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March 31, 2007

The Article Speaks for Itself

Here's one of those Wall Street Journal frontpagers that ought to be required reading for its editorial board: "The Conscience of the Colonel," by Jess Bravin. It's about a military prosecutor with a deeply personal reason to seek the conviction of a Gitmo prisoner connected to 9/11 and an even deeper reason not to prosecute him.

The prosecutor's "old Marine buddy, Michael 'Rocks' Horrocks, was co-pilot on United 175, the second plane to strike the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001," Bravin writes. "The prisoner in question, Mohamedou Ould Slahi, had already been suspected of terrorist activity. After the attacks, he was fingered by a senior al Qaeda operative for helping assemble the so-called Hamburg cell, which included the hijacker who piloted United 175 into the South Tower. To Col. Couch, Mr. Slahi seemed a likely candidate for the death penalty."

"Of the cases I had seen, he was the one with the most blood on his hands," Col. Couch says.

But, nine months later, in what he calls the toughest decision of his military career, Col. Couch refused to proceed with the Slahi prosecution. The reason: He concluded that Mr. Slahi's incriminating statements -- the core of the government's case -- had been taken through torture, rendering them inadmissible under U.S. and international law.

The Slahi case marks a rare instance of a military prosecutor refusing to bring charges because he thought evidence was tainted by torture.

It's too bad Bravin's reporting legitimizes a newspaper whose editorial writers and columnists refuse to believe the work of the paper's own news staffers like him.

Go read his article on online. I wouldn't bet on it, but the link is supposed to be available to non-subscribers for the next seven days, along with links to "key documents." This one, for instance. (If you click and can't get more than a summary of the story and/or the linked document, it's because The Journal has locked you out, despite advertising the freebie.)

Postscript: William Osborne writes, "Good point. ('It's too bad Bravin's reporting legitimizes a newspaper whose editorial writers and columnists refuse to believe the work of the paper's own news staffers like him.')" He continues:

What is so amazingly clever about these big papers is that the propaganda is never based on a single article. Instead, a Gestalt of articles is created serving different purposes that all work together: articles with false information and analysis; articles to establish false alibis; articles to create the false impression of balance and impartiality; articles to distract people from the truth hidden in plain sight; and articles banalizing immoral or unethical actions in order to inure the readers to their wrongness. Often the writing is very subtly specious.

It is only through all of these methods placed along side each other and in sequence, then repeated over and over, that true propaganda is created. And the motive? It takes little more than being allowed into the circle of big-foot reporters with full knowledge that status will be lost if they cross certain lines. There are a lot of views and approaches, but all guided into an isomorphic stance shaped by big money. People will naturally circle around the Golden Calf, and it will eventually shape their view of reality.

There is more to it -- and there are exceptions like Bravin's (whose work, in any case, is put to use for the Gestalt) -- but at least that much I can see.

Speaking of the pressure to conform: The author of the V.I. Warshawski novels, Sara Paretsky, who has a collection of essays, "Writing in an Age of Silence," due out this month, recalls her chilling experience in today's Chicago Tribune.

The night we began our invasion of Iraq -- March 20, 2003 -- I was speaking at the Toledo public library. The day before, my speakers bureau told me that the library wanted me to change my proposed remarks; my talk on how the Patriot Act was affecting writers, readers and libraries was too political. The library wanted instead the kind of humorous anecdotes that other writers used. With war imminent, the library felt that a criticism of the Bush administration was an insult to local families who had relatives in the service.

Haven't we had enough of our BananaRepublic-cum-President With His Head Up His Ass?

Posted by jherman at 12:01 PM

March 29, 2007

The Invitation Speaks for Itself

(Mouse over it for details, and click for Emmett.)

Posted by jherman at 2:14 PM

March 22, 2007

March Madness

This was the week to remember the invasion of Iraq and the climate of opinion four years ago, per "The Ides of March, 2003." Can't let it pass without recalling what I posted at the time on MSNBC.com, links included. (Miracle of miracles, many still work).

Looking back, I see the posts are very tame. I tried not to be, but I knew I could go only so far. Most of the stuff did not sit well with certain company-minded bosses to whom I reported. I was never asked to take a particular point of view, but I was called on the carpet for the viewpoint I took. They wanted me to stick strictly to entertainment commentary without harping on the war or emphasizing antiwar views.

March 13, 2003 / 12:59 p.m. ET

       The case for war branding: Selling war to the public depends on branding. Well-branded wars include the American Revolution, the Civil War, World War I and World War II. Poorly branded wars are losing or less-than-winning propositions. They include the War of 1812, the Korean War, the Vietnam War and the Gulf War.
       
       Is this nutty thinking or what? If you answered "or what?" you would make Tracey Riese, 46, a happy branding warrior.

"As we move daily closer to war in Iraq, President Bush might benefit from examining how America has branded major wars in the past -- and how each branding strategy contributed to the outcome," says Riese, whose corporate clients have included Revlon and RJR Nabisco, Scholastic Inc. and Schwab.
       
       Her notion of war branding sounds like commodified propaganda. And in our society, commodification is the way to go. But Riese says "the process of branding is the opposite of commodification. It's the opposite of sloganizing. It's finding the true meaning of things. It's not about finding a snappy slogan for war."
       
       She says, "Really great branding connects the product, if you will, with some very powerful emotional need on the part of the people who must pay for it or who you want to pay for it."
       
       For instance, the War for Independence was transformed from a contest between a colony and a great power into a struggle for "liberty" by enlightened citizens. The brand went global as France picked up the idea and went to war in 1789 for "liberté, fraternité, égalité." That's strong branding.
       
       "Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death was a fancy rhetorical point," Riese says. "But it was not just sloganizing. It had an underlying meaning. In the face of war, citizens are asked to pay the highest price. And so they need to make a fundamental connection to the purpose of any war."
       
       The American Civil War began as a struggle between two economic systems over constitutional rights. But it took on new meaning -- and vigor -- when Lincoln was able to characterize it as a battle for the soul of a nation "conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal." Strong branding.
       
       World War I, the tragic, outsized result of a series of petty miscalculations, was redeemed when Wilson transformed it into the "War to End All Wars." Strong branding.
       
       World War II became a moral test of humanity. So pervasive was that brand that it was reflected even in the post-war peace, when the victors revitalized their former enemies and laid the foundation for the modern global economy and the growth of democracy. Its later characterization as "the good war" was strong branding, too.
       
       By contrast, she says, calling the Gulf War Operation Desert Shield and then Desert Storm was "just creating a name or logo. That's an expression of the brand that isn't the brand itself. The underlying meaning was that it was not really war, that it was nothing for anyone to worry about. It was just a military operation. The administration wanted to create the sense that it would all be over in no time." Weak branding.
       
