The Enemies List Read online

  Thomas F. Steele of Orange County, California, has only one name for the docket but, as Tom says, “It’s an eye-opener for the most populous Republican county in the country to contain such a critter”:

  Mayor of Irvine, California, Larry Agran, honors grad U.C. Berkeley, Harvard Law School, close friend of Tom Hayden, co-author of the California Bilateral Nuclear Weapons Freeze Initiative, executive director of the Center for Innovative Diplomacy, which has set up eighty Nicaragua/U.S. “sister city” relationships

  “I didn’t know Nicaragua had eighty cities,” notes Tom. Neither did I, but Larry Agran is welcome to go be mayor of all of them.

  L. C. Carter of El Paso, Texas, inveighs against:

  Rose Kennedy, and the fruits of her womb

  A group of self-described “militant right-wingers in Kentucky” submit a rather peculiar roster which combines politics, music criticism, and an apparent attempt to get even on some ill-advised sports betting:

  The Rainbow Coalition

  Mayor Ed Koch

  Sen. James Exxon [sic] (D-NE)

  Andy Rooney

  Diane Sawyer

  Paul Kirk

  Michael Jackson, the singer, not the radio talk show host

  John Hinckley, Jr.

  Kitty Dukakis

  Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell (D-ME)

  The Grateful Dead

  Joan Rivers

  Metallica

  Richard Daley

  Union Boss Richard Trumka

  Flag Burners

  Abortionists [I must disagree here. I’m all for abortion, of the retroactive kind.]

  AC/DC

  Alice Cooper

  Martina Navratilova

  Don King

  Lane Kirkland

  Muhammad Ali

  Toyotas [Toyotas?]

  Ozzy Osbourne

  KISS

  Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

  California Lt. Gov. Gray Davis

  William “The Refrigerator” Perry

  Jane Wyman: She divorced Reagan. How smart can she be? [Let us pause here to note that practically every member of the Reagan household except the Gipper himself has been named to the Enemies List. More quality time with the family, Ronald, please.]

  Anthrax

  Tone Loc

  Draft dodgers [Hey, fellows, this cuts a bit close to the knuckle for some of us sixties-era born-again conservatives.]

  Jeanne Dixon

  “The sooner we can get out a contract on the following,” says Thomas H. Black of Midland, Michigan, “the sooner we can all get to work on the plan to ‘clean up the environment’”:

  John Catennacci

  Day care

  Sammy Davis, Jr.

  Eckankar

  Sonya Freedman

  Squeaky Fromme

  Bishop Gumbleton

  Oveta Culp Hobby

  IMF

  Alfred Kinsey

  John McEnroe

  Bette Midler

  Liza Minnelli

  Muammar Qaddafi

  Burt Reynolds

  Rowan and Martin

  The other Smothers Brother

  J. D. Salinger

  Bo Schembechler

  Liv Ullman

  Truman Capote

  ERA

  Dianne Feinstein

  Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-HI)

  Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI)

  Joni Mitchell

  Nicki McWhirter

  Dean Martin

  Manuel Noriega

  G. Bromley Oxnam

  Abu Nidal

  Alan Quartermaine

  Morley Safer

  Tex Schramm

  Jimmy Swaggart

  Foster Wynans

  Katharine Hepburn

  David Brinkley

  Patti Davis

  Doris Day

  Sally Field

  The Federal Reserve System

  The Gabor family

  Amy Irving

  Coretta King

  Robin Leach

  James Taylor

  Daniel Ortega

  Monica Quartermaine

  Carl Rogers

  Sylvester Stallone

  Angela Sombranno

  Tracey Ullman

  X-rated movies

  Vidal Sassoon

  C. Collins of the American Enterprise Institute cries down:

  Norbert Nadel

  The Cincinnati Reds: a cheap shot, but one can’t be too careful

  Jose Canseco and any other major league player who charges for autographs: This is an obvious Commie plot to debase America’s native game

  Jim McMahon and Brian Bosworth: just because they’re horrible people

  Red Auerbach and John Thompson: ditto

  Bruce Springsteen, another multimillionaire wailing about the wretchedness of capitalism

