Linda Ronstadt Is Not Smart
By Brian Wise (07/23/04)
A good friend brought up Linda Ronstadt’s near-controversy, and some fine laughs were had. Well, I chuckled, one must remember that the vast majority of the American entertainment complex exists in this perfect little Leftist vacuum, where everyone they come into contact with shares their exact political and social opinions and there is just no such thing as infighting or dissent. If you spend enough time inside such a vacuum, you begin to assume that everyone – absolutely everyone! – feels and thinks the same way you do, about the president, about the war, about the Pure Evil that surrounds even watered down Republicanism.
You remember that old story about McGovern? I asked. No? Well, legend has it that on the night George McGovern was stomped like a hippie at Altamont, a group of Hollywood Leftists gathered in one of those great ballrooms anxiously awaiting Richard Nixon’s dismissal. As the results rolled in, and it became clear that all McGovern would win that night was the District of Columbia, the assembled stood in stunned disbelief. “I don’t understand,” one of them exclaimed. “Everyone I know voted for McGovern!”
Meanwhile, out here in farm country – it’s that large piece of American land occupying the distance between New York City and Los Angeles – there are a few hundred million people who, no matter what you think of them, make up their own minds when it comes to the issues of the day. These people primarily occupy large, magnificent cities like Las Vegas on the weekends, and not all of them walk through their daily lives believing the president of the United States is a war criminal, or refer to him as such. It was apparently without this knowledge that Linda Ronstadt took the stage at Aladdin’s last Saturday.
Here’s something you may not have known: Before even getting to the Aladdin, Ronstadt informed a local newspaper, “I keep hoping that if I’m annoying enough to them, they won’t hire me back.” That’s the mentality that walked on stage. Prior to her love letter to Moore, Ronstadt dedicated a song to Enron (I would love to know which one) and attacked Governor Schwarzenegger for referring to Democratic State legislators as “girlie men.” (Which they are. Shut your mouths and get back to work on that budget, you sissies.) Eventually Ronstadt referred to Moore as a “great American patriot” who “is seeking the truth.” Of the thirteen hundred in attendance, a few dozen left the scene, some tearing down posters as they left. Aladdin management, taking unkindly to the political tone brought to the evening, gave Ronstadt what she wanted, except that she wasn’t allowed to return to her suite on the way out.
This prompted a letter from Moore himself, addressed to Aladdin’s president, Bill Timmins. “I understand from news reports I’ve read that, after Linda Ronstadt, one of America’s greatest singers, dedicated a song to me from your stage … you instructed your security to remove her … which they did.” Not exactly, see above. “What country do you live in? Last time I checked, Las Vegas is still in the United States. And in the United States, we have something called the First Amendment.” (It happens, of course, but I can’t recall the last time I heard a Republican say something stupid and claim the First as his defense.)
The Constitution! The First Amendment is, to put it lightly, a helpful device. For instance, it’s what allows Michael Moore to make and release a movie that lies to the world in a way not witnessed since Nazi propagandists filmed little white kids standing on the sides of roads giving open-palmed salutes to the SS as it marched by. It’s also the First Amendment that keeps this fat disgrace from being thrown into an insane asylum. (All right, I’m sorry, but someone has to repeat comedian Greg Giraldo’s brilliant observation about Moore, that there’s something very wrong with someone weighing “four hundred and fifty pounds” going on and on about America’s excesses.)
Moore continues, “For you to throw Linda Ronstadt off the premises because she dared to say a few words in support of me and my film is simply stupid and un-American.” Odd that he sees the un-Americanism here but not when he looks in the mirror, or to France. The kicker: “Invite her back and I’ll join her in singing ‘America the Beautiful’ on your stage.”
Drolly, the UK’s Guardian Unlimited website referred to this last bit as “a threat.”
Well done.
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