Word: insulters
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...thing is that it was not so long ago that the art of the insult was in its heyday. Winston Churchill was a virtuoso at it, calling Clement Attlee "a sheep in sheep's clothing" when he was not calling him "a modest little man with much to be modest about." Then there was this famous exchange...
...trouble is that these insulters leave no heirs. The best we have-William F. Buckley Jr., Gore Vidal, Truman Capote -show a flair from time to time, but perhaps because cleverness is so desperately expected of them, often sound as if their hearts are not in it, as if they are merely paying tribute to the old masters. Capote once called Jacqueline Susann "a truck driver in drag." Have we come to this? During Watergate, H.R. Haldeman's lawyer, John J. Wilson, referred to Senator Daniel K. Inouye as "that little Jap." He then defended himself by saying that...
...this slackening occurred? For several reasons, all of which pertain to the general corruption of life as well as to that of the insult. There is psychiatry, for one thing. Mothers can no longer be joked about; victims agree with the worst that is said about them. There is provincialism, for another. Oscar Wilde explained: "Of course, America had often been discovered before Columbus, but it had always been hushed up." You could not get away with that today, even if you thought of it, because nations are as touchy as individuals. Then, too, no one wields real criticism...
...Violence has become an accepted way of life," says Sergeant J.J. Garcia. The slightest insult, real or imagined, provokes a mid-traffic surge for revenge. The protection of turf and machismo honor are the pretexts; baseball bats, screw drivers, knives, cheap guns and especially tire irons are the weapons. Sadly, passers-by are often the innocent victims of this remorseless violence...
...press conference, McCloskey added: "We have to respect the views of our Jewish citizens, but not be controlled by them." Morris Casuto, San Diego director of the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith, promptly denounced McCloskey's statements as "arrant nonsense" and "an insult to the Jewish community...