  Harry Belafonte

  Spike Lee

  E. L. Doctorow

  Bill Plante

  Arthur Kropp

  The post-containment George Kennan

  Joseph Rauh

  Andreas Papandreou

  Hans-Dietrich Genscher

  France

  Neil Kinnock

  David Lynch

  Robert Hawke

  Any student who comes here because his backwater, tinhorn, Third World wasteland of a country can’t provide a decent education and then complains about what a repressive and horrible system we have

  Robert Mapplethorpe

  Would-be Armand Hammer Dwayne O. Andreas

  John Paul Arnerich of Los Angeles, California, exprobates:

  Mark Russell

  Bill Press, California liberal sophist

  David Gergen

  The Detroit Pistons

  Michael R. Hemmerich of Cleveland, Ohio, disparages:

  Dick Cavett

  Men who wear sandals

  American Spectator House Hoosiers: OK, OK, just kidding!

  Peter Hart

  Nan Aron

  Norman Ornstein

  William Wimpisinger

  People whose movements are engaged in a “struggle”

  Indignant Methodist Thomas Donelson of Olathe, Kansas, writes “to nominate”:

  The Reverend George Baldwin

  “to your New Enemies List. Mr. Baldwin spoke in front of the Kansas East Conference of the United Methodist Church about Nicaragua and the workers’ paradise being developed there.

  “Five years ago, Mr. Baldwin took a vow of poverty and moved to Managua where a vow of poverty has been easy to undertake ever since the Sandinistas took over running the economy. Despite his vow of poverty, he is going on a world’s tour for peace with someone else footing the bill.”

  Leo Eagle of Old Bethpage, New York, tells us, “Long Island has its own brand of lefties. I say off with their heads”:

  Rep. Thomas Downey (D-Amityville)

  Rep. Robert Mrazek (D-Centerport)

  Rep. George Hochbrueckner (D-Coram)

  “Red” Michaels of Birmingham, Alabama, is furious with any number of people, including some local Alabamians I’ve never heard of. But have at ’em, Red. We’re here to serve:

  Roy Higginbotham

  Arthur D. Penser (Huntsville)

  Frank Sievelmann (Fayette)

  Earl Hilliard

  Crumm Foshee

  Richard Arrington

  Alvin Holmes

  Thomas Reed

  Ted Bryant

  Abraham Woods

  Mary Jean Haddin

  Mitch Mendelson

  Frank Bruer

  John Brinkley

  Rheta Grimsley Johnson

  And this cryptic addition:

  Sieglemann

  Also:

  Henry Kissinger

  Jaruzelski

  Sen. Richard Shelby (D-AL)

  Sen. Howell Heflin (D-AL)

  Art Buchwald

  Robert T. Stafford

  Sen. John Chafee (D-RI)

  Sen. Dale Bumpers (D-AR)

  Rep. J. Ober
star (D-MN)

  Sen. Al D’Amato (R-NY)

  Sen. Mark Hatfield (R-OR)

  Sen. Bob Packwood (R-OR)

  Bruce Poindexter of Ann Arbor, Michigan, berates:

  The editorial staff of the Michigan Daily

  The entire state of Minnesota

  The California condor

  The snail darter

  The two whales freed from the ice in Alaska

  Larry J. King of Morrisville, Vermont, has an unusual venue of criticism. “I don’t believe you’ll recognize any of the following names,” he says:

  Alan Moore: His works include an attack on the Reagan administration nuclear policy. He belongs to the British organization AARGH (Artists Against Rampant Government Homophobia).

  Frank Miller is afraid that the religious right intends to censor his work.

  Danny O’Neil criticized mankind’s treatment of the environment in a recent editorial and has written a story condemning the conservative churches’ involvement in politics.

  George Perez wrote a story in which a woman tells her “gay” brother to be proud of what he is. Mr. Perez is a committed feminist.

  “What do these people have in common?” Larry asks, rhetorically. “They write comic books. Here’s some more data for you to chew on:

  “1. Gloria Steinem is the consultant on the ‘Wonder Woman’ comic written by George Perez.

  “2. In Superman comics, one of Superman’s best friends, Maggie Sawyer, is a lesbian.

