The American Enterprise articles from September 1997

The American Enterprise archives from September 1997

Rupert Murdoch. (media tycoon)(Interview)
September 1, 1997... A MEDIA MAGNATE DEFENDS HIS LATEST VENTURE IN TELEVISION NEWS, AS WELL AS HIS NEWSPAPERS AND TV SHOWS - BELOVED BY THE COMMON MAN, BUT NOT THE CRITICS. Rupert Murdoch has been called both brilliant and vulgar (sometimes by the same person),...

Rebel children.
September 1, 1997... It used to be that rejecting the views of one's parents meant veering to the left. No more. Come meet the new... When a young Hillary Rodham headed out for Wellesley College in fall 1965, she proudly described herself as a "Gold-water girl."...

Alan Greenspan - cultist? The fascinating personal history of Mr. Pinstripe. (Federal Reserve Board chairman)
September 1, 1997... The Fascinating Personal History of Mr. Pinstripe Alan Greenspan's name first appeared in the New York Times, not as one might expect, in connection with politics or economics, but as the author of a 73-word letter to the editor of the Times...

In praise of television: the greatest TV show ever. ('The Simpsons')(includes related article on a visit to Springfield, Oregon)
September 1, 1997... A Shakespeare scholar lauds 'The Simpsons' Taking potshots at television has become all too easy. The boob-tube tends to flatten out reality, to oversimplify the human beings it presents to the point of caricature, and to rely on stereotypical...

Great books, great dog. ('Wishbone')
September 1, 1997... 'Wishbone' brings the classics to life I am standing on the battlefield of Shrewsbury advising a dog how an English medieval king might comport himself in battle. Before us, a company of archers has just loosed a volley of arrows; behind us, a...

The Fox News gamble. (establishment of Fox News)
September 1, 1997... A brash news channel bets non-liberal reporting will beat the competition. Brit Hume has his work cut out for him. As head of the Washington bureau of the infant Fox News Channel, he's working hard to get the scoop on the top stories in town....

Good news & bad news: the trouble with network news. (includes related articles on TV's influence on the public and TV as a source of news)
September 1, 1997... Conservatives complain incessantly about liberal bias in television news, but while well-founded, this criticism misses a larger point: Network news today is frivolous, fluffy, sensational, tabloid, dumbed-down, and just plain stupid. If People...

TV and me: what my TV talk show taught me.
September 1, 1997... During 1994-95, my national television show was on 156 stations, covering over 80 percent of America. Yet of all the people to have their own television show, I must be he most ironic choice. First, I almost never watch television. Since...

TV vice? Sex and violence aren't the problem.
September 1, 1997... Most Americans who fret over television focus on its seedy content, often waxing nostalgic for the innocent fare of yesteryear. If only "The Beaver" hadn't transmogrified into "Beavis," they sigh, then TV might still function as a source of...

Religion on TV doesn't have a prayer. (shows featuring religious persons)
September 1, 1997... Whether it's news shows that ignore religion or entertainment programs that regularly depict clergymen as buffoons, hypocrites, or outright perverts, on remains ground zero for the culture of Rabbi Marc Gellman, one of the first clergymen to pear...

America unplugged. (giving up TV viewing)
September 1, 1997... Growing up on Long Island, I watched my share of murders and sit-coms, as well as space shots and political assassinations. I always thought Maxwell Smart had a better grip on the Cold War than did Henry Kissinger. Everything I needed to know...

TV-free: real families describe life without the tube.
September 1, 1997... Real families describe life without the tube Does the idea of killing your TV - getting the box completely out of your house - seem unfathomable? Well, two million American households, most of them families with children, have done exactly...

The Gentleman's Guide to Life: What Every Guy Should Know About Living Large, Loving Well, Feeling Strong, and Looking Good.
September 1, 1997... The intended audience of Steve Friedman's The Gentleman's Guide to Life is the American "guy," a sociological type that has yet to be adequately defined but is everywhere apparent. "Guys" can be distinguished even at great distance by the...

Rules of Civility: The 110 Precepts That Guided Our First President in War and Peace.
September 1, 1997... The intended audience of Steve Friedman's The Gentleman's Guide to Life is the American "guy," a sociological type that has yet to be adequately defined but is everywhere apparent. "Guys" can be distinguished even at great distance by the...

The Vanishing American Jew: In Search of Jewish Identity for the Next Century.
September 1, 1997... Responding to the personal crisis of his son's marriage to a gentile, Alan Dershowitz mounts a full-scale attack on the religion of Judaism, which condemns marriage of Jews to unconverted gentiles. Instead, he advocates not a faith but a...

The Correspondence of Shelby Foote and Walker Percy.(Book Talk)
September 1, 1997... Do you think, Georgia novelist Flannery O Connor was asked, that universities strangle writers? Frankly, she replied, I think they don't strangle enough of them. Readers of the 40-year correspondence between O'Connor's fellow Southern authors...

Ground Zero: The Gender Wars in the Military.
September 1, 1997... Once in a while, a feminist stumbles upon the truth. Whether their motive is a hatred of men or a concern for women, some feminists in recent years have discovered that pornography and contraception are male inventions, more enslaving than...

The Decline of American Liberalism.
September 1, 1997... Although originally published in 1955 and much engaged with the Cold War's chilling effects on civil liberties, Arthur A. Ekirch, Jr.'s provocative The Decline of American Liberalism has perhaps never been more relevant. By stressing that, from...