Salon | Letters to the editor

_______________AN ACADEMIC LYNCHING BY DAVID HOROWITZ (09/22/97)

In David Horowitz's piece this week he writes:
"Graglia's crime? As usual in these intellectual autos-da-fé, for telling an uncomfortable truth: that affirmative action is simply an attempt to conceal or wish away the unwelcome fact that blacks and Mexican-Americans are not academically competitive with whites and Asians."
It is an "uncomfortable truth" that black and Hispanic people are inferior to whites?
How dare you? You do not have a journalistic responsibility to give voice to the white supremacy movement!
I remember when the New Republic promoted "The Bell Curve." Now, to their embarrassment the so-called "research" (funded by the Pioneer Fund, a white supremacist organization) in that book has been discredited. But the damage has been done.
Now you are furthering the cause.
You should be ashamed of yourselves. Your lily-white high-paid backgrounds are showing. Scrolling down your columnists' pictures I can see that you have a thing about black people and Hispanics. I guess they aren't "competitive" with the rest of your staff?
-- Dave Johnson

_______________AIN'T GONNA WORK ON BILLG'S FARM NO MORE BY JENNIFER NEW (09/25/97)

I didn't know whether to send this message to the editor or the Webmaster or maybe the Justice Department.
I was using Microsoft's Internet Explorer 3.0 to access the Salon pages and wanted to read "Ain't gonna work on BillG's farm no more." Couldn't get there. I quit Explorer, rebooted Mac PPP and relaunched Explorer. Still couldn't get there. Intrigued, I launched Netscape 4.0 and got right to the article.
This must be a coincidence, or a technical problem, or ...
-- Jim Keener

_______________WIM WENDERS' "THE END OF VIOLENCE" BY ANDREW O'HEHIR (09/26/97)

In Andrew O'Hehir's review of Wim Wenders' "The End Of Violence," he speaks rather disparagingly of Wenders' 1991 film "Until The End Of The World," and (it must be said) quite rightly so. In its released form (somewhere around two hours in length) it is a film that seems fundamentally incomplete ... and though it does deal with some rather interesting concepts and images, it just isn't enough.
The truth of the matter is more interesting though: The film seems incomplete because it is. The director's cut of the film, spanning something like six hours as I recall and unreleased due to contractual obligations, completes it. Wenders has a personal copy, and at the showing of it I went to he mentioned that only three or four copies existed at all. Shown in two parts (with a nice, necessary little intermission between), it is simply the best film I have ever seen. All the cluttered things in the truncated version unravel beautifully, completely and sensibly. The whole thing proceeds at its own pace, rather than the hideous rush of the released version.
If it makes its way to a film festival or special viewing near you, I cannot recommend it enough. I don't know if it would be enough to change Mr. O'Hehir's opinion of Wim Wenders, but it would certainly give him some food for thought.
-- Jason Stiney

_______________ ST. DIANA BY LLEWELLYN H. ROCKWELL JR. (09/23/97)

I was pleasantly surprised to see an article by Lew Rockwell in Salon. I subscribe to his R&R Newsletter, but have long thought that he was too "extreme right" to appear in any publication that has any respectability. His ideas on Diana, from the paleo-right, corroborate Camille's from the "left." With two great thinkers capable of basic criticism of their comrades, I guess this could be called "militant centrism," but "critical radicalism" would be better. Radicalism is going to the roots, and "Centrism" is going to the safe and sound middle of the road.
-- John Harlan

