The plot revolves around the recently widowed (and beautiful) Amanda Vaughn, whose husband Bill died in a car crash. Just about everything the couple owns has been seized by federal marshals because the recently deceased Bill was indicted in a Ponzi scheme, leaving his wife and teenaged children (Will and Sara) with little choice but to pack up what’s left and leave California for Amanda’s native Texas – Dallas, to be precise – and move in with Amanda’s mother Gigi until Amanda can find a job and support herself and the kids.

Amanda not only has to cope with the shame surrounding Bill’s death and helping her children transition, but moving back to her hometown. As daughter Sara discovers one of Amanda’s old high school yearbooks at Gigi’s (who does not want her grandchildren to call her Grandma), it prompts a discussion of Amanda’s past as a popular cheerleader who wasn’t above being a manipulative bitch to get what she wanted. Not proud of her past, Amanda is determined to make a fresh start. Too bad some of the girls she grew up with aren’t willing to let bygones be bygones.

Darlene Cockburn, Cricket Caruth and Sharon Pevy are gleefully plotting their revenge, which is 20 years overdue. Darlene is the former ugly duckling who is now a miracle of plastic surgery. Cricket’s looks have also improved since her high school days (and she isn’t above giving her daughter breast implants for her 16th birthday), but Sharon has gone from being a svelte beauty queen to a woman who has to wear queen-sized panty hose. She even defends herself when gobbling food that she’s supposed to be putting into baskets for charity by saying she’s testing the food before giving it away. All three women are regular churchgoers who go to Bible study and wrap their revengeful plans and general – well, bitchiness and cattiness – in a false robe of godliness. I guess having one’s bikini area waxed in the shape of a cross and having Bible verses etched on one’s car has to count for something.

Amanda’s first trial comes the first Sunday she’s in town, when Gigi forces her and the kids to go to church. Amanda’s argument against it is that she and her husband didn’t raise Will and Sara with any particular religion, figuring they could find their own spirituality. (Cue liberal soundtrack.) But Gigi tells her daughter that while they live under her roof, they follow her rules, which include church every Sunday. This is where Amanda meets up with her former classmates for the first time in two decades. Darlene begins the assault by “praying” for Amanda during the service, using the parable of the prodigal son and saying that it’s not their place to judge others’ lack of morality. Afterward, during the coffee hour, the only person who is genuinely kind to Amanda is Heather Sappington, who has become very successful in real estate. She admits that life is still like high school, only with more money and power behind the petty machinations. Men are still very much hot for Amanda, even though she doesn’t do anything to attract their attention. This does not go unnoticed by her foes. And as Amanda leaves church, she comes to the realization that she’s back in Dallas so she can atone for her past sins.

It’s a hard slog. Just when Amanda thinks she’s found a job, she loses it due to Cricket’s behind-the-scenes machinations. Her daughter Sara makes friends quickly, but doesn’t realize that she’s just being pumped for information by Cricket’s daughter Alexandra. Son Will has more difficulty fitting in, getting into a fight on his first day at school. And suddenly Amanda finds she has a secret admirer, who sends her a new Mercedes and an entire household worth of goods from a local department store. To top it all off, Sharon’s husband Zack catches Amanda off guard and forces a kiss on her when Amanda goes to his car dealership to find out who bought her the car that she doesn’t want – a kiss seen by Darlene, who is torn about whether to tell Sharon about it.

There’s a lot more – all of it somewhat nauseating. At the end of the pilot, Amanda manages to turn the tables on her foes, which gives the viewer the promise of more estrogen-fueled, sex-infused catfights to come in future episodes. Will America embrace Good Christian Belles in same way they embraced Desperate Housewives? No idea – new shows are always a gamble, no matter what the plot line. But the anti-Christian tone in this one is more than obvious. The main characters are all portrayed as a bunch of grasping, grabbing women who claim to follow the word of the Lord but live the life of the sinner. Are there real people like that? Sure. But hypocrites and immoral people come in all shapes and sizes. They certainly aren’t all Christians.

Notice, too, the location: Dallas, Texas. Sure, it’s a big city, but Texas is deep in the heart of red state flyover country. Can you imagine Good Christian Belles being set in, say, New York City or Los Angeles?

Now, if Hollywood were to play equal opportunity offender and create a television show called Good Muslim Bitches, or Belles, or whatever, that showed Muslim women as a bunch of grasping, grabbing women who use their religion as a convenient shield, then perhaps I wouldn’t be so quick to complain about Good Christian Belles. But unlike Christians, Southerners, gun owners and fat people, Muslims are a protected minority.

Besides, Christians don’t issue fatwas when their religion is insulted – they organize boycotts and write letters to the editor.

When BH editor John Nolte asked me if I wanted to take a peek at the pilot script for Aaron Sorkin’s upcoming HBO series about the drama behind the scenes on a cable news network, I said “Yes!” without hesitation. Word on the street was that the main character was based on MSNBC’s recently dethroned Keith Olbermann, and I was curious: Would “Olbermann” be raked over the coals or treated as a media icon?

I’ll get to the answer in a few.

The show, which is as yet unnamed, takes place behind the scenes of News Night with Will McCallister, a show broadcast by the fictitious United Broadcasting Systems. Will McCallister is the pseudo-Olbermann clone who knows a lot about sports, can’t be bothered to remember the names of his staffers, and can’t seem to hold on to an executive producer (E.P.) for longer than 14 weeks. In fact, in the show’s opener, Will is given the unhappy news that his current E.P. Don has elected to join Will’s protégé, who has just been given his own show, and Don is taking most of the production staff with him.

Amongst the few junior staffers who are still on Will’s team are Maggie, Steve and Neal. Maggie and Steve are involved romantically, even though such fraternization amongst co-workers is discouraged, and the relationship is not going well.

Even worse is the news that Will’s boss Charlie Skinner, who is the president of the cable news division, has gone behind Will’s back and replaced Don with Mackenzie MacHale, a top-notch producer whose own chance at on-air stardom at a rival network fizzled and who is now in need of a job.

