Solidarity with Karen…Keith Olbermann and I share a beloved high school English teacher–Arthur Naething. We’ve done tributes together for the guy. I love the way Keith writes and thinks. I love his program. But there’s a helium effect going on here–rampant righteousness, leading to some questionable decision-making. Not just with Karen, but what is this smarmy campaign against Anderson Cooper all about?
If you read anthropologists who study primitive societies, you’ll learn that scapegoat sacrifice was any given society’s most intense ritual–and the scapegoat was always guilty of a sin that reflected thar society’s darkest impulses. (The Jews civilized the process, making it metaphoric, turning the scapegoat, literally, into a goat–which wasn’t nearly as much fun). So the atavistic intensity of our scapegoat sacrifices–Imus, perhaps Wolfowitz and Gonzalez to come–shouldn’t be surprising. Being part of a lynch mob, whether it’s led by Rush Limbaugh or by Keith Olbermann, is viscerally satisfying and it sure beats thinking.
But the attendant bloodlust is very dangerous. And we have to be careful who plays Inspector Javert–Al Sharpton, for example, is a dangerous buffoon. Not just because he lied egregiously, and hyped racial tensions, in the Tawana Brawley case for his own aggrandizement. But also his role in many other phony protests–including the anti-semitic boycotting of the Jewish-owned Freddy’s clothing store in Harlem, which led to a firebombing and death. If Imus doesn’t deserve airtime, Sharpton doesn’t either… much less the power to determine the next scapegoat that Huffington and others are ceding him.
The perpetual adolescence of our public culture isn’t worthy of a great country. Having dispatched Imus this week, it’s time for a nice, reflective time out.
And Keith, if the barrel is so empty that you’ve got to pick on an honest, hard-working journalist like Tumulty, maybe you should ration The Worst Person in the World–save it for nights when there really is one.
Note to Readers: Very boring comments today and lazy, too. Did you not notice that I said that a scapegoat is guilty of the sins of society? So that means–pause–I believe Imus is guilty of the sins of society. And Wolfowitz should spend the rest of his life emptying bedpans at Walter Redd. And Gonzo, get thee to a soup kitchen. But that doesn’t mean the bloodlust is good for us. I think it’s primal, and we have to be careful of those sorts of impulses. My guess is that we’re so intent on lynching these guys now because of displaced anger toward and frustration with Bush. Bottom line: this level of toxicity is not good for a society.