52 Comments

1. JJE:

Oh man, that’s hilarious. Norman Mailer is OLD! And probably senile! He may even have Alzheimer’s! It just doesn’t get any cleverer or funnier than making fun of the eldery. This must be that “South Park Conservative” irreverence all the kool kids are talking about.

Jun 22, 2005 - 8:44 am 2. uranari:

Gutfeld is a riot. I make a point of going over to the Huff once a month, typing his name into the search engine and having a good laugh.

Same old Mailer. Just much older and a bit more senile. I imagine he spent three whole days writing that out. Sad he needs to pleasure himself in this way.

Jun 22, 2005 - 8:51 am 3. Rick:

Well, I don’t know about senility or what-have-you, but plainly, old Norman is pooping himself.

Is that age related, or was it always his style?

Cordially…

Jun 22, 2005 - 8:51 am 4. Cynical Nation:

My God. Is there a *damn* thing worth reading on the Huffington Post? Ever?

Jun 22, 2005 - 8:57 am 5. TallDave:

Reagan and Bush, both brilliant ideologues who accmplished things the liberal so-called intellectual class thought impossible, get the “dumb” label as their sour-grapes reward.

Poor dumb Reagan and Bush, stupidly defeating tyrants and obliviously freeing hundreds of millions to live in democracy.

Jun 22, 2005 - 9:08 am 6. PeterUK:

Some of the comments at old Huff’s place are so obsequios that they can only have been written by Mailer himself,or his mother.

Jun 22, 2005 - 9:09 am 7. Bruce W.:

Come on now, JJE. If you want to start complaining about irreverence, start with the irresponsibly irreverent Gitmo/military-bashers. At least the lives of the people that you say are being ridiculed by Gutfeld (and their countrymen) are not being put in greater jeopardy for their lives as a result.

Wait. This just in. Gutfeld issued an apology for you misunderstanding what he meant. Satisfied?

Jun 22, 2005 - 9:17 am 8. PeterUK:

Yes reviling the dead is pretty cool as well.

Jun 22, 2005 - 9:25 am 9. Kbegg:

Norman Mailer calling George W. Bush “vain.” Man, you just can’t make up stuff like that.

Jun 22, 2005 - 9:33 am 10. David Thomson:

ìIs that age related, or was it always his style?î

It definitely isnít age related. Norman Mailer (and also Gore Vidal) was making similarly stupid statements years ago. When hasnít he been an idiot? The only real difference is the new media. We are ridiculing Mailer whereas the has been establishment praises him for his alleged brilliance and courage. I remember well when he helped Jack Henry Abbot get out of prison. Within hours this convicted criminal murdered an innocent man:

http://www.transterrestrial.com/archives/000546.html

Jun 22, 2005 - 9:34 am 11. Kyda Sylvester:

Oh thank God. For a minute I thought Norman Schwarzkopf had gone over to the dark side.

fluvial funereal obsequies LOL Same old Norman. Pardon me while I…yawn…zzzzzzzzzzzz

Jun 22, 2005 - 9:34 am 12. JJE:

Bruce, I won’t be satisfied until Gutfeld makes a joke about adult diapers. Der her her. I’m not sure why you brought up Gitmo, except to engage in some silly whataboutery. At any rate, I’ll need more than your say-so to believe the Dolchstosslegende that pointing out that the conduct described in the FBI report is generally associated with repressive regimes rather than the United States of America has actually placed anyone’s life in greater jeopardy. Uh-oh, I used a phrase from the Weimar Republic! I’m personally responsible for all U.S. casualties incurred in the future!

Jun 22, 2005 - 10:01 am 13. JK Ribera:

Whoever you are, JJE, with all respect, I must say Mr. Gutfeld is a lot wittier than you are. But you know your Weimar jargon. I’ll give you that.

Jun 22, 2005 - 10:04 am 14. PeterUK:

What has the Weimar Republic got to do with the death camps? They were cross dressers not torturers.

Jun 22, 2005 - 10:19 am 15. Fausta:

When I read the Norman Mailer post, I thought it was Steve from Huffinton’s Toast.

Sad.

(Dolchstosslegende? Is that a fancy word for caca?)

Jun 22, 2005 - 10:23 am 16. Old Dad:

Just google “Norman Mailer tedious old gasbag” and count the hits.

Jun 22, 2005 - 10:29 am 17. TomB:

It just doesn’t get any cleverer or funnier than making fun of the eldery.

