That said, the general idea of the “audacity of hope” was that in an age —pre-2008, you understand — of desperate cynicism, we needed a gargantuan dose of optimism, even chutzpah, to find the silver lining around the darkest of modern clouds, chiefly those hovering above the United States. The only man with the requisite skills for the task was Mr. Audacity-of-Hope-and-Change himself.
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It was a symbol of local pride, and like all things regional and local, it fell under the inflexible scrutiny of progressive aparatchiks and was found wanting as racist, nativist and, of course, political.
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Yet I hear often enough of students at state universities who attend class in their pajamas; and I once heard the story of a young woman who was stopped by the highway patrol for driving naked. Why? She said it was “hot.” It doubtless was, but her inability to distinguish between dressing appropriately for the season and dressing not at all might stand as a symbol of the times.
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With homosexual marriage given Justice Kennedy’s benediction as an inherent right, is it too far-fetched to envision courts granting homosexual litigants custody of children from the heterosexual marriages being dissolved?
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Shakespeare, more or less shorthand for the entire Western tradition, and perhaps its greatest literary manifestation, contains in abundance the most sublime meditations on nature and, outside of Scripture, the deepest insights into the soul of man quite likely ever written: high ambition, hilarious folly, bestial desire and the most refined love.
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But what of a modern-day Rip Van Winkle? First of all, the modern Rip would not need to snooze for twenty years; a mere eight or fewer might suffice for him to find changes unimaginable before his nap.
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I’m not saying that conservative Christians don’t wish the best for Bruce Jenner. Undoubtedly, many do. But I fear if there was a suicide attempt many Christian conservatives would say, or think, “I told you so.”
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But with season five of Downtown Abbey now history, I will say that while the characters were still there, the plots were not. A good character in a bad plot is liable to look like an idiot or a bore, and in either case, a major irritant.
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As to how we teach the post-modern student, put simply, we don’t. We are to engage. Now I’m all for a good class discussion, but I also know that students with minds as poorly stocked with the simple facts of history, literature, and politics require teaching and lots of it.
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This moral collapse of one of Hollywood’s most powerful studios brings to mind one of the most famous examples of tyrant-as-minor-star — Ernst’s Lubitsch’s 1942 masterpiece “To Be or Not to Be.” Here Hitler and his slavish goons are savaged satirically from start to finish — although the “great” man himself appears for only a few seconds.
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