Re: National Review piece

By now, the average enthusiast of American history will have already scoured YouTube for clips of Bentsen quipping on Quayle and Ford tripping on the steps of Air Force One. Lest one run out of history, herein has been assembled ten lesser-known yet equally interesting specimens of political life in the 20^th century.

While Gerald Ford was busy being Gerald Ford, 1976 vice presidential hopeful Bob Dole was busy being Bob Dole, which is not a particularly good thing for a vice presidential hopeful to be. Asked about his earlier condemnation of Nixon's Watergate pardon in light of his current status as potential number-two man to the fellow who gave the pardon in the first place, Dole retorts that, although this was an appropriate topic, it was not a very good issue. He then helpfully notes that World War I, World War II, and the conflicts in Korea and Vietnam had all been Democrat wars which had left many Americans killed or wounded. So, there you go.

In one of the more colorful of the secret audio tape excerpts to have emerged in subsequent years, Nixon waxes homophobic on San Francisco's relatively gay-laden upper class before segueing into a short lecture on Bohemian Grove, an invitation-only outdoor extravaganza that plays host each year to an all-male guest list of presidents, defense contractors, and Rockefeller hangers-on. For his part, Nixon describes it as the most faggy goddamn thing you can imagine. And although Nixon's imagination in this regard is probably limited, he's not entirely alone in his assessment; Bill Clinton once described the California club gatherings as being where all those rich Republicans go up and stand naked against the redwood trees, while David Gergen made a remark of similar substance to The Washington Times in the early '90s.

Like those youngish supporters of his to whom I once unwisely provided my phone number out of curiosity, independent Democrat Lydon LaRouche is incapable of uttering even a couple of sentences without saying something confusing; this is a movement of people who hold strong opinions on the allegedly negative sociological impact of composer Sergei Rachmaninoff's later symphonies. Veteran skimmers of LaRouchian pamphlets will not be surprised, then, to see the big man himself announce that Walter Mondale is not only a KGB agent in the ordinary sense, but also owned in part by the grain cartel interests, which is certainly a strange thing by which to be owned, even if only in part.

The general thrust of this George Wallace presidential campaign ad from 1968 is that if you fail to vote for the Alabama governor, someone is likely to throw a firebomb through the window of the discount television store that you just opened. From the context, that particular someone may be presumed to be a rioting Negro or some such and not Wallace himself, angrily retaliating against those who opposed his pro-segregation presidential bid. The ad also notes that your school-aged children are in danger of being bussed across town to be educated alongside black children, where they will perhaps learn to make their own firebombs. And thus the circle of life is complete.

When Mark Felt was identified as Deep Throat in 2005, former Nixon speech writer Ben Stein was very angry indeed, comparing the aging Watergate informant's face to that of one of those old Nazi war criminals and wondering aloud how Felt - whom Stein believes to be at least part Jewish - could have betrayed his fellow Jews by turning against a president who was concurrently saving Eretz Israel and otherwise providing salvation to the Jewish people as a whole. It's hard to disagree with Stein's reasoning as one listens to the former president compliment the Hebrews with such lack of reservation, noting that Jews are born spies due in part to the strange malignancy and arrogance that he's observed in that particular tribe. Nixon then goes on to worry aloud over how ashamed Kissinger must feel over the general perfidy of his Jewish brethren, which is also quite touching. Ah, Ben Stein.

Herein lies a rare look at the first political notable of the Bush clan as well as an early specimen of the public affairs program. For his part, the senator comes off as rather articulate for a fellow who appears to have been drinking, though he lacks the genial charm of his most prominent grandson and even of his most prominent son. Had he been an actor and not a politician, he would have almost certainly be typecast as someone whose nefarious plans are foiled towards the end of the film. This isn't so much a criticism of Bush as it is of Hollywood movies of the time, which, as people often forget, were generally pretty bad.

Though the two are better known for their earlier ABC debate in which Vidal called Buckley a "crypto-Nazi" and Buckley called Vidal a "queer," this later segment in which the two pundits are wisely kept in seperate rooms is somewhat more representative of their respective approaches to rhetoric. Here, both are at the top of their craft to the extent that pretentiousness can be considered a craft, but Buckley manages to steal the show with his extended quotation of some very surreal "hippie play." The clip ends with an unusually well-produced Pepsi commercial in which it is announced that the soft drink will give you "zap."

This conservative bid for the youth vote makes liberal use of still shots depicting youngsters that are hip enough to perhaps convince other youngsters that Nixon is far out and whatnot but not so hip that they might be actual hippies. The accompanying song, like every songs that accompanied anything in the early '70s, is terrible and ought never to have been written.

On Wed, Mar 25, 2009 at 7:40 PM, Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:

Mike-

I'll have it to you within a couple of days.

Thanks,

Barrett Brown
Brooklyn, NY
512-560-2302

On Wed, Mar 25, 2009 at 6:50 PM, Michael Hogan <Michael_Hogan@condenast.com> wrote:

Hey Barrett,

This is a pretty brilliant idea. I say we do it. When can you have it to us?

Best,
Mike

On 3/24/09 6:40 PM, "Barrett Brown" <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi, Mike-

Would you be interested in a piece along the lines of a guide to YouTube's lesser-known but interesting historical political clips? Basically, it would consist of links to about ten clips accompanied by (allegedly) humorous descriptions of the content and some background info.

Here are a couple of examples of the sort of clips I'd cover:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aG6MUBAkFQg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPb-PN9F2Pc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCsGSMze_6Q

Thanks,

Barrett Brown
Brooklyn, NY
512-560-2302

On Thu, Mar 12, 2009 at 10:10 AM, Michael Hogan <Michael_Hogan@condenast.com> wrote:

Hey Barrett,

Understood, thanks. Lets definitely stay in touch.

Best,
Mike

On 3/12/09 12:24 AM, "Barrett Brown" <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:

Mike-

Yeah, but looking over the material I've got here thus far, I'm actually starting to think this wouldn't work as well as I was thinking it would and probably wouldn't be quite right for VF anyway (in case you're curious, the amusing thing about the ads in general is that they're very blatantly geared towards the gullible and tend to make use of the really bad sort of Eisenhower-era sort of ad copywriting that you don't often see anywhere else these days, but now I'm not sure that this would translate well into an article).

I'll query you again when I think of something that might work better.

Thanks,

Barrett Brown
Brooklyn, NY
512-560-2302

On Wed, Mar 11, 2009 at 6:05 PM, Michael Hogan <Michael_Hogan@condenast.com> wrote:

Hey Barrett,

Can you give me a couple examples?

Thanks,
Mike

On 3/11/09 5:47 PM, "Barrett Brown" <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:

Howdy, Mike-

Just wanted to check and see if you received my e-mail from Sunday about me perhaps doing an article on National Review and how its ridiculous ads would seem to reflect on the sort of people who still read National Review. Let me know when you get a moment.

Thanks,

Barrett Brown
Brooklyn, NY
512-560-2302