When it comes soldiers captured in the Middle East, for Monty Python alumnus Terry Jones, some POWs are more equal than others.

While I remain a tremendous fan of the Pythons' early 1970s output, Jones' heads-is-tails priorities are a reminder of how ossified so much of the thinking among Britain’s leftwing elites has been for an exceedingly long time. And that Punitive Liberalism is definitely not exclusive to the US.

(And some thoughts on how that sort of cognitive dissonance pervades the BBC from top to bottom, don't miss the latest Blog Week In Review podcast.)

Related: "The Wimps of the West vs. The Mad Mullahs".

Update: "SeeDubya" reminds us that Jones isn't the only Python member to have lost it after 9/11.

Well, they're not too dark, actually. Check out Tim Blair's before and after photos. As John Hinderaker writes, "A good time was had by all, and if not much energy was saved, that's all right: it's the thought that counts".

We all need a little faith to get us through the darkness--or in the case of the Religious Left, to create it.

Update: Mark Steyn writes:

Being on Eastern Time (US) rather than Eastern Time (Oz), I’m afraid I slept through the excitement of Sydney’s “Earth Hour” when, from the Lord Mayor to the lowliest rummy lying in the gutter belching incandescent meth fumes, the entire city turned out its lights for one whole hour in order to stop global warming. You can see a satellite picture of it here.

No, wait, that’s North Korea by night. Now there’s a guy who’s really doing his bit to save the planet.

Kim Jong-il wouldn't be the first Communist to be dubbed "a liberal in a hurry"--towards this, it seems.

"Now, before we get our freak on, we need to match up our beats": the circle is now complete; the recently deceased Larry "Bud" Melman's successor has been discovered.

In the "tradition" of Shatner and Nimoy, and perhaps inspiring future singing thespians like Don Johnson and David Hasselhoff, Jack Klugman and Tony Randall get down with their funkadelic vocalistic selves.

As Orrin Judd writes, "'You're So Vain' is a highlight, relatively speaking".

He may have been a genial hedonist, but he was definitely the Great Communicator:

Tammy Bruce checks in with the state of the computing art in 1989.

Maybe someday, I'll be able to send faxes from the beach, too!

And speaking of RAM, forget two megabytes--you'll be able to put a whole heckuva lot more than two gigabytes in your PC in the coming years.

Compare and contrast:

"Pelosi to Brits: Drop Dead!"

"Unilateral: Pelosi to meet with Assad next week in Syria"

Meanwhile, as Ed Morrissy notes, Pelosi is set to talk Turkey, in a manner of speaking:

Let me see if I get this straight. The Democrats want to condemn Turkey for a genocide that the Ottoman Empire committed before the Turks overthrew them, in order to invest Congress with a certain level of moral authority, if not historical illiteracy. At the same time, Nancy Pelosi -- who has pushed for the condemnation of our Muslim ally in the war on terror -- now wants to fly to Damascus to hang on the words of our enemy in the same war.

As Ed writes, "It's difficult to achieve this conjunction of idiocy in a single week, but Pelosi & Co have proven themselves just the idiots for the task".

Just making sure I understand the scorecard: Ann Althouse has two sips of wine in a video, and is now the reincarnation of Dorothy Parker or Zelda Fitzgerald. Ronald Reagan, who as a former actor was once thought second only to Jack Webb as a rigid authority figure, is now a genial hedonist. President Bush, who gave up drinking nearly two decades ago, is a "dry drunk". Smoking=worst danger to mankind. Automobiles=New Holocaust.

When did the left become more uptight than my parents?

Update: Related thoughts here.

Austin Bay asked me to guest host the Pajamas Media "Blog Week In Review" podcast this week, so I interviewed Robin Aitken, the former BBC journalist and on-air personality who left the network and has written a new book, very much in the vein of Bernard Goldberg's books on American media bias, titled Can We Trust The BBC. I tried to aim the questions towards an American perspective on the topic, but then, how could I not? Aitken also discussed in depth the BBC's biases regarding Iraq, Israel, and the Palestinians. Regular readers of this blog won't exactly be shocked where the BBC comes down on these issues, but for those who still hold out a belief that the BBC is entirely objective, its an eye-opener.

I also asked Robin if this was still flying on the walls of his former workplace.

It's a 20 minute long podcast (no iPod required--any computer with broadband and a soundcard can play an MP3 file), so please tune in and listen.

