Republican Party Reptile

by P. J. O'Rourke

  Gerald Weales reviewed All Faithful People: Change and Continuity in Middletown’s Religion (a group effort). From 1976 to 1981 a group of social scientists studied Muncie, Indiana. Muncie is the “Middletown” where Robert and Helen Lynd did their pioneering sociology work in 1929. Despite oodles of staff, piles of money, help from computers, and time to spare, contemporary sociologists are not doing as good a job as the Lynds. Mr. Weals said All Faithful People should be taken with a grain of salt (and some lime and some tequila, suggests this writer).

  Some of the articles do not deserve brief summaries:

  The Wandering Jew by Stefan Heym was reviewed by D. J. Enright. It sounded like an interesting novel, but by the time I’d finished reading Mr. Enright’s exhaustive praise, I was too bored to even consider buying the thing. Michael Wood reviewed two books about Alfred Hitchcock and proved that some people are unable to experience even the slightest of life’s pleasures without being thrown into frenzies of analysis. And Howard Moss’s critique of the Martha Graham Dance Company’s performances at Lincoln Center was a powerful argument that people who like dancing should shut up and dance.

  One article I could not comprehend. Charles Rosen reviewed Julian Rushton’s The Musical Language of Berlioz. When writing contains such asides as “This is how Schönberg is able to reconstruct the effect of dissonance and consonance rhythmically within a nontonal system,” I am out of my depth. However, I gathered Mr. Rosen’s thesis was that Berlioz’s music either stinks or it doesn’t.

  One other article I could comprehend too well. It was called “Reagan’s Star Wars” and in it nine experts from the Union of Concerned Scientists argued that a space-based missile defense system would be expensive as all get out, would make the Russians hopping mad, and wouldn’t save us from getting blown up anyway. The experts presented a great number of facts and figures and many long passages of thoughtfulness to support their arguments. But it seemed to me that by using common sense and inductive reasoning based on the history of defensive weapons the same arguments could have been made in two hundred words.

  The poem, by Patricia Storance, was called “Illegitimacy.” It did not rhyme. The text implied illegitimacy is an uncomfortable state.

  Among all this intelligence there were a couple things of interest. Irvin Ehrenpreis reviewed the forty-eight-volume Yale Edition of Horace Walpole’s Correspondence edited by W. S. Lewis. Walpole, fourth Earl of Oxford, was a creature of the Enlightenment and a vivid and hilarious letter writer who roundly damned the world about him. Mr, Ehrenpreis called it a “style of ironic recoil” and quoted liberally. Ehrenpreis did not, however, address some important questions. What manner of man makes his living by editing forty-eight volumes of somebody else’s bread-and-butter notes? Who, at a cost of $2,700, buys a set of books like this? Where do they put them? Did Mr. Ehrenpreis really read them all? And how did he find the time?

  Robert 0. Paxton’s review of Don Clark’s de Gaulle biography was also worthwhile. Mr. Paxton argued that de Gaulle had a perceptive and pragmatic vision of world politics and that his behavior during the sixties was not inspired by anti-Americanism or egocentricity. Instead, said Paxton, de Gaulle was very sensibly putting distance between France and the American penchant for turning every CARE package and UN vote into A Great Crusade.

  It took about three hours to read the New York Review of Books. I lay down for a while with a cold compress on my forehead and then began watching television.

  Seven-thirty is the official beginning of “prime time.” I had a choice of Entertainment Tonight on ABC, Wheel of Fortune on CBS, or Family Feud on NBC. Entertainment Tonight seemed to be the name of the thing I was looking for rather than the thing itself. Wheel of Fortune sounded a little too stupid. I chose Family Feud. It turned out to be a fascinating show. Two perfectly normal American families dressed in go-to-church/second marriage/get-a-bank-loan clothes were pitted against each other. They were asked questions but instead of answering them they had to predict the answers that a hundred other perfectly average Americans gave. “Know thyself,” said the ancient Greeks. “Know thy neighbor,” say the more practical Americans.

