|
Edited on Tue Dec-16-03 02:01 AM by ann_coulter_is_a_man
It's for our zine in louisville, but I thought i'd share it here
I'm in the middle of editing this thing to go to print on Wednesday. What do you think so far?
more info on our zine at this website my sister threw together.
our new issue goes to print wednesday and has this interview (w/photos), howard zinn, daivid rees, mary timony, freakwater, holly golightly my disgruntled cartoons and a bunch of other stuff.
www.bejeezuszine.com
-----------------------------------------------------
Q – What prompted you to go on TV and speak out against the war?
A – Shortly after Afghanistan, there was a growing anti-Bush Doctrine movement in this country. A lot of people were unhappy with the bellicose nationalism, the partisan psuedo-patriotism, and just the general bullying tone that was coming out of FOX News, MSNBC, right-wing radio, and the White House. More and more people were becoming trepidatious about where, after Afghanistan, this administration was going to take us.
A lot of voices from all walks of life and different backgrounds were meeting each other on the Internet and trying to from coalitions, but none of these people were being represented in the mainstream media. I got involved with Moveon.org and Win Without War.
The myth perpetuated by the mainstream media was that the country was 100% behind the Bush administration – no matter what. There would be no nuance, no context, and no global perspective to any of the questions about what our role in the world was, how the rest of the world perceived us, or what was the right move after Afghanistan. And was Afghanistan, indeed, even working out very well?
It was obvious that the mainstream media wasn’t going to pay much attention, so some of the people at Moveon.org and Win Without War had the idea to get some of the actors who, coincidentally, happen to be part of these groups, to agree to go on television. We know they could get booked - that’s how the mainstream media works. They’re willing to book actors for almost anything. But mostly, the mainstream networks didn’t mind booking us because then it was easy to marginalize the antiwar movement. It’s easy to make it look foolish. It’s easy to make it look like some hair-brained Hollywood scheme.
I was asked if I would be willing to step forward in order to get any antiwar voices heard and I said that I would.
Q- You’ve always been politically active. Did your experience making ‘Steal This Movie’ a few years ago influence you and change the way you went about activism
A – Robert, the director of “Steal This Movie’, and also a friend of mine, is one of the most interesting people I’ve met. He introduced me to Anita Hoffmann, America Hoffmann, Tom Hayden, and other activists who were inspirational to me. I had been involved with other causes near and dear to my heart, but they inspired me to get even more involved, be more vocal about it, and less fearful of speaking out.
I’m always a little bit reticent because most people don’t respect actors. Most people, for whatever reason, like to make fun of them in the same way they like to watch COPS. They seem to delight in watching E! True Hollywood Stories and Celebrities Uncensored in that same way. For whatever reason, emotionally, it makes people feel better to feel superior to actors. I’m worried that when actors get involved in certain activist causes, they don’t get a fair shake and people don’t listen as readily as they might.
Q – After the war, the media began to pick the case for war apart, though lightly. Was it frustrating for you that they took so long to report readily-available information?
A – The conflict with Iraq has been ongoing for years. This is certainly nothing new. America’s interests in the gulf region go all the way back to Truman, but if you want to deal just with Reagan/Bush, the first Bush administration, and this one, the Anglo-American conflict with Iraq has been going on for 13 years. The news never discusses that. They don’t want to give you any history, because if you know your history, you can’t be sold this war as easily.
The news has abdicated its responsibility in many areas. It just refuses to do its job. It’s a self-censoring media, even though, allegedly, it’s a free press. It refuses to watchdog the government or give full, balanced reporting. It refuses to give you historical perspective, global perspective, and context. It pretends it just found information sometimes - this Joe Wilson stuff is not new at all, and the case to go into to Iraq had so many holes in it from the get-go.
I don’t know what’s more alarming, that a lot of the journalists: A. Know the news and they lie about or B. They don’t know. Either option is a bad one. I think the mainstream media in this country has almost no credibility anymore. I think the American be people should be much more concerned about it than some of them seem to be. It’s almost like a dysfunctional relationship. It’s like being in an abusive relationship.
Q – With CNN, Christianne Amanpour recently admitted that there was self-censorship.
A- And one of the higher-ups at FOX, in their infinite wisdom and maturity, which FOX is known for (laughs), said ‘Wow, I’d rather be patriotic than a spokesperson for Al-Queda.’ Just more things that are embarrassing about FOX News. I think what a lot of people don’t realize is that FOX is not really a news organization. That’s not really what they do. They’re homeland propaganda.
Unfortunately, a lot of people are under the impression that they’re getting news from FOX. In order to get news, you really have to do a lot of legwork. You have to listen to the radio, go on the Internet, watch PBS, dip into CNN and read a couple of papers. They make you really have to work for it to learn anything about your country. You’ll probably learn the most about your country by watching international news.
