Another book about Hillary Clinton released to the hungry public last week. This particular tome The Truth About Hillary, by a man named Ed Klein, is supposed to be causing a bit of a dust up among the Hillarites because of some claims in the book that show the junior Sinister, I mean Senator, from New York in an unflattering light. Some in the Republican camp are in a tizzy about the book because, while they may appreciate the implication that our dear Hill is the re-incarnation of Lady Macbeth, they feel that the book goes too much for the personal instead of the ideological and personal revelations about Ms. Rodham may backfire and create sympathy for the poor thing. Well, I suppose Mr. Klein just can't please anybody.
We've not read Mr. Klein's book here at Bloody Nib Manor and we have no plans to do so. The reason is not because of the advertised content of the book. It is simply because Hillary Clinton is uninteresting. In fact, she's downright boring. Even the excerpts from her auto-hagiography showed her to be just another pol on the make. She's come up with no great ideas, written no great works of literature or music, experienced no great adventures, had no great affairs and has not had the honesty to be either a great criminal of the Jesse James type nor the ruthlessness to be a great manipulator behind the throne such as Livia, wife of Augustus Caesar. She's just a politician who learned the lessons from her dog-eared copy of Machiavelli For Dummies a little better than most of her fellows.
But I digress. This week on a nationally syndicated radio program hosted by Michael Medved there was an interview of Mr. Klein regarding his book. During the interviews Mr. Klein stated something that puts the whole thing in perspective. He stated that he is not a political writer and that he is, for the most part, an entertainment reporter. Ergo, Mr. Klein was writing about Mrs. Clinton as a personality or celebrity. Or should I write, a Personality or a Celebrity? Mr. Medved, who is as close to being a front man for the Useless Party (remember, Republicans are useless and Democrats are dangerous) as one can get without being named Karl Rove, took Mr. Klein to task for not writing more about Madame Hillary's political and ideological positions, her constant habits of dissimulation and duplicitous behavior, as well as her overwhelming ambition and hubris. Mr. Medved then went on and told Mr. Klein what Mr. Klein should have put into the book and what he should have left out. After a few minutes I wasn't sure if I was listening to an interview of an author whose book was already taking up space at the local emporium or if I was eavesdropping on a book editor advising a writer on how to improve the manuscript. But then, Mr. Medved is one of those who feels that Mr. Klein's book will be red meat for the Party of Dean when Bill's wife decides to make her grab for the brass ring, so there is a possibility that he is working two edges -- the book's crummy and perhaps he can kill its sales before it becomes a popular controversy. The book is not the book that Mr. Medved wanted to see. So instead of taking the book as it is he attacks the book, not according to what it is, but according to what he wants it to be.
What the hell is that all about? I've seen the same thing occur in movie reviews. The reviewer will write something to the effect of, "Gigli (just to pick a title out of the air) is not the movie it could have been. If the male lead had been a steel worker instead of a stockbroker and the heroine had been a debutante instead of a porn actress and the director had been Fritz Lange working from a script by William Faulkner instead of Alan Smithee working from his own script, this could have been a watchable, perhaps even enjoyable, film." It's like reviewing a KFC restaurant and complaining that the chicken wings would be a lot better if they came from pigs.
By the time a book is published and in the bookstores, or the first review copy of a movie has been shown in a theater, it's too late for reviewers and critics to start saying what the products should have been. They have to, in fairness to the writer, the movie-maker and the public, address what is. If they want to rewrite the product, do it on their own time. Don't waste the public's time trying play Mr. Potato Head with someone else's spud. Just criticize, for better or worse, the tater as it is.
Finally, a last word about Miz Hillary. Don't be surprised if they (you know -- "those guys") start floating Billary's names as potential replacements for Sandra Day O'Connor as Supreme Court Justice. I would not be surprised if she snuggled up to the ex-Prez this evening imagining herself achieving the governmental hat trick; sinister (dammit! I mean senator), Supreme Court justice and elected president in 2008. It's an impossibility of course, but hyper-Rotarians have strange dreams.
No comments:
Post a Comment