       So what about President Bush's "axis of evil" slogan? And what about the expensive set now being built in the desert by the military for branded TV press briefings? A no-brainer.

       "Right now the brand the administration has established in the minds of Americans and in the global community -- whether it meant to or not -- is that war in Iraq is an American prerogative," Riese says. "We are threatened, and we do not have to be threatened, and so we are going to eliminate a threat to us, regardless of how it affects others. That's the brand."
       
       Full disclosure: Riese also gives branding advice to the World Wildlife Fund. In some quarters that would mean she's a tree hugger.

March 14, 2003 / 1:28 p.m. ET
       
       George Bush and Humphrey Bogart: I've been trying to find the apt movie metaphor that evokes the reality of President Bush, and now I've finally got it: "Capt. Queeg." I wish I had thought of it myself, but it's Paul Krugman who came up with it this morning for the title of his column: "George W. Queeg."
       
       The reference, of course, is to Capt. Philip Francis Queeg, the tough-talking, ship-shaping, mind-boggling, nervous-making Navy martinet that Humphrey Bogart played so perfectly against type in the 1954 movie "The Caine Mutiny."
       
       "Aboard the U.S.S. Caine," Krugman writes, "it was the business with the strawberries that finally convinced the doubters that something was amiss with the captain. Is foreign policy George W. Bush's quart of strawberries?"
       
       If you've never seen the movie, you must. It's based on Herman Wouk's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, and it gives us Bogart's last great role. (He died of cancer three years later. He also lost the best-actor Oscar to Marlon Brando in "On the Waterfront," which aced "Mutiny" for best picture.)
       
       You've got to read Krugman's column, too. It's the best summary I've read about the U.S. commander-in-chief's strange command. By his account, Bush is a Capt. Queeg for our time.
       
       And just to be even-handed, here's a very different sort of opinion: the rambling but impassioned Oriana Fallaci's thoughts on the eve of battle. Which is not to say that she's confident of Bush's leadership either.
       
       Finally, a poem by Robert Creeley, called "Help!" It reads like rap, which is totally uncharacteristic of his poetry. This is the way it begins:
       
       Help's easy enough
       If it comes in time.
       Nothing's that hard
       If you want to rhyme.
       
       It's when they shoot you
       It can hurt,
       When the bombs blast off
       And you're gone with a squirt.
       
       Sitting in a bunker,
       Feeling blue?
       Don't be a loser,
       It wasn't you--
       
       Wasn't you wanted
       To go kill people,
       Wasn't you caused
       All this trouble.
       
       I can't say, Run!
       And I can't say, Hide!
       But I still feel
       What I feel inside.

March 17, 2003 / 7:43 a.m. ET
       
       Norman Mailer nails it: Just when critics like Michiko Kakutani pretty much dismissed him as an old cuckoo, calling him a writer full of "wacky mumbo jumbo" who could barely cobble together his latest book, the old cuckoo has shined a clarifying light on the American dilemma and the "liberation" of Iraq.
       
       In a powerful speech he gave recently in San Francisco, now published in the New York Review of Books, Mailer asserts: "Behind the whole push to go to war with Iraq is the desire to have a huge military presence in the Near East as a stepping stone to taking over the rest of the world. That is a big statement, but I can offer this much immediately: At the root of flag conservatism is not madness, but an undisclosed logic."
       
       Read the article and see if you don't agree. Mailer offers straightforward thinking in plain language. His diagnosis of the dilemma as the Bush Administration's dream of an "American empire" may be more frightening than ancient Rome's worst nightmare, but it doesn't sound like "mumbo jumbo" to me.
       
       (By the way, a note to all the folks who prefer to think of George W. Bush as Capt. Ahab rather than Capt. Queeg: That's giving Bush far too much stature.)

March 17, 2003 / 4:53 p.m. ET
       
       Turning the Chicks into Chickens? It took a lot of guts for the Dixie Chicks' Natalie Maines to say she was ashamed of the president of the United States. Foolish guts. And it would have been surprising, given the stakes for a group of platinum-selling superstars, if she hadn't apologized.
       
       But the backlash against them -- pulling them from radio playlists -- is more than mere patriotic outrage. The indefatigable Eric Olsen, who's been following the latest pro- and anti-war stories from Nashville with keen attention, points out that there's been a concerted e-mail campaign orchestrated by "a radical right-wing online forum" to stoke the anger, manipulate the radio polls and pressure the Lipton company to drop its sponsorship of the Dixie Chicks' upcoming U.S. tour.
       
       Do celebrities have a right to speak out on political issues? Should they? Do the media trivialize antiwar messages by providing a forum for celebrities? Media reporter David Shaw of the Los Angeles Times believes so. "We've paid too much attention to celebrity opposition to the war," he writes.
       
       To correct the balance, my staff of thousands and I have taken a solemn vow to report on all the celebrities who favor war. Please help us carry on. Let us know when you hear of celebrities as famous and foolish as the Dixie Chicks going out of their way to praise the Bush team and war in Iraq. There's Charlie Daniels, Bruce Willis, Kid Rock and Dennis Miller. Do I hear more?

March 18, 2003 / 4:43 p.m. ET
       
       Martin Sheen strikes back: "The West Wing" star who plays fictional President Josiah Bartlet has written an Op-Ed piece, "A Celebrity, but First a Citizen," in the Los Angeles Times. With eloquence, he defends his right to speak out against war in Iraq.
       
       "I am not the president; instead, I hold an even higher office, that of citizen of the United States," Sheen begins, in reply no doubt to a story the paper carried by LA Times staffer David Shaw that said the media pay too much attention to celebrities who oppose the war.
       
       Sheen notes: "Although my opinion is not any more valuable or relevant merely because I am an actor, that fact does not render it unimportant. Some have suggested otherwise, trying to denigrate the validity of this opinion and those of my colleagues solely due to our celebrity status. This is insulting not only to us but to other people of conscience who love their country enough to risk its wrath by going against the grain of powerful government policy."
       
       Yesterday, my staff of thousands and I took a solemn vow to report on all the celebrities who favor war -- just so we could right the balance that Shaw complained about.
       
       Well, it turns out to be a burning issue. I've received hundreds and hundreds of e-mails, pro and con, about celebrity rights and the Dixie Chicks and famous people who've said this or that. I realize now that even with a staff of thousands I don't have time to fact-check the allegations. So here's a site where you can see for yourselves what some of Hollywood's famous have said, pro and con, about the war and about President Bush and his policies.