This week's Sanity Squad podcast on Pajamas Media had all sorts of loud clicks, pops and other elements of digital distortion scattered throughout it. Fortunately, through the help of Cakewalk Sonar and its editing tools, and the Bias SoundSoap Pro noise-reduction plug-in, I was able to make it at least listenable--so please take a listen.

Fascinating topic as well, discussing the psychological aspects of the Iranian capture of 15 British sailors.

Given that Law & Order jumped the shark well over a decade ago, this sounds like it might be reason enough to support a Fred Thompson candidacy.

(And more seriously, so does talk like this.)

Update: "If Fred Thompson runs, his first ad might look like this..."

After recieving an email wishing--in no uncertain terms--ill-will towards Tony Snow, Dean Barnett writes, "It seems like a lot of people have been asking in recent days why our politics have grown so bitter":

Generally, I find such inquiries tedious. Politics has always been a blood sport. Just ask Julius Caesar. Or the Senators who butchered him.

Things haven’t gone much differently in America. One of our founding fathers killed another of our founding fathers in a duel. George W. Bush isn’t the first president to be routinely compared to a primate. Abraham Lincoln’s critics often accorded him the same honor.

Still, there are some differences today. It used to be tough to get a letter to the editor published in a prominent newspaper. Furthermore, the papers edited their letter sections for quality and to make sure the letters’ authors were genuine. They also of course checked for ideological conformity.

Today, anyone can get the equivalent of a “letter to the editor” published on the blog of their choice. They can also do so anonymously. One would have anticipated that some keyboard cowards would appreciate the advent of such a forum. What has been a moderate surprise is how these boards have been a magnet for the keyboard cowards and how great their number has been compared to sensible people. One has to wonder how these people got their jollies before anonymously spewing venom became an option.

I think there are several additional reasons to consider here, as well.

Meanwhile, in a somewhat related post, Ann Althouse meets the New Puritans.

Yesterday, a well-known employee of the American Broadcasting Company said (on an ABC television program, even more ironically co-hosted by one of its most prominent veteran newspersons), that ABC's news programs are not to be trusted:

I’m saying that in America we are fed propaganda and if you want to know what's happening in the world go outside of the U.S. media because it's owned by four corporations one of them is this one. And you know what, go outside of the country to find out what's going on in our country because it's frightening. It’s frightening.

Rosie's only partially correct: you don't have to go outside of America, merely outside of ABC.

Mary Katharine Ham videoblogs this year's installment of the annual Media Research Center "Dishonors Awards":

Many more clips at the MRC itself.

James Panero of The New Criterion's "Armavirumque" blog writes:

You read it here first. And once our post about an art gallery's plans to display an 'anatomically correct' Chocolate Jesus was picked up by Ed Driscoll and Pajamas Media, so did the rest of the world.

Hot Air notes the layers of "sweet, nougaty irony" wrapped up in the gallery's churlish response when called on their reactionary juvenilia.

Update: Ed Morrissey rounds up a list of a few of the other bloggers who have since posted on this topic.

"NRO needs a new mug: Pop culture is our secret weapon in the war on terror!"

(Don't tell Dinesh D'Souza, though.)

Yea, though I walk through the Valley of the Shadow Of Death, I will fear no evil. For I am the baddest Muppet in the valley.

(And for additional silliness in a similar vein, don't miss Kermit Reznor as well in the same post.)

If the left is serious about global warming, here's the biggest, bluest state of them all, and in terms of pollution, it's a mess.

(It's a mess in terms of lots of other issues, but this seems like it would be a great place to start.)

This is rich--in the Washington Post, leftwing journalist Timothy Noah is attacking President Reagan for his "genial hedonism":

Reagan, like just about every other actor who ever passed through Hollywood, had a very hard time viewing sex as something to repress. This genial hedonism would later express itself in Reagan's embrace of supply-side economics.

I've referred to the left as "the new puritans" on more than a few occasions here, but up until now, I've never thought that they actually believed they were acting upon this trait themselves.

So if Reagan, who by all accounts wasn't exactly the next Errol Flynn when it came to 1940s and '50s style Hollywood hard partying is being attacked for being too hedonistic, perhaps its time for the left to re-evaluate President Clinton's excesses?

(Commencing holding breath....turning blue...feeling faint...never mind.)

