7 minute read
OPINION
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BY DAVID LEIBOWITZ Glendale Star Columnist
One of the things I miss most about America was how people used to believe certain topics shouldn’t be discussed in public.
Religion was one. So was politics. You didn’t ask people what they weighed or how much money they earned. We kept those things to ourselves, and it was deemed impolite to quiz people about it.
Those days are over. Now everyone is an amateur newspaper columnist, spouting off 24/7: constantly on social media, with bumper stickers and fullsleeve tattoos, Yelp reviews, you name it.
Then there’s the lady who lives in north Phoenix up around 56th Street along Bell Road. Not content to stop at Facebook trolling or boring the hell out of people at a Memorial Day barbecue, this anonymous soul has hoisted a massive black fl ag up her backyard fl agpole for thousands of drivers-by and neighborhood school kids to glimpse daily. Her fl ag uses expletives to describe Biden and those who voted for him. “Yes, it might be a little vulgar to some and offensive to some, but everybody’s entitled to their opinion,” Ms. Profane Flag Lady told reporter Jason Barry with Arizona’s Family. “If those kids can fi gure out what that sign said, then those kids have already heard that kind of language and vulgarity either from their homes, on TV, in movies or in school.”
And furthermore: “It’s a sign,” said the woman, who refused to be identifi ed out of fear for her safety. “Get over it. If it hurts your feelings, sorry.”
My standard policy when it comes to people who are striving to be offensive is to refuse to be offended. Instead, like with this lady, I just feel sorry for them.
How miserable does your life have to be that you would go to the trouble of ordering such a fl ag, much less taking the time to raise it to offend strangers? Can you imagine sipping your morning coffee as the sun rises over the neighborhood, sitting in your backyard and enjoying the occasional honked horn or screamed profanity from a Prius driver tooling up Bell? Boy, talk about living.
Get a life.
That same sentiment occurs to me when I play golf on a course that winds through homes amid backyards. Trust me, Profane Flag Lady is not alone. From Mesa to Glendale, Avondale to chi chi Scottsdale, many of us still feel compelled to lash out at Donald Trump with the same class this Bell Road idiot has displayed.
Trust me, for every gentle soul mortally wounded by your cheap piece of polyester, there’s a hundred of us who simply shake our heads at the statement you’ve chosen for all the world to see.
Put another way, there are more than 60,000 fl ags for sale today on Amazon. There’s innumerable Stars and Stripes. There’s Arizona fl ags galore. ASU, NAU, UA, they all have fl ags. Your alma mater has a few dozen. There’s the Jolly Roger, if you’re into pirates. For 10 bucks, you can get a fl ag adorned with Marlon Brando in full Don Corleone mode from “The Godfather.” There are POW/MIA fl ags, yellow smiley face fl ags, “Beware of Pugs” fl ags and an “I Heart Hot Moms” fl ag.
The best fl ags seem to speak about what we love, not who we hate. If you can’t manage that, there’s always no fl ag at all. Back in the day, we used to keep quiet about a lot of controversial things, which added some mystery to life.
The guy next door or the lady beside you in line at the bank might be an absolute jerk. Fortunately, those people rarely opened their mouths to prove it to everyone.
David Leibowitz has called the Valley home since 1995. Contact david@leibowitzsolo.com.
China means you always have to say ‘Sorry!’
BY J.D. HAYWORTH Glendale Star Columnist
“Love means you never have to say you’re sorry,” or so Ali MacGraw and Ryan O’Neal told us in the 1970 motion picture “Love Story.” But over a half-century later, the love of money has Hollywood falling all over itself to apologize to communist China.
“Fast and Furious” is not only an exhaustive action fi lm franchise — if you’re keeping count, the new release is No. 9 — but it also describes how quickly bodybuilder/wrestler/movie star John Cena scrambled to get back into the good graces of the millionaire Marxists in Beijing.
After encouraging the good moviegoers of Taiwan, saying that the island nation of Chinese nationalists would be the fi rst country to see the new feature, the communist mainland started breathing fi re in dragon-like fashion, and Cena promptly surrendered to the worldview of the jarringly misnamed “People’s Republic.”
Putting the “dip” in diplomacy, Cena sought to blame his busy promotional schedule for his unintentional deviation from Chicom dogma, with its insistence that Taiwan is really part of China, and the ominous rumblings that a “reunifi cation” through military action could become reality.
To reinforce his “love and respect,” Cena offered his apology in Mandarin, a language he initially learned for WWE tours in China. He is now considered fl uent in Mandarin, since he moved to China for fi ve months in 2018, shooting a movie there with Jackie Chan.
The Cena-Chan casting combination isn’t much of a surprise in the movie biz, but the bipartisan tag teams that emerged to take apart Cena’s Mandarin mea culpa in the Twitter-sphere was eye-opening. Leftist commentator and sportscaster Keith Olbermann called it “shameful”; conservative Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Arkansas, described it as “pathetic.”
Two other broadcasters from opposite ends of the political spectrum offered another rare left-right combination. CNN’s Jim Sciutto put forth this rhetorical question-and-answer fl urry: “Why not call a decades-long healthy and functioning democracy a country? Because much of Hollywood operates in fear of Beijing, many of its blockbuster movies dependent on the mainline Chinese market.” Talk radio
MARGULIES’ OPINION – jimmymargulies.com
HAYWORTH FROM PAGE 12 host Ben Shapiro taunted Cena with a cross between “Monday Nitro” and “Firing Line”: “Taiwan is a country. Hong Kong should be free. If you are unwilling to say these things because it might hurt your bottom line, you are a pathetic coward.”
Cowardice, calculation or both, Cena is scarcely alone when it comes to kowtowing to the communist Chinese. NBA players and coaches, so “woke” when it comes to America’s alleged social ills, stay silent on the subject of slave labor in China.
The World Health Organization, tasked by the United Nations to deal with major health problems such as global pandemics, lavished praise on the Chinese government for its initial response to COVID-19, despite reports that security forces locked infected Wuhan residents in their apartments, denying them food and medical treatment, while nature took its course.
What course will the world follow in the years ahead?
Puff Daddy rapped of gritty economic reality in his 1997 hit “It’s All About the Benjamins,” but given the inclinations of the entertainment industry, the indulgent attitude of the Biden administration, and the Chinese aspirations for military and economic ascendancy, he would do well to concoct a new composition.
Perhaps “It’s All a Yin for the Yuan” will reflect the rhythms of a new reality, but don’t expect anyone in China to say “Sorry!”
And no one will confuse it with “Love Story.”
J.D. Hayworth worked as a sportscaster at Channel 10 Phoenix from 1987 until 1994 and represented Arizona in Congress from 1995-2007.
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