The twist here is that MacKenzie is Will’s former lover, with whom he parted ways on a sour note several years before. And when Will and MacKenzie come face to face for the first time in three years on her first day on the job, we are treated to Will’s famous temper a la Olbermann. “How dare you SIR!” (No, Will doesn’t actually say that. I just couldn’t resist.)

So far, so good. All typical fodder for this type of television drama: love triangles, stars with inflated egos and sneaky bosses. Then there’s the gratuitous liberal jab at certain big corporations in the guise of entertainment – Sorkin hearkens back to the BP oil well explosion for the big news of the day and Halliburton’s use of faulty cement to seal the well’s bottom. Whatever.

But let’s get back to my original question: Is “Olbermann” raked over the coals or treated as a media icon? The answer is, a little of the former and a lot of the latter. Yes, the Will McCallister character seems highly unlikable. It’s surprising that his head can fit through the front door, let alone fit within the confines of a television screen. Nobody seems to like working with him and they exit stage right as soon as they get the opportunity. In fact, Charlie Skinner tells Will that he’s probably “nicer to work for than Bin Laden.” Talk about damning with faint praise. Yet despite all of Will’s foibles, the most important thing we discover about him is that he’s a newsman who’s been wronged.

Yes, wronged. MacKenzie bemoans the fact that “they baited” Will into going into an on-air rant about how there aren’t any statistics to support the claim that America is the greatest nation in the world. (Who are “they?” It’s not mentioned, but it doesn’t exactly need to be spelled out.) As a result, Will’s lost his nerve, lost his edge, and the network has been forced by his insurance company to hire a body guard due to his receiving death threats.

There’s a money quote in this scene, uttered by MacKenzie, where he tells Will he’s not a liberal, he’s a newscaster and therefore needs to be himself — that’s his brand.

See? Newscasters are not liberals, they are themselves. And people like MacKenzie are needed to help them broadcast the right information to the hoi polloi because, as we’re also told, the great unwashed are uninformed and need people like Mackenzie and Will to give them information. Such nobility…

Get that? Maybe I’m nitpicking, but note she doesn’t say false or incorrect information, but wrong information. Who decides what’s right? Who decides what’s wrong?

Who watches those who make those decisions? That’s where we come in, my friends.

Author’s note: There are a couple of spoilers in this review. If you are dying to watch this show when it eventually premieres, don’t read any further. 

BH editor John Nolte has already told you about HBO’s greenlighting of a comedy called Veep. It’s set in Washington and follows the life of Selina Meyer, a former senator who campaigned for the presidency, lost out to a competitor, and is now his vice president.

I’ve read the pilot script. In a word, blech. VP Selina Meyer is portrayed as somewhat of a dimwit whose biggest project is getting as many government buildings as possible to use biodegradable cornstarch cutlery in place of plastic, which gets the plastics industry in an uproar. No one in Washington really gives two hoots about her, as is evidenced when she is pointedly ignored during her pathetic speech at a fundraising event – where she makes a further gaffe in saying she and her staff were “hoist[ed] by our own retard,” which then forces her to make a preemptive apology to someone from a mental health charity.

Meyer is aided and abetted in her ridiculous role by the sharp-tongued Anna, her chief of staff; Mike, her slobbish press secretary; and Gary, her bodyguard. Other characters we meet along the way are the sleazy and ambitious Dan, a senator’s aide who isn’t averse to throwing his boss to the political wolves if it benefits his own career; and Jonah, the liaison between the President and VP’s offices – a man who is extremely unattractive and creepy but hopes his role as a White House “big shot” will someday impress the chicks.

None of the characters have any redeeming qualities. They’re all either sleeping around to climb the ladder of success or being needled for being rejected in the sleeping around department despite their professional success. Profanities and sophomoric jokes about genitalia fly left and right. No one can trust anyone else. Veep provides a truly revolting and un-funny view of the Washington DC fishbowl as written by two Brits. It’s like that Brit comedy Coupling, which I considered not only not funny, but uncomfortable to watch. The Veep script has that same creepy vibe. Maybe I just don’t get British humor…

Okay, I admit I laughed at one joke. Sue me.

According to John’s post linked above, this lemon of a pilot script has been sitting on the shelf, gathering dust, since 2007. So why the sudden interest? Why is the New York Times’ Frank Rich, not exactly Palin’s biggest fan, interested in producing this project? Why is big-time Dem supporter Julia Louis-Dreyfus in talks about the starring role?

Could it be…Sarah Palin?

Maybe John and I are stretching it. But consider that no one gave a rodent’s patootie for this dreadful project three years ago, when Palin was a relative nobody on the national radar. Flash forward to 2010. Despite not having won with John McCain in 2008, Palin’s star is on the rise: two successful books, a deal as a Fox News a contributor, her Facebook post making headlines, and a reality show about her life in Alaska that will, in all likelihood, burnish that star further with her fans and – just maybe – show others that she’s not a monster.

Palin didn’t go to the “right” schools. She’s handy with a shotgun and enjoys fishing. She didn’t have a politically powerful family member behind her rise in politics. Heck, just the sound of her voice drives the left bonkers.

She. Must. Be. Stopped.

But let’s say, for the sake of argument, that the pickup of Veep has nothing to do with the hope of undermining Palin’s credibility further, and that the folks at HBO thinks it’s just a hilarious show of which the viewing public must not be denied any longer. I say, in response, that based on what I’ve seen, this show is a big fat loser and deserves to die a quick and painful death.

Not for HBO’s sake, but for ours.

Author’s note: There are a couple of spoilers in this review. If you are dying to watch this movie when it is released in 2011 don’t read any further. 

When BH editor extraordinaire John Nolte asked me if I wanted to do a Sucker Punch review of the script for The Iron Lady, the upcoming film featuring Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher, my response was (and I quote), “Yes!!!” After reading the script, however, I almost wish I had declined the offer.

