JONAH GOLDBERG: 2011: You Can’t Win for Losing – NRO
By MB Snow at December 31, 2011 | 1:10 am | Print
You’ll recall that 2011 began with the oafish actor celebrating his own narcotic and sexual crapulence like a victorious gladiator working the crowds. He was egged on by a media with as much decency as the cons on the top tiers of the prison who chant “fresh fish” as the new inmates walk into general pop, their eyes stinging from delousing powder.
Sheen succeeded at turning his own debasement into a national pseudo-event by calling the very definition of losing “winning.”
And that’s what 2011 was all about: pretending to be winning while really losing. Sheen’s Hollywood compatriots played the same game. Kim Kardashian, fresh from the “success” of her sex tape, parlayed her celebrity into a “classy” wedding that netted her millions and 72 days of marital bliss. Poor Lindsay Lohan, meanwhile, merely found victories in reduced jail time and a million-dollar Playboy spread.
Speaking of jail time, former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich started the year by trying to translate his crimes into a lucrative career as a reality-show star and ended it with a prison sentence.
In January, a deranged madman killed a bunch of people in Arizona and horribly wounded Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. It was a true tragedy, disgustingly exploited by liberals who saw it as the perfect opportunity to demonize political opponents. Against the weight of logic, facts, and decency, allegedly serious people claimed that a map on Sarah Palin’s Facebook page inspired the shooter.
The Tucson tragedy also let Barack Obama deliver perhaps the best speech of his presidency — on the need to tone down the extreme rhetoric on both sides. Alas, when liberals lecture “both sides,” they mean, “Everyone who disagrees with me should shut up.”
via 2011: You Can’t Win for Losing – Jonah Goldberg – National Review Online.