March 19, 2003 / 10:37 a.m. ET
       
       And now for the petitions: We've heard of famous Hollywood actors against the war (Susan Sarandon, Richard Gere, Sean Penn, Jessica Lange, George Clooney), and we've heard of famous pop stars against the war (Sheryl Crow, Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks and Barbra Streisand, of course), but what about famous writers against the war?
       
       Well, writers tend not to be famous. But some of them are -- Stephen King, Russell Banks, Amy Tan, Richard Price, Jonathan Franzen -- and they, along with about 150 others, have signed a petition that says to President Bush:
       
       "Iraq, while led by a tyrant, represents no clear and present danger to our shores. We therefore see no sufficient moral or historical justification for a pre-emptive war. ... As you yourself have noted, there are evildoers in this world. Let the United States not be one of them."
       
       Of all people, writers who depend on precise language should know better than to use the term "pre-emptive war." Perhaps they can be excused because everybody's been using it, including President Bush, news reporters, pundits and even foreign-policy experts.
       
       But the proper term is "preventive war." A "pre-emptive war" is undertaken to thwart an imminent attack. A "preventive war" is what we're about to see in Iraq. (I notice that Tom Friedman at last uses the correct term this morning in his "D-Day" column.
       
       Bush has promoted the wrong term precisely because he has had to justify the urgency of an invasion. (It's also why Bush has always made clear that Iraq is a threat to other shores and wants to depose Saddam for that reason.)
       
       Meanwhile, there's another online petition out here in cyberspace. Called "Support of the Dixie Chicks," it endorses the group's right to dissent from President Bush's style of diplomacy. Not many have signed it, only 126 people so far. Many more Dixie Chicks fans have e-mailed me in support of the group. I suspect the reason so few have signed is that they don't know of the petition or can't find it.
       
       Postscript: Whaddya know. At this time -- 5:54 p.m. ET -- many more people have signed: 1,697 ... and counting.

March 20, 2003 / 8:27 a.m. ET
       
       When Bush comes to shove: The number of people who have signed the online petition supporting Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks and her right to dissent has climbed to 2,642. When we first posted the petition's address yesterday, the number was 126. So we may have helped people find the petition. We also may have flooded Hollywood on the March, a rightwing site that's been listing what actors have been saying for and against war. At the moment, the site is down. Possibly can't handle all the traffic.
       
       A quick note: Amen to this morning's column by Bob Herbert. He writes: "Now that the U.S. strikes against Iraq have begun, we should get rid of one canard immediately, and that's the notion that criticism of the Bush administration and opposition to this invasion imply in some sense a lack of support or concern for the men and women who are under arms."

March 24, 2003 / 9:52 a.m. ET
       
       Oh! What a lovely Oscar war: The real suspense of Sunday night's Oscars was when or even whether the show would be interrupted by news of the invasion of Iraq and what, if anything, the stars would say about the war rather than what they would say about winning an Oscar.
       
       For a long while, you might never have known there was a war at all -- except for Steve Martin's opening monologue. The Oscar producers ought to get down on their knees and thank him. As good as the show became -- only in part because of the classy production -- it would have died without him.
       
       And let us all thank Adrien Brody for his stunning, unprepared remarks about the "sadness and dehumanization" of war. But let's also thank him for his sense of humor, not to mention his wonderful grace under pressure. Before Brody ever got to his serious remarks, he reacted with charming wit to his surprise at winning the best-actor Oscar. "There comes a time in life," he said, "when everything seems to make sense, and this is not one of those times."
       
       Now, about Michael Moore's outburst. I'm all in favor of tasteless outbursts at the Oscars. They lend spice. Tom Shales disagrees. What I wonder, though, is whether the boos his remarks provoked were the result of anger at his lack of taste or disagreement with his political views. Or was it both?

March 25, 2003 / 9:47 a.m. ET
       
       Cheers, jeers and Michael Moore: Many readers hated my remarks about Michael Moore's remarks about President Bush. They would like me to take a hike (preferably off a high cliff). Of hundreds of e-mails, this one was typical:
       
       Kelly Evitts
       Atlanta
       "Of course you agree with Moore. I only hope that when we get attacked, you and he are the first to go. Why don't you communists go over and join your 'human shield' friends. ... God bless our troops, our president, and if there is any justice in the world, let God turn his back on you, and your fat friend."
       
       Here's one of the more pleasant jeers:
       Jeff Curran
       Oklahoma City
       "Michael Moore? Michael less, please."
       
       Some flat-out cheered:
       Eduard Itor
       Tampa, Fla.
       "What Michael Moore did was brave and right."
       
       One cheered with an explanation:
       Sarah
       Cleveland, Ohio
       "Politically, I agree with Moore, too, but in terms of PR value, he's 'our side's' version of Rush Limbaugh: a self-congratulatory clown who behaves like a braying jackass in front of an audience."
       
       Here's an e-mail exchange of March 20, as the U.S. invasion of Iraq began, with a thoughtful reader who doesn't like my views about the war:
       Air Force TSgt. Gary J. Kunich
       Kenosha, Wisc.
       "I'll take it as a small victory for me that you allotted at least one paragraph to give a nod of support for the troops, even if you don't support the action in Iraq. Still think you're wrong, and your column really ticks me off, so begrudgingly, I guess that means you're doing your job.
        "Speaking from my personal experience during Desert Storm, public support was very important to us. We were afraid it would change once that war started, and were grateful that the support for us -- and the war -- never wavered. But not everyone fighting this fight is able to see the 'support' through the smoke and noise of the protest. There definitely was no support for the troops when several celebrities and pseudo-politicians signed that full-page ad in the New York Times comparing our military to the terrorists.
         "I -- and the majority of Americans according to several polls -- believe this to be a war to ensure our security. The war on terror cannot be summarized by just the face of Osama bin Laden. There are many facets, and this is but one of them. This isn't Vietnam. This isn't a gray area, or a murky quagmire. This is our only option. If you can add just one line in your column, add this on behalf of the U.S. military."
       
       This was my reply:
       "I appreciate your point, especially since you are speaking from personal experience. I worry about the safety of U.S. troops. I want them to win -- swiftly and with no loss of life or limb, if that is even possible -- because I, too, am an American who believes in the ideals this country was founded upon. But I fear the motives of our president. I do not believe that this nation should be ruled by Christian fundamentalism or by the imperial mandate of corporate power, both of which I believe is at the heart of the president's beliefs."
       
       And here are words of warning: Though they were never intended as such, they ought to remind us of the perils we face not only from enemies who would destroy us but from leaders who would destroy our enemies.
       
       "Why of course the people don't want war. ... That is understood. But after all it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship ...Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country."
       