Why? Well, when I think of Margaret Thatcher, I think of an extraordinary woman who defied the odds to become the UK’s first woman prime minister and who did her best to bring her nation, kicking and screaming, into a period of prosperity - a nation that was on the brink of financial collapse when she first came to office in 1979. Being human like the rest of us, she had triumphs, and also some failures. For a comprehensive look at both her successes and what she might have done differently, see this article at The Heritage Foundation.

Unfortunately, Thatcher (formally known as Baroness Thatcher, having had the lifetime peerage bestowed upon her by Queen Elizabeth II in 1992), after a lifetime of strength, courage and fortitude, is now known to be suffering from dementia, a terrible disease in which one begins to forget little things and slowly forgets more and more. I cannot imagine how frightening it must be to begin to forget one’s loved ones and, perhaps, oneself.

But it’s great fodder for a movie, especially if the subject is a strong conservative woman whose policies have always been loathed by the left. Who cares if she’s still alive but unable to defend herself against the film’s implications?

The Iron Lady, written by Abi Morgan and produced by Damian Jones, is a bit of a roller coaster and it was hard at times to keep track of what time period it was, even with it written right there on the page in front of me. Flitting back and forth from present day (noted in the script as 2008) to 1943 to 1990 and many different years in between, we “see” the world through the eyes of a Thatcher who is losing touch with reality and who frequently travels back through time to relive a life once full of activity and purpose - a life which has now been reduced to the occasional dinner party and trips to the doctor. And don’t forget the whisky – lots of whisky. To dull the pain of what’s become a menial existence, I suppose.

Once surrounded by powerful men and the occasional woman, Thatcher’s constant companions now consist of her home health aide, her private secretary, and her grown  daughter Carol (Olivia Colman), who pops in often to check on Mum and make sure she is okay.

Oh, and husband Denis Thatcher (Jim Broadbent). Trouble is, Denis died back in 2003. Lady Thatcher is talking to a ghost – or, rather, a lively figment of her imagination that only she can see and hear, causing concern for the few people who she sees on a daily basis. In the film, Denis acts as her confidante and her conscience – at times trying to cheer her up by doing silly things like wearing a pink turban, while at other times he lectures that no one listens to her anymore because she is just an “old lady who is losing her marbles” and when a public bored with socialism votes the conservatives back into power, “they’ll wheel you out to show again.”

Denis also – and this is key – claims that what Lady Thatcher achieved during her long and storied career was really not any of her doing. He says that all of her accomplishments “would have happened anyway darling” because that’s “the way politics always goes” and she was “just in the right place at the right time.” He continues by saying that she’s “yesterday’s news, just another footnote in history.”

Isn’t that the narrative about Ronald Reagan,  Lady Thatcher’s international friend and ally? He had nothing to do with the fall of the Soviet Union and the eventual destruction of the Berlin Wall – he just happened to be in office when it happened. Mikhail Gorbachev is the one who deserves all of the credit, right? In this, The Iron Lady is simply another vehicle to for the contemporary Left to rewrite history more to their liking, despite polls like this one where Lady Thatcher is considered the most influential woman 20 years after leaving office.

The script also alludes to Lady Thatcher being an absentee mother who placed her career above the well-being of her children. There is truth to this claim, as her own daughter was quoted as saying, “A mother cannot reasonably expect her grown-up children to boomerang back, gushing cosiness and make up for lost time. Absentee Mum, then Gran in overdrive is not an equation that balances.” But that doesn’t mean that Thatcher’s children are thrilled with the upcoming portrayal of their mother. In fact, according to a family friend, they are “appalled” by it and “think it sounds like some Left-wing fantasy.” Blood is thicker than water, after all.

Women have always walked a fine line when it comes to balancing family with career, and women in politics face even more scrutiny than the average working mother. But while the Left has always told us that a woman’s place is not in the home but out furthering her own career ambitions, when a conservative woman does just that, she’s demonized by those who might naturally be her ally.

However, there are some  depictions of Lady Thatcher’s maternal nature in the script. Lady Thatcher is depicted as a woman who, no matter how hard she tries, will never be “one of the guys.” What’s an alienated female politician to do? Act like a mother hen to both her husband and colleagues, buttoning the cuff links of one and pouring tea for another, saying, “Shall I be mother?” This script is chock full of such moments calculated to show Lady Thatcher in a most unflattering light.

It’s always galling to see conservative women held to different standards than their liberal counterparts. Take this comparison of Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin by the ever-classy Maureen Dowd, for example. Dowd claims Hillary has finally come into her own and has conquered any doubt that she can’t manage without riding Bill’s coattails, while Sarah – who worked her way to where she is without having a politically powerful husband – is described as “bizarre babe-at-large, a Nixon with hair extensions” and a “whiny presidential contender.” Keep it classy, Maureen. I might suggest that your bile toward Sarah is reflective of your own fading beauty and inability to form a lasting relationship with that special someone, but that wouldn’t be nice.

Hillary’s famous comment about deciding to forge ahead with her career after marriage instead of “baking cookies and having teas” also comes to mind in The Iron Lady during a flashback where Lady Thatcher tells hubby Denis that she refuses to be one of the women who stays “silent and pretty on the arm of their husband…washing up the teacups.” In fact, she declares, she “will not die washing a teacup.”

Guess what the Iron Lady is depicted as doing in the final scene? 

Cameron McCracken, managing editor of Pathe Films, says of the movie:

“It is a film about power and the price that is paid for power. In that sense, it is the story of every person who has ever had to balance their private life with their public career.” He says Lady Thatcher’s health will be featured, but insists that it will be “treated with appropriate sensitivity”. He adds of the film: “Although fictional, it will be fair and accurate.”

I have to wonder: Someday, if (heaven forbid) Hillary Clinton or Nancy Pelosi or another powerful female politician is struck down with dementia, will filmmakers do a ”fictional” but “fair and accurate” movie about a woman who preferred to be a formidable political force to staying at home with her daughter, creating a completely unsympathetic character who deserves to face impending death alone with only memories of a career fit for being “just another footnote in history” for company? 