  The first question was “Name the most time-saving invention.” “Washing machine” was the winning answer, and a good one too. Clean clothes are the hallmark of civilization. But “microwave” came in second. Ugh. Delicious food is the other hallmark of civilization. “Car” and “airplane” ranked only third and fourth—possibly an indication of latent provincialism. “Dishwasher” followed in fifth place and “telephone” in sixth. It’s a sign of American folk wisdom, this ambiguous attitude toward the telephone. There aren’t many Horace Walpoles in this generation.

  I could have pondered all this for hours—minutes, anyway—but another question was already posed. “What should athletes not do when in training?” “Smoke cigarettes” came in first, reasonably enough. But down the list in fifth place was “have sex,” which doesn’t hurt athletes a bit. Was this some recrudescent puritanism seeking a fitness-era excuse for itself? Unfortunately at this point I was interrupted by that dubiously time-saving device the telephone. (I suppose I should get a VCR, but the only thing I like about television is its ephemerality.) I was forced to give Family Feud only partial attention but did glean that 35 percent of Americans consider pink the most popular nightgown color. By the time my caller hung up, the contestants were playing a word game (“Things used for transportation in the city: . . . bus . . . feet . . .”) interrupted by a farty buzzer sound. This was of no interest. But it was disturbing to see American quiz-show contestants applaud themselves when they won. What happened to humble disclaimers and mumbled thanks to third-grade teachers? By the way, does anyone blush anymore?

  At 8:00 I had to choose among CBS’s Scarecrow and Mrs. King, which I feared might be about Stephen King’s mother, ABC’s That’s Incredible, which I was sure wouldn’t be, and NBC’s TV’s Bloopers and Practical Jokes. This seemed too horrid to pass up, and it was. The hosts were Dick Clark, American Bandstand’s master of ceremonies during this century’s worst period of popular music, and Ed McMahon, who has some ill-defined role on The Tonight Show. They talked to each other a good deal. I believe some of the time they were making jokes.

  The “bloopers” were outtakes from television shows where actors and actresses made mistakes. Some mistakes were amusing. An actress named Deidre Hall had a prolonged struggle with syllable #3 in “infinitesimally.” The point seemed to be that the famous make mistakes just like the rest of us. The “practical jokes” were all played on well-known people (at least the show claimed they were well known), I was perplexed. The beauty of a practical joke is vengeance. What reason was there to wreak vengeance on these supposed celebrities? Has fame replaced wealth as a criterion of class division? Is being unknown the modern equivalent of being oppressed? Are fameless people therefore justified in rising up against the better-publicized?

  One practical joke, however, was telling. Some actress I’d never heard of was escorted into a “butcher shop” to buy steaks for a barbecue. The butcher brought out a live cow, showed the actress where the steaks would be sliced out, then led the cow into a back room. A shot was heard, followed by the sound of a meat saw. The actress was horrified and the audience convulsed. How far we’ve come from our agrarian heritage.

  The rest of the show was simply junk, mostly in the form of old television commercials shown for their alleged amusement value. Another, particularly idiotic segment had the nighttime collegiate-humor-show host David Letterman tour an inventors’ convention and sneer at people. A Mexican man had created a device to detect signs of life in a casket. Mr. Letterman and the audience thought this hilarious. It may not be such a good joke in a country with poor medical care and no embalming. A black woman had developed a heated chair cushion to keep people warm in chilly homes. Letterman thought this, too, was risible. I’m glad his home is so well heated. I’ve used a similar item in duck blinds and found it a godsend. The audie
nce laughed whenever foreigners were on the screen. A number of the inventors were oriental and the audience seemed to find that extremely funny. I hope the audience finds waiting in unemployment lines as amusing.

  TV’s Bloopers and Practical Jokes lasted an hour—remarkable content mileage. Incidentally, whenever any of the befuddled victims said, “Oh, my God,” “God” was bleeped out.