       Who said that? Hitler's accomplice, Hermann Goering (commander of the German Air Force and president of the Reichstag), at the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals in 1946.
       
       Postscript: For all you folks who think I'm making an implicit comparison between Hitler or Goering and President Bush, please put that out of your minds. I don't believe that for a minute. I'm merely using Goering's words to point out that people are too easily manipulated by leaders who are "good" and leaders who are "bad." People are too easily led, period.

March 27, 2003 / 10:43 a.m. ET
       
       Rock the protest: The war on the song front has heated up again, and it's not a confrontation over the Dixie Chicks. Lenny Kravitz has joined the battle with a song titled "We Want Peace." You can hear it or download it free at a get-out-the-vote Web site Rock the Vote.
       
       One major critic describes the song as reaching down deep "for a funky, Middle Eastern-flavored ode to peace." What bothers this critic though, is that "it's by far the best song to address" the issue of war in Iraq. So why does it bother him? Because, he writes, it's "anti, and people, I am way pro!"
       
       Critic Eric Olsen, who is also a radio DJ, a music historian and a relentless blogger, further objects that Rock the Vote -- which is dedicated to getting young people to participate in democracy -- is perverting its mission by taking sides on Iraq. He wonders whether the site would give equal time to "equally heartfelt, pro-liberation" songs by -- let's say -- Clint Black or Toby Keith, Darryl Worley and the Warren Brothers.
       
       Olsen contends that the issue dividing Americans on Iraq should not be characterized as "pro-war vs. anti-war." His point is that both sides are pro-peace. When Rock the Vote's executive director states: "We hope the war will come to a swift conclusion with a minimum loss of human life and that we can move on to build a better future for the Iraqi people," Olsen counters: "Who doesn't agree with this?"
       
       His formulation -- "pro-liberation vs. anti-war" -- smartly frames the issue with more nuance than "pro-war vs. anti-war." If it ignores the deeper issues dividing American public opinion, well, you can't expect a music critic-radioDJ-blogger to do what our clever leaders -- Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and the other geniuses leading the administration -- haven't done themselves, can you?
       
       Meanwhile, Olsen is not the only blogger seeking some sort of middle ground in the war debate. Here's Ryan McGee, a Harvard smart aleck, prompted by a support-the-troops rally at Yale.

March 27, 2003 / 12:36 p.m. ET
       
       What is patriotism? Are we born with love of country? Is it written into our genes, having proved useful for survival from earliest times like a trait expressed through natural selection? Is it hard-wired into our brains like a universal grammar theorized by Noam Chomsky, simply waiting to be applied in specific languages? Is it wholly learned?
       
       Writers, artists and philosophers have grappled with the issue of war and patriotism for centuries -- as a theme in poetry and novels (Tolstoy's "War and Peace"), as a pictorial force (George Washington Crossing the Delaware or The Flag-Raising on Iwo Jima), as a subject of academic inquiry and just this morning as a topic of debate in the media.
       
       The secret of Rome's success, according to the Roman historian Livy, was its belief in the supremacy of country over family and -- just as important -- its ability to inculcate that belief in its citizens. "This, without question," Lee Harris writes in Policy Review, "was the steady drumbeat of Roman pedagogical legend, the unquestioned primacy of one's ethical obligation to the team, the origin of the specifically Western concept of patriotism."
       
       Before that, the ancient Greek philosopher Diogenes had challenged the idea of a narrow, that is to say, national patriotism. Reputedly, when anyone asked him where he came from, he said: "I am a citizen of the world."
       
       The noted contemporary philosopher Martha Nussbaum writes: "Diogenes knew that the invitation to think as a world citizen was, in a sense, an invitation to be an exile from the comfort of patriotism and its easy sentiments, to see our own ways of life from the point of view of justice and the good. The accident of where one is born is just that, an accident; any human being might have been born in any nation.
       
       "Recognizing this, his Stoic successors held, we should not allow differences of nationality or class or ethnic membership or even gender to erect barriers between us and our fellow human beings. We should recognize humanity wherever it occurs, and give its fundamental ingredients, reason and moral capacity, our first allegiance and respect."
       
       Where does that leave us today as American and British soldiers fight and die in Iraq and as Iraqis fight and die? Basically nowhere. Certainly not with definitive answers, not even with tentative ones.

March 31, 2003 / 10:33 a.m. ET
       
       This is patriotism: It's no secret that my staff of thousands and I receive a lot of e-mail messages. Some are more heartfelt than others, but I'd say that with few exceptions they're all sincere. On Friday, we asked the question: "What is patriotism?" Below are a dozen replies. Some are frightening, others reassuring, and still others fall in between. Which are which? We leave that to you.
       
       Jim Nabors
       Baltimore, Md.
       "Patriotism is being WITH one's country, right or wrong, especially if the overwhelming majority of its citizens are in favor of the government's actions. It is NOT being a minority rebel-rouser who uses 'free speech' as a pretext for one's fringe political leanings against one's country or its leaders. The 'free-speech' argument is a crock, and is used by today's anti-government newspapers, news shows, and 'unpatriotic' low lifes who have no life."
       
       R. Guerrero
       San Lorenzo, Calif.
       "I believe patriotism is developed and attained by the way in which the government of a nation treats its citizens."
       
       David Maddux
       McKinney, Texas
       "I firmly support our president and our efforts to remove Saddam Hussein and his oppressive regime. We live in the most loving, caring country on the face of the earth as we have given billions of our tax dollars to help suffering humanity. I respect dissent done in a civil manner but when celebrities or anyone else start getting personal with our leaders, they cross the line of being 'un-American' in my view. For example, Michael Moore's comments at the Oscars. He was disgusting. My forefathers fought and died for his right to be 'disgusting' and my right to call him 'un-American.'"
       
       Sandra Isaacs
       Oak Park, Illinois
       "I am not in favor of any government that chooses violence. I am a citizen of the world. I wave the flag of Mother Earth."
       
       Brian Kiser
       Macon, Ga.
       "You quote Martha Nussbaum saying, 'We should recognize humanity wherever it occurs, and give its fundamental ingredients, reason and moral capacity, our first allegiance and respect.' Should we not also recognize inhumanity in the same way? Wherever it occurs, should it not be worthy of our disdain and efforts to remove it from this world? Surely Saddam and his Baath party are guilty of some of the most inhuman crimes against his own people, yet those opposed to this war want to look away believing that the United States and its allies should not get involved. Thank God for President Bush and our brave military men and women who are willing to be true citizens of the Earth!"
       
