Polanski Polarization

What a difference a day makes. I underestimated the relevance of this story when it first broke, then miscalculated the direction it would break.

Last night at this hour the most self-righteous Polanski defenders were still waxing hyperbolic, issuing demands, acting as if by sticking Polanski's jewishness in everyone's face they could ride roughshod over the few neutral, factual articles and negative op-eds. The elites were coming to the consensus that Polanski was the victim, and the ethnic-ethical divide was almost exclusively constrained to the disgusted comments of a million faceless nobodies.

Since then a few new Polanski defenders have come forward, but the overall tone has completely reversed. Some celebrities have questioned the defense. With the nobodies clearly and overwhelmingly against Polanski the elites have already begun trying to defuse the anger. Some of his early defenders are retreating from their previous positions.

A few zealous jews haven't yet gotten the memo. Roman Polanski: backlash as Whoopi Goldberg says director didn't commit 'rape-rape' - Telegraph:

Goldberg, star of The Color Purple and Sister Act, said: "I know it wasn't rape-rape. I think it was something else, but I don't believe it was rape-rape.

One celebrity supporter, the actress Debra Winger, said it was a "three-decades-old case that is dead but for minor technicalities. We stand by him and await his release and his next masterpiece." Movie mogul Harvey Weinstein said Polanski was a "humanist" who had been the victim of a "miscarriage of justice". He said: "We will have to speak to our leaders, particularly in California. I'm not too shy to go and talk to the Governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and to ask him once and for all to look at this."

That's curious. Weinstein thinks the governor of California answers to him.

However, the views of the Hollywood elite seemed out of step with those of ordinary Americans and they now face a backlash.

On the Los Angeles Times website only one in 30 comments from members of the public supported Polanski and most called for him to face justice.

Recall that bizarre piece that tried to paint the White/jewish culture war as an American/French or American/European conflict, Roman Polanski's Arrest: Why the French Are Outraged - TIME? They can file that one under oooooops. Roman's long, outrageous European holiday: For years, elites embraced child rapist Polanski, by James Kirchick, September 30th 2009:

For evidence of the widening cultural gulf between average people and the transnational cosmopolitan elite, look no further than reactions to the recent, and long overdue, arrest of Roman Polanski.

Fortunately, the degradation of the European intellectual and political class does not seem to be trickling down to the masses. In an online poll conducted by the French newspaper Le Figaro, more than 70% of the 30,000 participants voted in favor of Polanski's deportation to the United States, as did most of the 400 people who wrote letters to the magazine Le Point.

Keep in mind, however, that the supposed rage of the European masses was not stirred until his arrest last week, which inevitably brought forth a lurid rehashing of the original charges. Never before was there a popular movement among ordinary Europeans to have Polanski sent back to the U.S. in leg irons.

French support softens for Polanski, Hollywood divided | Entertainment | People | Reuters:

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told reporters in New York that Polanski's extradition from Switzerland to California to face sentencing on the 1977 sex crime charge was a matter for judges, not diplomats, to handle.

But support in Europe and Hollywood appears to be eroding. Along with the French government's new focus on strictly legal matters, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk on Tuesday said that while Polanski should be offered consular help, ministers need not get involved in the extradition battle.

Translation: all political manuevering to pardon/spring/free Polanski has now officially moved behind the scenes, away from public view.

Kirstie Alley on Roman Polanski: Don't Celebrate or Defend Him, Hollywood! - E! Online. Alley gets as unhinged as a Polanski defender, against Polanski and his defenders.

Twitter / Jewel: Polanski-admitted raping ...:

Polanski-admitted raping a 13 yr old-whys every1 in the arts upset hes facing jail? cause hes a gifted director? what am i missing?

This is a good indication Jewel Kilcher is not jewish. Only Whites can be so naive.

Next up, malpractice suit? Director Roman Polanski's boastful lawyer triggered arrest: report:

In paperwork filed as part of his bid to get 31-year-old rape charges dropped, Polanski's lawyers said the Los Angeles County district attorney's office wasn't really trying to hunt him down.

Bad move.

The Los Angeles Times reported that this claim "caught the eye" of prosecutors and prompted them to plot an end to Polanski's three decades as a fugitive.

But the Los Angeles County district attorney's office contends it has been trying to nab the filmmaker since he fled 30 years ago - including once in Israel as recently as 2007.

Prosecutors released a list Monday detailing their efforts to nab the director since 1978. They sought arrest warrants for Polanski in England, Thailand and France, they said.