So let me get this straight, JJE, Mailer can spend almost an entire post mocking and ridiculing a DEAD GUY, and that’s OK. But the moment someone takes offense and calls him old, we are the bad guys?

I dare say consistency isn’t one of your strong points.

Jun 22, 2005 - 10:35 am 18. Pat Curley:

Gotta love the brilliant commenters on Mailer’s post. My favorite is shea, who says, “bush, a moron of gigantic proportions…” and then proceeds to warn the others about “marshall” law. I guess that’s the law that Matt Dillon enforces.

Jun 22, 2005 - 10:52 am 19. Old Dad:

I don’t recommend it, but if you read Mailer’s post you’ll see it’s obviously and clumsily cut and pasted from something else, probably a speech.

It’s sad when you have to cut and paste crap in hopes that it will somehow improve.

As PeterUK and Pat curley suggest, do read the comments. Moonbattery at its goofiest.

Jun 22, 2005 - 11:11 am 20. Bruce W.:

JJE: You commented on what you believe is unseemly irreverent speech. I gave a worse example of such speech with which I presumed you had no quarrel.

And Durbin was not the main subject I had in mind. More on point is the incorrect reporting of Koran desecrations and the hyper-attention given by the MSM to the rare cases of misbehavior.

Jun 22, 2005 - 11:18 am 21. Kevin P:

Roger:

The supposed Dean of the American Literary scene can’t come up with anything better then Reagan was an idiot and Bush is a bigger idiot. Well Norman, you are a idiot and your mother is ugly. When do I get my Pulitzer?

Kevin Peters

Jun 22, 2005 - 11:20 am 22. JJE:

Tom B,

I can’t say logic is one of your strong points. As an initial matter, your objection is a version of tu quoque and doesn’t go to the the merits of mocking the elderly, but fallacies and non sequiturs appear to be the order of the day around here. At any rate, Mailer said Reagan was overrated and ignorant (and the post was chiefly about Bush, not Reagan. Reading may not be your strong suit either). Mailer did not, at least in the post, mock Reagan’s Alzheimer’s or any other personal trait, unless you want to claim that calling him ignorant was a subtle jab at his mental condition, which would be a stretch. Gutfeld, by contrast, mocked Mailer *for being old*. Hopefully the distinction no longer evades you.

Jun 22, 2005 - 11:24 am 23. Kevin P:

PeterUK:

The fact that JJE confuses the Weimar Republic period with the Nazi’s explains everything. If Durbin had compared Gitmo to Weimar police procedures he would have had no problems.

Jun 22, 2005 - 11:27 am 24. PeterUK:

JJE Seems to have an obsession with Alzheimers,nobody else has mentioned it.

Mailer is simply a nasty self indulgent egotistical old man.

Jun 22, 2005 - 11:39 am 25. TomB:

JJE, since you are so easily confused, I’ll condense it for you.

(in JJE’s world):

Mocking a dead man - good.

Mocking the man who did the mocking in the first place for being old - bad.

There is no logical fallacy or strawman here, just hypocrisy.

BTW, what exactly could Mailer possibly be basing his “Bush is a moron” idea on?

Jun 22, 2005 - 11:43 am 26. Rick Ballard:

Kevin,

Be charitable, describe him as being elderly and bewildered. He does remember some big words, even if he does not demonstrate any knowledge of their meaning.

Why are pixels wasted on HP dreck?

Jun 22, 2005 - 11:43 am 27. Kevin P:

Rick:

Does JJE realize that Mailer, who prided himself on his macho ability to defend himself with both physical and verbal fisticuffs, would detest having himself defended in JJE’s “you mean guys are picking on an old man, shame on you for being so insensitive” pantywaist manner?

Jun 22, 2005 - 11:54 am 28. Acheron:

“Being exists in essence as potential” (John Blake). Thus “reality” in the here-and-now lies not in being but becoming (”nicht im Sein, sondern im Werden”). Where Norman Mailer goes wrong is to ignore his limitations… as Information Theory has it, everything is subject to Initial Conditions, Boundary Conditions, and Postulates of Impotence. We are born; we reproduce; we die. And what is more, in between, we dream…

Jun 22, 2005 - 11:55 am 29. JJE:

KevinP, I didn’t confuse Weimar and the “Nazi’s”. Had I meant the Nazis, I would have said the Nazis. Instead I said Weimar. Try again. Furthermore, I didn’t say it was “insensitive” to make fun of old men. My point was it’s cliche and tired, and thus not funny, even by the standards of Gutfeld’s preferred medium. But there’s no accounting for taste. Perhaps you still laugh at “take my wife, please.”

