Poor babies....
Left coast crashes
Hollywood is down in the dumps, now that it has become clear that terrorists do not consider Tinseltown important enough to attack, Rob Long writes in the Wall Street Journal.
"'I miss Clinton,' a development executive at a television network said to me last week. 'First off, the guy was always in town. I mean, he must have spent half of his eight years in L.A. Second, he listened. Really listened. I remember back then, we had a sitcom on the air and one of the actresses on it was really concerned about I don't know, air quality or something and she marched right up to him and started talking air-quality policy stuff to him, and he just listened for, like, half an hour.'
"It's true," said Mr. Long, a writer in Hollywood and a contributing editor of National Review. "When Bill Clinton was president, we were more than entertainers and campaign contributors. We were policy-makers and deep thinkers. Our ideas on environmental protection and space exploration were sought after by the White House. Articles were written in important chronicles — well, Vanity Fair, but still — about the 'New Establishment' and the 'Powerful Media' and guess what? They were talking about us! We were the New Establishment, and we had the president in town to prove it. We slept over in the Lincoln Bedroom and had all-night snack and policy fests in the White House kitchen and got Important Briefings from Important Staffers. It was a glorious time, let me tell you. Even I miss it, and I'm a Republican."
But now, after eight years of Mr. Clinton, "Hollywood is back where it belongs," Mr. Long said. "At the great Thanksgiving dinner of American society, we are back eating at the kids' table. Among the not-so-terrible casualties of September 11, along with Bill Maher's career and Susan Sontag's credibility, we must now add Hollywood's flatulent self-importance." |
