How long did the "new" tone last in Washington?

Not very long for Democrat Steve Cohen.

The Whimpification of Language

I remember a commercial from the 1980s featuring L.A. Dodgers pitcher Orel Hershiser describing pitching as "like climbing a mountain" or "going to battle."  Hershiser's use of those analogies (similes?) irritated me at the time (believe it or not, I was more easily irritated back then) and I lashed out in verbal diatribes (since the blog had not yet been invented) whenever the commercial aired and anyone else was in earshot.  "Shut up Orel!  You've never climbed a mountain!  You've never been in battle!  How would you know what either one was like?"

So what does this trip down memory lane have to do with 2011?  The Arizona shooting spree seems to be taking its toll on the English language, at least as used in public America these days.  Apparently, language that when taken in any context as possibly or potentially or maybe-in-the-mind-of-a-sociopath violent is now taboo.  Take, for example, House Speaker John Boehner's new way to refer to Obamacare.  He used to call it "job killing" but now it is merely "job crushing."  (Link to Ben Smith's Politico blog here.)

Apparently, no one is allowed to use the word "killing" in political discourse anymore.  Even when it refers to the "death" of inanimate objects or ideas.  How, ever, can the wonderfully-named city of Town & Country discuss how to control its rampant deer population?  Or what would happen if a researcher today discovered a cure for cancer that "killed" malignant cells?  I guess they'd have to "disable" those cells instead.  Right?

English is not the most beautiful language in the world.  It is certainly not the most logical.  But it is certainly colorful.  But, in the aftermath of a deranged man's act of violence, the political correctness crowed is trying to scrub some of that color from our language.

If John Boehner had been referring to an "employee killing" piece of legislation, that would be over-the-line.  But no person in his or her right mind could possibly believe that a reference to a piece of legislation "killing jobs" is inciting violence.  It doesn't even mention violence.  How can it be violent to "kill" something that is not physical, not alive.

Now, whatever I can say about the Orel Hershiser commercial, his language was colorful and I still remember it about 25 years later.

Stop watering down our language!  Stop making us sound like a bunch of P.C. wimps!

How is this okay?

That's my question for those accusing Sarah Palin of hate, divisiveness, and vitriol.  Don't the posters themselves intentionally serve to enrage people with fear?  Justify their violence?  More so than Sarah Palin ever has.

These anti-Palin posters are showing up in San Francisco.  Link to story here.

Sarah Palin responds to those blaming her for Tucson . . . and does it well

Sarah Palin: "America's Enduring Strength" from Sarah Palin on Vimeo.

The Blame Game

I spent some time in the car today, much of it listening to talk radio - everything from NPR to KMOX to 97.1.  The hot topic this morning was Jared Loughner's Saturday shooting spree.  That, of course, is a worthy topic.  Thankfully, it is still an unusual and newsworthy event when a man takes out a gun, starts shooting, and kills six random people while injuring fourteen more, including a member of Congress.  But folks across the dial weren't content to talk about the news - what happened and what we know.  No, the talking heads were aghast over climate of American political rhetoric which they seem to blame for making this Loughner-nut act like the nut he is.

The media's focus today seems to be on Rush Limbaugh, Sarah Palin, and Glenn Beck - blaming them (as the sheriff in Tucson did) for Loughner's actions.  Those three, and other conservative voices, are vaguely blamed today and all to often for "divisiveness" or "hatred" or "vitriol" or "negativity".  What that really seems to mean, though, is that they disagree with the media, the Democrats, and the folks who currently hold power in Washington, D.C., and want to keep it and acquire more.

Conservative voices are often discussed by their opposition without any reference to specifics.  Take criticism spouted by Clarence Dupnik (quoted in the story linked above), the Pima County, Arizona, sheriff investigating the rampage:  "The kind of rhetoric that flows from people like Rush Limbaugh, in my judgment he is irresponsible, uses partial information, sometimes wrong information.  . . . [Limbaugh] attacks people, angers them against government, angers them against elected officials and that kind of behavior in my opinion is not without consequences."

What, Sheriff Dupnik, did Rush Limbaugh say that caused this nut to go off and start shooting?  Did he suggest violence?  Have you ever listened to Rush's show?  Or have you just heard your friends second-hand criticism of what they think he said?  What did he say that was irresponsible?

Limbaugh, Dupnik said, "angers" people against government and elected officials.  But anger is not synonymous with violence.  Anger, often - usually even, does not result in violence.  What is wrong with anger in the context of political discourse?  Nothing, of course.

Anger channeled to violence is wrong.  But political rhetoric is not responsible for doing that particular wrong.  Certainly not in this case.

Jared Loughner is - to the best of my barely informed knowledge - nuts.  And Jared Loughner (or possibly his mental illness) is responsible for his actions.

The Ghost of "Christmas" Past

I happened to drive past a St. Louis County auto dealership today and noticed three signs.  One said "Happy Hanukkah".  Another said "Happy Kwanzaa".  And then, the third, said . . . what would you think?  "Merry Christmas" maybe?  Just a sales staff covering all bases - that might make some sense.  But no, the third sign was the now ubiquitous "Happy Holidays"!

"Happy Holidays" has become the omnipresent, politically correct greeting for December.  Stores don't have "Christmas" sales but "Holiday" sales.  The word Christmas has become taboo in America.  National reporters even apologize for using the term.

