That's "Mr. Right-Wing Bloviator" to You, Pal - November 14, 2003

That's "Mr. Right-Wing Bloviator" to You, Pal
"This week [CBS] replayed its craven Vietnam-era cancellation of the Smothers Brothers by yanking its Reagans mini-series after fire from right-wing bloviators and the Republican National Committee. - Editor Frank Rich, November 9.


Warren Hoge's Rogue Commentary
"America is now something of a rogue state, a pariah nation. People repeatedly say it isn't Americans we don't like, it is just Bush. He pushes hot buttons. Bush has so much to do with this rather stupendous fall-off in American popularity. It is quite amazing to think where we were the day after September 11 and how much of that goodwill has been squandered." - Warren Hoge as quoted by Paul Majendie of Reuters, November 13.


Baghdad, Washington, Whatever
"While its title character is still a hero, as she must be, the movie portrays Private Lynch as a lowly pawn of larger, mysterious forces operating in the shadows, whether in Baghdad or Washington. - Frank Rich on the TV movie on POW Jessica Lynch, November 9.
Anti-Cheney Conspiracy-Mongering
"[Author Loretta] Napoleoni draws a startling comparison with the era of the Crusades against Islamic dominance, arguing that economic imperatives propel the war on terrorism in 2003 as much as they did in the 11th and 12th centuries. (Consider the contracts in Iraq awarded to the Halliburton Company and other United States businesses, and she may have a point.) - Alan Cowell, November 9.


Building Stronger Communities Through Huge Tax Hikes
"Wealthy and middle-class Californians have increasingly withdrawn into gated communities that thrive while the older, poorer counties they have fled struggle along on a diminished tax base. The people in the new, homogenous communities tend to be extreme localists who drop out of the broader civic life. When they do engage statewide politics, they tend to do it with ballot initiatives that slash tax revenues, hamstring the Legislature and generally cut the civic ties that bind citizens in one place to those at the far end of the state. - Editorial writer Adam Cohen, November 10.


Conservatives Hate Freedom
"Hugh H. Bownes, a former federal appeals court judge whose rulings in defense of civil liberties often put him at odds with conservative New Englanders" - Katie Zezima, November 8.