  At 9:00 NBC and ABC were showing movies, so I watched something on CBS called Kate and Allie. As best I could figure, the situation in this situation comedy is that Kate and Allie are two divorced women who’ve set up house together with one in the role of housewife and the other as breadwinner. There are a number of children. The atmosphere is faintly homoerotic but with references to dating men. In the episode I saw, the breadwinner (I couldn’t determine which was Kate and which was Allie) lost her job and the housewife began making money by baking cakes at home. In the end, as per a long-established rule of situation comedy, everything returned to status quo ante. The message seemed to be that housewifery and job-holding have equally valid rewards. And some people hate to clean house, and some people hate to have jobs. People should do what they like best, within reason—a fair-minded thesis and Utopian in a friendly, middle-class American way.

  The movies were still on at 9:30, so I watched CBS’s Bob Newhart Show. This also dealt with woman’s place in society. The character played by Mr. Newhart has moved to a small town in Vermont. The people there are very backward. At a potluck supper all the men ate in the dining room while the women ate in the kitchen. The wife of Mr. Newhart’s character took umbrage at this and convinced the women to rebel and eat their potluck in the dining room. They did so but ended up at a separate table away from the men.

  I’ve lived in northern New England for years and have never seen such behavior. But maybe this is what potluck suppers are like in Los Angeles, where situation-comedy writers live.

  To be fair, I suppose I should have watched one more half hour of television. But after careful, objective consideration of the evidence gathered thus far, I decided: Screw it.

  ANALYSIS

  In the two lists below I have attempted to summarize the information gathered from one issue of the New York Review of Books and one evening of network television.

  INFORMATION FROM NEW YORK REVIEW

  INFORMATION FROM NETWORK TELEVISION

  1. Walt Whitman is an important poet.

  1. Washing machines save more time than jet planes or telephones.

  2. He masturbated a lot.

  2. Athletes shouldn’t smoke cigarettes.

  3. He was a hard guy to figure.

  3. Maybe they shouldn’t have sex either.

  4. Communism is bad when Russians have anything to do with it.

  4. Pink is a popular color for nightgowns.

  5. Upper Silesians couldn’t decide if they were Polish or German, then most of them died.

  5. Americans do not blush to congratuate themselves.

  6. War is bad.

  6. Dick Clark and Ed McMahon are entertaining.

  7. Colette’s French was good.

  7. Actors are human.

  8. Colette was a self-obsessed ratchet-jaw.

  8. It’s fun to trick others.

  9. The Farrar, Straus and Giroux edition of The Collected Stories of Colette doesn’t have Gigi in it.

  9. Meat comes from dead animals.

  10. Central Europe’s culture is disappearing.

  10. Old television commercials are silly.

  11. Russians are bad.

  11. We’re more sophisticated than we used to be.

  12. Everybody’s culture is disappearing.

  12. Foreigners are funny.

  13. Sociology isn’t what it used to be.

  13. Orientals are particularly funny.

  14. Stefan Heym has written a novel of genius but it’s complicated.

  14. David Letterman is funny too.

  15. Alfred Hitchcock was a hard guy to figure.

  15. You can’t say “God” on television unless you mean it.

  16. The Martha Graham Dance Company isn’t what it used to be.

  16. Traditional male and female social roles are both rewarding.

  17. The Martha Graham Dance Company’s costumes are too la-di-da.

  17. A little lesbianism is cute as long as you date men.

  18. Berlioz’s music either stinks or it doesn’t.

  18. People should do what they like best, within reason.

  19. A space-based missile defense system will be expensive.

  19. Men and women should be equal.

  20. It will make the Russians mad.

  20. Small-town folks are behind the times.

  21. It won’t work,

  21. Some things never change.

  22. Atomic war is very bad.

  23. It’s upsetting to be illegitimate.

  24. Horace Walpole was some letter-writer.

  25. Charles de Gaulle was playing with a full deck after all.

  Percentage of information from the New York Review that was news to me: 28%

  Percentage of information from the New York Review that sounded like bunk: 12%

  Percentage of information from network television that made sense: 52.4%

  Percentage of information from network television that made my flesh crawl: 52.4%

  Percentage of information from either source that was worth repeating to friends or acquaintances: 10.9%

  Specifically:

  Walt Whitman masturbated a lot.

