Dan Rather (see below) isn’t the only cultural icon recently promoted to the coveted status of a victim don’t forget those po’ little Dixie Chicks!
Natalie Maines, you’ll recall, got the victim ball rolling for the Chicks with an anti-Bush rant that went over like a lead balloon with C & W fans.
The Chicks recently talked about their victim status with a Brit scribbler (as Myrna Blyth, who penned this wonderful commentary notes, the Chicks always fall for an English accent. It makes them open their mouths and insert their Jimmy Choos!):
At lunch [Chick Martie] Maguire whined about how poor Natalie, superstar as victim, was mistreated after she apologized to a British audience at a concert for being from the same state as President Bush. It was in the days leading up to the start of the war in Iraq. The aftermath of Maines’s remark ‘was like the McCarthy days, and it was almost like the country was unrecognizable,’ Maguire declared, without a touch of irony.
Then [Chick Emily] Robison jumped in to diss any singer who was supportive of our country at the time. According to her, all they were doing was ‘cashing in on being against what we said or what we stood for because that was promoting their career.’ In other words, only self-absorbed, liberal, America-hating celebrities can be sincere. Robison continued, ‘You’d see soldiers and American flags in every video. It became a sickening display of ultra patriotism.’
That really got the mouthy Maines going. Through ‘gritted teeth’ she declared, ‘The entire country may disagree with me but I don’t understand the necessity for patriotism. Why do you have to be a patriot? About what? This land is our land? Why? You can like where you live and like your life, but as for loving the whole country, I don’t see why people care about patriotism.’
How can we take seriously a singer who doesn’t seem to be so smart about music history, let alone American history? Maines apparently isn’t aware that the lyric ‘this land is my land, this land is your land’ was written by Woody Guthrie, also a critic of our country, but one who not only talked the talk but truly walked the long painful walk across Depression-era America.
What is really upsetting — and what these three may share with too many others today — is their tone deafness when it comes to realizing the enormous opportunities that being an America has given them. Rather, they sulk and complain, and feel oh-so-badly-one-by. Maines seems to think that living in a place she likes and having a life she likes is her right, and is completely unrelated to our country’s past, our system of government, and the sacrifices others have made (and continue to make today) for her well-being.
Like many entertainers, the Chicks are talented but that talent does not encompass a talent for astute political observations. Or, as Myrna says:
Shoot, I remember when the trio’s primary goal was not discussing the pros and cons of America’s foreign policy with Diane Sawyer but scoring a cover on Redbook.