       John Smith
       Heathsville, Va.
       "Patriotism is loving your country and being willing to defend it. Our country was found on the principle: 'Don't tread on me!' Liberals would change all that. Liberals would allow terrorists and tyrants to overrun us in the name of peace. They prove that by insulting their president at a time of war, and protesting in the name of peace while throwing rocks at service men, beating up policemen, and collaborating with the enemy by not having enough sense to find out who is bankrolling their noble effort."
       
       Michael Anthony
       Calgary, Alberta, Canada
       "True love of country -- especially a democratic one -- should embrace the concept of keeping that country true to its ideals, and holding its leaders accountable for upholding its founding principles. It is our patriotic duty to blow the whistle on an unprovoked, illegal and shamefully 'manufactured' war. If we love America we will try to keep her hands clean. If we cannot do that then at least we should remember we have dual citizenship -- we are also citizens of the world."
       
       Daniel Hendriks
       Chico, Calif.
       "I think patriotism is good when you are rooting for your team in the World Cup, but when it comes to a war without support from the U.N. I question my love not for this country as a whole but I question my trust in the government. This whole situation is too fishy for me. ... I will be able to vote come next election and if George Bush gets re-elected I will move to Holland and not come back until a Democrat is in office."
       
       Letitia Little
       Bartlett
       "We are as one. That's why we are in Iraq. Justice and Freedom for all, is the key. We cannot stand back and allow a government destroy innocent people. And the manner that these people murder is like nothing I've ever heard of before and everything I've ever feared. While I do believe we should have done this long ago (1991) we are where we are. Let's get the job done and get our boys and girls home."
       
       Bob Johnson
       "We ARE recognizing humanity as it occurs in Iraq. And we are also recognizing man's inhumanity to man and trying to stop it. After World War II, Harry Truman said, 'We need to build a better world.' We can help to build a better world for the oppressed people in Iraq. That is something that makes a lot of us proud to be Americans."
       
       Tanya D. June
       Troy, N.Y.
       "Are we going to war with North Korea -- because of lack of disarmament? NO
       "Are we going to war with Saudi Arabia -- because of connections to terrorists? NO
       "Are we going to war with Iraq -- because he tried to kill our president's daddy? YES
       "Have we secured our homeland from future terrorist attacks? NO
       "Have we left our men in Afghanistan more vulnerable? YES
       "I am a proud Trojan. Because I am an African-American I see our country's values much differently. We are a 226-year-old country trying to tell countries that existed for thousands of years how to live their lives -- when our civil rights movements is barely 40 years old.
       "Did we get freedom from the Revolutionary War? NO.
       "Did we get freedom after our Civil War? NO.
       "Did anything change after we fought in both World War I and II? NO.
       "I think our government is so hypocritical. Thank you for giving me a forum to express my views."
       
       Linda C. Strain
       Tucson, Ariz.
       "I am an American Citizen. Bred, born and reared here in this country. Some of my people were here to greet some of my people on the Mayflower. I love my country, and, yes would give my life for this country and it's people. But I also consider myself a world citizen, and care greatly what happens to my sisters and brothers in other parts of this world.
       "The Iraqi leadership was not only a threat to it's own people, but to all of us everywhere. We need to be there, and the rest of the world needs to be there too. It's not about Islam, and it's not about oil. It's about the right of everyone to be able to live and speak freely about their own country and government without fear of reprisal. We are getting rid of a world threat.
       "Do I like war? No indeed. Everyone in my family has always served this country from the Revolution to the Gulf War. I considered it an honor, even if I couldn't be sent to the front lines [at that time] because of gender. I still felt obligated to wear the uniform -- for my country and my people, not the government. I still feel that way, and wished I were younger so I could join up. I am flag-waver, tree-hugger, and I break for butterflies."

March 31, 2003 / 2:41 p.m. ET
       
       This is satire: We've heard anti-war songs from Lenny Kravitz ("We Want Peace") and from The Beastie Boys ("In a World Gone Mad"). Here, direct from England, is the latest entry: a Bush-Blair duet, "Read My Lips." It's also the funniest.

As I said, pretty tame stuff. But it's not difficult to understand what bothered my company-minded bosses. The MSNBC cable channel, our corporate sister, was veering to the right. Phil Donahue had been fired several weeks earlier, on Feb. 23, ostensibly for poor ratings but really for being antiwar and anti-Bush. If Donahue could be fired, so could they. (And of course so could I.) Paradoxically, the popularity of the blog was cause for concern. It drew tens of thousands of hits on any given day, as many as 500,000 on its best day. This would have thrilled my bosses ordinarily, but not under the circumstances

Posted by jherman at 12:18 PM

March 20, 2007

Playwright Sends a Letter: Tenenbom vs. The Times

First he took on the Polish government, which claims he's stereotyping Poles as anti-Semites, a charge he denies. Now he's taking on a bigger fish -- The New York Times, which has declined to review his play.

In an open letter to news media, Tuvia Tenenbom accuses The Times of doing "the Polish government's bidding ... by refusing to allow Times critics to review 'Last Jew in Europe.'" The play opened last week in an off-Broadway theater on Manhattan's Upper West Side.

The letter also calls for the firing of the recently appointed chief of The Times theater department, Rick Lyman, whom Tenenbom deems responsible for "censorship by omission" and an attempt to "stifle free speech."

I phoned Lyman for his response. He declined to comment, referred me to The Times spokeswoman Catherine Mathis, and hung up on me in mid-sentence. She was unavailable. (See PPS, below.)

Several major European newspapers and magazines have written about the play, in largely laudatory terms, including the top German weekly news magazine Der Spiegel ("Das Drama mit dem Antisemitismus"), the Frankfurt daily Frankfurter Rundschau ("Tuvia & Erika"), and Italy's most respected daily Corriere della Sera ("Teatro d'accusa").

"It never occurred to us that The New York Times would join with anti-Semites so easily," Tenenbom writes. "We did not ask for a 'good' review; all we asked for was that this important project not be ignored." He contends that the paper's unwillingness to write about the play is a "slap in the face on an issue of utmost concern to millions of American Jews, many of whom are faithful readers of the Times." The paper has covered other plays of his.

Full disclosure: I reviewed the play last week.

Further intelligence: Princeton University professor Jan T. Gross, the author of "Fear: Anti-Semitism in Poland after Auschwitz: An Essay in Historical Interpretation" and "Neighbors: The Destruction of the Jewish Community in Jedwabne, Poland," will participate in a post-show panel discussion with the author Thane Rosenbaum, who teaches human rights law at Fordham University Law School, on March 27 at The Triad Theater, where "Last Jew in Europe" is being produced. (A spokesman for the Church of Latter-Day Saints who was to participate has dropped out.)

