and interviews -- a sequel to Who the Devil Made It, his interviews of top film directors -- begins with an affectionate tale about Orson Welles that reminds us just how intimate the author's connection to Hollywood's greatest has been. But contrary to what we've come to expect from dime-a-dozen celebrities and celebrity interviews not worth two cents, the tale avoids bromidic egotism and journalistic platitudes.
SAMMY'S WHITE DREAMS 
Four decades ago Lenny Bruce sentenced Sammy Davis Jr. to "30 years in Biloxi," stripping him of "his Jewish star" and "his religious statue of Elizabeth Taylor." Now we have two new biographies of Davis that spring him from ridicule, if not from doubts about his legacy, and restore a measure of dignity to a black entertainer whose huge fame and success never overcame his devout wish -- indeed his lifelong effort -- to be white.
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This page contains a single entry by CriticalMASS published on May 24, 2004 11:38 AM.

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