HELL OF A CONVENTION
PODHORETZ, JOHN
Hell of a Convention by John Podhoretz San Diego AS I WRITE, THE REPUBLICAN convention has only been over for 12 hours, and yet it is already a clich? to compare it to NBC’s coverage of...
...It may be that stories of rape and disease appeal to women—there’s a whole genre of TV movies on these subjects whose advertisers seem exclusively to produce remedies for yeast infections—but the violent and clinical detail works like a drug on us boys too...
...By proving that Republicans can feel sorry for rape victims...
...That was why she was there in the first place—to sadden, thrill, disgust, and excite all of us, male and female alike, with her tale and somehow tie it into the idea that the Republican party stands for victims’ rights...
...Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania: “Ladies and gentlemen, a woman of extraordinary conviction, a woman of extraordinary courage, my friend Jan Licence...
...Here is a partial list of the “real people” with “real stories” who appeared on or around the podium of the Republican National Convention: 2 legal immigrants 1 deaf Miss America 1 paralyzed cop 1 supermodel (who is the celebrity spokeswoman for a hemorrhoid ointment and has just published her first novel) 1 up-from-welfare mother 1 dog that helps people with MS 1 Olympic beach-volleyball player 1 bunch of other Olympians 1 Cuban-American Medicare recipient 2 AIDS victims 1 gas-station owner 1 teacher 1 nurse of Bob Dole’s 1 widow of an Armenian doctor of Bob Dole’s 1 guy in a wheelchair Bob Dole was nice to 1 rape victim named Jan Licence Jan Licence’s appearance on the podium was the most striking moment of the convention—indeed, the heart and soul of its four days...
...By making the point over and over again that Republicans do care, and making it with such insincerity, one is tempted to believe that Manafort and Barbour believe Republicans actually don’t care, and thus found it necessary to trick America into thinking they do...
...But you have to hand it to Barbour and Manafort: They put on a hell of a show...
...Now I stand in my home at a window and try...
...Instead, I woke up to a stranger grabbing and touching me...
...One might even follow Jan Licence’s example and call it a living hell...
...But how...
...Like the convention, those movies were made to appeal almost entirely to an audience of women, but they were actually the work of men, and notoriously tyrannical men at that—men like studio chief Jack Warner, and directors King Vidor, William Wyler, and Michael Curtiz...
...But I must fight to keep him from taking my mind, my spirit, my soul...
...In pursuit of painting a giant smiley face on the Republican party, Barbour and Manafort staged a convention as ruthlessly efficient as a Joan Crawford or Bette Davis tearjerker from the 1940s...
...I can tell you that being raped is not every woman’s worst nightmare...
...Jan Licence was, therefore, someone with whom women were supposed to identify, someone whose horrible personal experience was supposed to humanize the Republican party’s message...
...I know we all think this sort of public confession is the result of Oprah Winfrey’s influence on American culture, but in truth there is something ineffably male about the act of asking Jan Licence to stand center stage and tell her story in horrifying detail at a major media event...
...to compare it to NBC’s coverage of the Atlanta Olympics...
...She was introduced by Gov...
...Jan Licence received a standing ovation for talking about her rape...
...She walked out from backstage as though she were being presented with an honorary Oscar, and proceeded to give a really gruesome speech: “Good evening...
...The sex offender, the rapist, he takes the body...
...I am a rape survivor...
...Sports and politics are traditionally boys’ pleasures, and so both NBC and the RNC decided profound changes in tone were needed to capture a female audience—NBC because it needed women viewers for ratings, the RNC because it needed women voters to close the gender gap...
...Someday I hope to reclaim that simple joy...
...We wake up from nightmares...
...And why not...
...It has also become a clich...
...I used to...
...The “real stories” we heard from the podium of the convention, like those at the Olympics, actually had a great deal in common with the tales boys tell around the campfire to frighten and thrill each other, tales of death and blood and gore and doom...
...I did not wake up to my alarm clock...
...And what was the meaning of the appearances of the other “real people...
...The morning of August 23, 1993, did not start the way I had planned...
...And there was nothing, it seemed, that Barbour and Manafort would not do...
...Some people may think I look okay, but there is much you don’t see...
...Have you ever sat outside at night and tried to count the stars...
...Instead of focusing on competition and victory, the very things boys love about politics and sports, the respective poohbahs of the Olympics and the convention decided to focus on “real stories...
...That’s not really surprising, considering that both events were designed, directed, and stage-managed not by women but by men: Dick Ebersol and Don Ohlmeyer at NBC, Haley Barbour and Paul Manafort at the RNC...
...Words cannot describe the 45 minutes of terror, the helplessness, the violation, the humiliation...
...To prove Republicans can feel sorry when a little black girl and a Jewish mother get AIDS...
...You do not see as I deadbolt myself into my bedroom and I get into the very bed I was raped in...
...to say that these events represent a new kind of “feminization”—a feminization that is either (a) long overdue or (b) another step down the path to a terrifying androgyny...
...To show that Republicans love a dog, and Bob Dole had an Armenian doctor, and that Dole could be nice to a guy in a wheelchair...
...It’s a living hell...
...To show that Republicans don’t just want to throw CubanAmerican Medicare recipients into the street...
...There was very little these men would not do in pursuit of an emotional wallop...
Vol. 1 • August 1996 • No. 48
