Canceling Kate, the “warmonger” within, Infamous Amos, &c.

September 21, 2001 12:00 p.m.

ell, now they’ve done it — the terrorists, that is. They’ve canceled Kiss Me, Kate, the best show on Broadway (which I say only because I haven’t yet been able to see The Producers). Kate was supposed to run until the end of the year. My wife and I saw it last year, on our anniversary. I was so looking forward to seeing it again. But it, like many other shows, had to close abruptly, owing to the paucity of tourists in the city.

Who cares? What a trivial, stupid thing to mention, amid all the death and destruction! A Broadway show, for heaven’s sake?

We talk about how our enemies seek to end, or disrupt, our “way of life” — a phrase that can seem meaningless. But this is the sort of thing we mean. They have robbed us of much that is precious, above all human lives, but they’ve robbed us of Kiss Me, Kate, too, and I have to say — Go get ’em.

By the way, the above is not unrelated to my ongoing steam about the cancellation of the Ryder Cup matches in England. Kiss Me, Kate, not far from the World Trade Center, wanted to go on, as usual. But it had to go away, because of the terrorists. The Ryder Cup could go on, easily — but it won’t.

My mood? Thanks for asking. Last week, I called a friend of mine and asked him about his own mood. He replied with a story about a favorite historian of his, the Briton Robert Byron. While filling out his passport application — in the significant year of 1938 — Byron gave his occupation as “warmonger.” This expressed his frustration with the complacency and timidity of his country.

This is how we feel, my friend and I (and countless others): “warmonger.” Not in a belligerent way, oddly enough (though you will ask how one can be a warmonger without being belligerent). Just in the sense of: Let’s get on with it, let’s be determined.

There was a sad, sad story in the New York Post — concerning something I never would have thought of (or at least not so quickly). All of those logos and designs featuring the New York skyline — a skyline that includes, that boasts, the Towers? What to do with them? Withdraw them? Phase them out after a decent interval? Keep them whole, indefinitely, in a show of defiance? This is a rather strange and peripheral question, but it is sad and fascinating all the same.

About three weeks ago, my wife and I gave a young friend of ours — the four-year-old daughter of friends — a “snow globe,” if that’s the proper term, of Manhattan. The sight of the thing, last night, we were told, was difficult.

Everyone has his own favorite article — his own favorite piece of journalism — that sums up his own feelings and views. My favorite, in the “what to do” category, is Richard Perle’s Sept. 19 piece in the Daily Telegraph. The piece basically expounds on what has become known in Washington as “the Wolfowitz view,” after deputy defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, who was disavowed and just plain dissed by the secretary of state, Colin Powell. Perle lays out beautifully why going after mere “terrorists,” per se, is futile, and why reckoning with the states that sponsor them — that give them their very breath — is the only way.

It seems to me that apologists for Arab intolerants — and such apologists are bold and prominent — are caught in a bit of a bind. On the one hand, they say, “The terrorists are a ridiculous, hated faction, and they have no popular support.” On the other, they say, “But you have to understand why people in the Middle East despise the United States so.” I’m not sure this is ultimately sustainable. Which is it, y’all? Do ordinary Middle Easterners abhor and reject our enemies? Or do we have to understand why ordinary Middle Easterners hate us, although perhaps not to the point of mass murder?

Good news, bad news: Said one Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations — probably the most prominent Muslim group in the country — “We can suppress terrorism by force, but not eliminate it except by justice. We have to understand when people abroad are angry with this country, and come up with solutions.” Said one Khalid Saffuri, president of the Islamic Institute — not the most prominent organization, unfortunately — “It’s wrong for someone to say he understands why terrorists would do this to America. There is never an excuse for doing it.” Whew.

I wonder if you noticed a newspaper ad taken out by the United Nations, or rather, taken out for the U.N. by the Better World Campaign, a group about which I know nothing, but whose name is lovely, isn’t it? The ad says, “The United Nations Stands with America.” Gee, that’s swell. It goes on to list a statement by Kofi Annan saying that he “condemns” the terrorists. Also swell. And there is an excerpt of a General Assembly resolution expressing “condolences and solidarity with the people and Government of the United States.” Super-swell. How neighborly and civilized.

Is it just my heightened U.N. pique, or shouldn’t it sorta go without saying that the U.N. is kind of miffed about unprovoked and murderous attacks on America? The whole ad, to me, had a kind of creepiness.

We may wish to call him Infamous Amos. In the widespread condemnation of the fat targets Falwell and Robertson, it has been somewhat lost that a preacher in San Francisco named Amos Brown delivered an anti-American tirade . . . at a memorial service for the victims. He said, “America, is there anything you did to set up this climate? America, America: What did you do — either intentionally or unintentionally — in the world order, in Central America, in Africa, where bombs are still blasting? America, what did you do in the global-warming conference when you did not embrace the smaller nations? America, what did you do two weeks ago when I stood at the world conference on racism, when you wouldn’t show up? Oh, America: What did you do?” The crowd went nuts, with glee.