_______________THEY DESTROYED HER BY CAMILLE PAGLIA (09/02/97)

I take great exception to Camille Paglia's references to Camilla Parker-Bowles as being "unbeautiful" and "harridan-like." In fact, Parker-Bowles, whatever her faults or her morals, looks to be a rather pleasant, athletic-looking representative of her age and class. To compare her to a younger, radiant woman like Diana is to do them both (and perhaps, women in general) an injustice. It is disheartening to have someone who is both female and thoughtful refer to this relationship (that of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker-Bowles) in this way. It is reminiscent of what was said about the late Duchess of Windsor when the King gave up his throne for her. People professed themselves stumped because the King would give up his throne for someone "middle aged" and "not beautiful."
When are people going to recognize that choosing a companion for life is not necessarily a beauty contest? What hope is there for the rest of us if they don't? One's strongest suspicion is that the Windsor men, raised under conditions of emotional deprivation and removal from the ordinary joys of companionship, are on a perpetual search for such comfort. In fact, Prince Edward alluded to this fact in his abdication speech. Once he had found a true friend, it seems that he would have given up everything he owned not to be left utterly alone again. The same might well be true of his grand-nephew.
Prince Charles has come out of this whole sordid thing looking terrible, as has his entire family. No one is defending his actions in the matter of his marriage. He will have to live with the wreckage he has wrought for the rest of his life. It will probably even impinge on his relationship with the one person in his life who appears to have given him a modicum of comfort. That is too bad. Because he is going to need it in the days to come.
But if there is one matter in which he does not look bad, it has been in his profound faithfulness to his old love, despite the ravages that time inevitably takes on all of us. That he was such a Hamlet that he couldn't bring himself to marry her at the first is pathetic. That he wrecked two marriages, and several lives, to continue that relationship is dastardly. He may well be a cad wrapped in royal robes. I won't argue the point. But that he continues to cherish his lady love -- through youth, childbirth and middle age, is in my opinion, the only thing that makes him appear to have any depth of character at all. Give the devil his due. And while we're at it, let's not slam Camilla for not being a beauty queen. She never scared anyone when she put on a little lipstick.
These are two people who have gone from youth to middle age, and are now approaching their older age, and their affection for each other has never flagged. That is an achievement of sorts, in an age of quickie relationships. Had they only celebrated their relationship in the context of a marriage of long duration, we would probably be lionizing them. That they did not has had unlooked for consequences in a "widening gyre" that has involved the destinies of tens, then of millions, of appalled onlookers. It may bring down the dynasty in the end. Well, Mark Antony is said to have regarded the world as well lost for love. We shall see.
-- Mary Fischer

