The Internet Monk
"the power of opinion, the phenomenon of speech, the impact of truth"
A Webjournal Edited by Michael Spencer
Ben Stein: Conservative Boor?
by Michael Spencer
Boor
1. A person with rude, clumsy manners and little refinement.
"Hey, Ben Stein's on C-SPAN! Let's watch!" My wife and I settled in to listen to one of our favorite conservative writers and wits speak at the Washington Television and Radio Correspondents Dinner Thursday evening. Ben was following President Bush, who'd given a wonderful self-deprecating review of his many malapropisms. The audience was a "Who's Who" of the Washington establishment opinion shapers.
"What a good choice of a speaker," I said to myself. Ben Stein is smart, eloquent, funny, a wonderful writer and a media personality. His father was part of the Washington media for sixty years. Ben served with Nixon, is an economist and a lawyer, and one of the best spokesman for the joys of fatherhood you will ever read. Ben's conservatism is no secret, and his success with "Win Ben Stein's Money" on Comedy Central has introduced a different image of conservatism to millions of young Americans. Yes, a great choice to follow the President's comments with humor and class.
How do I describe the nightmare that followed in the next twenty minutes? I know a bit about public speaking and its not hard to spot someone who is unprepared. Ben was completely unprepared, and did the worst possible thing to try and make up for his inexplicable lack of preparation: He told internet jokes.
Internet jokes. You know, the kind you get in endless forwards and on conservative mailing lists. Bad jokes. Tasteless Clinton jokes. Sex jokes with embarrassing lines put in the mouth of Jerry Falwell. Jokes about lawyers. Jokes about the retarded. Jokes about John Hinkley being asked to shoot Bill O'Reilly by Bill Clinton. Jokes you don't tell in front of the President and his wife, or anybody's wife. Crude. Insensitive. Boorish. And they went on and on, with the audience groaning and mumbling in disbelief. Ben followed each bad joke with whining and pleading and idiotic attempts at being cute. I've seen middle schoolers give class talks with more sophistication. Why does one of the smartest men in popular culture need to resort to bad jokes that anyone with a computer has heard months ago? And horrible, not-funny jokes besides?
When the jokes finally ended- just before most of the room started booing- Ben gave a very brief admonition to spend time with your aging parents and your kids. This was alright and sincerely delivered, but even then Ben couldn't avoid using the term "Gxx-Dxxx" in regard to pushing his son in a swing. Where was the trap door and why didn't someone use it? Couldn't Ben see that his sudden veering into family values came on the heels of crude and inappropriate humor that made Robin Williams look tame?
The applause that followed Ben Stein's conclusion was full of tangible relief. WIth no sense of decorum, Ben Stein played the lowest card possible in front of the establishment media and a national television audience. This was locker room fare, and about as out of place as Al Gore at the Bush family Christmas.
Why did this happen? Was Ben drunk? (A real possibility.) Did he misjudge his audience? (I can't believe it.) It seems unreal that a person as familiar with the liberal media as Ben Stein would descend to this level of crudity for the sake of looking cool. Or is he really a boor, and we just didn't know it? I choose to believe Ben isn't the person I saw last night.
I am continually amazed at how many conservatives just don't understand how badly we are losing the battle of public perception. The liberal establishment won't take on our ideas, but they will continually say we are mean, greedy, hypocritical, power-hungry and cruel. These things are not true, and we know that the mean-spiritedness of liberal politics is the curse of our age. But you won't purge this public perception by telling Clinton jokes, saying lawyers be electrocuted or suggesting John Hinkley is humorous. We won't beat the caricature by using profanity in front of the first lady, trying to get the crowd to laugh at brain injuries and talking about sex exactly as the Hollywood crowd does. Ben, don't you get it?
Every time a Ben Stein gives this kind of performance, or a Newt Gingrich confesses to an affair, our cause is hurt badly. Mr. Bush's misstatements are mistakes. They are the fodder for jokes. Ben Stein's performance was intentional, and makes all conservatives look badly. I'm glad my daughter and son weren't around.
Conservativism appeals to our better nature by being honest about our lower nature. We can laugh at anything, but there is a time and place. The Television and Radio Correspondents dinner was neither.