  “3. One comic used to be called ‘Justice League of America’ until the ‘America’ part of the title was removed in the interests of one-worldism.”

  Greg Paolano of Centereach, New York, chides:

  Anyone who runs against Jesse Helms

  Kip Krady, director of Accuracy in Media’s speakers bureau, reprehends:

  Cartoonist Feiffer, Jules

  Neo-Nazi thugs everywhere and their skinhead brethren

  Paul Seabury of Berkeley, California, declaims upon:

  Alger Hiss

  Right Reverend Barbara Harris, Suffaragan Bishop of the Diocese of Massachusetts: The Rt. Rev. is a lesbian, a nuclear unilateralist, a Sandalista, a kind of theological Ron Dellums. She was never entrusted with a parish before becoming bishop, probably because no parish would take her.

  Jan Beck of Seattle, Washington, dresses down:

  Stanley Kramer

  Defense Attaché

  Legal Services Corp.

  Gary Merrill

  Parade magazine[You’re wrong, Jan. And ex-Marine Viet Vet Walter Anderson, who runs Parade, will probably be glad to tell you so in person.]

  Riverside Community Church

  Seattle City Council, for voting Managua a “sister city,” inviting the Soviets to “Friendship Games,” etc.

  60 Minutes

  Anyone using the terms “red-baiting,” “Commie-bashing” or “McCarthyism” without quotation marks

  Finally, American Spectator staff assistant Dan Erech weighs in with:

  “President” Carlos Duque of Panama

  Mayor W. Wilson Goode of Philadelphia

  Edward Dos Santos, MPLA leader, Angola

  Rep. Barney Frank’s “significant other”

  Anyone dumb enough to vacation in Lebanon[Hey, watch it, kid.]

  Craig Spence and “Professional Services”

  Li Peng

  Prime Minister Michael Manley of Jamaica

  Javier Perez de Cuellar

  Walter

  I would also like to thank Joseph P. Maguire of Evanston, Illinois; Mercedes Casey of Lake Charles, Louisiana; Louis J. Tripoli of Rochester, New York; Joe Mysak of New York, New York; and Mrs. M. B. Hermel, all of whose choices for incrimination had already been incriminated by others.

  And there was one final letter which contained a photocopy of the American Spectator subscription ad that lists many of the fine, thoughtful people who read our publication. My own name was added to the top of that list and, at the bottom, in crude, shaky letters appeared the message “KILL THEM ALL.” OK, Mom, cut it out.

  IV

  Shoot the Wounded

  The American Spectator, November 1990

  Well, fellow witch-hunters, a lot has happened since we began our New Enemies List. Freedom has come to Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union has shriveled as a world power, the people of Nicaragua have given Danny Ortega the Order of the Boot, and all because of us and our brave revival of the Red Scare. As a result of our noble crusade, Communists are now just another small, half-baked cult who put out an occasional newsletter (the Washington Post, for instance) and pester people in airports (particularly Peking’s). Tail-Gunner Joe must have a mile-wide smile up there in Heaven’s AA meeting.

  “But who ya gonna pick on now?” smirk the liberals, who are no smarter running with the hares in the nineties than they were hunting with the hounds in the seventies. The answer to their question of who we’re going to pick on now is—them. Let’s whoop on the useful idiots, the moral equivalentizers, the peace scum, the social justice hairballs, and see who sang the Marxist tune and expected us not to mind because they had the lyrics wrong. You’re next, you south-ends-of-an-NEA-grant-headed-north, you.

  We won’t be able to print all the additions to the Scroll of Fools this year, partly because of sheer volume, partly because we’ve already shot so many of the fish in the barrel, and partly because we’ve exhausted the earth’s supply of “Fonda Commies” puns. Although we hounded Mitch Snyder to his death—he’s got a home now, and a warm one at that—we have yet to settle on fit punishment for our blacklist victims. Reader suggestions range from the bloodthirsty (“Throw them into a pit of live lawyers”) to the excessively humane (“Put them out of their misery with a brick”). No doubt a happy medium will emerge.

  First off, we will exercise droit du seigneur and set a couple of burning faggots (no sniggering, please) at the feet of Satan’s familiars:

  • The twig-toothing leaf-brains who spray-painted my local McDonald’s with the message “Meat Is Murder”—If meat is murder, does that mean eggs are rape?