Now the PC-police removing "Christmas" from public places is bad enough, but "Christmas" is being removed from our private lives too . . . without many noticing.  Over 1/3 of the "Christmas cards" that my family received this year did not mention "Christmas" at all.  And only about 1/3 of the cards that mentioned "Christmas" actually had anything to do with the story of Christmas.  The rest were about Santa and snowmen and presents.

What is happening?  Why is it not okay to remember that Christmas is a celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ?  Why is it frowned upon to be a Christian and publicly celebrate a Christian holiday?

Jews stand up for Hanukkah.  African-Americans even stand up for Kwanzaa.  And it has remained okay to talk about both.

It is time for Christians to stand up for Christmas.  In 2011, please, join me and boot the generic and oh-so-politically correct "Happy Holidays" and wish the world a Merry Christmas instead.

And, oh yeah, Happy New Year too.

Drawing the line on Political Correctness

There's a big day coming up on December 25.  Americans are in a festive mood.  Some cities, even, are celebrating with parades - tradition, you see.  But tradition is under attack by the forces of political correctness.  See, for example, Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Apparently, Tulsa, for years, has hosted the "Christmas Parade of Lights."  But not anymore.  Instead, they are holding the "Holiday Parade of Lights."  (Just what holiday could that be?  I wonder.)

Enough already.  If a city wants to throw a Hanukkah Parade, be my guest.  If a city wants to throw a Kwanzaa Parade, have at it.  What the heck - if a city wants to throw a Festivus for the Rest of Us , go for it.

But by the same token, if the folks in Tulsa want to have a Christmas Parade, the easily offended and their "do-gooder" sympathizers should get out of the way.

Oklahoma Republican Senator Jim Inhofe, the former mayor of Tulsa who participated in the parade for years, has drawn a line.  He refused to participate last year and won't again this year, or ever, until Christ is again recognized as the reason for the celebration.  (Link to story here.)

Well done Senator Inhofe.  Keep up the fight.

Freedom of Speech . . . SLU-style

In 2006, the president of Saint Louis University, Rev. Lawrence Biondi, taking heat for his school hosting "The Vagina Monologues" defended intellectual diversity . . . "Sometimes that means hosting speakers, events or plays that some may find inappropriate on a Catholic College campus.  But as soon as censorship begins at any university, where does censorship end?"

That's certainly a good question Father Biondi, and one that you might want to revisit now that SLU has canceled David Horowitz's speech on "Islamo-Fascism Awareness and Civil Rights."  (Link to Kavita Kumar's story in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch here.  Kumar gets credit for the Biondi quotation above too.)

Censorship at Random House - Publisher of The Da Vinci Code doesn't want to offend Muslims

Random House has "postponed indefinitely" publication of The Jewel of Medina, a novel by Sherry Jones, which was due out on August 12.  According to Reuters, the book "traces the life of A'isha from her engagement to Mohammed, when she was six, until the prophet's death."

Though the author claims to have "written respectfully about Islam and Mohammed," the publisher felt that the novel "might be offensive to some in the Muslim community" and pulled it.  Random House also felt that the novel "could incite acts of violence."

Offending Muslims is verboten at Random House . . . but offending Catholics isn't.  Random House, you see, published The Da Vinci Code.  (Doubleday is the named publisher - but that's a division of Random House.)

I'm not Catholic and I don't even play one on television.  I actually enjoyed The Da Vinci Code quite a lot.  I don't really understand the offense taken either - it's just fiction everybody, not history after all - but, again, I'm not Catholic.

A large number of Catholics did find The Da Vinci Code offensive but that didn't keep and shouldn't have kept it from being published.

But the same goes here . . . even if Muslims find The Jewel of Medina offensive, that shouldn't keep it from being published.  There should be no room for such a double standard.

Shame on Random House.

Unfair Attack on McLaughlin by the pro-Obama P.C. Police

John McLaughlin a curmudgeon rapidly approaching "old codger" status.  During the eighties his The McLaughlin Group on PBS was popular and iconic enough to be spoofed by Saturday Night Live.  With the proliferation of cable talk shows, in 2008 I'm not sure that anybody still watches the program.  

But the world seems up-in-arms about McLaughlin calling Barack Obama an "Oreo."  When referring to a person instead of a cookie, that's racist and derogatory.  And if McLaughlin actually did call Obama and Oreo, the heat he's taking would be justified.

But he didn't.

What he actually said is this:  "Question:  Does it frost Jackson, Jesse Jackson, that someone like Obama, who fits the sterotype blacks once labeled as an Oreo, a black on the outside - a white on the inside, that an Oreo should be the beneficiary of the long civil rights struggle, which Jesse Jackson spent his lifetime fighting for?"

McLaughlin did not say, "Obama is an Oreo," or "I think that Obama is an Oreo."  He essentially asked his panelists a question:  does Jesse Jackson think of Obama in that crude, racist, derogatory way?  And then he elicited discussion on the subject from his panelists.

For those of you who have never watched the The McLaughlin Group, that's the show.  The host presents items for discussion in the form of questions to his panelists and raucous interplay, hopefully, ensues.  Reading every item of discussion as a presentation of the host's own viewpoint shows an ignorance of the program's format?

Here's another problem with the attacks on McLaughlin . . . he's not being quoted in context.  Take a look at CNN's politicalticker blog (to which Drudge linked).  Instead of quoting McLaughlin in one block, they have split what he actually said into two pieces to make it look more like he's simply referring to Obama as an Oreo.

But, what do you expect from CNN?  Honest reporting?  Ha.