Sorry, union regulations require that we take the hamsters off the generator wheel for about an hour near the end of the month. They've been fed, watered, and are back keeping the site active.

Interesting Kausian Kabuki concepts:

Here's a question: If it's

a) in the Congressional Democrats' interest to try but fail to use their funding power force a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq (it shows the antiwar left Pelosi is trying without giving Dems responsibility for a messy Iraq outcome),

and it's

b) in the Bush administration's interest to have Congressional Dems' try but fail to use their funding power to force a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq (it lets Bush continue the "surge" while giving him the threat of a Dem-forced pullout with which to pressure the Maliki government),

then

c) isn't it true that what probably will happen is that the Congressional Dems try but fail to use their funding power to force a U.S. withdrawl from Iraq?

Tough to argue with that formulation, and if it's correct, it's amazing how incredibly cynical the whole affair is.

"Prominent environmental groups today declared April 1 a 'National Day of Mourning' for the loss of another species to global climate change. Researchers today confirmed that there are no surviving members either in the wild or in captivity of the genus Homo Erectus Hirsutus, also known as the Pacific Bigfoot".

Read the whole thing, with tongue firmly in cheek.

Well, I think we have an answer to this.

What are the odds that some enterprising reporter on the campaign trail will ask Hillary for her own take on it?

I know, I keed! I keeed!

(Speaking of which, if Bob Dole weren't alive and to the best of my knowledge very well, he'd be turning over in his grave over that silence right now.)

Immediately after Tony Dungy, the head coach of the Indianapolis Colts was victorious in February’s Super Bowl, he gave a remarkable speech on the live CBS postgame show, in which he said, at about 2:38 into the above clip:

I tell you what. I'm proud to be representing African-American coaches, to be the first African-American to win this. It means an awful lot to our country. But again, more than anything, I've said it before, Lovie Smith and I, not only the first two African-Americans, but Christian coaches, showing that you can win doing it the Lord's way. We're more proud of that.

Such heterodox thinking was too much for a few of the guests at my Super Bowl party, and after witnessing their vaporous near-faints and splenetic responses, I wrote:

Unlike Janet Jackson's shopworn halftime routine a few years ago, think of this as the most radical example of Epater Les Bourgeois at the Super Bowl.

Certainly far too radical for the Washington Post, It seems. I guess this is more their speed.

(And once again, so much for "Mass With Class".)

The New York Times: same story, new international flavor!

Allahpundit spots the hot new Internet trend.

Update: Related thoughts here.

As a city, San Francisco has had its share of problems in the 21st century, among them: declining population, declining economy, declining children, contempt of the US military, a large and often militant vagrant class, and declining tourism.

Fortunately, when it comes to making an effort to solve those problems, local government has its priorities firmly in order.

Update: More decisive moments in governing here.

Fred Thompson writes:

A lot of people have at least a little in common with [Charlie Sheen and Rosie O’Donnell]. They just don’t like to think about how much our enemies actually hate us. It’s easier to escape down a rabbit hole to a land where our own government is tricking us into thinking the world is a dangerous place.

And also down this rabbit hole, often simultaneously.

That's the headline of an item by James Panero on the New Criterion's "Armavirumque" blog, along with a photo of a new "art" exhibit captioned, "Six Foot Jesus Made Of Chocolate". Panero responds:

'Forty Days in the Dessert'? The 'Immaculate Confection'? The possible New York Post headlines here are endless (and yes, I know the difference between the Immaculate Conception and the Virgin Birth.) But one thing is clear. From Piss Christ to The Sensation Show, America hates New York for cheap art-world stunts, and for good reason. Check out the following notice that just came over the transom. (Be sure to read down for the bit about how this artist is "best remembered for covering a New York City hotel room in melted cheese." And just what is "anatomically correct" supposed to mean? And why do I feel like this has been done before? And why have I yet to see a custard Mohammed?)

Truth be told, I don't think America hates New York because of this stuff. Like the anti-Christian content that fuels so much of Hollywood's current product, they're too bored by how reactionary it all is to break much of a sweat over it.

The Manolo says:

Sometimes the Manolo comes across the pictures of the celebrity event which astound. Such is the case with the photos from the premiere of the new Quentino Tarentino and Robert Rodriguez juvenile movie, Grindhouse.

