How Hollywood liberals are making no sense by defending Polanski
On The View yesterday, Whoopi Goldberg stopped Sherri Shepherd in mid-fume as she ranted about Roman Polanski "raping" a 13-year-old. Polanski didn't plead guilty to a rape charge, Goldberg (correctly) pointed out. In his plea bargain, he admitted to having "unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor" (Polanski, now 76, was in his mid-forties at the time). And while something had surely occurred that day, Goldberg continued, it wasn't "rape rape." Prodded by an unrepentant Shepherd, Goldberg allowed that while she wouldn't like to think of her own 14-year-old daughter having sex, in Europe they saw young teens differently.Wow. While Goldberg insisted she was only concerned for journalistic accuracy about the charges, it was easy to see her as simply defending Polanski--a volunteer job she has shared, since this past weekend when the director was arrested in Switzerland on this 32-year-old charge, with such boldface directorial names as Martin Scorsese, Pedro Almodovar, and Woody Allen (whom Polanski should pay not to be a character witness), along with 100 other filmmakers, actors and industry figures. Maybe Goldberg et al. sympathize so strongly with Polanski's side of the story because they all share one great, common, artistic soul. Heck, both Polanski and Goldberg are Academy Award winners (he for The Pianist, she for, um, Ghost).
But given Goldberg's own proud history as a feminist and a liberal, one who famously mocked George Bush during the 2004 election campaign with sexually explicit puns on his name (and was dropped as Slimfast spokeswoman for her pains), this defense of such decadence, if not plain pedophilia, seems out of character. So maybe asking herself this question would help clear her mind: "If George Bush was the one accused of drugging, raping and sodomizing a 13-year-old back in the day, would I be defending him to an audience of millions? Would I be arguing the technicalities instead of the morality?" Suppose it was Donald Rumsfeld? Dick Cheney? Rush Limbaugh? Case closed.