Federal Judiciary

Everything begins with O, &c. -- By: Jay Nordlinger

The Year Zero nonsense continues: Nothing counted, certainly nothing was praiseworthy, before the Obamas came along. Michelle had never been proud of her country. And, at the U.N., the president said this: ?For those who question the character and cause of my nation, I ask you to look at the concrete actions we have taken in just nine months.?

Actually, the last nine months have given Americans not a few things to be ashamed of: our president?s bowing to the Saudi king; his yukking it up with Hugo Chávez, and calling him ?mi amigo?; his friendliness with Daniel Ortega over the Bay of Pigs; his bullying of the Hondurans, and the Israelis; his Medal of Freedom to Mary Robinson; his stiffing of our Eastern European allies; his courtliness before the regime in Iran; his seeming annoyance with the Iranian democrats in the streets; his cold-shouldering of the Cuban democrats; his refusal to meet with the Dalai Lama -- and so on.

But back to this Year Zero stuff: I know the establishment media don?t really notice. But do Americans notice it anyway? And do they care? That is, will it rankle them? Or do they think it?s all right?

I also wonder this, about Obama -- and wonder it more than ever, following his performance at the U.N.: Whose approval would he rather have? Chávez?s, the Castros?, Ban Ki-moon?s, and Le Monde?s? Or that of the Rotary Club in Butte?

When George W. Bush was president, and spoke at the U.N., Chávez called him -- from that U.N. podium -- ?the devil.? He also said that Bush had made the place smell of sulphur. After Obama spoke, Chávez said, ?The smell of sulphur is gone. It smells of hope.?

Of course, we don?t always have control over who praises us. But I wonder whether Obama and the Democrats, at some level, are a bit embarrassed by Chávez?s remarks. Or do they feel affirmed and congratulated by them?

Also, shouldn?t Chávez have said ?smells of hope and change??

Castro, too, heaped praise on our president -- I mean, Fidel, the older brother-dictator. He said, ?No other president would have had the courage to say what he said? -- to say what Obama said about global warming. He also said that Obama?s expression of American guilt on global warming was ?without a doubt a brave gesture.?

Actually, John McCain, had he been elected president last November, would have said the same things as Obama on this subject. I have heard him say them at Davos: America is late to act, we have a responsibility to lead, the clock is ticking, American inaction has been disgraceful, etc. Wonder what the Cuban dictator -- dictator emeritus? -- would have had to say about a President McCain, where environmentalism is concerned.

By the way, did you know that Castro was a great environmentalist?

Again I ask: How does praise from Castro feel to Obama and his supporters? Such praise would be hornets in John McCain?s ears. Is it McCarthyite to ask questions like this? Many would think so, but I say nuts to them: and think that these questions are perfectly natural.

Okay, I have another rude question: Chávez, in his speech at the U.N., joked about how an Iraqi had thrown a shoe at President Bush. I wonder whether Obama found that funny, when he heard it, or heard about it -- if he heard about it. I wonder with whom he feels the greater sympathy: Chávez or his predecessor as U.S. president.

Whom do the department chairmen at Columbia prefer?

I wonder what would happen to a Venezuelan who threw a shoe at President Chávez -- in Venezuela, I mean.

I remember wanting to ask Rep. Charles Rangel a question, years ago: Whom do you consider the better man: Ronald Reagan or Fidel Castro? (At the time, Rangel was pounding Reagan as a racist villain, basically, and, of course, Rangel has long been one of Castro?s best friends and biggest defenders in the American political establishment.) In fact, I might like to ask him still . . .

Of course, you could ask José Serrano, Maxine Waters, Chris Dodd -- a million of them.

The other night, I was walking into a concert at Alice Tully Hall, when someone said to me, ?This is a big night here at Lincoln Center: Hugo Chávez is over at the Walter Reade Theater, talking about the new Oliver Stone film? -- the one that propagandizes for Chávez. My friend obviously thought it was nifty that Chávez had graced us with his presence. I was thinking: ?Is this the way many good people thought about Mussolini, before his colors were unmistakable?? I believe the answer is yes.

Earlier, I spoke of the ?establishment media? -- and I have had a media thought lately, one that you have too, I bet: The game is so very, very different now. A couple of upstarts investigate ACORN, using crafty methods. They expose ACORN. And then the establishment media work to expose them -- the exposers. The non-establishmentarians do the key investigating, and they, in turn, get investigated by the establishmentarians.

Glenn Beck is the one who tells the nation all about Van Jones. And then the establishment media tell us about Glenn Beck. Why weren?t those establishment media on the job about Jones?

This is positively weird, I think, and disheartening. I wish the reaction of the media establishment to the ACORN stingers and to Beck were, ?Holy smokes, these guys are beating our pants off. Why don?t we tip our hat to them, and redouble our efforts??

One near-universal charge against Bush was that he had squandered American alliances; it was the job of Obama, everyone said, to restore those alliances. I wrote a piece about this queer notion for the December 29, 2008, National Review: ?Diplomatic Health: On Bush, our alliances, and varied perceptions? (go here). You may find it interesting.

Anyway, I thought of this subject when reading of late about the United States and Britain -- and high tension between President Obama and Prime Minister Brown. It might have started with Obama?s banishment of the Churchill bust. In any case, I think it might have taken the smooth, intellectual, diplomatic Obama to tarnish the ?special relationship?; under the blundering, swaggering, unilateralist cowboy, that relationship was pretty good. In fact, William Shawcross wrote a book: Allies.

You might ask yourself this, too: How are our relations with Honduras, Israel, Poland, and the Czech Republic going? They were good under the previous administration. And the previous president even deigned to meet the Dalai Lama, spiritual representative of the Tibetan people, much oppressed.

I am astonished, not for the first time, at the power of anti-Semitism, and the power of an anti-Israeli feeling: how the tentacles of this hostility reach into everything. And those impulses -- the anti-Semitic one and the anti-Israeli one -- are closely linked, of course. All my life, I have heard -- even said -- ?You don?t have to be anti-Semitic to be anti-Israeli.? No, but it helps.

More and more, I see played out a kinship between anti-Semitism and the anti-Israeli posture. And I remember something Paul Johnson said in an interview last year: ?Scratch the person who is anti-Israeli, and you will not have to get very far to find the anti-Semite within.?

In any case, I was reading about the Honduran situation -- and Israel has entered in. Oh, yes it has. Zelaya, in his embassy refuge, says that Israelis are trying to poison him with radiation -- no, really. Now, where did he learn to talk like this, or to think like this, if he thinks it? (He could be playing to the gallery.) (But where did the gallery learn it?) I guarantee you that Israel has better things to do -- such as stave off destruction by Iran -- than poison a Central American fool.

Really, you must ask yourself: How did the Jews get involved in the Honduran standoff? Because they get involved in everything, in the anti-Semitic mind. And this mind, or mindset, seems to be spreading, ancient and widely established though it is.

Incidentally, I wonder what the Obama administration -- which has made a cause out of Zelaya -- thinks about these anti-Israel charges. Any embarrassment? A private wince?

Want to tell you about something -- pardon the self-referentiality: Came in the mail a new textbook. It was Writing Arguments: A Rhetoric with Readings. It contained an essay of mine called ?Bassackwards: Construction Spanish and other signs of the times.? (Find it here.) Very flattering, to have this essay included. But there was a fly in the ointment.

What is ?Construction Spanish,? by the way? Well, it?s a kind of Spanish that contractors, supervisors, and others can take: giving them vocabulary and phrases related to the construction trade. That way, they?re supposed to be able to talk with the workers under their command. My idea, of course, is that the workers, if they are to be Americans, should learn English. In other words, it?s all backwards: The newcomers should assimilate to the country, not the country to the newcomers. Generations ago, no one felt he had to learn Construction Polish, or Construction Chinese, etc.

My argument is more ?nuanced? (dread word) than this, but I?m giving you a flavor.

Anyway: Here is the fly in the ointment: Following my essay, the editors say, ?Working in small groups or as a class, discuss: What are the warrants for believing his [my] argument -- that is, what other beliefs or values must one hold in order to buy his contention that immigrant workers should learn to speak more than just ?construction Spanish?? What beliefs and values would enable one to doubt Nordlinger?s argument??

Um, I?m not sure I understand that fully, but I do know that immigrant workers don?t need to learn Construction Spanish -- they know it already. It?s the gringo bosses who are learning the Construction Spanish. I may be misreading the editors, as they may be misreading me. I?m afraid that students, examining these instructions, might scratch their heads.

In any case, I remain flattered to be included . . .

Brief words on a few passings:

Irving Kristol meant a lot to me. He was so smart, so cool -- and someone you couldn?t mess with. When I was migrating to the conservative side -- this was in late high school and early college -- I found him immensely comforting, in addition to illuminating. I was always taught that conservatives were dummies, simpletons, bigots, and so on. Well, you couldn?t say that about Irving Kristol, could you? (Or about Bill Buckley, or Norman Podhoretz, or . . .) He was a wonderful guy to have in your corner, when your corner seemed pretty lonely and the other corner was teeming with snarling brutes.

William Safire: I read him without fail in the New York Times. I read his political column and his language column. I also read Before the Fall, his memoir of the first Nixon administration. This was during a period when I was reading every White House memoir I could get my hands on, from about Wilson to the present. And none was better than Safire?s -- a superb book, which I still remember, instantly, many passages and points of.

I was disappointed -- keenly -- when he went for Clinton in 1992, rather than Bush the Elder. But he seemed to make up for it by being on Clinton?s case for the ensuing eight years. And I loved the man?s sense of humor. I remember something he told on himself.

Someone he had been out of touch with said, ?Hi, Bill! I missed not seeing you.? Safire said, ?Actually, you mean that you missed seeing me.? The man paused and replied, ?Well, maybe I meant what I said.? (We must never be language scolds or nuisances!)

I, certainly, will miss seeing Safire . . .

Alicia de Larrocha: I have written about this Spanish pianist many, many times -- and I will not say anything musical or even biographical here. Would just like to offer a couple of personal notes.

I heard a recital of hers, early on -- she played Mozart, Rachmaninoff, Turina, and others. Will never forget it. I devoured just about every recording she made, and went back to the green room to see her once. I think I was about 13. I wrote about this experience when Victoria de los Angeles, the soprano, died. Do you mind if I reprint that?

Many years ago, de los Angeles and the pianist Alicia de Larrocha gave a joint recital in my hometown. (De los Angeles and de Larrocha were longtime friends and fellow Barcelonans.) I went to hear only my idol, de Larrocha, caring nothing for singers, thinking them dumb and not really musicians (as most young instrumentalists do). Afterward, I went back to the green room, to shake de Larrocha?s hand. She was standing between two men -- managerial types. They were all holding drinks, I remember. I could not get de Larrocha?s attention. I stood there for a while, but -- no luck.

 

I turned to leave, and I heard this voice behind me, beckoning me. The sound I heard was the sound a Mediterranean woman would make if she wanted to stop and call you, but didn?t know your language: ?Eh . . .? It was de los Angeles.

 

She had witnessed the whole scene, between de Larrocha and me. The soprano was seated at a large vanity, whose mirror was outlined by bright round lightbulbs. I went to her. She hugged me and kissed me. (I was young and cute.) I remember that she smelled good; she had been sweating, and her makeup had run a little. She took my program -- unasked; I was never an autograph-seeker -- and signed her name, her signature being as flowery and beautiful as her name: ?Victoria de los Angeles.? Then she patted my head and sent me on my way.

 

I grew to love her.

I loved de Larrocha, too -- and first! I saw her on the street once, in New York, when I was all grown up. Gave me a little thrill, I have to say. And the last time I heard her was in Carnegie Hall, I believe -- her final appearance there. She played Mozart?s ?little A-major? concerto, in a chamber version: with the Tokyo String Quartet, I recall. She was not her best self, but you had a sense of what she had been, and maybe still could be.

Finally, will tell you this: She was a friend of Bill Buckley?s. And Bill told me a story once: He was sitting at lunch with her and one other person, and Alicia was saying she had to fly to the Southwest the next day to give a concert: She was going to New Arizona. Bill and the other friend explained that there was no New Arizona: just New Mexico or Arizona. But de Larrocha insisted: ?No, I?m quite sure, my contract says ?New Arizona.?? Apparently, even the great, and mightily persuasive, Bill Buckley could not persuade her.

Thanks for joining me, dearhearts, and see you soon.

Full post as published by Bench Memos - National Review Online on September 28, 2009 (boomark / email).