Q–With a lot of the debate programs, they have someone on the far right vs. a moderate or centrist, but no one from the left. As a result the debate’s framed from the right. Do you think that Americans are getting an accurate understanding of what liberalism is?
A – Oh, clearly not! One of the base, fundamental misunderstandings is that there’s a liberal bias in the media, which is a pretty neat scam that’s been working since Reagan. Lee Atwater was pretty instrumental in floating the myth that there was s a liberal bias in the media. He would say it to combat criticism of Reagan and it to cow the media from criticizing Reagan and it worked really well.
Most people don’t understand at all what liberalism is. They don’t understand that this country was founded on liberal ideas and liberalism is one of the greatest American philosophies that we have. Every great reform we have in this country from ending slavery to seatbelts is a liberal reform. The right wing has been great at confusing an easily confused public about what liberalism is and what it means. They have led people down the road of thinking that liberalism means sex, drugs, rock & roll, gossip and scandal. That’s why they think there’s a liberal media. They are making a classic mistake of thinking that, you know, Howard Stern is an example of liberal media. And that’s just not true.
Q – Michael Moore points out that when you ask about specific issues like abortion and the environment, a majority of Americans always take a liberal position.
A – What’s going on lately is not conservative, if you’re defining conservative as fiscally prudent small government types, who believe in separation of church and state. That is not at all what you’re dealing with now. That is not what the conservative voice in America is now, whether it be Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity, Newt Gingrich , Karl Rove, Wolfowitz, Cheney, or Perle. They are not, in any way, small government, fiscally prudent, separation of church and state types. In fact, they are all for spending as much money as the government wants to spend, as long it’s for the militarization of the culture or for corporate welfare purposes. They’re fine with that. They’re also fine with hiding behind Jesus. They love to hide their cruelty, their homophobia, and their closet racism. They wrap it in the flag and hide it behind Jesus. It’s very convenient and they hope that nobody notices.
Q – And they use issues like the Ten Commandments or prayer in school as a distraction.
A – It’s all a distraction so that you don’t notice that the emperor has no clothes in the Oval Office. That’s great, and what has also been a really, really wonderful trick also perpetrated by people like Ann coulter, FOX News, Laura Ingraham, Michael Medved- they pretend that actors are the evil within our borders; that actors are this subversive, liberal-communist group that are going to somehow brainwash your children. This is a great tactic that they use, because they all, essentially, carry water for the right. They are great at manufacturing straw men, manufacturing the false opposition, because it’s easy to foist that on an unsophisticated population that goes, “Oh yeah, it’s Barbra Streisand, not Enron!” (laughs)
Laura Ingraham and Ann Coulter really, really work very hard in that. I call it ‘Operation Dumb-Ass’ (laughs) which is, this huge subterfuge-kind of rightwing movement to distract the population and have them look at Hollywood as if it’s a monolithic problem to their family, when really, what’s bad for families is militarization, globalization, and deficits. All those things are bad for your family. Barbra Streisand is not bad for your family.
Q – Laura Ingraham has a new book out now called “Shut Up and Sing.”
A – She’s one of those girls that finds Joe McCarthy sexually appealing. She’s in that crew, who identifies as a conservative, but is not. What she is, like Hannity and all those people, is cruel and has issues with ‘the other’ in our culture. She doesn’t like people that are not like her. So she hides behind being a conservative, which isn’t really true. She’s just sort of emotionally immature and unable to be tolerant of diversity. That’s the problem with a lot of movement conservatives. They are pretending that it’s political, but it really isn’t. It’s really just an emotional need to keep the playing field tilted.
Q – A lot of these pundits were saying celebrities should stay out politics—
A – Well, they are celebrities, though. It’s the rightwing celebrities not liking the leftwing celebrities (laughs)
Q - And then they all supported Arnold Schwarzenegger’s campaign for governor. Are you surprised that no one called them on their hypocrisy?
A – People did, but those voices didn’t get on mainstream media. People fail to realize, because there are no moderate-to-left voices in the media, as far as the right is concerned, their stance on things is incredibly elastic. Actors are bad, unless it’s a Republican actor. Affairs are bad, unless it’s Newt Gingrich having an affair. Gambling is bad, unless it’s Bill Bennett. Drug abuse is bad, unless it’s Rush. It’s all very elastic.
They’re not really political. They have other issues that go beyond politics that cause them to be so aggressive in fighting against social just issues. It’s not politics, it’s “I don’t like you!” (laughs) and “I don’t understand you. You are different,” and also, “I’m going to pretend I’m being conservative, but that’s not really what it is.”
Q – Basically, they’re taking hate and framing it around politics.