I leave you to guess.

According to Nikki Finke, Universal sent a trailer of the upcoming film The Dilemma, directed by Ron Howard and starring Vince Vaughn, to the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) in order to get their blessing. Universal claims that GLAAD had no problem with the trailer, but a press release issued by GLAAD says they did:

After reviewing, GLAAD called on Universal to remove the scene where the word ‘gay’ was used as a pejorative from the trailer. Today, after Anderson Cooper also spoke out against the scene, Universal confirmed to GLAAD that the offensive joke will be removed from promotional campaigns from this point forward, including in the trailer currently playing in movie theatres.

Kind of hilarious, isn’t it, that Anderson Cooper, who made plenty of jokes on television about “teabagging” at the expense of Tea Partiers, would complain about the word “gay” being used as a pejorative? But that’s neither here nor there. And the point of this post is not to debate whether saying “that’s so gay” or whatever is offensive enough to be scrubbed from the American lexicon, and whether one group should have the power to make that decision.

No, the point of this post is to ask some very serious questions: Why did Universal feel the need to send its trailer to GLAAD for their PC benediction in the first place? Does Universal send their trailers to other special interest groups for vetting too? What about other studios? Do they make it a regular practice to send trailers to GLAAD, the NAACP, PETA, NOW, CAIR, and others? And does it stop at trailers? What about scripts? Previews? Merchandising ideas?

Pardon me, but I was under the impression that true artistes don’t worry about what other people think. I thought the point of any kind of artistic expression was to, well, express oneself without regard to public opinion and when certain members of said public complain about being offended by said art, those “in the know” thumb their noses at the scoffers and call them Philistines, Bible-thumpers and other choice names.

But whatever. If Hollywood is worried about offending its viewing public, then Big Hollywood wants in on the pre-screening process. Our very own Sucker Punch Squad has been instrumental in exposing the bias against conservatives and conservatism in many movies. In fact, Big Hollywood as a whole exists to call Hollywoodists out on their bias and provide a platform for conservatives in the entertainment business to voice their opinions on the issues of the day.

We’re sure that it was a simple oversight on the part of Hollywoodists that Big Hollywood has yet to be consulted in the all-important matter of keeping movies free of material offensive to you, the conservative consumer.

Wouldn’t you agree that Big Hollywood could provide indispensable advice to screenwriters, directors, studio bigs and distributors as to what is considered offensive, demeaning and politically incorrect to their conservative audience? An audience that, according to a highly reputable polling group,  makes up the largest demographic in America? Only a year ago, a Gallup poll revealed that conservatives form the single greatest ideological group in the US, including so-called moderates, with conservatives outnumbering liberals in all 50 states (yes, that’s 50 states, not 57 - check your atlas). And that was before Obamacare passed! With the upcoming midterm election looking to be a washout for Democrats and a watershed year for Republicans, currying the favor of conservatives could be a very wise move for Hollywood. Cha-ching!

So, Hollywoodists, take note! Big Hollywood is at your disposal. If your goal is to avoid offending conservative consumers who might want to spend their hard-earned money on your product, we’re here to help! We hope people like writer/director Adam McKay will give us a call so we can help him with his eternal quest to Speak! Truth! To! Power!

The hotline is open - 24 hours, 7 days a week.

…there’s a real possibility that for the first time since the 73rd Oscars 10 years ago, there will be no black nominees in any of the acting categories at the February ceremony. In fact, there are virtually no minorities in any of the major categories among the early lists of awards hopefuls.

What the liberal media might call a “predominantly white” crowd…

I mean, we have the likes of Cher wondering why anyone who isn’t white, rich and Christian would want to be a Republican. Brilliant political mind John Cusack supports the idea of a “Satanic death cult center” outside of Fox News headquarters. Actor John Hamm agreed the Tea Party is a racist institution – on the show hosted by a guy who is upset that President Obama doesn’t act like a “real black president” with a “gun in his pants.” And white comedienne (?) Joy Behar says that only the majority (read: white people) can be racist. Well, I guess as a white chick, she should know. Plus, she studied sociology in college and everything!

Yes, these are the people who believe they set the social narrative in America. And yet…and yet…they don’t seem to live up to their own hype! I mean, here we have what might be the first Oscar night in 10 years with no ethnic minority actors/actresses nominated for an acting award. My goodness, what will George “Smug” Clooney have to say about it?

Actually, considering the high amount of tripe coming out of Hollywood lately, I should think that those excluded from the nominee list would be thrilled by their narrow escape.

Now there may be some of you out there who say that it’s the quality of the performance, not the color of the actor’s skin, that should count. In a rational world, this would be true. But leftists, many of them residents of LaLaLand, are constantly telling those of us who don’t agree with them politically that we are a bunch of bigoted, racist hacks who are destroying the social fabric of America. Just ask Megan Fox! Therefore, it’s quite satisfying to point out their particularly smarmy brand of hypocrisy whenever it pops up. 

John Cusack thinking: Don’t try this at home!

No matter where they live and work, leftists usually live by – and die by – the Balkanist sword. Rather than seeing us all as just plain old Americans, they like to sort us into different groups: black, white, brown, gay, straight, man, woman, handicapped, Christian, Jew, whatever. Divide and conquer is the game. Like the Greek goddess Eris, sow that golden apple of discord and resentment among different groups and then promise to cure all of their ills if they just vote for liberals and trust the powers that be in a centralist government to do right by them. After all, the people can’t be trusted to do right by themselves.

Unfortunately, when color and creed is all you think about, you often get caught in your own web of destruction. Take  Helen Thomas and Rick Sanchez as recent examples. These so-called journalists both made public comments about Jews that were definitely offensive: Thomas said Jews should “get the hell out of Palestine” and “go back home” to Europe – where they had nearly been exterminated during World War II by Hitler and his minions. Sanchez, who has been mocked frequently on Jon Stewart’s Daily Show, complained that the Comedy Central star  (a Jew) is a bigot and that those who run CNN are “a lot like Stewart, and a lot of people who run all the other networks are a lot like Stewart, and to imply that somehow they, the people in this country who are Jewish, are an oppressed minority? Yeah.”

