Strengthening Constitutional Self-Government

No Left Turns

Happy Birthday Brigham Young, Marillyn Monroe, and Walt Whitman (June 1)!

Each of these strange and wonderful Americans dsplayed a distinctive feature of our nation’s liberty and could not have been from anywhere else. I would even say that Brigham and Walt are the most impressive representatives of the two most influential forms of religion that originated on our soil. Is there an American poet with a heart large enough to love them both? I could say something now about Marilyn’s heart, but I won’t.

Discussions - 4 Comments

Somebody's got to say something about this! Peter has outdone himself with this tradic juxtaposition. For starters, what is Marilyn doing between Brigham and Walt? How does she fit in with our home grown polygamist and gay celebrant of all things American? Is there a secret teaching here? I could love the tragic Marilyn, but am not up to Brig and Walt (though I remember the great Hollywood movie about Brigham with Tyrone Power I think, and the hordes of locusts).

Why do men always have to find Marilyn Monroe a tragic figure? Why can't she just be a loose woman with a predictable ending? Chivalry or wishful thinking?

No doubt it's sex, Julie. Though she was misused by powerful men? Or before that unappreciative of the love of better men? Has anyone ever read Arthur Miller's paean to her, "After the Fall?" I read it as a senior in high school and was quite moved, which is probably what it's worth but.....

More for Julie: I read your eloquent and probably true defense of Cindy Sheehan below. Would you be as sympathetic with MM? Given the nature of the female beast, with the tyrannical temptations to which Tocqueville alludes, isn't the combination of conventional beauty and fame a very very very near occasion of sin?

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