Here is Tenenbom's letter in full:

For Immediate Release The JTNY, 212.494.0050

The Jewish Theater of New York calls on The New York Times to Remove Rick Lyman from his new post of Theater Editor.

The Polish government, using its embassy in Washington D.C. and its Consulate General in New York, is investing resources and time in order to discredit our new show, LAST JEW IN EUROPE. According to the Polish government the show, which uses authentic documentary materials to illuminate the newly resurgent anti-Semitism in the heart of modern-day Europe, could "create a set of negative emotions" in American Jews towards Poland. To prevent this from happening, they urge our theater not to use the documentary materials we collected while in Poland. If we fail to do so, they insinuate, we are "racist." This bizarre intervention by a foreign government in the affairs of an American theater should not be allowed to succeed and will not; we will continue to present our show. However, we are shocked to learn that the Theater Department of the New York Times, under the new leadership of Mr. Rick Lyman, decided to do the Polish government's bidding and do its share to kill the show by refusing to allow Times' critics to review LAST JEW IN EUROPE. This slap in the face on an issue of utmost concern to millions of American Jews, many of whom are faithful readers of the Times, was so important to Mr. Lyman that he issued his order on the second day on the job. To achieve this dubious goal, Mr. Lyman and some of the administrators in the Theater Department engaged in outright lies while speaking to our Artistic Director, Mr. Tuvia Tenenbom.

After being notified that "we'll pass on reviewing" the LAST JEW IN EUROPE because "not one of our critics wants to review" the show, Mr. Tenenbom personally called a few critics. They flatly denied that they ever refused to review the show and claimed that they were not given the opportunity to do so by Mr. Lyman; in addition, they expressed their own opinion that LAST JEW IN EUROPE should indeed be reviewed. Some even asked Mr. Lyman to change his mind, but he refused. Mr. Tenenbom also spoke with Ms. Patricia Cohen, the Theater Editor prior to March 1, 2007 and was told by her that this was "Rick's decision; I can't do anything about it, I'm no longer the editor." But Rick Lyman is not Patricia Cohen. In an angry and uncontrolled outburst that followed days later, Mr. Lyman told our Artistic Director that since the "last two reviews by the Times were negative, we won't review your theater this year."

Commenting on this patently lame excuse, Mr. Tenenbom said: "His words were so strange that my ears could hardly tolerate listening to him. This is not about "good" reviews, this is about abhorring censorship. In our theater we regularly deal with sensitive political issues, where the chance of negative review is higher. We understand it, and we never complained about a bad review; why does he? We are the only English-speaking Jewish theater in the city, all the others closed down years ago. What does he want, to close us down as well?"

What the New York Times is doing in this case is censorship by omission as it tries to stifle free speech. It never occurred to us that The New York Times would join with anti-Semites so easily. We did not ask for a "good" review; all we asked for was that this important project not be ignored. But after more than a decade of continuous coverage by the Times, this new editor flexes his muscles, aided by outrageous lies, and all-too-gladly joins racist censors of the Polish government.

We understand the risk we take by making this story public. After all, the Times' Theater Department is the unquestionable lodestone of most theater people in this city. But we cannot be silent in the face of rising anti-Semitism in Europe and the New York Times' attempts to keep it out of the public awareness. The rise of anti-Semitism in Europe should not, and will not, be kept a secret from millions of New Yorkers just because of one man.

The New York Times, due to its enormous influence, has obligations to the public that it must meet. If it refuses to do so, it is our obligation to make this story public. It is our belief that if the New York Times wants to be a liberal paper it should never support either racism or censorship.

LAST JEW IN EUROPE was just recently reviewed by some of the most prestigious publications in Europe. The New York Times can do no less. It is a well known fact that during WWII the New York Times wrote as little as possible about the horrors that befell the Jews during the Holocaust. Indeed, the outstanding order at the time was not to have Holocaust stories on the front pages. Is the New York Times returning to the same patterns? Is every mistake bound to repeat itself?

We hope that our call won't be a voice calling in the wilderness and that the top echelon of the Times will rise to the occasion and either fire Mr. Lyman or revoke his boycott of our show immediately. We also urge the other critics in our city to not follow Mr. Lyman's example. If one man chooses to be blind, the rest of you are still allowed to open your eyes and see. Judge for yourselves. Judge us harshly if you wish, but judge us!

With hope for better times to come,
The Jewish Theater of New York

Postscript: A reader writes, "I guess Lyman picked up on Clive's take on totgeschwiegen and put it to use."

Here's the reader's reference, from an item called GERMAN LESSONS in Dwight Garner's column in The New York Times Book Review of March 11, 2007:

Leave it to Clive James, the London-based critic and poet -- his new book, ''Cultural Amnesia: Necessary Memories From History and the Arts,'' is due out any minute -- to remind us that the Germans have yet another useful word Americans should be more familiar with. It is totgeschwiegen, which James defines this way: ''Killed by not being mentioned.''

PPS: Sam Sifton, culture editor of The Times, replied in an email late this afternoon to my request for a response. He wrote:

The New York Times has by no means decided not to review shows put on by The Jewish Theater of New York. Instead, we are adopting the same policy that we use when evaluating which books to review, or musical performances (or recordings), or art shows, or restaurants. There's simply no room for them all. And in this instance the editors have decided to take a pass.

Moving right along: A reader writes, "Yes, I have seen how things can be totgeschwiegen in the NYT -- like the half a million people protesting the Iraq War in NYC before the war began."

Posted by jherman at 11:25 AM

March 19, 2007

Obamarama

Text, subtext and context, David Ehrenstein's op-ed in today's Los Angeles Times is cultural critiquing at its finest -- the best I've read to date about Barack Obama. It begins:

As every carbon-based life form on this planet surely knows, Barack Obama, the junior Democratic senator from Illinois, is running for president. ... But it's clear that Obama also is running for an equally important unelected office, in the province of the popular imagination -- the "Magic Negro."

And it ends:

Like a comic-book superhero, Obama is there to help, out of the sheer goodness of a heart we need not know or understand. For as with all Magic Negroes, the less real he seems, the more desirable he becomes. If he were real, white America couldn't project all its fantasies of curative black benevolence on him.

In between, Ehrenstein provides substantial insight based on evidence drawn from Hollywood trivia that few cultural critics have the expertise to marshall and fewer still would know how to apply to matters of race and politics.

Posted by jherman at 12:08 PM

Collateral Damage

Katrina vanden Heuvel writes: "Jan -- Enjoyed your post this Sunday." Nice of her to say so. But here's the real import of her message:

The WashPost editorial page is beyond the pale at this stage not only on Iraq, but on fundamental issues of justice. A week or so ago it was attacking efforts to strengthen the right to organize among workers in this country; then it dismissed the Libby verdict; and on Russia, it crusades with a vengeful hypocrisy.

