Andrew J. Lederer

Have we always lived in such a disingenuous society, where the prevailing paradigm is Casablanca's game-happy Captain Renault proclaiming expediently that he is "Shocked! Shocked to find that gambling is going on" in Rick's Cafe?

Merely the latest example of this mania for flogging others as if their actions (which may be wrong, but that's beside the point) are somehow out of the ordinary is the frenzy over Alec Baldwin's rage-filled and perhaps vile message to his 11-year-old daughter.

I don't know. The level of froth didn't seem outside my childhood experience or the experiences of others I know. I heard on CNN that Baldwin's visitation rights were rescinded because of this tape. Come on, now. For calling her a pig?

88% of America's children would be wards of the state if that were the standard of parental inadequacy.

This is what we fiddle with while America burns.