Friday, February 16

:: WaPo's Incipient Old Codger Strikes Again

WaPo's Howard Kurtz has an insane - no, I mean INSANE - column profiling conservative freakshow Michelle Malkin. Apparently she is a lovely person who is the victim of hate-driven liberal extremists (yes, an oxymoron). Sample quote:

Over lunch at a Filipino cafe at Union Station, Malkin, who has two young children, is charming one moment and pugnacious the next. She says she loves the intellectual freedom of the blogosphere, where "you can respond, you can reveal people to be the liars and slanderers they are."

Howard Kurtz sounds so much like an old codger in this column that I mistook him for David Broder. Why? Old codgers, I believe, are the group most prone to thinking their reaction to a person is the reaction everyone would have - particularly when the person in question is a young (or youngish), attractive (or attractive-ish) woman. I recall, but am too lazy to go look for, a review of Marie Antoinette by some old codger who said one could not glimpse the face of Kirsten Dunst without feeling a protective urge. That struck me as pretty odd given that my urge upon glimpsing her face was to punch her right on her preternaturally pointed nose.

Of course its not just old codgers who get that protective thing going. I remember an interview with Rosie O'Donnell - lost to the depths of time - in which she defended Sean Penn's pugilistic approach to press outreach by explaining there was just something about Madonna that made you want to physically jump to her defense. I have a feeling that "something" is sublimated lust. But that's just a guess; keep in mind that I'm using a hazy memory of Arsenio as source material.

I do sympathize with Malkin in one respect - that a lot of the criticism she's received from rank-and-file lefties has contained sexist content. You should see some of the comments my postings in defense of Amanda/Melissa received. Maybe I will compile them. I'm pretty sure you will be outraged on my behalf and probably want to track these people down to beat them up. Or at least that's what you should tell me. Why? Because I arouse that protective urge in everyone, no questions asked.

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