This is clearly a case of celebrities trying hard to look as ugly and clapped out as the movie they'll be watching.

Update: The Manolo reminds us of another Grindhouse-related fashion abortion.

Hugh Hewitt interviews House of Commons member Brooks Newmark on England's rather tepid response (so far at least) to her 15 sailors kidnapped by Iran and concludes, "Where is Margaret Thatcher when you need her?"

And speaking of which, for a total contrast (again, so far at least), on 18 Doughty Street, there's a videotaped interview with former Secretary of State for Defence Sir John Nott, on his role in liberating the Falkland Islands 25 very long years ago.

Not as large as Mayor Nagin's, but quite well-equipped nonetheless.

(Via Don Surber.)

Glenn Reynolds went with FDR, which is an excellent choice, but I'm picking Lincoln.

Frank Martin writes:

In August 1929, it was all chamapagne and celebration for the crew of Graf Zeppelin. The future looked very bright indeed for the makers of Airships. Sitting below the Graf Zeppelin on its arrival to Los Angeles, I can’t help but think that the smart set of the day would have been betting their money on the big, big future for the use of Airships.

It just goes to show you what a waste of time it is to try to predict the future. Stand in the shoes of the people living in LA in the summer of 1929, and see how far it gets you.

Read the whole thing; Frank goes on to compare 1929's Zeppelin with today's.

(If you were expecting something else by the above title, well, I've got that covered also.)

Ed Morrissey is shocked--shocked!--that Barack Obama, a presidential candidate "with an entire two years of experience in national office turns out to be a policy lightweight. Who'd a-thunk it? It had to hurt that Obama got compared to John Edwards, widely considered an empty suit himself, and found wanting".

On the other hand, as Jim Geraghty recently noted, "Hillary has de facto experience on Bill’s bids, and the 1992 campaign has to rank as one of the all-time chaotic campaigns (Gennifer Flowers, 'I didn’t inhale,' draft dodging, etc.)." That, and the tailwind the media will build for her should serve her quite well this time around.

Update: Or not...

"They're running away with their little curly tails between their legs", writes Glenn Reynolds, adding, "It's a disgrace, but par for the course for this bunch".

Not at all a surprise, of course. But very far removed from how they were actually elected in the first place.

Update: Ed Morrissey explains what comes next:

The President will definitely veto this bill, and the Democrats do not have anywhere near the votes needed to override. That means that Congress and the White House will have to reach some sort of compromise, or else theoretically allow the troops to remain in Iraq but without the funds to either fight or come home. If the President doesn't veto it, he has to start retreating in four months, to which he will not willingly assent. It will take weeks to unravel, and in that time I believe that Congress will work on a much smaller supplemental to keep funding going while the negotiations ensue. Reid, however, wants to wait until after the spring recess to start even on the conference committee talks, which will drag out the event even further.

Undoubtedly, Reid won big by declaring defeat. No one really expected this to pass, but Reid managed to talk Hagel and Nelson into reversing themselves, when even the ladies from Maine remained steadfast. He and Nancy Pelosi made it clear that the last election had its consequences, even if it took them several variations on the defeatist theme to do so.

One thing is certain: Chuck Hagel can skip the exploratory committee for the 2008 race.

Elsewhere, Michelle Malkin explains Reason Number 9,327,235 why the 1970s will never end.

Another Update: "Not with a bang but a whimper".

That's what the headlines would read if newspapers treated their own comments sections the same way they do those on blogs.

Gee, I can't imagine why.

Found via Atlas Shrugs; for some thoughts on how Newark arrived at this point, click here and here.

"I Bet The NY Times will jump on this".

Want to get into digital video? Over at Blogcritics, I review three books that make a fine introduction to medium cool.

Coming so quickly after Cathy Seipp's demise, this is dreadful news. As Mary Katharine Ham writes, "Keep Snow in your prayers".

(For all sorts of reasons, this sounds like a smart move by the HuffPost.)

Now it all makes sense!

"Meanwhile, here's Al Gore's view of humankind". It's certainly this fellow's view of mankind, at least.

In War And Anti-War, Alvin Toffler explained that wars come in many forms, not just the sort of Technicolor battles that are the stuff of Saving Private Ryan or Apocalypse Now. Case in point is the financial war that we're waging against Iran's assets, according to Ed Morrissey:

The US has targeted the Revolutionary Guard with its attempts at isolating the Iranians. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has transformed the Guard into an economic powerhouse in Iran, a major defense and civilian contractor even outside of its arms trading. This has made the Guard very loyal to Ahmadinejad, and the sanctions aim to both drive a wedge between the Guard and the president and also to cripple their ability to prop up the current regime.