Thomas, a White House press room regular since the Cretaceous period, resigned under the onslaught. Sanchez, a CNN anchor with pathetic ratings, was outright fired. That’s what you get for biting the proverbial hand.

Anti-Semitism is on the rise worldwide and Western media may be complicit in demonizing Israel. However, to come out and say such things outright is still considered taboo in the world of media. (Thank goodness for small favors.) Both Thomas and Sanchez rightly paid for their diarrhea of the mouth. “Journalists” claim to be unbiased (which is a load of baloney, IMHO). But as long as they’re making that bogus claim, they should at least attempt to live up to it.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, the Tea Party welcomes anyone who believes in smaller government and greater personal responsibility – no matter what color your skin may be.

But don’t tell Hollywood and the rest of the media. They’re still too busy promoting the myth of their own greatness and holier-than-thou stature to notice. Meanwhile, minorities in the entertainment world continue to bear the brunt of this self-serving lip service.

Who are the real bigots? You decide.

The day before Halloween? I’m sure it’ll be a solemn occasion, where people intend to reflect upon the real problems that face our nation, dressed up in costumes mocking conservative movers and shakers like Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck. In fact, I can just imagine the oh-so-clever people who will be dressed up like Christine O’Donnell as a witch. (Funny, isn’t it, how when a conservative admits to “dabbling” in something like witchcraft as a teenager it’s a big scandal, but progressive, leftist PC dictates that we should be sensitive to the beliefs of those who declare themselves pagans and Wiccans.)

Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert – your hosts

Oh, but I’m being cynical. The Comedy Central guys don’t really “mean” anything by the whole thing. It’s just a big joke, doncha know:

“We’re not provocateurs, we’re not activists; we are reacting for our own catharsis,” Stewart tells [New York magazine's Chris] Smith. “There is a line into demagoguery, and we try very hard to express ourselves but not move into, ‘So follow me! And I will lead you to the land of answers, my people!’ You can fall in love with your own idea of common sense. Maybe the nice thing about being a comedian is never having a full belief in yourself to know the answer. So you can say all this stuff, but underneath, you’re going, ‘But of course, I’m f*cking idiotic.’ It’s why we don’t lead a lot of marches.” (emphasis mine)

Perhaps that’s why the Comedy Central overlords have asked Craig Minassian, former Clinton administration press aide who is now a consultant to Comedy Central, and Chris Wayne, a former Clinton White House event organizer who works on large-scale media events and promotions, to help them file their permit for the October 30th event. But I’m sure they won’t be helping them actually run the event…

Still, we know that Stewart, Colbert and Comedy Central aren’t activists. How do we know? Jon Stewart told us so! Why would he lie?

Remember when comedians used to speak “truth to power” (I hate that phrase, but there it is) to the rich and powerful? Back in the ’70s, Chevy Chase enjoyed portraying Gerald Ford (an accomplished athlete in his youth) as a perpetual klutz. Even Johnny Carson wasn’t averse to making the occasional funny reference to politicians.

During the 2008 campaign, politicians running for president were the butt of many jokes (some more than others – guess who?, but we’ll put that aside for now). More recently, Will Ferrell loved to bash George W. Bush so much that he even expanded his SNL impressions of W to a one-man Broadway show. And Tina Fey milked her impression of Sarah Palin until the cow ran dry.

Tired schtick.

Then there are the really vulgar offerings of David Letterman and Kathy “I’ll say anything to get press” Griffin.

That’s to be expected, of course. Public figures are ripe for ridicule, deserved or not. It goes with the territory.

But now, Colbert and Stewart (real last name Leibowitz) are, to bastardize a quote from Emeril Lagasse, kicking it down a notch. Because instead of going after the rich and powerful – or those who would like to be rich and powerful – and those associated with them, they’re going after YOU.

That’s right. If you:

• Went to Glenn Beck’s recent (and massively attended) Restoring Honor rally in August or wished you could have;
• are an official Tea Partier or a Tea Party supporter;
• are one of the people whose values are closer to Sarah Palin than Barack “The Won” Obama’s;
• agree with 68% of Pennsylvanians that cutting taxes, not increasing spending, will lead to more jobs
• and read Big Hollywood…

…then the Wonder Twins at Comedy Central have a bone to pick with you.

You see, Colbert and Stewart and their ilk (the big cahunas in the entertainment industry) have risen above such petty concerns as which bills will have to go unpaid this month or what to do when you’ve been informed that your job will shortly be eliminated. Paid much, much more than the average schlub and surrounded by yes men and other adoring admirers, they live in a bubble world where unicorns and sugar-coated raindrops really do exist.

In other words, they are part of the self-anointed elite. As such, the people lovingly described by accomplished actress and American icon Megan Fox as “white trash, hillbilly, anti-gay, super bible-beating people in Middle America” who are becoming more politically aware and not liking what they see, have become a threat who must be eliminated. Not literally, of course.

And it doesn’t matter if you watch their shows or not. Hollywoodites have proven again and again that they really don’t care if they insult their loyal fans as long as they can suck up to one another and to their liberal overlords in the government. How else would they get chances to schmooze with the prez? (Another reason why I think they despised W – he wasn’t as impressed with vapid celebrity as his predecessor and successor.)

This is not a rally to restore “sanity;” it’s a rally to show the Democrats that they still haven’t lost Hollywood – and to show middle America the finger.

Question: Am I the only one who thinks Stephen Colbert is a dead ringer for the nerdy, upper crust Cecil Vyse (played by Daniel Day-Lewis) in one of my favorite films, 1985’s A Room With a View?

Stephen Colbert and Cecil Vyse: Separated at birth?

