Casual
Carlson, Tucker
Casual Ho Ho Ho Chi Minh City If there's one thing that Third World Marxist dictatorships seem to have in common, it's a high tolerance for reckless driving. I first discovered this in 1988 after...
...Or almost no mention...
...And there are bigger problems...
...There is no mention of the fact that, once the French left, the Communists continued to use the building for nearly 50 more years to torture and repress their own enemies...
...Where does the opposition party sit...
...The Vietnamese didn't...
...There is a volleyball net in a glass case, and other pieces of memorabilia designed to show that, on the whole, American prisoners had a pretty relaxing time at the Hanoi Hilton...
...I waited for the handcuffs...
...You could almost hear them thinking: Now there's an idea...
...he asked deadpan...
...Vietnam, on the other hand, remains very much a people's republic...
...Nervous ones...
...I first discovered this in 1988 after a particularly long dinner party in then-Communist Nicaragua...
...Much of the original prison was torn down a few years ago...
...I was there last week covering John McCain, and I'm happy to report that almost everyone in the country still drives like a total nut case...
...One morning in Hanoi, McCain gave a short speech to members of the country's National Assembly, its mostly rubber-stamp legislative body...
...We shouldn't have been driving...
...A friend and I were headed back to our hotel in Managua, doing about 70 in a heavy rainstorm, when we hit a pothole the size of a bird bath...
...American pilots in Hoa Lo prison attending mass in the cathedral," reads the caption...
...One shows a group of men standing in church...
...For example, he said, one voter he spoke to suggested a law mandating oral hygiene...
...Back home, my friend and I would have been on the phone to a bail bondsman within about eight minutes...
...Or maybe you just have bigger problems to worry about...
...The police turned out to be amused...
...As a father of four children," McCain joked, "I supported requiring Americans to brush their teeth every night...
...This time the Vietnamese did erupt into titters...
...After a moment you recognize his expression...
...So I revised my theory: Maybe when you live in a totalitarian country, it's psychologically important to break the little laws, like the ones against driving a motorcycle with one hand on the wrong side of the road while talking on your cell phone...
...The portion that remains has been turned into a museum of French atrocities...
...The Sandinistas changed the tire for us...
...They looked contemplative...
...In Vietnam it's not unusual to see them attempt to pass trucks while going uphill on a two-lane bridge...
...Nicaragua isn't Communist anymore, so there's no telling how its traffic laws have changed...
...There is a guillotine on display, leg stocks, and other instruments of colonial torture and repression...
...His right hand is raised, a slender middle finger draped across his chin...
...If you look closely you'll notice that one of the men has an odd expression on his face...
...He grinned...
...The Vietnamese government isn't famous for its sense of humor, though if you're in Hanoi and looking for a way to spend an amusing hour or two, I recommend a trip to Hoa Lo prison, the medieval-looking brick compound made famous during the war as the Hanoi Hilton...
...Vietnam is a pretty place with good food and friendly people, so it's easy to forget that it's also run by a Stalinist regime...
...In America, he told the group, politicians have to listen to their constituents...
...I figured we were in trouble...
...Their attitude seemed to be: Inebriated Americans in a car accident...
...At first I assumed that the Vietnamese must be unusually skilled drivers...
...The left front tire popped like a balloon and shredded into long jagged strips...
...Then an American who lives in the country set me straight...
...It's a suppressed grin...
...In a tiny room at the back of the compound is a small exhibit dedicated to the American flyers once interned there, including John McCain...
...The chairman invited McCain and the reporters following him on a tour of the main chamber, a cavernous Soviet-style room with rows of wooden desks and a statue of Ho Chi Minh...
...TUCKER CARLSON...
...It came to a stop in front of a Sandin-ista police station...
...It's not unusual in developing countries to see entire families packed onto a single moped...
...A huge number of people die in traffic accidents in Vietnam, he said, several a day in Saigon alone...
...And there are pictures...
...A few hours later, McCain stopped by the National Assembly building to meet with the group's chairman, the Communist equivalent of Denny Hastert...
...The cops had automatic weapons...
...Every once in a while there are reminders...
...He explained the protocol: who sits where, who speaks, and in what order...
...The car bounced sideways down the road...
...What a riot...
...People pull into oncoming traffic without looking, blow through red lights at top speed, travel long distances in the wrong lane...
...The lecture went on for a while, until Howard Fineman of Newsweek broke in...
Vol. 5 • May 2000 • No. 33
