August 9, 1979

No Honor For Jane Fonda

It is ironic that Actress Jane Fonda should choose this week to publish a newspaper advertisement protesting the rejection by the California legislature of an appointment to the State Arts Council.

The sense of the law makers, by overwhelming majority, is that Ms.  Fonda committed acts of a "traitor" during the Vietnam War and thereby is undeserving of official recognition.

The actress summoned liberal friends to support her with their signatures.  Presumably such names as Shirley Maclain, Paul Newman and Sterling Hayden will impress us with their superior judgment.

Those of us over 30 remember well that exactly 15 years ago a U.S. destroyer with the improbable name of Joy reportedly was attacked by North Vietnam torpedo boats in the Bay of Tonkin.

Only five days later, Aug. 7, 1964, a rubber-stamp Congress passed a resolution giving President Lyndon Johnson standby powers to "take all necessary measures to protect U.S. forces and repel aggression."

And so a momentous issue was joined.

It was the logical extension of a humanitarian effort a year earlier to rescue North Vietnamese refugees.

Desperate Vietnamese by hundreds of thousands "voted with their feet" for democracy -- fleeing a communist massacre of genocide proportions.  More thousands took to the seas in rotten fishing boats and home made rafts -- the original "boat people."

The refugees were Christians who had been converted by French priests and indoctrinated by French politicians with ideals of "liberte, egality, fraternity."

Such "bourgeois" principles are poison to socialist regimes.  Those clinging to western notions must be eliminated, death being most certain.

Americans, still laboring under the do-nothing guilt of the Nazi holocaust, demanded we "do something."  President John F.  Kennedy sent in troops.  Churches set up refugee camps.  Liberals chided us for not doing more.

But the communists didn't play nice.

Thumbing their noses at the Geneva Treaty that had divided Vietnam, North Vietnam guerillas invaded the south and displayed a distressing preference fact shooting Americans.  With real bullets whistling about their heads!  American liberals quickly lost the stomach for human rights.

To cloak their timidity and distaste of personal sacrifice, erstwhile do-gooders mounted a campaign to find greater fault with the United States than with the enemy.  Such a rationale made retreat from great responsibilities hastily assumed not only permissible but even "moral."

Thus, it became fashionable with "intellectuals" to tear up draft cards, burn ROTC buildings and run away to neutral countries.

Jane Fonda did her part by going to North Vietnam to make an anti-American broadcast in the manner of Tokyo Rose and Axis Sally.  For the benefit of communist cameramen, Ms.  Fonda climbed onto an anti-aircraft gun, pretended to fire it at American planes and -- according to the Hanoi press -"giggled."

Americans are tolerant of outrageous behavior.  Giving aid and comfort to a declared enemy, however, is conduct that used to bring imprisonment if not execution.  Apparently entertainers have become so important to our modern society that we accord them privileges of insult.

Ms.  Fonda uses her status as an actress to command a respectful audience for political propaganda.

Then she demands we ignore her politics when it affects her money-making profession.

It is an American privilege to capitalize on reputation, but accountability goes with it.

Now, here we are 15 years later in the same ideological mire.  The liberal establishment is in a quandary.  It is too soon after Vietnam defeat to abandon a self-righteous position.  Yet, a new generation of boat people cries out for help.

Fonda and her show biz friends feel constrained to defend their previous position of surrender.  They invent blame for new communist horrors on lingering transgressions of Richard Nixon.

Less prominent liberals such as Folk Singer Joan Baez have no difficulty reversing themselves to demonstrate once again for involvement.

Deja vu.  The feeling persists that we've experienced all this before.

Ms.  Baez and a cortege of bleeding hearts march on Pennsylvania Avenue on behalf of Indochinese refugees.  President Jimmy Garter slips past his security guard to run across the White House lawn, climb up on the fence to shake hands with the demonstrators, and promise ships for the Bay of Tonkin.

And so American ships are in dangerous waters once more on missions of mercy.

Under the circumstances, conferring honor on Ms.  Fonda - the leading apologist for communist atrocities, the severest critic of American compassion -- hardly seems appropriate.

Author: Lindsey Williams