Trust Busters
Until recently I had never watched "The View," a spirited little gabfest on ABC that is, apparently, trying to destroy America. Of course, I'm referring to co-host Rosie O'Donnell's remarks suggesting there was some sort of conspiracy behind the collapse of World Trade Center 7 on 9/11 and that the British--in an incident involving the detainment of 15 of its sailors by Iranian forces--might have intentionally been trying to provoke Iran as a prelude to some larger action, a la the Gulf of Tonkin. "Google it," Rosie told her viewers.
You know, I'm pretty sure I don't have to. The Gulf of Tonkin incident involved cooked American intelligence suggesting North Vietnamese forces had launched an unprovoked attack on two American vessels in August 1964. The incident, or President Lyndon Johnson's understanding of it, led to the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which gave the president the authority to conduct military operations against North Vietnam without a formal declaration of war. And then we were off to the races.
Whatever else you might think about Rosie, you have to grant she has the advantage of unsympathetic enemies. First it was Donald Trump, who, stung by Rosie's mocking over the Miss U.S.A.-Tara Conner episode, went after Rosie like an irate New York cabbie, calling her fat, ugly, a loser and various shades of crazy. Trump, I think it's fair to say, got the worst of the exchange. In the most recent dust-up, Bill O'Reilly said Rosie was a "fanatical leftist" who was actively supporting Iran against her own country. Rosie's legions of detractors--just Google "Rosie" and "traitor"--were even less kind. Fox News' John Gibson called Rosie a "fat lesbian vampire bat bully," which is probably my favorite insult of all time.
Yet when I watch "The View," I don't see a morning talk show hijacked by seditionists, wearers of tinfoil hats or Revolutionary Guard partisans. Anything but. The show couldn't possibly be more conventional TV--the well-lit stage and sweeping camera booms, the eager Middle American applause, the endless roundelays about relationships and movies and kids. These people are making Easter egg figures with bits of yarn, for heaven's sake. The doyenne of "The View" is Barbara Walters, who is nobody's idea of an anarchist. Am I to understand that "The View" is a seething bed of anti-Americanism? If so, why are there so many commercials?
