Monday May 05, 2003

SNEERED WITH A BEARD. Dennis Miller in the Wall Street Journal:

I empathize with Mr. Mailer in one regard, though. Although he's clearly abdicated the lucid throne, it must be hellish for someone who can still arrange words so beautifully--i.e., "the question will keen in pitch"--to wake up every morning and have it slowly dawn on him that he's effectively been rendered totally irrelevant.

Well, if by "totally irrelevant," you mean holding several Pulitzer Prizes and National Book Awards, and having to occasionally endure the disrespect of a Monday Night Football color man -- yes, the burden must be awful. But somehow I think the man will cope.

It's interesting that much of Miller's invective is about Mailer being unhip: "more out of the loupe than a jeweler with conjunctivitis," "18-year-olds who mistakenly think Mr. Mailer wrote 'Gravity's Rainbow,'" "kinda hot for a few minutes in the '60s," etc. And the part that isn't about Mailer's low cool factor is just straight-up "but seriously, folks," followed by no seriousness.

That's the problem when you get funnymen to do commentary. They think Friars' Club schtick is an argument. Well, these days it is. (See the Kurtz item below. Or just look around.)