Town Hall Review: Michael Jackson Edition
On Monday night, Brad of Sadly, No! asked us to place our bets on which Townhall columnist would be the first to blame the Michael Jackson acquittal on "either the decline of traditional values or Bill Clinton's penis."
Well, today we have our answer: it was Cal Thomas (and so commenter TG wins the new car, the million dollars, and the dream date with Jonah Goldberg).
Here's a clip from Cal's column, Faultless nation
What was missing in virtually all of the commentary and analysis of the verdict was how this case reflects America's moral climate. The narcissistic generation has come full circle, from indulging children to abusing them; from setting standards to removing all taboos. Nothing is wrong any longer, because nothing is right.
So, there you have it: Michael Jackson was acquitted not because his accuser didn't seem credible (and because no evidence corroborating his account was presented). No, twelve citizens found that there was reasonable doubt about Jackson's guilt because "the immoral have now imposed their immorality on the rest of us."
Oh, and despite the lack of evidence that Jackson is sexually aroused by children, Cal knows that Michael is a pedophile.
Michael Jackson exhibits every symptom of pedophilia. [...] Sam Vaknin, author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited," has written on the "roots of pedophilia" for the Psychology Resource Center online. It reads like a profile of Michael Jackson.
Hey, why did we even bother to spend all the money to have a trial, when we could have just read an online article about pedophila?
And really, when you think about it, each one of us is guilty of molesting that boy, even if a jury found Jackson not guilty .. I mean, innocent ... of the charges against him/ We're guilty because we said that it's okay to molest children. (Okay, I actually didn't do that, and I don't think you did either, but apparently we did make fun of Ben Shapiro, which is the same thing as telling Jackson to go ahead and sexually abuse some kids.) And for our sins, Michael Jackson will walk by night, throwing our little girls into wells, eating soup with our blind hermits, and terrorizing our superstitious villagers.
Our tolerance for everything has produced an unwillingness to restrict anything. A jury (how could it be of his "peers," for who could be said to be a peer of Michael Jackson?) found Jackson innocent of the charges against him.
But our culture is not innocent. We produced Michael Jackson, and, like the fictional "Frankenstein" monster, he walks among us as a living judgment to our promiscuous permissiveness.
If only Abbott and Costello were still around, they could meet Michael Jackson -- then we'd be safe from this threat!
Some other Townhallers also addressed the Jackson verdict. Let's look at their columns.
1. The MJ in the rest of us by Suzanne Fields
Suzanne says that Michael is actually Dracula, not Frankenstein. And she claims that she tried not to follow the case, but apparently the TV forced her to watch the Jackson coverage.
Anyway, her point is that we are all Michael Jackson in a way, except that he's horrible and we're not. Or maybe he's Pinocchio, and we pull his strings. Or maybe the message is that by trying to focus on his image, he has blurred his substance, just like us. Or something.
I guess she really doesn't have a point.
Michael Jackson is the child in all of us who yearns never to grow up. He's not Peter Pan, who ultimately left childish things behind. "MJ" is the living spectacle of perversity, the mature boy child who refuses to act like an adult. Life is one long pajama party. He lives life as satire and farce with the dark side of his moonwalk in full sight.
[...] He wears flashy costumes, but they become like his skin, sewn into his nerve sinews, a dancing, singing life that has turned into a simulation of himself. He's the mirror image of Pinocchio, going from boy to puppet with his public pulling the strings.
[...] "The new images have blurred traditional distinctions."
That sounds a lot like Michael Jackson. And, alas, sometimes a little like most of the rest of us.
Thank you, Michael Jackson, for helping us all to understand ourselves a little better.
2. Where have all ze (real) men gone? by Kathleen Parker
Kathleen's point seems to be that the French are silly nancy boys, and so is Michael Jackson.
She (like many other conservative pundits before her) makes fun of French marketing consultant Pierre Le Louet. She ties in his remarks with a poll that showed that 38% of new French fathers said that they would have liked to have gestated their children, if that was somehow possible. And then she tops it all off with a dig at Michael Jackson. (You get the feeling that she had the column all written, but then there was a verdict in the Jackson trial and she felt compelled to address it somehow, and so she tacked on a really silly coda.)
Anyway, here's the MJ portion of the piece:
As for the new hybrid male, I think we've met him already. He's the lost boy of Neverland, human totem of the cult of Narcissus, that monument to arrested development - Michael Jackson.
It can't be mere coincidence that his trial on charges of pedophilia - the ultimate expression of the narcissistic impulse - intersected with the birth of a postmodern man who's all boy.
Yes, a French marketing exec made some stupid remarks, some French fathers expressed a wish that they could have participated more fully in the birth of their children -- and it can't be a mere coincidence that this happened at the same time that Michael Jackson was on trial for molesting a boy! Imagine the odds of three things happening at the same time!!!
3. No more Michael -- hopefully. by Linda Chavez
Linda also tried desperately to ignore the Jackson trial, but liberals broke into her home, tied her up, and forced her to pay attention to it. And now she's pissed! Pissed that, after all that, Jackson was found not guilty. And so she recaps the case, the trial, and Michael's disgustingness for us. You know, as a public service.
For months I avoided reading anything about the Michael Jackson case. It's the kind of story I try to avoid on principle: salacious, celebrity-focused, with little long-term significance. So I was surprised at my own reaction when the verdict in his molestation trial came down: acquitted on all counts. I was furious. How could he get off on all charges, I fumed. Suddenly, the story millions of Americans had been obsessing about since Jackson's April 2004 indictment ensnared me, too.
What's the moral that Linda derives from it all?
Apparently, that we SHOULD focus on salacious, celebrity-focused stories with little long-term significance -- for the sake of the children.
Anyway, today's Townhall also featured John Stossel on "The Government Helping Out in the Bedroom," Michelle Malkin on "Those Anti-Breast Bitches from 'The View,'" and Tony Blankley on "Paris Hilton Threatens to Become Less Skanky." We'll try to get to those columns (plus Ann Coulter, and Dr. Mike) tomorrow, unless something more important happens, like another celebrity trial, or another white woman goes missing. Until then, just to be safe, you'd better not do anything in your bedroom -- it might not be safe, thanks to the government!
4:19:44 AM 
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