Friday, January 27, 2006

Some Conservative Advice for Oprah

Who doesn't like Oprah? But her mea culpa about James Frey's book A Million Little Pieces was an embarrassing spectacle of liberal self-flagellation. It all could have been avoided with the application of a few conservative principles, which I present here in bite-size homilies like a self-help book by Dr. Phil to help the advice go down easier.

Never flip flop - "I supported James Frey's book before I came out against it" is exactly the wrong strategy. Never change your position no matter how wrong it is or people will see you as indecisive.

Never admit a mistake - Only wimps and liberals admit mistakes.

Make light of the situation - "What happened to those three months James Frey supposedly spent in prison? Are they under the desk?"

Stand by your man - You can learn a lot about life from Tammy Wynette, no matter what Hillary says. Be loyal to your people no matter what they do. Tell them they're doing a great job, whether it's true or not.

Move the goalposts - If it turns out the "essential truth" of A Million Little Pieces doesn't seem like such a good reason to like the book anymore, say that it was actually the lack of paragraph indentation that moved you all along.

Distribute blame evenly - Everybody believed the book was true! The French, German and British critics loved it!

Don't be swayed by popular opinion - Oprah claims she read emails from her fans castigating her for calling up Larry King Live. Doesn't she have people to insulate her from such things? How can she make important decisions when she is distracted by the hoi polloi? This is what bubbles were made for.

The best defense is a good offense - Instead of having critics like Richard Cohen and Frank Rich on her show to criticize her, couldn't she have had her staff dig up some dirt on them? What do their wives do for a living, for example?

The more you repeat something the more true it seems - The more you repeat something the more true it seems. See?

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6 comments:

PoliShifter said...

Tell it like it is brother!

Finally, an honest Conservative...

Anonymous said...

Hey, you seem like a nice person with good intentions, but i want to ask you a couple of questions. Why are you so cynical? Not just on this post (I don't know much about Oprah, I just chose this one since it's your most recent), I'm saying just in general. And I am NOT being sarcastic, I'm not trying to make you look bad, this is not a trap question designed to be used against you. I am being straightforward and unbiased with my questions, this is a genuine question.

I understand that the first thing that comes to your mind might be, "this is a questioned to make me look bad if I answer it the wrong way," because there are people out there that DO do that; they ask questions not just for the sake of genuinely asking a question, but they have some ulterior motive to use it against you. I am telling you right now, I am not doing that to you. Again, these are just questions, with no negativity attached.

Do you believe in being kind to others, and I mean genuine kindness. And I don't mean being kind to those who support you just as a way to hurt those who don't agree with you on something, I'm talking about genuine kindness.

What is the purpose, the goal, for the things you do and believe in? Is your goal for world peace? A person fights for things that he/she believes in, but is it just for the sake of not wanting to be proven wrong, or is it bigger than that, like world peace? You get what I'm saying? why fight and argue, is it for a bigger issue?

Do you believe that you, or any other person, whoever they may be, is perfect? Do you think a person can be perfect?

Again, this is not a personal attack on you or anything like that. For example, the last set of questions I asked, Don't think of it as, "Who do you think you are? You think you're perfect?" [said in a spiteful way], don't think of it like that, it is just a genuine question. Even after telling you I'm not trying to offend you, you still might answer my questions defensively and cynically. Or you might just answer my questions with yes/no answers or something just as simple to avoid saying too much, just to play it safe. I hope you don't though, because again, I am not trying to be offensive toward you or trap you or anything negative like that. You don't have to answers these questions if you don't want to, but it's just something I was thinking about and wanted to post. Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Jon Swift said...

Thank you for your very thoughtful comments. In answer to your question I would say that my goal is indeed world peace.

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