[Marxism] Oprah, the memoir, and the Iraq war

[Brian Shannon <brian_shannon@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I started reading this NY Times transcript of Oprah confronting James
Frey and all at once realized that Frey's lies were a little like
Bush's lies and then I came to Frank Rich's interjection who said the
same thing.

So read on. It becomes hilarious or tragic depending on your mood if
for James Frey you substitute George W. Bush.

And as all Marxmail subscribers should be aware the NY Times on the
web is mostly free. It is definitely worthwhile signing up for the
whole thing.
http://makeashorterlink.com/?S6FA2298C

Brian Shannon
_____________________________

Mr. [JAMES] FREY: I've struggled with the idea of it, and...

WINFREY: No, the lie of it. That's a lie. It's not an idea, James,
that's a lie.
. . .
Mr. STANLEY CROUCH (New York Daily News): Oprah Winfrey is, number
one, the queen of good will in the United States. And she was had,
it's that simple.

Ms. MAUREEN DOWD (The New York Times): James Frey very clearly lied
to promote his book, and I don't think that should get the Oprah seal
of approval.
. . .
Mr. [JOEL] STEIN: I mean, I felt like he was a liar and a weasel, but
the more I thought about it, I still loved the book. When I found out
a lot of it had been made up, it didn't really change how I felt
about the text. It certainly changed how I felt about the author.

Ms. DOWD: It's just very disappointing that the publishing house
doesn't care; they're counting their money. And readers don't care,
it's gone to the top of the bestseller list. But somebody has to
stand up for truth. This is not a close call.

Mr. CROUCH: Is he a liar alone, or was he coerced by Doubleday into
becoming a bigger liar? That's the real question. And that's the one
that has to be addressed.

Mr. STEIN: I think people can sense when a detailed truth isn't true
and when the bigger truth is true. And it doesn't excuse what he did.
I mean, it's still wrong if someone lied to you, you resent them.

Ms. DOWD: I would say that Oprah should kick James Frey's boney,
lying, non-fiction butt out of the kingdom of Oprah.
. . .
Mr. [RICHARD] COHEN: And I would say to the publishing industry, you
guys have got to cut this out. You're not little shops anymore with
two or put three people working with quills, you're part of a large
corp--large corporation, hire somebody for 25, $30,000 a year as a
fact checker. A fact checker would have found out in a half an hour
that some of this book didn't--didn't work, because the book doesn't
pass the smell test. I--Nan's a great person and a friend, I have to
put that up front, but I started reading that book and I said, `How
does this guy get on the airplane like this?' I mean, I can't get on
the airplane with a third piece of luggage, how did he get on like this?

WINFREY: When he's holding his face and bleeding?

Mr. COHEN: And so, you know, when something doesn't pass the smell
test, you give it to a fact checker. Work it out. Somebody could have
done what The Smoking Gun did, they could have done it. Publishers
have to do it from here on in. There's a difference between truth and
fiction; we find this out all the time. Now we're finding it out
again. It's a betrayal of his readers, it was a betrayal of you, and
it was a betrayal, I think, of Nan.

WINFREY: Why do you think it was a betrayal of his readers?

Mr. COHEN: Because they were told that this actually happened. They
were told truth. I--I--I know nothing about addiction, very little
about addiction. I'm only addicted to bagels and that's it. But--but
you--I talk to people about this, people who know about addiction,
and they said the first step is truth. The first step is self-
accountability, coming to terms...
. . .
Mr. COHEN: Well, I'm not going to pardon what he did, I mean, it was
a lie. And--I'm a journalist. I believe in truth, I believe that
there is such a thing as truth, and I don't play this game. I heard
what Nan said, and I respect what Nan said. If a man says, `I'd like
you to meet my beautiful wife,' and she's, like, teeth sticking out
and all these things, you know, you know that it's not his beautiful
wife, but so what? That's what a memoir is, you know, you can get
away with that. But half an hour in jail is not three months in jail.

WINFREY: Right.

Mr. COHEN: And the difference between one and the other is the
difference between the truth and a lie.
. . .

Mr. [FRANK] RICH: I mean we live in this world now which this is just
sort of the tip of the iceberg, this memoir, where anyone can sort of
put out something that sort of looks true, smells--smells a little
bit like truth, but in fact is in some way fictionalized. And you
look at anything from Enron fooling people and creating this aura of
a great business making huge profits when it was an empty shell. Or
people in the government telling us that mushroom clouds are going to
come our way if we don't invade Iraq in two months when it was on
faulty and possibly suspect intelligence.
. . .

Mr. [ROY PETER] CLARK: Oprah, do we--this is very important for two
reasons. The first is that when you learn some significant piece of a
story is not true...

WINFREY: Yeah.

Mr. CLARK: ...you begin to doubt everything in the story.
. . .
Mr. FREY: I mean, I feel like I came here and I have been honest with
you. I have, you know, essentially admitted to...

WINFREY: Lying.

Mr. FREY: ...what I have been--to lying.

WINFREY: To lying.






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