ORWELL@TRIUMFRG.BITNET (02/06/90)
It is obvious that Leonard Abbey has his tongue partly or mostly in his cheek and enjoys rattling people's cages. O.k. by me -- sometimes I rise to the bait even when I know I'm being baited, other times not. As for films, I have always thought that a selection from the films of say, Humphrey Bogart, Gary Cooper, Kirk Douglas, Burt Lancaster, Spencer Tracy and Gregory Peck represented the best self of the U.S. -- e.g. "Casablanca", "The African Queen", "For Whom the Bell Tolls", "High Noon", "Inherit the Wind", "Judgement at Nuremburg", etc. The questions you then have to ask yourself, are these: Would Rick Blaine or Robert Jordan have been in favor of funding the contras and the El Salvador government? Would either of them have admired Oliver North? Would Ingrid Bergman have loved either of them if they had so been in favor? (Any male who has seen either Casablanca or For Whom the Bell Tolls without falling at least a little in love with Ingrid, is, in my estimation, no man at all.) The answer, to me, is clear. Here's looking at you, kid. Ron Balden