A– Exactly. They’re taking paranoia and distaste- and I’m sure a healthy dose of the self-loathing in there, too, because you really can’t be that cruel on a daily basis and not dislike yourself or be unhappy. They’re taking all these emotional shortcomings, and playing it politics. It’s really effective, because it makes for good TV and it finds its audience in the nation. It’s very easy to build an Archie Bunker nation. It’s not easy to build a Paul Wellstone nation. That’s why FOX’s ratings are high.
Q– There’s been talk of Republicans running Dennis Miller for the Senate in California. As someone who appeared on his show in the past, what do you make of his overnight conversion to fringe-right politics?
A–Instead of taking an anger management course, or instead of working out in therapy your inner demons and your rage issues, it’s really much easier to be an in-your-face prick and pretend you’re being patriotic. And I think that’s worked out really well for Dennis.
Q – For a while, many on the right demanded that you apologize for predictions you made before the war Bill O’ Reilly’s show. Six months later, with daily attacks on U.S. soldiers and no weapons of mass destruction found, are you still hearing that as much?
A – No, but there still is that, because a lot of people in the Bush groupies don’t accept reality. As far as they’re concerned, whatever Hannity says goes, whatever O’Reilly says goes, whatever Bush says goes, or whatever Rumsfeld says goes. It doesn’t matter that reality doesn’t reflect that, and what’s more important to them is that I apologize.
Q – It’s cult-like. There are actually sites online selling Bush and Ann Coulter dolls.
A – It’s so easy to be a Bush-Coulter fan. What that means is that you do not have to care about other people. You can be angry all the time so it really, really lets you off the hook. Instead of participating meaningfully in your community, or your own life, for that matter, you can be a dittohead or buy a Bush doll or watch O’Reilly and write hate mail to people. That’s not politics. That’s a person in need of a tribe and in need of easy targets.
Q – Earlier this year, in Ms Magazine, you said you didn’t believe there was a blacklist against celebrities who spoke out. ABC later dropped the sitcom you were working on. Do you still fell the same way?
A –We didn’t even shoot the pilot yet. ABC itself has said publicly that this has nothing to do with that. This is business and this business dictates that ABC does not want to do a non-laugh-track, documentary feel. I wanted to do a show sort of like ‘The Office’ on BBC. That’s not what ABC does and we could never come to terms on that. We were really were moving forward, and then it was like ‘We will never, ever see eye-to-eye,’ so they dropped it. But it made such a great story for MSNBC and FOX. They loved it. I think a lot people on the right loved the idea of me being dropped by ABC. Even when one of the executives at ABC volunteered to go on MSNBC and say, “Look, I’ll tell you exactly why we cancelled it,” they didn’t book him. That didn’t make a good story.
There is no Hollywood blacklist. There are certain people, like in any office setting, if they don’t want to work with somebody, they don’t work with them.
Q – And what do you make of certain conservative actors who say they aren’t allowed to work because of their views in a so-called ‘liberal-dominated’ Hollywood?
A – That is another really useful myth, because you can get a lot of mileage out of being perceived as the underdog. That’s another myth that’s been kicking around. It’s like the vanishing hitchhiker (laughs). You know what I mean? You name me one person that’s ever ‘not worked because of the liberal biases,’ especially since most people who make that kind of money, politics switch over to the right real quick. It doesn’t matter if it’s Hollywood or Silicon Valley or New York City or Dubai. That tends to be the route that people who start making millions go.
Q – Do you think the country is finally beginning to swing the other way and turn on Bush?
A- I think it’s been swinging for a long time. It was never as far to the right as the mainstream media manufactured it to be. The amount of people on the streets before the war in Iraq started was historically unprecedented. If you look at February 15th, that is a world record of people, domestically and internationally, marching against the doctrine of preemptive strike in Iraq. The country has been severely polarized since the day the Supreme Court installed Bush in the White House.
Q- There was a lot of effort to create a façade that the country wouldn’t tolerate dissent-The Dixie Chicks being an example. Sean Hannity frequently said on his show, ‘I don’t think they have any idea what they’re in for when they get back to America.’ Once the tour began, the boycott fizzled out completely. There wasn’t any grassroots support for it.
A –Guys like Sean Hannity, and that’s what I’m talking about with the emotional immaturity, loved the idea of bashing the Dixie Chicks. That’s what his version of what America is – God Bless America only, and let’s assault people who don’t agree. That’s the kind of America that Sean Hannity wants to live in and cultivates on FOX. That is not reflective of mainstream America.
If the support for the war and Bush had been as high as the mainstream media claimed, they wouldn’t have had to push so hard, advertise so much, and put so much P.R. homework in. I’ve never seen anybody sell a product harder than they sell the likeability of George Bush. The level to which people despise the Bush administration, internationally and domestically, is probably also historically unprecedented
Q – Why do you think the leadership of the Democratic Party continues to be as submissive as it is? Only twelve democratic senators voted against the $87 billion request for Iraq.
