Tucker Carlson’s Crossfire

December 16, 2003

The release of Hillary Clinton’s autobiography should make readers painfully aware that political celebrities can write for hundreds of pages and still be incapable of saying anything meaningful about themselves or their times.  Yet, with Tucker Carlson’s new memoir of his days as a cable television talking head, this is decidedly not the case.  In   Politicians, Partisans, and Parasites: My Adventures in Cable News the author provides a pleasurable read even if imparting little in the way of political wisdom. 

Carlson’s narration spares few details and one has the feeling that his publishers were pleasantly surprised with the richness of his account.  His onscreen adventures began, improbably enough, with the OJ trial in 1995.  It seems that the offices of The Weekly Standard were called by Dan Rather’s booker in the hopes of finding a reporter to provide a conservative take on the trial, and Carlson, as he was the first one back from lunch, accepted the invitation. 

A few years and many appearances later, our author was transformed from a chain-smoking journo to a smoke-free, media celebrity.  He even got falsely accused of rape by a stalker fan (which says all one needs to know about his renown).  Carlson briefly had his own show with Bill Press called Spin Room and currently he is one of the hosts on Crossfire.

Before relaying more specifics about the book, let me state, as a disclaimer, that I am personally not a fan of this author.  Previously, I’ve always anticipated his views on politics with the same interest that I have in glasses of room temperature skim milk. 

Carlson himself cites the concerns that Congressman Tom Delay had about his representing the conservative side before the nation.  He believed Carlson “too liberal to represent the Right on the air.”  Frankly, I agreed with the Congressman before reading a page of the memoir and, after finishing it, I still agree with him.  CNN needs guys like Carlson to be rightists in name, as the rest of us would not let Bill Press or Paul Begala dominate us with their informercials. 

The author has warm affection for the likes of James Carville and Bill Press.  He also seems to lament Senator McCain’s loss to President Bush in the 2000 Republican primary, which is rather disturbing as McCain’s goal, in regards to the Republican Party, was that we should “burn it down.”

Tucker Carlson’s tempting by McCain is proof enough of his ideological moderation.  I’ve always regarded his habit of wearing a bowtie as being a form of compensation for a dispassionate outlook.  On television, it’s almost as if Carlson is attempting to convey to the viewer, “See, I really am a conservative.  I have the bowtie to prove it.  I bet you thought I was George Will.  Please disregard the milquetoast quality of my opinions.”  Unfortunately, I cannot.  I regard him as being our Alan Colmes– which isn’t saying a lot. 

However, Carlson’s lack of partisanship may have made his tale a better and more open portrait of the cable news world as he addresses people that many of us would have glossed over.  The stories he tells, even if they are devoid of partisan bias, are always intriguing.  The depictions of Carville, former Congressman Jim Traficant, Congressman Don Young, and Senator Ernest Hollings are absolutely hilarious.  In fact, if it did not involve crude language, I’d recount the incident involving Don Young, which I’m actually still laughing about.

As it is, the quotes from the Hollings are about as good as they get.  The next time anyone tells you Republicans are racist, recount with pride this paragraph concerning Hollings (the South Carolina Democrat):

“[He] once explained to a television crew how foreign imports were taking minimum-wage jobs away from South Carolina’s ‘darkies.’  Another time, he told a reporter that he was looking forward to a trip to Switzerland because ‘everybody likes to go to Geneva.  I used to do it for the Law of the Sea conferences and you’d find these potentates from down in Africa, you know.  Rather than eating each other, they’d just come up and get a good square meal in Geneva.’” 

The NAACP accused Hollings of being mentally ill and he responded by saying that they were trying to lynch him!  I think this section should be copied and sent to your favorite leftist acquaintances with the title, “Hollings Unbound: The True Voice of the Democratic Party.”

Speaking of racist quotations, the author’s recollections of his interactions with Jesse Jackson are priceless.  He begins by admitting: “I didn’t have a lot of respect for Jesse Jackson before I saw him host a television show, but I had even less after.”  After a guest appearance on the now defunct, Both Sides with Jesse Jackson, Carlson’s observations reveal the infamous racial extortionist to be the lazy, societal free-rider we know him to be.

However, it is Jim Traficant who comes out looking like the most twisted man on earth.  He shows up drunk at the station for a show, then gets mad and sexually assaults a couple of young women who work there.  When one refuses him, he calls her a “goddamn communist.”  Then he raids the makeup room and successfully gropes another woman before bounding away.  Even though he was inebriated at the time, the Congressman must have remembered the incident as he said to Carlson, before his trial, “Tell the girls at CNN that if I get convicted, I’m going to be looking for conjugal visits.”

It may well be worth buying the book just to read about the catty way in which Carlson deals with Barney Frank after the Congressman berated a producer who tried to adjust his blazer (the horror!): “I made a mental note to devote the rest of my life to subverting Frank’s career.”  He does a noble job. 

This is by no means a philosophical work, but it was a great deal of fun to read.  As many liberal comedians have painfully illustrated in the past, you do not have to be on the exact same ideological page as your audience in order to entertain. Tucker Carlson was on a mission to lightly and gleefully depict some of the strange politicians, partisans, and parasites that he has known on from cable news and he has succeeded admirably.  Now if he could just lose that bowtie.  Anyway, if you’re short a present or two, you might consider his memoir for just about anyone who likes to laugh.  

Carlson, Tucker.  Politicians, Partisans, and Parasites: My Adventures in Cable News.  New York: Warner Books, 2003.

 Bernard Chapin