Well, you have to hand it to the "Ground Zero Mosque" controversy. It splits no hairs, takes no prisoners or leaves no infant splashing around in the bathwater. Sometimes Hitchens seems to be quoting Tony Hopkins in David Mamet's dumb but fun movie "The Edge": "All my life I've wanted to do something...unequivocal." Here it is! "Media idiocy, this is Bigoted Right Wing Thuggishness!" Bigoted Right Wing Thuggishness, meet Media Idiocy!" "You two must get together and put the boot in Mr. Constitution, he's over there looking at the record collection....."
Yet the question for the great self appointed watchdog of modern liberty.... which way, if any, will He go? What a perfect place to take a stand for the absolute importance to do what you want to do in a free society. I'm sure, after shouting down those scolds in Germany who sought to silence holocaust deniers just because they could, well, those who would try and outlaw a place of worship in Hitchens beloved New York City will get it turned up to 11! You wouldn't catch a man of principles like Hitch practicing selective targets.
And yet so far...nothing. I know, he's got a lot on his mind. This "Burning The Candle At Both Ends" business, I think Hitch fudges the meaning. It really means not getting enough sleep, from working and then doing something else. You know, like many Americans working who now work two jobs in an economy that's been blasted to hell by war and easy on the rich tax giveaways from the candidates Hitch supported. To Hitch, the phrase can only be about partying.
Oh yes, I know, something Islamic near Ground Zero. Well, it was easy enough to look the other way when it turned out that Giuliani had sent the fireman out with crap radios. Or that New York State would be handed a big bill to compensate the Rescue Workers who suffered, of all things, permanent lung damage from following the lead of mayor Happy Happy, "Hey, there's another World Series Game Tonight!" Or when Giuliani got his mafia friendly underling sent to Bagdad to clean up the crime problem. Not a word on any of this from pro Giuliani Hitchens.
So it is with this latest "controversy", constructed by the odious Pamela Geller and The New York Post. Finally, amazingly, the corporate echo chamber has got it's Whitewater on, and they will keep chanting "one term, one term" until Tinker Palin comes to life.
It's a dramatic moment for Htichens. With one Op Ed, he can make the right forget all about that Vietnam stuff and enshrine himself in the Hall of fame with Father Coughlin and Whittaker Chambers. Or, he can give his long, long suffering friends on the left some solid ground to start salvaging his reputation. As the syntax torturing Little Carmine told Soprano, "You stand at the precipice, Tony, of an enormous crossroad."
Or as The Band sang: "Olie showed me, the fork in the road.... you can take to your left or go straight to the right....."
“The enemies of intolerance cannot be tolerant." • "If it is an offense to justice to hold people who may have been victims of mistaken identity or of vendettas by other factions, then it is also an offense to justice to release psychopathic killers who believe that they have divine permission to throw acid in the faces of girls who want to attend school." • "Don't be such a lesbian!
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