From the Weekly Standard’s “Scrapbook”:
In the Don Imus vs. Al Sharpton celebrity tag-team cage match that obsessed Washington last week, and which ended with the radio jock’s firing for racial insensitivity at the hands of his risk-averse CBS and MSNBC bosses, THE SCRAPBOOK has to confess that it couldn’t work up a rooting interest either way. As National Review’s Rich Lowry noted in his syndicated column, the controversy over Imus’s calling the Rutgers women’s basketball team “nappy-headed hos” was “almost entirely a liberal conflagration.” Which is to say, from our admittedly jaundiced point of view, it was a sort of pundits’ version of the Iran-Iraq war.
With a few notable exceptions (John McCain, Rudy Giuliani), Imus’s favorite interlocutors were a Who’s Who of the Washington and New York liberal establishment: Evan Thomas, Doris Kearns Goodwin, Tim Russert, Chris Matthews, Tom Friedman, Frank Rich, Paul Begala, Howard Fineman, Tom Oliphant, Bob Schieffer, Jon Meacham, et al. Indeed, Oliphant–no one’s idea of a man you’d take with you to a knife fight–had the misfortune, as Lowry put it, “to appear on Imus’s show after the ‘nappy-headed’ comment and before it was clear that Imus was on his way to being expelled from polite company.” So he made a great show of excusing Imus. But to be fair, Oliphant’s parting remark might have been uttered by any of Imus’s famous guests: “Solidarity forever, pal!” Or, until Al Sharpton says otherwise–whichever comes first.
Our normal instinct would have been to side with a man in Imus’s position simply on the grounds that Sharpton led the charge against him. A slanderer and a race-baiter who has unrepentantly fomented deadly racial violence in New York on more than one occasion in the past 20 years, Sharpton doesn’t have the moral standing of a cockroach to judge someone else’s public discourse.
But good liberal that he is, Imus volunteered to appear with Sharpton and abase himself before this appallingly inappropriate arbiter. If CBS and MSNBC have now decided to outsource their Standards and Practices decisions to the velour sweat-suited demagogue–well, that too is something we can thank Imus for. So long, pal.
As a liberal, Imus wandered off the plantation, and in order to make his way back on, he abased himself before one of the modern-day Masters of race demagoguery, Al Sharpton.
Unfortunately for Imus—but predictably, especially those who follow the dynamics of identity politics—Sharpton balked at offering absolution, protecting the grievance narrative at the expense of following his own ostensible Christian teachings and forgiving the aging radio blowhard.
Which, from a “progressive” perspective was precisely the thing to do: no individual is above the goals of the collectivist movement, and so Imus—like Lieberman before him—was cast out into the wilderness, having surrendered his liberal bona fides for having desecrated the identity narrative of one of the key demographic voting groups for Democrats.
Interestingly—and as I pointed out recently—this same dynamic seems only to apply symbolically, and is applied to scapegoats like Lieberman or Imus. Because when it comes to the anti-homosexual stance of many blacks, their importance as a voting bloc makes it difficult for progressives to demonize the stance in terms that would risk alienating them. On the other hand, though, “Grey’s Anatomy” actors are forced to apologize and enter rehab should they wish to continue to work in the liberal enclaves of Hollywood.
As I say, not surprising—unless, that is, you happened to be of the opinion that liberal Democrats were sticklers for consistency. In which case, you really need to get out more.
On this subject: Best. Essay. Ever.
As I noted last week, living in the Northeast, I used to listen to Imus occasionally because his station is a sports station, and I was able to keep track of my teams that way. After the internet caught on, however, I ceased.
I never could understand why his guests put up with the abuse.
And I am reconciled to the fact that people can get fired at any time.
Nevertheless, even for people whose politics I don’t care for, or who I don’t even listen to, I don’t like seeing people fired for political incorrectness, and that’s what this was—well, I was going to say, “in spades”, but I guess I can’t say that either ….
Man, you are on a roll today.
I wonder if Imus will show up on satellite radio with a more right leaning slant. Faced with the hard facts that most of his leftist chums not only bailed but took some parting shots to polish their own liberal bona fides will Imus have an epiphany on the topic of conviction?
Never mind. I really don’t give a shit.
“Never mind. I really don’t give a shit”
The single best comment on the whole affair.
We can only hope so, and for that reason only, I really DO give a shit.
I started (and stopped) listening to Imus when I noticed he had a Rush Limbaugh impersonator singing painfully unfunny parody songs about what a racist Mr. Limbaugh was, only to follow that up with Imus trying to elicit slurs out of people, and in some cases succeeding (Senator Al D’Amato vs. Judge Lance Ito during the O.J. Simpson trial, for example)
Remember the definition of “neo-conservative”: a former leftist mugged by reality. Imus got his mugging.
Neo-conservative: a former leftist mugged by reality.
Love it, going to put on a t-shirt.
syn: I believe this guy invented the term.
NBC outsourcing its ethics decisions to Al Sharpton?
Well, that explains the day of Nothing But Cho.
I was going to say that Imus doesn’t really fit all that neatly into the “lefty” box, but I think that ground has been covered adquately. Now I’m just posting this comment to meet my quota.
Civil wars are always nastier than those between strangers. The sense of betrayal combined with urge to smite the unrighteous adds a spice no other combats can match.
So is Imus an involuntary apostate, a whipping boy, a human sacrifce proxy, or merely a very lucky witch?
I guess I don’t really give a shit, either: I just know that whatever it is, “It’s wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.”
h/t Dick Gebhart
Ah, that wonderful leftard ability to read another’s mind and heart while ignoring their actions.
Maybe we can get Rosie O’Donnell to eat the Democrats.
Dear God, no. It’ll only whet her appetite, and what’ll we feed her then?
Aren’t the Democrats supposed to eat Rosie? I seem to recall someone making that Modest Proposal, and there’s certainly enough for everyone!
Be nice to Rosie – she’s been diagnosed with a flesh-eating bacterium…her doctor’s given her 20 years to live.
TW: Now move52 dat azz, Rosie.