Vanden Heuvel, who is the editor and publisher of The Nation, also sent her Sunday piece "End the War (On Terror)," the latest entry in her blog Editor's Cut. It marks the fourth anniversary of "America's war against Iraq" as a "time to consider the longterm damage [of] the misconceived 'war on terrorism.'"

BananaRepublicans will accuse her of "mandating failure" of course -- as if they have any right to preach about success -- but it's just another of their galling pet phrases (like "micromanaging the war") to deflect attention from their own arrogance and incompetence.

She writes:

Eventually US troops will leave Iraq because the brutal facts on the ground will compel it. But even as we struggle to get out of this failed war, our political system continues to evade the challenge of finding an exit from the "war on terror." At a time when we need a coherent alternative to the Bush doctrine and an alternative vision of what this country's role in the world should be, we see both parties calling for intensifying the "war on terror" -- even for increasing the size of the military, and for expanding its ability to go places and do things. But who is asking the fundamental question: Won't a war without end do more to weaken our security and democracy than seriously address the threats and challenges ahead?

Witness the collateral damage to our democracy. This Administration has used the "war" as justification for almost anything -- unlawful spying on Americans, illegal detention policies, hyper-secrecy, equating dissent with disloyalty and condoning torture.

The Administration has also justified the expansion of America's military capacity -- over 700 bases in more than 60 countries, annual military budgets topping $500 billion -- as necessary to counter the threat of Islamic extremism and to fight the "war on terror." What too few politicians are willing to say is that combating terrorism -- a brutal, horrifying tactic -- is not a "war" and that military action is the wrong weapon. Illegality and immorality aside, it simply doesn't succeed. Yes, terrorism does pose a threat to national and international security that can never be eliminated. But there are far more effective (and ethical) ways to advance US security than a forward-based and military-heavy strategy of intrusion into the Islamic world. Indeed, the failed Iraq war demonstrated anew the limits of military power.

Amen, sister.

Postscript: Gary Hart weighs in.

Posted by jherman at 8:59 AM

March 18, 2007

Lessons Four Years After? What Lessons?

A friend who deals in matters of national security writes: "All the major newspapers seem to have a common, inexplicable blind spot in discussing the war in Iraq, which I find very disturbing because it obfuscates the fundamental failures, their nature, and their cause." The most recent example is today's editorial, "Lessons of War," in The Washington Post:

Clearly we were insufficiently skeptical of intelligence reports. It would almost be comforting if Mr. Bush had "lied the nation into war," as is frequently charged. The best postwar journalism instead suggests that the president and his administration exaggerated, cherry-picked and simplified but fundamentally believed -- as did the CIA -- the catastrophically wrong case that then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell presented to the United Nations [emphasis added].

In fact, "many high-level, very experienced career CIA people not only did not believe the stuff, but knew it was wrong," my correspondent notes. "The same is true at State and the Pentagon. The believers were the political appointees -- the agency or department bosses and therefore their unimpeachable mouthpieces, the bosses' immediate staffs, and the upward-bound opportunists. Why should but fundamentally believed even be in the sentence? The core failure at CIA, State, and Defense is that the facts were side-tracked and those who knew them and would speak them were muzzled."

Amen, brother.

Postscript: Furthermore, "take Powell's function as a mouthpiece: An Army four star who does not even suspect that the 'mobile bio-weapons labs' might be just hydrogen generators for inflating artillery weather balloons -- if anything at all? Even though our own Army has them? Even when the intelligence source is Curveball and only Curveball -- whom the CIA knew at the time to be a fabricator? I often wonder whether the editors read their own papers."

Worse, do the editors read their own papers and either 1) not care or 2) choose, for any number of reasons, to act as mouthpieces themselves?

Posted by jherman at 10:41 AM

March 15, 2007

It's Pantheonic

Something else to turn your stomach: The Waverly Inn in the West Village -- Manhattan's "latest clubhouse to the rich and famous under the direction of its host-with-the-mostest, Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter" -- where a $50,000 mural by Edward Sorel features caricatures of Anaïs Nin, e.e. cummings, Jackson Pollock, Bob Dylan, William S. Burroughs, Eugene O'Neill, etc. But the actual caricatures are the host and his rich-and-famous customers.

Posted by jherman at 8:38 AM

March 14, 2007

More VD

It was two months ago that the Ventriloquist Dummy claimed "good management" to justify the Justice Department's political purge of federal prosecutors. Now that his excuse has been exposed as one more Orwellian lie in a cynical grab for power by the BananaRepublic's very own President With His Head Up His Ass, the VD's nonconfession that "mistakes were made" reminds me of The Pure Malarkey of Softspeak and his Tortured Testimony in January of 2005.

Posted by jherman at 9:00 AM

March 12, 2007

No Polish Joke -- It's Ecumenical

The government of Poland objects to "Last Jew in Europe," a play by Tuvia Tenenbom that documents and then satirizes the anti-Semitism still visibly thriving in Lodz, the country's second-largest city, a half-century after the Holocaust. Staged with the simplified power of a cartoon, "Last Jew" puts Polish anti-Semites on trial by ridicule. No wonder the government protests.

Self-hating Jews are not spared, either. And Mormons are also likely to be upset when they get wind of the show, which opened Sunday at The Triad Theater in Manhattan. A young Utah missionary from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is a central figure in the action. He arrives in Lodz seeking the names of Jews buried in the local cemetery so he can have them baptized -- retroactively. ("Why is he interested in dead Jews?" "I heard they have a law in America to recycle everything.")

The plot revolves around the wedding plans of a butcher's daughter and a morgue pathologist's son. She's a hot young thing who drinks like a sailor and moves like a go-go dancer. Her father is a pastor in the Crucified Church of Christ in Christ. Her fiancé is a Jew, or so he thinks. And of course he's a klutz. The Mormon interloper complicates the couple's plans. Like it or not, "Last Jew in Europe" is the theatrical equivalent of a graphic novel. (More sample dialogue: "Americans know everything. They have good satellites.")

Tenenbom's outrageously comical take on anti-Semitism and Jewish self-hatred is a long way from the somber vision of Art Spiegelman's in "Maus," for instance. But Tenenbom, the provocateur, is no less serious in his grim estimate of human nature. He says he based the play partly on "a real story," partly on his own travels in Poland, and partly on the "rampant" anti-Semitic graffiti he saw everywhere in Lodz.

