MATTHEW CONTINETTI THINKS THERE ARE LITTLE TINY PEOPLE INSIDE HIS TV
Or maybe not, but the Weekly Standard writer, who was raised like a veal by Bill Kristol and other right-wing mentors, doesn't seem to understand the difference between TV characters and the people who play them. Here's an excerpt from his forthcoming book, The Persecution of Sarah Palin, via U.S. News:
"It was telling that [Tina] Fey should be the actress who impersonated Palin. The two women may look like each other, but they could not be more dissimilar. Each exemplifies a different category of feminism. Palin comes from the I-can-do-it-all school. She is professionally successful, has been married for more than 20 years, and has a large and (from all outward appearances) happy family. And while Fey is also pretty, married, and has a daughter, the characters she portrays in films like Mean Girls and Baby Mama, and in television shows like 30 Rock, are hard-pressed eggheads who give up personal fulfillment -- e.g., marriage and motherhood -- in the pursuit of professional l success," he writes. "On 30 Rock, Fey, who is also the show's chief writer and executive producer, plays Liz Lemon, a television comedy writer modeled on herself. Liz Lemon is smart, funny, and at the top of her field. But she fails elsewhere. None of her relationships with men works out. She wants desperately to raise a child but can find neither the time nor the means to marry or adopt. Lemon makes you laugh, for sure. But you also would be hard pressed to name a more unhappy person on American TV."
Let me summarize. Fey and Palin are extremely "dissimilar" because Fey built a career while she was married and a mother -- just like Palin. Palin "comes from the I-can-do-it-all school" -- which makes Fey "dissimilar" to her even though Fey has been a successful actress and writer in TV and movies (and, by the way, has her own multi-million-dollar book coming out). Fey, arguably, has "it all" -- and Palin, who clearly wants something out of life that's currently beyond her grasp, doesn't. But Fey's the one who's unfulfilled -- because the characters she plays are unfulfilled.
Oh, and did I mention that Fey didn't create the Sarah Palin character, but was asked to play it -- remember, she wasn't on Saturday Night Live anymore -- and was not the writer of the Palin sketches? So how is a characterization crafted for her by another writer a sign of her anger and bitterness?
Hey, I've got it -- maybe it's Liz Lemon who's jealous of Palin! Maybe fictional characters are real! Maybe poor, lovelorn Liz secretly resents Palin, and created her own creator, Tina Fey, in order to get back at Palin. (Yikes, this is starting to sound like a Borges story.)
Or maybe Matthew Continetti is just a fool.
Coming via the Washington Monthly to your project , "Putting a face , any face , on the mud cocktail called reason and logic at the Weekly Standard" .
ReplyDeleteOne of the reasons that the Weekly Standard is capable of successfully tilting at windmills is their own vast production of humid , well chewed , Jujitsuian gravities , and of course their vivacious legions of absurdisties .
These devotees , who are frankly slavish , in their adoration of such an infallible guide to reason as the afore mentioned Solon , Bill Kristol (Mr Kristol who being an elevated intellectual , is the only known living relic of the time when sheep were frightened) . This astounding fact along with Mr Kristol's own impenetrable logic have led him , and his lucky investors (Damn the public ! a stoutish lionesque reply to those who deny the attractive , no nonsense personalities of Corporations) , to an unprecedented record string of speculations . With the Vice President , Ms Palin , and President McCain , the wild economic successes of the flattering “trickle down” theories substantially vindicated by the rousing Bushian justice and economic swaggering as evidence , this humble solon , a man amongst mens , an irrepressible genius , it is no wonder the fawning allegiance of the neophyte trust fund babies wild cries of courage equal their sophisticated , wide eyed approval and adoration .