Seriously, one more question: Will this event be reported as an in-kind donation to the DNC?

Early feminists fought against the centuries-old image of a “woman on a pedestal.” Gloria Steinem (she of the “a woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle” who in later years ended up getting married anyway) once said, “A pedestal is as much a prison as any small, confined space.” I suppose a bra is also a small, confined space, which might explain the bra burnings of the 1960s. But the early feminists had a point – to a point. If a woman wants to be put on a pedestal and admired and adored, fine. But if she doesn’t, she should have the right to do with her life as she chooses. She should be free to pursue any vocation for which she is qualified, either as a single or married woman, children or no children.

But one of the problems with the new feminism was the annoying little fact that children could get in the way of this brave new world. Having to either stay at home with the little tykes or find daycare for them – not to mention all of the discomfort and disfiguration that comes with pregnancy itself – sure put a damper on Gloria Steinem’s idea of a “liberated woman” being “one who has sex before marriage and a job after.” Unbridled sex does, after all, have consequences. And so, according to historian Elaine Tyler May, birth control was “an important tool to gain control over their lives.”

May touts the contributions of Margaret Sanger, whose group eventually became known as Planned Parenthood, conveniently ignoring – as many do – Sanger’s devotion to eugenics. Sanger spoke of sterilizing those “unfit” to contribute to the gene pool, a group which included not only blacks and other ethnic minorities but, according to  Sanger associate Dr. Harry Laughlin, the “shiftless, ignorant, and worthless class of antisocial whites of the South.” What a classy group of people.

Margaret Sanger: eugenicist and racist.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not against safe, legitimate birth control methods. But when tooting the horn of the likes of Margaret Sanger, we need to be honest about what really drove her pursuit of birth control for women, just as we should be honest about what drives the abortion mills of Planned Parenthood – profit. And quelle surprise – Planned Parenthood as we know it really came into its own in the 1960s.

In a nutshell: True feminists of the time felt that you could only be a feminist if you rebelled against the natural workings of your body and eschewed marriage and motherhood  for a “higher cause.” There are still many of the old guard around today. But the times, they are a changin’.

Fast forward to 2010. Many would say the fight for equal rights has pretty much been won. Girls can dream of going to college and becoming airline pilots, electrical and biological engineers, teachers, doctors – the list is almost endless. In fact, more women graduate with college degrees than men – perhaps due in part to more focus being put on girls than boys in school to “make up for” previous inequality and also what is being called the feminization of society (what Rush Limbaugh calls “chickification”).

And for years, the entertainment industry has done its part for the last 20 or 30 years by portraying men as bumbling but lovable fools who wouldn’t be where they are if it weren’t for the very attractive, smart-as-a-whip women they somehow managed to marry. Television’s Home Improvement and King of Queens are two of the more recent examples. And, of course, commercials like this one. So even if the woman did commit the sin of marrying, she always had the redeeming quality of having the upper hand in just about any situation.

Dopey husband, brilliant wife.

Earlier, I said that unbridled sex without birth control or easy access to abortion has the consequence of pregnancy and childbirth. Today, unbridled sex with birth control and easy access to abortion combined with an increasingly “anything goes” attitude in society and pop culture gets girls who have as their role models the like of Paris Hilton, the Kardashian sisters, Snooki from MTV’s Jersey Shore and various other “celebrities.” Their claim to fame is not similar to being the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean or receiving the Nobel Prize for pioneering work in radiation, but for on-camera antics like tanning, catfights, and puking after binge drinking, and having their “sex tapes” released to the press for quick and easy profit. Too many are the next target of the creator of the Girls Gone Wild video series, which shows images of drunken girls taking off their tops and making out with one another.

We also have the likes of Lady Gaga, who makes Madonna look like a choir girl – almost. And those who begin their careers as wholesome young things (Britney and Jamie Lynn Spears, Christina Aguilera, Lindsey Lohan, Miley Cyrus) often decide that “growing up” must mean “giving out” – figuratively speaking in some cases, not so figuratively in others.

As the mother of two girls, one just starting college this year and the other starting high school, I find these so-called role models severely lacking.

Writing for Macleans, Anne Kingston also notes this disturbing trend. As those she interviews see it, the fight for women’s equality is not over but has taken a giant step backward because of something called “enlightened sexism”: where women are not only “empowered” by overtly flaunting their sexuality, but are also obsessed with getting married.

Certainly this new trend in the entertainment media, which exploits this so-called sexual empowerment for fun and profit, is partially to blame. But what about the parents? Where are they?

Sure there are the mothers quoted in Anne Kingston’s article who are upset about this trashy turn of events. Unfortunately, there are plenty of others who are pushing the trend. I was in TJ Maxx some time ago and heard two women talking, excited because the store was finally carrying the tacky Juicy Couture clothing line. Yet I had to wonder – were they excited because they could buy it for their children or were they excited for themselves? Just a couple of weeks ago, I saw an older, heavyset woman at the mall who was with a boy who looked like he might be her grandson. She was wearing a tight t-shirt with the word Juicy across the front and it was painfully obvious that she wasn’t wearing a bra. Nothing like mutton dressed like lamb a la Absolutely Fabulous.

Blech.

What’s funny on TV is scary in real life.

Then there’s the recent story about skinny jeans for toddlers. Why anyone would put their two- or three-year-old in an item of clothing usually connected with sexuality is beyond me. But then we have shows like TLC’s Toddlers & Tiaras, where some think “beauty pageant stage parents make Jon and Kate Gosselin look like Ward and June Cleaver.” There are notorious stage parents like Dina Lohan, who has done her best to launch her own career on the back of her daughter, nearly sucking her dry.

Double blech.