A– There’s a part of the Democratic Party that’s basically Republican-lite. They have ideas of ‘don’t rock the boat, just keep your mouth shut, and keep your head down,” which, as you can see, works terribly. It gets us nowhere. Then there’s the democratic wing of the Democratic Party, as represented by Dean, Kucinich, Carol Mosley-Braun, Al Sharpton, and, in some ways, Graham and Gephardt. Wesley Clark remains to be seen. I like him. I’m not sure where he stands, but I don’t think he’s part of the Leiberman camp of Terry McAulliffe and the DLC, which is Republican-lite.
I don’t put my allegiance in that part of the party. There’s no reason to look to them for any kind of inspiration or forward motion, although any one of them would be better than a Bush-Cheney administration. You’d have much more of a sense of fairness as pertains to social justice issues. And you certainly wouldn’t have any type of nonsense about creationism (laughs). You know, George Bush saying that the jury is still out on evolution. You can’t even parody that. That’s unbelievable to me. You wouldn’t have to deal with that type of anti-intellectualism, but it really wouldn’t be much better.
Q – Do you think there’s more room for debate in the Democratic Party now, as opposed to 2000, when many saw no difference between the two parties and backed Ralph Nader?
A – I think this Bush administration proves there’s a huge difference between the two parties. I think a reason why the Democratic Party seems to have less teeth is because the media is not in the business of forwarding a progressive Democratic agenda. What they tend to do is give much more support to the Republican Party and frame the story that the Democrats are ineffectual. That’s the media frame that’s been chosen, so that people are left thinking (laughs), “Boy, they seem really ineffectual!” If there was a more equitable media that was more fair to the GOP and the Democratic Party and really displayed more of a diversity of ideas, opinions and voices, we wouldn’t have this false opinion. There are also many interesting voices in the Republican Party that you never hear.
Q– Recently, the Republicans cut veterans benefits. You often get accused of not supporting the troops. When you see something like that happen, what do you think?
A – The ‘You don’t support the troops’ to the antiwar camp is a trick used to appeal to the unsophisticated. Only a moron would equate peace with not supporting the troops, if you think about it logically (laughs). How is it supporting the troops to send them into a war of choice with no exit strategy, cut their benefits, and force them to do tasks they’re not trained well to do?
Basically, they’re guards for oil, but they also have to hold together Iraqi society. They have to hold together all these Iraqi people that are in dire straits anyway and live in poverty. Some don’t have water and electricity, don’t have access to school and have no money. And then these18 to 21 year-old kids are sent from Britain, America, Australia, Spain, and Poland to take care of it.
This huge mess—“Now you kids take care of it and we’re going to lie to you about how long you’re going to be here. We’re going to lie to you about your benefits and then, when you get home, good luck getting medical treatment.”
Anybody who thinks that the peace movement, who wanted authentic debate and more weapons inspections prior to Iraq, is unsupportive of the troops is either unintelligent or a liar. That’s the only way you can categorize it, because supporting the troops is never in question. Everybody, of course, supports the young people, wants them to live and have a quality life.
Q– The right in this country maintains lockstep solidarity, while the left tends to be more democratic and allows more room for ideas to circulate. Do you think the opposition to Bush can remain united enough to defeat him?
A – I do think it’s possible, but that’s one of the issues with diversity. That’s part of the reason that some people that are on the right are on the right. They don’t want diversity, many messages, or many voices. That’s part of the reason some people gravitate towards the right. They like authoritarian systems where the marching orders are given and people follow them lockstep. That’s the reason they sort of go rightward. The reason other people go leftward is because they’re more interested in diversity. There’s much more room for alternative opinions. The downside of that is that it’s harder to mobilize behind one issue or one talking point.
Q – During the buildup to the war, you quit doing standup, saying that things just weren’t funny anymore. Do you foresee yourself going back to that in the near future?
A – I did start up shortly after that, because I was booked for a tour for a year and a half, and a lot of the theatres said, “Oh, yes you are! You’re not quitting.” I had to honor all of those contracts. Also, I don’t know what else to do. I’ve been doing stand-up since 1985. The news was getting me so upset and there were so many things that I wanted to talk about anyway, so it wound up working out. There was so much material to be mined from current affairs. There always is, but it was very immediate.
Q- Would you say that your material is more politically oriented now?
A – There always was a part of it. Even from when I started, there were always current events, but now there’s a bigger part of my stand-up that is that. There’s still a lot of silly stuff, pop culture stuff, and conventional stuff, but there’s a big bulk of current affairs.
|
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
