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Toynbee: Writers Strike
Fred says I can be disjointed; hell, I like my joints fine as they are.
JB ------------ Rudy Guiliani is often praised for cleaning up the porn, drugs, homicide, and vice in Manhattan. At the same time, Arnie Schwartzenegger gets plaudits for trying to end the Hollywood writers strike. Omigod! The great American public will have to watch smut reruns because its creators, already too well compensated, have taken a sit-down. Irony: the writers, too, will have to watch their own reruns! Irony #2: when Rudy cleaned out the Times Square fungus, he sprayed Lysol, arrested some people, let in some light, and raised the cost of living there. The fungus, however, scattered spores and is now, through cable and the Internet, more available than ever before in every home as hotels in major cities replace Bibles with sex kits. Gideon has become Get-It-On. Toynbee drew a model: empires emerge, settle, collapse in the center, and are invaded from the outside. The same appears to occur now with the United States but, as Toynbee also noted, it is possible to find examples of collapse coming after a series of partial recoveries. Things end not with a bang but a series of whimpers. In our case, there are regional seizures: two sections, the southeast and midwest, affirm tradition, religions, family, duty, honor, and country. New England continues to freeze, drink, and lecture the rest of us but finds honor in reelecting Ted Kennedy. On our left coast, California whores along until Mexico takes it over, the Chinese make an offer, or a quake puts it in the sea. Agnostic JimB |
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