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_______________AN ACADEMIC LYNCHING BY DAVID HOROWITZ (09/22/97)
	In David Horowitz's piece this week he writes: "Graglia's crime? As usual in these intellectual autos-da-fé, for telling an uncomfortable truth: that affirmative action is simply an attempt to conceal or wish away the unwelcome fact that blacks and Mexican-Americans are not academically competitive with whites and Asians." It is an "uncomfortable truth" that black and Hispanic people are inferior to whites? How dare you? You do not have a journalistic responsibility to give voice to the white supremacy movement! I remember when the New Republic promoted "The Bell Curve." Now, to their embarrassment the so-called "research" (funded by the Pioneer Fund, a white supremacist organization) in that book has been discredited. But the damage has been done. Now you are furthering the cause. You should be ashamed of yourselves. Your lily-white high-paid backgrounds are showing. Scrolling down your columnists' pictures I can see that you have a thing about black people and Hispanics. I guess they aren't "competitive" with the rest of your staff? -- Dave Johnson
_______________AIN'T GONNA WORK ON BILLG'S FARM NO MORE BY JENNIFER NEW (09/25/97)
	I didn't know whether to send this message to the editor or the Webmaster or maybe the Justice Department. I was using Microsoft's Internet Explorer 3.0 to access the Salon pages and wanted to read "Ain't gonna work on BillG's farm no more." Couldn't get there. I quit Explorer, rebooted Mac PPP and relaunched Explorer. Still couldn't get there. Intrigued, I launched Netscape 4.0 and got right to the article. This must be a coincidence, or a technical problem, or ... -- Jim Keener
_______________WIM WENDERS' "THE END OF VIOLENCE" BY ANDREW O'HEHIR (09/26/97)
	In Andrew O'Hehir's review of Wim Wenders' "The End Of Violence," he speaks rather disparagingly of Wenders' 1991 film "Until The End Of The World," and (it must be said) quite rightly so. In its released form (somewhere around two hours in length) it is a film that seems fundamentally incomplete ... and though it does deal with some rather interesting concepts and images, it just isn't enough. The truth of the matter is more interesting though: The film seems incomplete because it is. The director's cut of the film, spanning something like six hours as I recall and unreleased due to contractual obligations, completes it. Wenders has a personal copy, and at the showing of it I went to he mentioned that only three or four copies existed at all. Shown in two parts (with a nice, necessary little intermission between), it is simply the best film I have ever seen. All the cluttered things in the truncated version unravel beautifully, completely and sensibly. The whole thing proceeds at its own pace, rather than the hideous rush of the released version. If it makes its way to a film festival or special viewing near you, I cannot recommend it enough. I don't know if it would be enough to change Mr. O'Hehir's opinion of Wim Wenders, but it would certainly give him some food for thought. -- Jason Stiney
_______________ ST. DIANA BY LLEWELLYN H. ROCKWELL JR. (09/23/97)
	I was pleasantly surprised to see an article by Lew Rockwell in Salon. I subscribe to his R&R Newsletter, but have long thought that he was too "extreme right" to appear in any publication that has any respectability. His ideas on Diana, from the paleo-right, corroborate Camille's from the "left." With two great thinkers capable of basic criticism of their comrades, I guess this could be called "militant centrism," but "critical radicalism" would be better. Radicalism is going to the roots, and "Centrism" is going to the safe and sound middle of the road. -- John Harlan
_______________THEY DESTROYED HER BY CAMILLE PAGLIA (09/02/97)
	I take great exception to Camille Paglia's references to Camilla Parker-Bowles as being "unbeautiful" and "harridan-like." In fact, Parker-Bowles, whatever her faults or her morals, looks to be a rather pleasant, athletic-looking representative of her age and class. To compare her to a younger, radiant woman like Diana is to do them both (and perhaps, women in general) an injustice. It is disheartening to have someone who is both female and thoughtful refer to this relationship (that of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker-Bowles) in this way. It is reminiscent of what was said about the late Duchess of Windsor when the King gave up his throne for her. People professed themselves stumped because the King would give up his throne for someone "middle aged" and "not beautiful." When are people going to recognize that choosing a companion for life is not necessarily a beauty contest? What hope is there for the rest of us if they don't? One's strongest suspicion is that the Windsor men, raised under conditions of emotional deprivation and removal from the ordinary joys of companionship, are on a perpetual search for such comfort. In fact, Prince Edward alluded to this fact in his abdication speech. Once he had found a true friend, it seems that he would have given up everything he owned not to be left utterly alone again. The same might well be true of his grand-nephew. Prince Charles has come out of this whole sordid thing looking terrible, as has his entire family. No one is defending his actions in the matter of his marriage. He will have to live with the wreckage he has wrought for the rest of his life. It will probably even impinge on his relationship with the one person in his life who appears to have given him a modicum of comfort. That is too bad. Because he is going to need it in the days to come. But if there is one matter in which he does not look bad, it has been in his profound faithfulness to his old love, despite the ravages that time inevitably takes on all of us. That he was such a Hamlet that he couldn't bring himself to marry her at the first is pathetic. That he wrecked two marriages, and several lives, to continue that relationship is dastardly. He may well be a cad wrapped in royal robes. I won't argue the point. But that he continues to cherish his lady love -- through youth, childbirth and middle age, is in my opinion, the only thing that makes him appear to have any depth of character at all. Give the devil his due. And while we're at it, let's not slam Camilla for not being a beauty queen. She never scared anyone when she put on a little lipstick. These are two people who have gone from youth to middle age, and are now approaching their older age, and their affection for each other has never flagged. That is an achievement of sorts, in an age of quickie relationships. Had they only celebrated their relationship in the context of a marriage of long duration, we would probably be lionizing them. That they did not has had unlooked for consequences in a "widening gyre" that has involved the destinies of tens, then of millions, of appalled onlookers. It may bring down the dynasty in the end. Well, Mark Antony is said to have regarded the world as well lost for love. We shall see. -- Mary Fischer