My take? The left tried its hand at social engineering in the name of equality – but rather than focusing on equal rights in education and the workplace,  ended up giving women the same “rights” as men in the arena of sex with no consequences. Religion and morality were for squares, no matter what Huey Lewis might have said. Yet it has backfired. Girls still like to look pretty and still like to attract boys. However, now they don’t have to worry about public stigma for public misbehavior. A girl who would once be labeled a skank for certain behavior is now celebrated. Be famous for being a no-talent party girl with an expanding rap sheet! No need to “settle with a man just to have that child.” Go back to the creep who used your face for a punching bag. Turn yourself into a literal caricature through plastic surgery. You deserve it.

You’ve come a long way, baby. Here’s hoping you can find your way home again.

Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire – class and glamour during Hollywood’s heyday

The term “movie star” used to mean a lot to the American public – glitz, glamour, excitement. It embodied an “other worldliness,” if you will, that took hard-working people away from the daily grind and gave them something thrilling and new to take their minds off of their troubles. An afternoon or evening at the movies really meant something then, and the stars who populated the silver screen lived up to the hype – publicly, anyway. This was due to the studio system. During the 1930s and ‘40s:

…the major studios groomed their stable for stardom by picking suitable vehicles that developed their personae—sophisticated comedy for Grant, intense melodrama for Davis, and so on. They also controlled the stars’ publicity, doling out digestible, often-erroneous tidbits on their personal lives for the fan magazines and gossip columns.

Once the studio system was broken, however, we began to see Tinseltown’s residents through a very different lens. Stars began to develop their own careers, making their own decisions and living with the consequences, both good and bad. And the press, which was once held at bay by the studio bigs, had much more access to celebrities. Television talk shows like The Tonight Show and Merv Griffin brought us even closer to our idols. They became…well, more like us, except with oodles more money, fancy cars, designer duds and entrée into exclusive clubs and resorts.

Which, of course, they are. Movie stars, celebrities, whatever you wish to call them, are “just like us,” with the same fears, worries, and issues about their love lives. The problem is, we don’t want them to be just like us. They are blessed with fabulous careers that bring them ever so much more than the average person can expect out of life. Think about it: how many of us can hop on a private jet to some exotic locale and have millions of people around the world waiting eagerly to read all about it in the celebrity rags? We want them to rise above the every day humdrum. We want glamour. We want excitement. We expect them to live up to the hype.

 
Brad Pitt looking more like a boxcar vagrant than one of Hollywood’s hottest men.

But these days, what do we get? Scandal upon scandal. Constant whining. Leading ladies pushing grocery carts outside of the supermarket. Leading men sporting very unattractive facial hair and looking like badly aging skater dudes. So-called celebrities who became celebrated not based upon any kind of talent, but because they figured out how to work the system. 

One word: blech.

I expect that many of BH’s commenters might take exception to the “we want glamour from our celebrities” theory, and it’s true that not everyone is enamored with the whole glitz and glamour aspect of the entertainment world. Fair enough. So let’s move on to something we can probably all agree upon: We want to be entertained. Whether it’s acting, singing or dancing, entertainers are paid to, well, entertain the masses. And those who have made it to the top of the heap are paid very, very well.

Remember, actors and musicians were, until perhaps a century ago, near the bottom rung of the social ladder. Men in high society had affairs with beautiful actresses and opera singers, but didn’t bring them home to meet mother and they certainly didn’t do anything so rash as to propose marriage to them.

 
Jennifer Aniston greets her rabid fans in Berlin.

But today, Hollywoodists are treated as close to royalty as one can get in American society. And what do we get in return for our admiration and hard-earned dollars that we spend at the movie theater or concert arena? Instead of focusing on what they’re paid to do, entertainers often want to use their very large public platform to “do some good in the world.” Sounds good, but too many of them seem to go about it in a way that’s insulting to the unwashed hordes without whom they’d still be just another waiter or dry cleaner attendant. Frankly, we get treated like a bunch of dumb hicks who wouldn’t know how to figure our way out of the proverbial paper bag. Environmentalism is one area in which celebs have invested themselves heavily. I’ve quoted him before, but it’s worth quoting Christopher Grey again on the topic:

Celebrities want attention, but they also want credibility because they typically don’t have any. Environmentalism is an easy cause for them to promote to get attention and at the same time appear somehow thoughtful and even educated because it is allegedly based on science. Of course none of this has anything do with reality, but this is the entertainment business. Reality is not important at all. Image is everything. Talking about recycling, stopping offshore drilling, solar power, and electric cars is a lot easier than really trying to do something for people in the world like feeding the hungry, helping abused children, or building houses for the homeless.

It also deflects attention from the obvious fact that celebrities are often some of the most wasteful, energy inefficient, materialistic, shallow, and superficial people in our society. A classic recent example was James Cameron, who talked about how his film, Avatar, was a shining example of environmentalism. Obama echoed this praise. This was the most expensive movie ever made about a war on an alien planet. What exactly about this movie helped to conserve resources or save our planet? The answer is absolutely nothing.

The emphasis on that first sentence is mine. Actors and actresses are not “rocket scientists.” Some of them do attain higher education, for what it’s worth – Brooke Shields and Jodie Foster come immediately to mind – but a good number of them are either high school or college dropouts. This obviously rankles, and they want to be more than just pretty faces. And so we’re told how great it is to live in cow dung huts and do our business in the jungle in a country where half the children are underweight and maternal mortality rates are high; treated to movies about how greedy and destructive human beings are by movie moguls who work in an industry that is one of the world’s biggest polluters; and in a mythical face-off with a giant robot, the “white trash, hillbilly, anti-gay, super bible-beating people in Middle America” would be the first to go.

Nice.

 Cameron Diaz is inspired by cow-dung huts in Nepal – but not inspired
enough to move there and live in one.

Of course, don’t forget that if you don’t agree with Hollywoodists politically, you might as well shoot yourself now. If you don’t like the current administration, you’re a racist. If you live in Arizona and support the law that makes it harder for illegal aliens to pour across the border, they’ll punish you by boycotting your state – of course, they don’t live there. Perhaps some of them are has-beens doing it to get their names back out into the press. Whatever. Interestingly enough, there isn’t a boycott of Rhode Island, a state that has been doing what Arizona is trying to do since 2008.