TomB, You are either incapable of comprehending what I wrote or are “arguing” in bad faith. Either way your comments are not worth addressing.

Jun 22, 2005 - 2:17 pm 30. Buddy Larsen:

Nobody shoud insult norman’s du coque even if Dessert Storm WAS way back in 1945. He stil smacked them irans real good. And is a great arthur of books. And matt dillon never was marshall of law, he did “Drugstore Cowboy”. or something like that.

Jun 22, 2005 - 2:52 pm 31. Rick Ballard:

Uh oh, Cracked Timbers Zinnfest erudition without comprehension. Realize ties to reality, Kevin. That’s not going to happen in this instance.

Jun 22, 2005 - 2:56 pm 32. Kevin Smith:

Fluvial Funereal Obsequies!

O Norman, no more half-alliterative statements, please.

Your tautologies fly all over me like snot from a sneeze.

Such effeminate effluvia stink worse than rotten blue cheese.

You senile old fart, no mas, please, please, please, please!

Jun 22, 2005 - 3:04 pm 33. JJE:

“Cracked Timbers”?! ROTFLMAO!! Oh man, that’s high comedy, that is. The zingers just keep comin’.

Jun 22, 2005 - 3:10 pm 34. Kevin P:

JJE:

So you did mean to use the Weimar Republic, which of course makes no sense and has no relation to anything this thread has discussed nor does it have any connection to Durbin or the WOT. I am curious, why did you pick the Weimar Republic as opposed to , lets say, pre-Columbus America?

Jun 22, 2005 - 3:10 pm 35. PeterUK:

JJE,Why did you say Weimar,you could have been just as innacurate with Zolverein?

Jun 22, 2005 - 3:11 pm 36. PeterUK:

Kevin P

Because he doesn’t know any pre-columbian words.

Jun 22, 2005 - 3:12 pm 37. Buddy Larsen:

good, Kevin, but 4th line should be

“Such effeminate effluvia stink worse than Efrem Zimbalist.”

Jun 22, 2005 - 3:13 pm 38. PeterUK:

Besides he probanly dresses up to post.

Jun 22, 2005 - 3:16 pm 39. Buddy Larsen:

Anyhoo, Durbin is sensitive to Weimar’s successors.

Jun 22, 2005 - 3:34 pm 40. Kevin P:

PeterUK:

He could be making the argument that the Islamo-fascists are thinking in economic terms and that the fears of the hyper-inflation of the Weimar period could help in their recruitment of grenade tossers.

Jun 22, 2005 - 3:49 pm 41. Buddy Larsen:

Or really, really likes “Cabaret”?

Jun 22, 2005 - 3:54 pm 42. Kevin Smith:

Buddy,

Thanks, but as amateur poet, I’ll have to stick to rhymes. Free verse in beyond me.

(Maybe that’s why they wouldn’t publish it over at the Huffington blog.)

How about this?

________

Effluvial G-man,

Swashbucking Efrem Zimbalist

Jokes of the old hack

Ready for his obsequies,

Annoying the easily annoyed.

Jun 22, 2005 - 3:55 pm 43. Kevin P:

To all:

He could have used dolchstosslegende followed up by Gleichschaltung to connect it to the nazi’s and thus made a logical argument while still using the pretentious method of using a foreign language to try to impress everyone instead of just using his talent and wit to make a point. It’s like a using a $100 bottle of wine to disguise rotten meat. It doesn’t make a difference.

Jun 22, 2005 - 4:25 pm 44. JJE:

Dolchstosslegende was an idea peddled by the several parties of the far right during Weimar Germany, echoed today by silly folks who think that Durbin and the evil MSM are undermining the war effort. I apologize if that simple point was lost on you, though I imagine you’re just being willfully obtuse so you can giggle with each other. Does anyone around here ever make any arguments, or is it just a handful of schoolyard tykes sniggering at each other’s poopie jokes?

Jun 22, 2005 - 4:35 pm 45. TomB:

TomB, You are either incapable of comprehending what I wrote or are “arguing” in bad faith. Either way your comments are not worth addressing.

Now THAT hurts.

I comprehend completely. Mailer took a shot at GWB by mocking a dead man. Someone else took a shot at Mailer’s inane post by suggesting senility. You found the latter objectionable while finding nothing wrong with the former.

It is quite simple.