Here's Patrick Goldstein climbing down. Sort of. Those angry town-hall Whites (AKA "Glenn Becks") are still to blame. Hollywood liberals under fire: The Polanski debate gets political | The Big Picture | Los Angeles Times:

It was surely only a matter of time. The noisy partisan divide that seems to infect everything in America today -- from what health care plan you want to what car you drive -- has surfaced again. As soon as commentators started weighing in on Roman Polanski's arrest over the weekend in Switzerland, the debate over whether the filmmaker should be made to stand trial in Los Angeles for his 1977 rape of a 13-year-old girl quickly turned into a series of shouting-match-style denunciations, with conservatives casting Polanski defenders as despicable, soft-headed liberals.

I know because I've been reading my mail, which has been running about 100-to-1 against Polanski. And since I wrote a column that most people interpreted as a defense of Polanski, the mail was also running 100-to-1 against me.

We live in an age where everyone is angry about everything. But I was taken aback by how many letters viewed the Polanski issue through a political prism -- if you weren't full of outrage over his crime and subsequent flight from prosecution, then you were a yellow-bellied lefty, always willing to come up with some new excuse for the loathsome behavior of the chic Hollywood elite.

So once again, we have a right-versus-left divide, with Hollywood, teeming as it is with Prius-driving liberals, being easily tossed into the lefty camp. To hear conservatives tell it, Polanski represents the classic example of the decadent artist who gets a free pass from liberals, the same liberals who'd be the first to express outrage against greedy Wall Street predators or Catholic priests accused of pedophilia.

He skipped town, sensing, as most people involved with the case have since concluded, that the judge had his own agenda and was going to bring the hammer down on him. But worrying about judicial fairness when it comes to a sexual predator would inject a layer of complexity into this affair that most people don't want to hear. Call it justice or call it vengeance, but people are town-hall-style angry that Polanski got off scott free, just as they are mad at the bankers on Wall Street who got bailed out -- after socking away millions in profit -- while regular folks got the shaft.

Commenters, once again, try to set Goldstein straight.

If your inbox is running 100-1 against Polanski then it's not a liberal conservative divide. It's a few Hollywood types who are comfortable letting him off since it wasn't "rape-rape."

Posted by: Tina | September 30, 2009 at 12:45 PM

This article confuses me. You are polarizing conservatives and liberals. I'm as liberal as they can get. I vote and donate to liberal causes, liberal politicians, environmental causes, etc..
There are a lot of liberals that I know, like me, who don't support the Polanski camp.

I think that when Polanski decided to rape a 13 yr old child - and sodomize her, he was absolutely wrong - there is no gray zone here. He was also wrong to flee his sentencing - and from what I have read - the Judge wanted to sentence him to an additional 48 days of prison... only 48 days... and that is why he fled the country. His lawyers wanted to have time served from his incarceration for psychiatric evaluation and the judge said no. Unlike a lot of other people, I actually read through the scanned transcript of that trial that is now publicly available on the web. What he did was horrific. period.

And no I don't think he has suffered already - he lives a lavish and free life. And to argue that he should never have gone to jail because he had horrible experiences in his life is a strange argument. Most of the people in our jails now had horrible upbringings and witnessed horrible crimes throughout their lives, yet no one is fighting to set all of them free.

Let's take a simpler and less morally challenging case - the artist is drunk driving and kills someone - shouldn't he be prosecuted the same as any other DWI case?

Sincerely, left-wing knee jerk liberal - who thinks raping children is wrong.

Posted by: Kim | September 30, 2009 at 12:48 PM

The main basis of the defense isn't liberal, or elite liberal, or Hollywood liberal. It's jewish.

Here's Anne Applebaum climbing down. Sort of. And much like Goldstein, it's done by first calling attention to the insulting feedback. Then she claims she didn't mention her conflict of interest because she didn't know there was one. We're to believe she wasn't in contact with her husband (I guess because being on different continents keeps phones from working) and didn't read any of the reports concerning his actions on Polanski's behalf. There's nothing worth excerpting from Applebaum's portion of PostPartisan - Reaction to Roman Polanski. But this reader's reaction is worth quoting and answering:

Ms. Applebaum,

I posted the link to wikipedia which stated your relationship with the polish foreign minister, whom I identified as Polish Ambassdor. I do not work for any DA or any government. Your defense of Mr. Polanski rings just as hollow as the people who defend or defended OJ Simpson. Mr. Polanksi is a deviant and a criminal. Because of his fame he was able to hide in Europe.

Posted by: nikhil22 | September 29, 2009 11:43 AM | Report abuse

Yes, Polanski is a jewish OJ. He quite neatly polarizes Whites and jews. Jews view him as a victim, wronged and hunted by a cruel, puritanical system. Whites see him as a pervert who has escaped justice.

OJ was famous and tried to run. Martha Stewart was famous and didn't run. Polanski ran but didn't hide. His fame and ego made that impossible. What enabled him to remain at large was the special deference any jew enjoys, but especially a "holocaust survivor" in Europe. That's why all the early defenses so bluntly played that card.