Fire did not engulf the stage, as promised in a press release, and the spectacle of crosses with "crucified young females nailed onto them" also failed to materialize. But they weren't needed. As performed by an enthusiastic troupe, "Last Jew" easily made its point without having to go any further over the top.

Produced by The Jewish Theater of New York in association with Peter Martin. Directed by Tuvia Tenenbom and Andreas Robertz. With Bill Barnett (Papa Jocka), Lila Donnolo (Maria), Michal Gregorewski (Dr. Kweczke), Caba S. Lucas (Józef), Aleksandra Popov (Zbrodzka) and Daniel Shafer (John Jay Smith). At The Triad Theater, 158 W. 72nd St., NYC (btwn. Amsterdam & Columbus Aves.) Performances: Sun. (3:00 p.m.); Mon. and Tues. ( 7:00 p.m.) No show on March 12. Open-ended run. Tickets: $55. Available online or by phone: (212) 352-3101.

Posted by jherman at 1:07 PM

March 7, 2007

Fisk's Prize 'Flak Jacket'

So much happens when Straight Up's staff of thousands leaves town. Here's something else that happened. We regret not being there. It isn't everyday that Robert Fisk picks up a Freedom Prize worth $350,000.

But we caught up with him by proxy on Democracy Now! Amy Goodman asked him in an interview to explain why he considered the prize as "important as a flak jacket." She said that's what he'd told the crowd at Town Hall in Manhattan, where the award ceremony was held Saturday.

Fisk, if you don't already know, is the veteran Middle East correspondent for The Independent of London, and the author of several books, including "The Great War for Civilisation" (see Postscript, below*) and "Pity the Nation."

He had much to say worth hearing, as usual. Speaking of Iraq and Afghanistan, for instance, he noted:

[T]his is the first war I've ever covered in which the leadership in the West bases its policies on its own lies. I mean, it's one thing to lie to the people, and then you have your own policy of how to pursue a war, but to pursue the war on the basis of the lies you're telling the people, this is an entirely new concept in war and strategy in foreign policy. I've never seen it before.

Goodman's interview aired on Monday, the same day that USA Today's top front-page story was headlined "Iraq ousts 10,000 in security ministry." Coincidentally, a manufacturer of armor-plating for U.S. military vehicles in Iraq pointed out the headline to me. He believed the news was a good sign perhaps of better things to come. Anybody who has read Fisk would understand why it isn't. Here's one of the things he said to Goodman:

[W]ho is funding the interior ministry militiamen who are murdering people? The interior ministry is funded by us. We use local gunmen and murderers to do our job for us and save our soldiers' lives, not very successfully, but that's what we do. And, of course, we'll do the same if necessary in Lebanon with all these unsavory groups, all of whom have got blood on their hands. I mean, there's one Lebanese politician -- he's a friend of mine, I know him very well -- who ran a militia during the civil war, which brutally tortured its opponents, committed war crimes, and he met Condoleezza Rice a few days ago. I mean, you know, we will make friends with those who want to help us and whom we think are worthy of our support on the short term. And if -- I mean, who did bin Laden used to work for when he was fighting the Russians? Us, you know? I mean, we use these unsavory -- who was Saddam working for for most of his rule? Us. Who gave him the gas? The components came from the United States.

None of that is secret. We've been going on here for months about death squads doing America's dirty work as the "Salvador option" in Iraq. Shit, years even. Most recently last December (see Loud Whispers). Fat lot of good it does.

*Postscript: March 9 -- "The Great War for Civilisation" has been short-listed for the Arthur Ross Book Award by the Council on Foreign Relations, along with five other books, including Thomas Ricks' "Fiasco" and Lawrence Wright's "The Looming Tower." The award honors "the best book published in the last two years on international affairs."

(This ought to embarrass the editors of The New York Times Book Review, especially if Fisk wins the $25,000 first prize. In 2005, when Fisk's book was published, The Times failed to include it among the 100 Notable Books of the Year.)

Posted by jherman at 10:27 AM

March 6, 2007

Critic Earns a Rave

Do I hear any bravos for Justin Davidson's principled stand against the Vienna Philharmonic? He wrote he would not be attending the orchestra's Carnegie Hall concerts this past weekend. For that matter, he added, "it may be years before I review it again." This is no small thing. Davidson is a Pulitzer Prize-winning music critc with readers in the New York region.

His piece in Newsday, headlined "Vienna is slow to change its tune," appeared while I was away in Alabama.

Further, Davidson wrote: "I believe that the Vienna Philharmonic has relinquished its claim to serious consideration as a dynamic cultural organization." To feminists who have criticized its exclusion of women that has been obvious for decades, as well as the fact that "the geological pace of change is not merely a regrettable obstacle in the relentless pursuit of quality. It is the product of a narrowly preservationist, antiquarian philosophy, which fetishizes sound at the expense of spirit."

But Davidson makes the unusual point, so easily overlooked, that the orchestra's backward attitude contradicts the most significant aspect of its musical history:

The composers in the Vienna Philharmonic's pantheon were all disturbers of the peace, and they railed against the city's recurring fondness for the status quo. Beethoven was a liberal idealist, a radical egalitarian and artistic revolutionary who would have been revolted by the claim that performing his forward-looking, constantly renewable music required an inflexible reverence for custom.

"This idea that the true tradition of the orchestra is one of innovation is very interesting," says William Osborne, the Vienna Phil's longtime nemesis. "It was only after the Nazification of the orchestra during World War II that it became associated with conservatism and tradition."

(Osborne, I wrote long ago, was the chief instigator who "mobilized a tiny, far-flung band of feminists" that pressured the Vienna Philharmonic to accept its first woman member.)

Meanwhile, this morning's headline over Bernard Holland's swooning review of the Vienna Philharmonic in The New York Times, "Viennese Boys' Club, in for the Weekend," probably won't be clipped for the orchestra's scrap book.

The review itself -- with phrases such as "overpowering beauty" and "Viennese mist of loveliness" -- leaves no doubt that Holland adores the sound of the boys' club. But Holland's unctuous disregard of its sexism has begun to crumble -- slightly. He spends three of 11 paragraphs on the orchestra's "lack of women" and the "ruckus" it has caused, even critiquing the orchestra's program notes as "coy" and "oozing."

Holland is still as condescending as ever about the issue of feminism. And he merely repeats what Osborne has said about the importance of the Vienna Phil's reception in America "for a lot of its prestige and bottom line." But for the first time I'm aware of, he says: "I think the orchestra's embrace of an all-male sound is wrong." That's a milestone for Holland, his caveat about American do-goodism notwithstanding.

Postscript: Davidson follows up with his take on race in American orchestras and gets a snide response at the American Spectator.

Posted by jherman at 10:47 AM