  The Martha Graham Dance Company costumes are too la-di-da.

  Charles de Gaulle was cool.

  Pink is the most popular color for nightgowns.

  “God” gets bleeped if you say it on television.

  CONCLUSIONS

  Whether smart is worse than stupid or vice versa is an important question. Smart means Neo-Expressionist paintings, which are awful. But stupid means music videos, which are pretty awful too. Ignorance is stupid, but education causes college students. Logic is smart, but Marxism is logical. Smart people don’t start many bar fights. But stupid people don’t build many hydrogen bombs. Then again, smart people would never drop one. Or would they? It’s something we ought to know.

  The test of the New York Review against network television cannot be said to have proved conclusive. However, several working hypotheses did emerge:

  A. Intelligence is, in this case, slightly preferable to stupidity because it is, well, more intelligent.

  B. In order to get anything of value from the New York Review one must shine the cold, hard light of stupidity upon it.

  C. Television, to be worthwhile, must be approached with all the intellectual capacity at one’s command.

  D. If you try to do both in the same day, you will need a big drink.

  Myths Made Modern

  Twelve romances from the Hellenic Golden Age turned into a dozen stories about Greek love

  APOLLO AND DAPHNE

  Apollo is the son of Jupiter, who is president of the gods, and Latona, an old girlfriend of Jupiter’s whom he never married. Apollo is the god of handguns, Blue Cross coverage, and elaborate home stereo systems. Also, he is the god of getting a dark and even tan.

  Apollo’s first love was a girl named Daphne, and this came about because of the anger of Cupid, the god of interpersonal relationships. Apollo, as befits a god, possesses perfect marksmanship. In fact, it was his celestial hand which steadied the .44 caliber pistol when the Son of Sam murdered all the pale girls who weren’t carrying adequate medical insurance. And it was also Apollo who guided the shots which hit John Lennon because of the awful mixing quality on the Plastic Ono Band album. Apollo was chaffing Cupid about that deity’s recent change to automatic weapons, which Cupid insisted was necessary to keep up with the fast-paced shifts in modern emotional involvement. Apollo was saying that Cupid could not hit the long side of a supertanker with an Uzi, so Cupid let him have it with one of his deep-felt emo
tional-commitment rounds. Then Cupid fired a couple of the bullets which make women want careers. And these struck Daphne, who was a beautiful tennis-court nymph. Apollo was immediately smitten with Daphne, but she wanted to go to law school. Apollo followed Daphne around and pestered her and phoned her in the middle of the night all the time until Daphne became annoyed and called upon Diana, the goddess of women who are searching for self-fulfillment, and asked that august deity to turn her into a female Family Court judge. Apollo wept when he saw the transformation. But he still loved Daphne, and to this day, whenever Apollo spies a case of child abuse where the youngster’s injuries aren’t covered by a private or corporate medical plan, he has the parents arrested and their cases placed on Daphne’s court docket.

  IO

  Juno is the first lady of Olympus and the goddess of acting like a married woman. She keeps a close eye on her husband, Jupiter. One day while Juno was straightening up around heaven she saw a large smog cloud descend over the usually sunny climes of Southern California. Juno suspected Jupiter of causing this smog to conceal some activity of his. So she called upon Zephyr, an arctic air mass high-pressure zone causing local high winds and cold temperatures, to blow the smog away. Then Jupiter was revealed in a motel room with a Datsun. Juno guessed that the Datsun’s form concealed some fair beauty, transformed for concealment’s sake. And she was right, for it was Io, daughter of the Imperial Valley irrigation sprinkler system god Inachus. Jupiter had been dallying with her all afternoon in the motel.