In this, the US has received a great deal of assistance from a surprising source: Ahmadinejad himself. Global bankers who might otherwise have rejected American pressure to reduce their engagement with Teheran have either dropped their Iranian business or scaled it back sharply. Why? Ahmadinejad has made himself appear like a very risky investment partner, with his rantings about the Holocaust and wild statements about the destruction of Israel. Perhaps even more importantly, Ahmadinejad has undermined confidence in the Iranian stock exchange, comparing it to gambling. That doesn't make for an encouraging investment atmosphere even under the best of circumstances.

All of this results in a currency crunch for Iran. Importers now have to pay up front for their materials, having seen the normal credit environment disappear altogether. Banks will not issue loans or conduct capital investments into the oil infrastructure in Iran, which has now begun to crumble from years of poor maintenance. Iran can no longer generate the revenues of the past, which means that less money can go to radical Islamist terrorists like Hezbollah and Hamas. The situation has become so bad that Iran has worked to keep its name and the names of its banking institutions off of financial transactions in order to shield them from the prying eyes of the US.

The Bush administration has successfully conducted an indirect war on Iranian interests, and it is a progressive war. The effects of these efforts will be cumulative, and the Iranians have not much time left before their economy begins to completely collapse under the weight of them. Oil production accounts for 80% of their exports, and once those facilities start to fail, they will have nothing left with which to bargain -- and it will take years to repair the damage. When they reach that stage, Iranians will find plenty of motivation to shake off the disastrous reign of the mullahcracy, and even the Revolutionary Guard will not find much motivation to protect them.

How brilliant is the deception involved to make the information war successful? Much like Patton's role as a decoy before D-Day, Seymour Hersh of The New Yorker is feeding Iranian radio all sorts of made-up war plans to add heft to what is likely to be purely an information war. And the postmodern twist is that he doesn't even know how he's being used!

(Well, that's one possible explanation at least.)

Mickey Kaus writes, "Will the Media Critic Please Turn Out the Lights?" (Fluorescents or halogen of course. I'm sure that incandescent bulbs are verboten at the Times on both coasts...):

The LAT's Tim Rutten has defended against the charge that he's "sanctimonious" by publishing a piece titled "These rules we live by." Oh-kay! More on this later. For now, please read through Rutten's piece and ask yourself if he shows any sign of awareness that he and his distinguished LAT colleagues only have their jobs because they produce a product that people are willing to pay money for? Rutten writes as if there's a constitutional provision that credentialed journalists have lifetime professional tenure no matter how much money his paper loses or makes.

Rutten's far from the first journalist to think that way, of course.

Mark Krikorian ponders mathematically challenged journalists:

At a time when more and more policy advocacy and policymaking is based on the assessment of data, the English majors who become reporters and editors are as bad as ever at discussing numbers. The WaPost had some cute stories on teenage entrepreneurs with a couple real howlers: "Last year, he sold 10 of his photographs, netting about $1,000 in gross sales." (Last time I checked, "net" and "gross" were different concepts.)

And this one in a story about a girl who bakes gourmet dog treats: "According to a survey by the American Pet Products Manufacturing Association, people in the United States spent $34.4 billion on their pets in 2004. The bulk of that — $14.2 billion — was spent on food." (How can the "bulk" be less than half of something?) And then a graphic in the Business section, of all places, (it accompanied this story, but isn't online) had a caption saying the volume of first-class mail has been declining since 1999, when the graph clearly shows volume declining since 1990.

Sure, these are trivial examples, but if newspapers can't get "net" and "gross" right, how are they going to write about the federal budget intelligently?

God is in the details, as Mies is always quoted as saying, and it’s these little things that demonstrate the superiority of elite journalists over the pajama-clad masses. Thankfully, unlike bloggers, they have an army of editors just offstage to help them get these crucial details right.

In business journalism, these skills are even more crucial, risking The Death of Equities.

"Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Lamar Smith (R-TX) today asked Former President Bill Clinton if he would be available to testify at the Democrats' Thursday hearing on presidential pardon authority":

"Former President Clinton is no stranger to controversial pardons, most notably the pardon of Marc Rich on his last day in office," stated Ranking Member Smith. "I can think of no better person to address this issue."

