Stop him before he says something truly despicable.
By Lawrence Meyers disagrees with Roger Ebert. All well and good. However, the reason Meyers disagrees with Ebert?
Yet I have to wonder if the physical and mental trauma Roger has endured has taken a toll on his mind …
Is it because the anger he must have concerning his condition is being projected onto the Right? After all, [Ebert’s blog at the Sun Times] started after all the physical damage had been done to his appearance …
Okay, so thus far it can be chalked up to the usual debate style of the Left. But here’s what concerns me about his state of mind …
I don’t care what his political beliefs are, ultimately. I care about his mental faculties, and how he is undermining his own legacy as one of cinema’s great champions.
I really wish he would return to the balcony.
This is, I believe, a new conservative tactic: “I disagree with the partisan pollster you agree with, but instead of acknowledging that the obverse is also true, I will assume that during your struggle with thyroid cancer and the seven painful, but ultimately unsuccessful, surgeries to restore the ability to eat, drink and speak that followed—I’ll assume that somewhere in there you lost your mind and I’ll just mourn your death now, so can you please shut the fuck up already?”
Seriously, that last line about “return[ing] the balcony” sounds like nothing so much as a former slave-owner longing for the days before all his former charges had the right to say whatever they damned well pleased. Meyers is annoyed because Ebert’s expressing the opinions he’s always held, but is blaming Ebert for his own inability to separate the body of work from the man who produced it. I wonder how he feels about Faulkner, whose politics he would (I hope) disavow as adamantly as he does Ebert’s?
UPDATE: Crap! Meyers is absolutely correct, or so I must assume because, like Ebert, I’m in no position to judge. I apologize in advance for the misunderstanding.