  • The freshly unemployed Neville Chamberlains at Nuclear Free America, who proposed replacing the Iron Curtain with a “Curtain of Peace and Freedom.” I guess if you’re caught trying to escape through the “Peace Curtain” you get petitioned to death. Among the various frisbee-witted individuals and organizations “who wholeheartedly endorse this proposal” are:

  International Philosophers for Prevention of Nuclear Omnicide: I am not kidding.

  Nevada Desert Experience: I am still not kidding.

  Center on War and the Child

  International Peace Academy

  Lawyers Alliance for Nuclear Arms Control: Quick, which is worse, lawyers or nuclear winter?

  Albert Einstein International Academy Foundations: After the guy who gave us the mushroom cloud

  Hungarian Reform Federation: No wonder it took them so long to reform Hungary ... they were in the wrong country.

  Coretta Scott King

  Professionals for National Security: Which begs the question, “How do I go about joining Amateurs for International Insecurity?”

  So much for the goofs, now let’s turn to the goons:

  Third World Caucus/Clergy and Laity Concerned

  This bunch sent me a press release, trying to convince me to publish the name of the “Central Park Jogger.” What I’ll gladly publish is the coffin measurements for the filthy little jackals who almost killed her. But let me quote, with one obvious omission, from the TWC/CALC press release:

  Our national group has voted to make known its concerns regarding the increase [sic] racist collaboration between the newspapers and the so-called justice system....

  Concerted efforts on the part of newspapers to treat people of color in an insensitive and completely different manner than which European suspects and victims are written about is criminal. …

  There are a number of cases we can refer to, but the current cases of Tawana Br
awley and XXX, known to the world as the Central Park Jogger, are two cases in point. Both were found near death after being assaulted. Tawana, 16, should not have had her body exposed to the world in public. There was & is a concerted effort not to publish the name of the older European, XXX. …

  Third World Caucus/Clergy and Laity Concerned’s address is 198 Broadway, New York, New York 10038, and I am sure they would appreciate suggestions on where to place their future press releases.

  Next on my personal Enemies List are

  Conservative Democrats

  because they’re always getting caught in bed with Ted Kennedy and telling us, “It’s OK—we’re not in love.” Besides, everybody hates liberal Democrats these days. Of course, being good liberals, they hate themselves, too.

  Last, but most of all, j’accuse:

  Everyone mentioned in the book Tenured Radicals: How Politics Has Corrupted Our Higher Education, by Roger Kimball, except Roger Kimball

  When it comes to throwing the book at the stinking, treasonous redniks in our universities, this is the book to throw. Mortarboards off to you, Rog.

  Before I go, kudos to Polish painter Franciszek Starowieyski, who founded his own McCarthy Society in Warsaw and told the Polish weekly Przekroj:

  The McCarthy Society is my private society, created to honor this fine man who halted the frenzied advance of Communism turning brains into jelly. That is what his greatness is based on. This is a very elite society. I don’t even remember if anyone else besides me belongs to it.

  And now, the New Enemies List Update:

  Let us begin on a spiritual note, with five additions from Noel K. Anderson, pastor at the First Presbyterian Church in Edmond, Oklahoma. The reading shall be from the Book of Deuteronomy 32:15:

  But Jeshurun waxed fat, and kicked: thou art waxen fat, thou art grown thick, thou art covered with fatness; then he forsook God which made him, and lightly esteemed the Rock of his salvation.

  The Reverend Anderson would now like us to bow our heads and say a small prayer for these people and institutions as they walk that long, lonely mile to the ducking stool:

  Self-righteous nonsmokers

  All seminaries which mean to conventionalize “inclusive language,” sodomists’ rights, and a “Theology of Compensation” for any self-proclaiming oppressed group

  John Irving, for his vacuous and inapposite political whimperings in A Prayer for Owen Meany

  Any office with more plants than people

  Sensitive people who dress like gypsies or peasants

  Helen H. Bergman of New York, New York, indicts the Big Apple’s entire Democratic party establishment and lists most of them. Here are some highlights from her nomenklatura of worms in the winesap: