Stop the presses: she’s a lesbian. But of course, this isn’t the point. The question of Rosie O’Donnell’s sexual orientation has not been open for quite some time, as any tabloid reader, or vaguely conscious being could tell you. The point is that she seems no longer ashamed or afraid of it, and in defense of the right of lesbian mothers to have custody over their own flesh and blood, she has finally summoned the personal courage of her political convictions. Good for her. But I must say I’m saddened that she had to wait for the end of her extremely successful talk-show to get to this point. Wouldn’t her statement have had more clout if she had been able to take a real financial and career risk for the sake of her own personal integrity? That’s the kind of statement that really impresses people. Then again, perhaps by establishing herself as someone in her own right before she came out, she will be able to change more minds and hearts. I certainly hope so. But I, for one, am relieved that the charade of “sorta ask, kinda tell” has in this case finally been brought to a close. Having to choose between a career and personal honesty is an intolerable choice. But there’s only one way our culture will free the next generation from such a burden: and that’s by more and more of us doing what we do while not hiding who we are. Welcome, Rosie, to the future.
A BODYGUARD OF LIES: “Our cause is just. So why not just tell the truth?” Maureen Dowd asks today, with all the military expertise of a journalist who only recently was calling Senators to calm her down about anthrax. I wonder what Dowd would have thought of FDR’s calculated public lying during the Second World War and before it. Or what she would have made of Churchill’s misinformation and propaganda efforts against the Nazis. Perhaps we should have told Hitler when we were planning to invade Normandy. Hey, our cause was just, wasn’t it? So why fib? No doubt Maureen would have found reason to ridicule both Churchill and Roosevelt. But they understood what war actually is. She still hasn’t got a clue.
FUND VERSUS RIORDAN: There’s no other Republican in California who stands a chance of either beating Gray Davis or dragging the G.O.P. back from the suicide of the last ten years than Dick Riordan. So why is the conservative line that Riordan must be undermined at every turn with the hope of destroying his candidacy? That’s the import of John Fund’s piece in the Wall Street Journal – yet another veiled attack on a Republican who doesn’t toe the hard-right line on abortion, gays, or immigrants. All the code-words are in Fund’s piece – the notion that Riordan is an “establishment” candidate, whispers about his commitment to low taxes, a sly reference to his age, and scarcely a word about his success as L.A. mayor or the complete disaster movement conservatives have foisted upon their party in the most populous state. Fund’s piece shows how parts of the right have become what the left now is: a movement dedicated to ideological purity even at the expense of electoral suicide. Riordan is part of the solution; not part of the problem.
I THINK THIS IS A JOKE: But it’s doing better than any of my three books on Amazon.
IRAQ OR TERROR?: I thought I’d heard it all, but there are some ingenious characters in London who are now arguing that attacking Iraq and removing Saddam Hussein would actually harm the war on terror. The argument? Here’s Euro-fanatic Hugo Young in the Guardian: “Parts of London, maybe including himself, see an Iraqi invasion as a fearful distraction from the defeat of global terror networks, a task that requires, above all, intelligence collaboration from many Islamic states that would be far more opposed than Europe to an invasion plan.” Does Young mean Pakistan, the only really useful source of intelligence for the war? Or perhaps he means those oh-so-helpful Islamic states like Saudi Arabia? More ominously, Young urges a British-Russian alliance to kill off the American attempt to foil Iraq’s and Iran’s attempt to acquire weapons of mass destruction. What’s in it for the Brits and Russians? Trade, I suppose. And perhaps Russia would also suffer if Iraq’s oil production came back on the world markets. Blair almost certainly won’t take his advice. He won’t cheer-lead an assault on Iraq, but he won’t oppose it either. All this is one more reason why the campaign against Saddam should be launched sooner rather than later. Sure, we need to get it absolutely right. But we don’t want to announce action, as the president has basically done, and then dither for months, while critics and enemies have a chance to organize. Is the president really that unimpressed by the Iraqi opposition? Or is there something else behind the apparent vacillation?
SCALIA’S CAFETERIA CATHOLICISM: I’m often accused of being a cafeteria Catholic because I oppose the Church’s position on homosexual relationships, and its irrational hostility to all non-procreative sex, gay or straight. Fair enough, I guess. Still, I don’t believe a reasoning Catholic has to take every single doctrine of his Church on moral matters without criticism or engagement and occasional disagreement. What, then, should we make of Antonin Scalia’s recently voiced opinion that the Church is simply wrong about the death penalty and that Catholic judges who take the Church’s position on the matter should resign? Has he finally gone nuts? Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick gives a clear account of his reasoning, but still comes up short. Isn’t Scalia just as big a cafeteria Catholic as many liberals? In fact, you could argue he’s more so. After all, sexual morality, while important, is nothing like as grave as matters of life and death. Yet not a squeak of protest from the usual defenders of Catholic orthodoxy. There’s also something more than a little disturbing about Scalia’s resuscitation of the view that Catholics somehow have dual loyalty in the conduct of public office – and it’s no less disturbing because a Catholic is making the argument. The silence of the right on this is particularly stunning. Imagine if a pro-choice liberal had made such a statement about, say, abortion – that all Catholic pro-life judges should resign. National Review would be producing a special issue on the scandal. So where’s the outrage about Scalia? More double standards. It seems to me that at the very least, Scalia is far more vulnerable to the charge of cafeteria Catholicism than many liberals, and, at most, he has helped set back the place of Catholics in public life by a considerable margin. Take it away, Rod Dreher!
POSEUR ALERT:“The Greek idea of hubris is on everyone’s lips – as if Oedipus-like, after ridding the neighborhood of the murderous Sphinx, our conceit is now leading us to a predestined rendezvous with Nemesis. The conventional wisdom of our Theban chorus of critics is that we are now blood-drunk on our victories and thus seeking a self-righteous and perpetual war against inequity – cynically either to guarantee large defense budgets at home or to expand American hegemony abroad. ” – Victor Davis Hanson, National Review Online, in
an otherwise fine piece, proving once again that there is nothing more boring than a fully extended metaphor.
The Dish 