To their credit, Democratic politicians Gray Davis and Dianne Feinstein walked out. Others did not.

My congressman — my ownself personal congressman — is Bad Jerry Nadler, one of the left-most and most obnoxious politicians in the United States. Yet, according to reports, he is dismissive of pleas from his Manhattan constituents that this country refrain from action: “I just think they’re wrong and living in a dream world. We’ve been attacked.” All right, Jer’: Let’s do lunch.

Another New York congressman, Charlie Rangel, is true to form. Said “Chollie” of Republicans and their economic initiatives in Congress, “Before we can even bury our dead, they’re asking for tax breaks.” It’s amazing how ugly the term “tax breaks” can be in certain mouths. Rangel says it as though talking about disease or crime or something. It must be remembered that any reduction in taxes, for any purpose, is a moral offense to some people.

Obviously, it has taken a national crisis to make Bill Clinton feel safe giving interviews again. He has chatted with anchormen, confident that there will be no questions about unpardonable pardons or anything else touchy. The Comeback Kid has come back — once more.

At so tense a time, a dose of sarcasm — of angry sarcasm — from our leaders is encouraging. The other day, Don Rumsfeld said, “The terrorists do not function in a vacuum. They don’t live in Antarctica. They work, they train, and they plan in countries. They’re benefiting from the support of governments.” I love that “Antarctica” : It makes one feel that the SecDef grasps the issue and is purposeful.

China, too, has been heard from: Jiang Zemin has made it clear that “any military action against terrorism” should be based on “irrefutable evidence and should aim at clear targets so as to avoid casualties among innocent people.” Of course, the PRC has always been a stickler for irrefutable evidence, and has always been careful not to inflict harm on innocent people. Falun Gong members must be particularly appreciative today of their government’s exquisitely moral position.

Here on the site, we’ve been calling our daily Hall of Shame “Kumbaya Watch” (put out by the redoubtable Ross Douthat). “Kumbaya,” of course, has for years been a sort of anthem of the American Left, at least in its gentler variety (though “This Land Is Your Land” probably still takes the cake). There is hilarious use made of “Kumbaya” in the early Tom Hanks movie Volunteers, always a popular rental.

It’s somewhat of a shame, though, because “Kumbaya” — drained of its political associations — is really a beautiful song, a Caribbean lullaby. Listen to Marilyn Horne sing it on her album of lullabies: She does so movingly and nobly. It’s hard to hear “Kumbaya” in the old, risible way again.

Speaking of patriotic singing — were we speaking of patriotic singing? — I couldn’t help thinking the other day of Leontyne Price’s singing of “America the Beautiful” (including the stirring verses beyond the opening, amber-waves-of-grain one). In her final recital at Carnegie Hall in 1991, she sang nine encores, virtually a “second program,” as we call it. (No one knew it was her farewell to Carnegie Hall, by the way — she didn’t tell anyone. Just as she didn’t announce what has proven her final, final recital, given at Chapel Hill, N.C., in 1998. Marilyn Horne, incidentally, was there — her friend ’tyne must have tipped her off.) Anyway, at the very end of the New York evening, Price came out without her accompanist and, somewhat hoarse but full of spirit, sang “America the Beautiful” — thrillingly. This recital was captured by RCA Victor, and it is unforgettable.

Okay, one more musical note: Sergei Rachmaninoff used to begin his recitals in his adoptive country — ours — with the playing of his own transcription of The Star-Spangled Banner. Another reason to admire him — and not a bad habit.

Finally, a correction (or clarification) or two. In a recent Impromptus, I blasted Italian defense minister Antonio Martino for being “the Perfect European,” based on reports that he had said his nation would not join the U.S. in a counter-terrorist war, while insisting that Washington not act without allied cooperation. Martino told Martin Sieff, in a UPI piece run on our site, that he had been misquoted.

I also received a call from the mayor of Ann Arbor, Mich., my hometown, which I have been describing and excoriating lately. I wrote that a correspondent had informed me that the mayor, John Hieftje, after a town meeting, had hugged a woman who had said, essentially, that the United States deserved what it got, because it, too, was a terrorist nation. The very gentlemanly Mayor Hieftje tells me that he did not hug her. He further says that he hails from “Main Street Ann Arbor,” not “campus Ann Arbor,” and that he, too, finds himself frustrated at the “political correctness” of the town (which I am apt to characterize less diplomatically as a hateful leftism).

Last, I thought I’d share part of a note I received from an old friend and high-school classmate: “I’m here to confirm for you that people who didn’t grow up in a fever swamp like ours do not believe our stories. My wife insists that I’m fixated on a few isolated incidents when I tell her what growing up in Ann Arbor was like. She doesn’t understand that, while she was in Knoxville diagramming sentences and dividing fractions, I was hearing about the glory of health care in Cuba and the amazing productivity of Soviet farmers.” Ma’am, I can vouch for your husband: It’s true.