Perspective
From Frank Rich, on the Reagan schlock-a-thon.
He's not entirely right--a lot of the hagiography was deliberately produced and managed so as to present a glowing picture of Reagan and his presidency. That's partly why any dissenting or realistic assessment of his terms found itself confronted with hostitlity and indignation.
He does get this bit largely right, but it does beg a little commentary:
Note especially the second sentence. Compare that statement with the sickening outpouring of manufactured shock we all witnessed. Not all of that was created by the media, OJ-style, to attract viewers. Rich ignores the role of the right-wing media, which did its best to deify Reagan and stamp out any intimation that Reagan was less than perfect. In fact, if Rich had written this very column in the days immediately following Reagan's death, he would have found himself denounced, along with Ted Rall, by the likes of O'Reilly, Hannity, Limbaugh, and so on. Peggy Noonan would have called for his head on a plate.
Anyway, Rich also gets a few other things wrong. OJ is not responsible for the reality-show purgatory we now experience. Like so many other annoying entertainment trends (the constantly-moving camera, stupid angles, personalities so vacuous you wonder whether or not they've been lobotomized, etc.), the reality show is the creation of MTV. The Real World, that hive of scum and villainy, premiered fourteen years ago. Yes, fourteen. I was still in high school at the time, and I thought it was awful then. So, while you can blame OJ for cutting two people up (civilly, but not criminally, at any rate), you can't blame him for Big Brother or Who Wants To Marry A Midget or any of that crap.
From Frank Rich, on the Reagan schlock-a-thon.
He's not entirely right--a lot of the hagiography was deliberately produced and managed so as to present a glowing picture of Reagan and his presidency. That's partly why any dissenting or realistic assessment of his terms found itself confronted with hostitlity and indignation.
He does get this bit largely right, but it does beg a little commentary:
His average approval rating in office was lower than that of many modern presidents, including each George Bush. His death at 93, after a full life and a long terminal illness, was neither tragic nor shocking. And in 2004, his presidency was far from the center of American consciousness. The cold war that he "won" (with no help from the Poles, the Czechs, Mikhail Gorbachev, the first President Bush or anyone else, mind you) had dropped into the great American memory hole in our age of terrorism, along with his administration's support of incipient bin Laden-style Islamic militants in Afghanistan.
Note especially the second sentence. Compare that statement with the sickening outpouring of manufactured shock we all witnessed. Not all of that was created by the media, OJ-style, to attract viewers. Rich ignores the role of the right-wing media, which did its best to deify Reagan and stamp out any intimation that Reagan was less than perfect. In fact, if Rich had written this very column in the days immediately following Reagan's death, he would have found himself denounced, along with Ted Rall, by the likes of O'Reilly, Hannity, Limbaugh, and so on. Peggy Noonan would have called for his head on a plate.
Anyway, Rich also gets a few other things wrong. OJ is not responsible for the reality-show purgatory we now experience. Like so many other annoying entertainment trends (the constantly-moving camera, stupid angles, personalities so vacuous you wonder whether or not they've been lobotomized, etc.), the reality show is the creation of MTV. The Real World, that hive of scum and villainy, premiered fourteen years ago. Yes, fourteen. I was still in high school at the time, and I thought it was awful then. So, while you can blame OJ for cutting two people up (civilly, but not criminally, at any rate), you can't blame him for Big Brother or Who Wants To Marry A Midget or any of that crap.
posted by Jude at 11:32 AM