Jun 22, 2005 - 4:45 pm 46. PeterUK:

JJE

It must be hard restraining you vocabulary,unhouse trained as it is,but,putting the words into sentences with meaning would help you communicate better.

You see,the basic problem here is the topic is Norman Mailer,and your vocabulary seems to want to talk about,dead Germans,the FBI,someone called Durbin,it must be hard for you,you want to ask the way to the bathroom and it comes out “Pass the condiments meine Schazi”.

Heaven knows what happens to you when you are abroad.

Take your vocabulary to one side and have a firm word with it “Kartoffel, Officer I am a bratwurst”.

Jun 22, 2005 - 4:52 pm 47. Kevin P:

JJE:

Your argument is simplistic, I agree. In your attempt to show sophistication you bungled it. The backstabbing of the dolchstosslegende was Hitler and his friends blaming the misery of germany’s position post WWI on previous acts,(the treaty of Versailles primarily), and is associated more with Hitler then the Weimar Republic. Mein Kampf was written during this period but no one associates it with the Weimar Republic, they associate it with Hitler. The outrage over Durbins comments was because he made the historically retarded comparison of Gitmo with the Nazi’s, the Soviet gulag, and Pol Pot. Anyone who has read Solzhenitsyn’s “The Gulag Archipelago” would laugh at the comparison.

The reason Durbin used Nazi instead of Weimar was because the weimar republic, while not thought of highly, does not bring up thoughts of evil.So when you used the lame ” i used a term from the Weimar blah blah so blame me blah blah” it made no sense. You might have been chronologically correct but as far as a analogy to Durbin or anything else it was limited to say the least. That is what brought the derision.

Mailer used “poopie” joke insults and gussied them up with a few obscure adjectives. Your attempt at sophistication was ruined because most people do not associate the Weimar Republic with the ultimate evil of the Nazi period so your comment made no sense. Most of the posters here will respond to an articulate, even when it is an opposing view, argument with a respectfull counter argument. Your post was so muddled and botched that ridicule was the only proper style to use.

Jun 22, 2005 - 5:25 pm 48. TomB:

“Drop your panties, Sir William; I cannot wait ’til lunchtime.”

“My nipples explode with delight!”

Sorry, that’s Hungarian.

Jun 22, 2005 - 5:26 pm 49. Buddy Larsen:

Kevin, sorry, in the clash of zymbols, and I forgot to make the rhyme (trying for a third ‘ef’ sound–a toughie).

On Durbin, I can’t understand why, if he didn’t cause harm, he’s spending so much time and energy apologizing.

Maybe just to mollify the outrage from all the mean and stupid people, from the Gitmo guards to the troops under fire, to the SecDef, to the majority of voters who have put conservative majorities in all three branches of federal government and are steadily taking state and municipal governships and judiciary benches?

Why, that’s no reason to apologize!

what would be a reason to apologize? Notarized statements from terrorists that their morale goes up when their enemy’s goes down (as in, the history of human nature)?

So, why exactly did he apologize? Career? but how would his original statement hurt his career? I mean, unless there was something wrong with it? Or the majority of the country is just plain stupid?

Jun 22, 2005 - 5:36 pm 50. Kate Marie:

It gets worse (or better) over at the Huffingandpuffington Post. Take a look at this bit of sublime sycophantic slobbering. The Huffington Post bears a closer resemblance to Huffington’s Toast every day.

Jun 22, 2005 - 5:50 pm 51. Rick Ballard:

Kevin P.,

I know that you can do better than that. I’ve seen you reach deep into the emesis basin of Zinn/Chomsky propaganda and pull off a mimetic that will satisfy the inner sophist of even the most pusillanomous pedant. Surely you can come up with an apologia pro vita sua defending Sen. Dick’s right to sedition. There are a number of historical examples of Copperhead legislators that could be used. Clement Vallandigham or James W. Wall come immediately to mind. Same party, same lack of principles.

Jun 22, 2005 - 5:56 pm 52. Buddy Larsen:

Gee, thanks, Kate Marie–not much bounce to Mailer’s pronouncement re Reagan and Bush’s ignorance, etcetera, but the comments–I just read the top–made the trip worthwhile.

(1) has found another Gettysburg Address, (2) ok, just an amen, (3) has “baited” his breath (worms or crickets?) and will want some Listerine ASAP, and (4) has discovered a philologic singularity, a “brilliant assertion”.

Rich, but no reason to go further. Like Mailer’s work, you pretty quickly get the attitude–and that’s all there is to get.

Jun 22, 2005 - 7:03 pm

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