In a nutshell: Americans don’t like being lectured by those who live in glass houses. We don’t like being lectured by people who, because they happen to make a lot of money without breaking into a sweat, behave as though they are more intelligent and more cultured than the rest of us. We don’t like being belittled by those who claim to represent us while they’re overseas. The death of the Hollywood star can, I believe, be partly put down to our being tired of their elitist attitude toward the public whose support makes their fabulously privileged lives possible.

There’s an old saying: Don’t bite the hand that feeds you. And a newer one: Shut up and sing. And if you can’t manage that, don’t complain when your adoring public isn’t so adoring anymore.

So: Levi Johnston has come out and apologized publicly for slandering Sarah Palin and her family. He told People magazine:

“Last year, after Bristol and I broke up, I was unhappy and a little angry. Unfortunately, against my better judgment, I publicly said things about the Palins that were not completely true. I have already privately apologized to Todd and Sarah. Since my statements were public, I owe it to the Palins to publicly apologize.”

Johnston wasn’t specific about what it was that he said that was “not completely true,” but he asked Sarah and the rest of her family to accept his “regrets and youthful indiscretion.” However, we can speculate that he may have been referring to a comment made in an interview with Barbara Walters that “she knows what I got on her.” Or perhaps it was his claim that Sarah referred to her youngest son Trig “the retarded baby” and that her marriage was falling apart. Then again, it could be his accusation that she left her post as Alaska’s governor in order to cash in on her fame. “She had talked about how nice it would be to take some of this money people had been offering us and you know just run with it, say ‘forget everything else.’”

His apologies are probably most welcome to the Palins. However, the damage has been done – and not just to Sarah Palin and her family.

When young adults like Levi Johnston are suddenly shoved into the public spotlight –- the father of Bristol Palin’s then-unborn baby during a highly contested presidential campaign and, at the time, her fiancée -– the results can be devastating. Heck, just look at the likes of Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan. And when his relationship with Bristol faltered, he was, to quote his own words, “unhappy and a little angry.” Most of us know what it’s like to break up with someone – you want to emotionally hurt them as much as you feel you have been hurt. And for Johnston, what better way than to go public with embarrassing accusations that were reported by media eager to humiliate Sarah Palin just as much as her daughter’s ex was?

Add to this already toxic brew Hollywood’s desire to do everything they could to showcase Sarah Palin to the world as a brainless, redneck hick in order to keep her out of national public office and you have a PR disaster of nuclear proportions just waiting to happen.

One might say that Levi Johnston deserves no quarter – he’s a legal adult, after all, and should be held accountable for his own words and actions. But I can’t help but feel a smidgen of pity for a young man who was obviously naïve and unworldly enough to believe that people like self-avowed D-list celeb Kathy Griffin had his best interests at heart when she took him as her date to the 2009 Teen Choice Awards, featured him on an episode of her television show My Life on the D List (where she ogled his Playgirl spread), and recently said that every time she’s with Johnston in public it’s her “very subtle middle finger to Sarah Palin.” Johnston was also courted on the talk show circuit, was cast in a B-horror movie and was at one point shopping a reality show about Alaskan “bromances” (a term I dislike about as much as “have a good one” instead of “have a nice day” and people saying they have to go p** rather than say they have to go to the bathroom).

A star sucker is born 

So why is Johnston apologizing now? Has he finally realized that Hollywood doesn’t love him – rather, they love using him to trash his son’s grandmother? Or has his latent conscience finally come to the fore? Whatever the reason, it’s a sad commentary on today’s society where people, especially young people with precious little life experience to prepare them, are so infatuated with the idea of fame that they’ll do just about anything to get their proverbial 15 minutes of it. Yet the Hollywood machine grinds on, littering the ground around it with the shattered remains of these broken lives, all in the name of politics and money.

As Big Hollywood’s Joseph Lindsey notes:

[W]hen the media showers the public with the car crash that is Levi Johnston they are filled with glee because somehow they believe they are helping their liberal cause by destroying a young man, smearing a young mother and mocking a conservative woman who rose to power by her own boot straps.

And BH’s Kurt Schlichter calls this type of exploitation the new minstrel show:

The minstrel shows of the past were calculated to demonstrate white superiority through the employment of the most degrading stereotypes and the ritualized humiliation of the African-American performers. This shameful circus is no different. Levi’s mindless brand of masculinity, his dropping out of high school, his troubled home life – these are all the hyper-exaggerated cultural touchstones the bicoastal liberal elite imagines define the rest of our country.

Levi Johnston is what they want to see when they look at Middle America. They don’t want to see the young heroes like Track Palin, an Iraqi Freedom vet. They don’t want to see Americans whose commitment to a better world is manifested by their putting their lives on the line instead of pasting a “Hope & Change” bumper sticker to the back of their Prius. They want – and need – clowns, and Levi is only too happy to oblige them.

“Youthful indiscretion” is a kind way to characterize what Levi Johnston did. I am sure there are others out there who would use a much harsher term. But he was egged on by an industry that didn’t care what happened to him in the end, as long as they could squeeze every drop of bitterness and angst out of this troubled young man in order to use it in their continued attack on conservatism and those in Middle America who embrace it. Now that he’s made a public apology, expect his newfound “friends” to drop him like a hot rock. Maybe Tina Fey will reprise her Sarah Palin shtick on Saturday Night Live in order to skewer Johnston for daring to bite the gnarled hand that fed him.

 
Tina Fey pretending she’s as savvy and pretty as Sarah Palin

Whatever Johnston’s future holds, I hope it includes much introspection for how his public antics affect him and his family, including his infant son, who will surely someday find out that his dad traded his integrity for a nudie spread in Playgirl and a spot in a pistachio commercial. I hope it doesn’t include continuing to allow Tinseltown to use him for their own nefarious ends. He owes it to himself, and in the end may become a positive role model for young people in America who will do anything to become famous – or, in Johnston’s case, infamous – and sell their souls in the process.