Peggy Noonan is so weird. I especially enjoyed her projection of how the president feels about sexual repression as it relates to Americans’ opposition to junk-touching (SAR is short for Noonan’s proposed “Special Assistant for Reality”):
President: I’ve wondered if this general feeling of discomfort might be related to a certain Puritan strain within American thinking—a kind of horror at the body that, melded with, say, old Catholic teaching, not to be pejorative, might make for a pretty combustible cultural cocktail. This heightened consciousness of the body might suggest an element of physical shame we hadn’t taken into account.
SAR: Mr. President, the rebellion isn’t shame-based, it’s John Wayne-based.
President: I don’t follow
SAR: John Wayne removes his boots and hat and puts his six-shooter on the belt, he gets through the scanner, and now he’s standing there and sees what’s being done to other people. A TSA guy is walking toward him, snapping his rubber gloves. Guy gets up close to Wayne, starts feeling his waist and hips. Wayne says, “Touch the jewels, Pilgrim, and I’ll knock you into tomorrow.”
President: John Wayne is dead.
SAR: No, he’s not. You’ve got to understand that. Everyone’s got an Inner Duke, even grandma.
I get Noonan’s point about how we’re all John Wayne deep down in our souls, but I think she’s telling us that the president isn’t a Catholic (like all but one of our American presidents), so he can’t relate to our high level of sexual repression. And that’s insane.
fake through and through.
How much damage has the special ‘Merkan brand of big guns, transparently-compensating, flag waving, macho cowboy b.s. done to the world? It’s pathetic and sad and of course deadly.
My favorite quote about John Wayne (a/k/a Marion Morrison), is actually about Elvis as well, and is taken from the Flavor Flav, to whit: “m.f. him and John Wayne.”
The man has been dead 30 years.
She’s certainly in touch with her inner elite. Under the attractive glibertarian gloss it’s still the same old American bullshit: Why are there no quick pass lanes for those with the appropriate racial and class markers?
It is said that Noonan drinks…a lot.
This piece is simply stupid.
What is Marion Morrison telling me? Bwahahahaha
Have another drink, Nooners, it’s only 10 AM.
There are some folks out there whose “Inner Duke” says, “Shoot ’em all and let {fill in the blank of your favorite deity] sort them out.”
I think that nude travel is looking more an more attractive for American families during holiday seasons.
An interesting risk analysis shows that without any airport screening, the risk of death in traveling during Thanksgiving weekend from flying is still substantially less than the risk of dying in an automobile accident.