Ben Stein on Hollywood

Here's a beautifully written piece on last week's Academy Awards by Ben Stein in AMERICAN SPECTATOR:

Hollywood is above all about self: self-congratulation, self-promotion, and above all, self-protection. This is human and basic, but let's not kid ourselves. There is no greatness there in the Kodak theater. The greatness is on patrol in Kirkuk. The greatness lies unable to sleep worrying about her man in Mosul. The greatness sleeps at Arlington National Cemetery and lies waiting for death in VA Hospitals. God help us that we have sunk so low as to confuse foolish and petty boasting with the real courage that keeps this nation and the many fools in it alive and flourishing on national TV.

Well done, Mr. Stein. I will, however, go see V For Vendetta, which is already being flayed as a thinly veiled attack on the war on terror by the Matrix's Wachoski brothers, largely because I like to see things blow up and Natalie Portman in skimpy clothes. Which, I suppose, makes me a guy. Or a hypocrite...