At Thursday's hearing of the Judiciary's Crime Subcommittee entitled, "The Appropriate Use of the Presidential Pardoning Power," Democrats are expected to explore what is and is not the appropriate use of pardons, despite a president's plenary power to issue pardons.

President Clinton granted pardons or commuted the sentences of nearly 500 people, including fugitive financier Marc Rich, whose wife donated $450 thousand to the Clinton Library. Other pardons included a person accused of cocaine trafficking and a former Democratic committee chairman indicted on political corruption charges.

The Constitution gives the President the absolute authority to grant clemency, commutation, and remission of fines for offenses. Despite this absolute authority, presidents are not immune from criticism and even congressional attempts to restrict pardon authority.

"Mr. Clinton's exercise of his pardon authority would be of real interest to Members of the Subcommittee," concluded Smith. "I hope he will lend his expertise."

Cute. But something tells me that President Clinton will have another gym workout that he just can't get out of that day.

When someone tells you that he hates America, or that the U.S. deserved it on 9/11, read him this list.

Meryl Yourish writes, "what time is it? That’s right. It’s Israeli Double Standard Time".

Glenn Reynolds advises, "Set your clocks", but why? When it comes to the media and the left, it's always Israeli Double Standard Time. I guess it's somewhat akin to Double Secret Probation--except that it's certainly no secret.

Rosie O’Donnell speaks truth to power! The latest Iranian hostage crisis? Gulf of Tonkin, Part II.

9/11? The greatest conspiracy ever.

Ahh, the journey that Rosie's taken since this moment. It's as if she's captured by history, turned upside down, riding the whirlwind, channeling unseen forces!

Allah asks, "Is it time for Unstable Mabel to go?" I doubt it--she's a trainwreck, but viewers can't turn away. Rosie's the best thing that's happened to The View's ratings; ABC is happy to beam her into your home--F-bombs and all--five days a week. And it looks like her style is catching far beyond the measured, nuanced confines of over-the-air television.

Once again, proof that no satirist can improve upon the folly of man, as Germany releases convicted Baader-Meinhof terrorist Brigitte Mohnhaupt from her sentence two days early so that she doesn't have to face the indignity of--wait for it--talking to reporters.

As Ed Morrissey writes:

This has to be a joke. They wanted to protect a hardened murderer from getting hassled by reporters? How awful! We wouldn't want to have Mohnhaupt experience that kind of inhumanity!

Besides, what exactly do the Germans expect Mohnhaupt to do? She may disappear long enough to write her autobiography, or perhaps to market the one she probably wrote in prison. Afterwards, she will hit the lecture circuit, talking about the grand old days of revolution, when radical leftists like Mohnhaupt and her friends murdered bankers and abducted law-abiding citizens for fun and profit. She'll want to hold press conferences wherever she goes.

The Germans have to have a holes in their heads for ever letting Mohnhaupt out of prison. This latest concern over the inconvenience of answering for herself to a free press shows what a joke this process was from the start.

Who's Germany's equivalent of Leonard Bernstein? She'll be a huge hit at his cocktail parties.

(Via Betsy Newmark. Incidentally, does anyone have Margaret Cho's take on this development?)

Pajamas HQ calls it the "Lecture of the Week"; from his introduction praising David Frum's How We Got Here onward, Evan Sayet, a Hollywood comedy writer who calls himself "a 9/13 Republican", gets it.

It makes a terrific palette-cleanser from the Tinseltown pots & pans banging a couple of posts down--watch the whole thing:

Update: And (via Instapundit) for some context, "What You Can't Say".

Mickey Kaus writes:

This audio of Katie Couric's questions to the Edwards'--with their answers excised--would make a great soundtrack for a piece of conceptual art.

Or as Marshall McCluhan said in 1960 about the contents of an even older legacy media, "Take the date line off a newspaper and it becomes an exotic and fascinating surrealist poem".

George Will has a great piece on Anger In America Now (to coin a book title), but American anger as a whole has nothing on Hollywood.

Back in 2005, I linked to a typically great article on that very topic by Cathy Seipp:

Behind the New Age grin of beatific self-righteousness with which so many Hollywood celebrities greet the world often lurks a tan