MAN UP, JUAN

The NPR-Juan Williams thing is why the Great Spirit made television: pure entertainment. NPR, of course, comes across as ideologically rigid, unfair, and not very bright.

But Juan Williams and his cohorts at Fox News are using the occasion to take both umbrage and gloating to new levels. The umbrage was at the seeming injustice of firing poor Juan for expressing in measured, non-inflammatory language a queasiness about getting on a plane with individuals in Muslim garb, a queasiness shared by perhaps 90 percent of his fellow citizens. The gloating was, “see, this proves our point about how hypocritical those pinhead leftwing liberals are.”

Juan-Fox, however, are in danger of overplaying their hand. In the day or so after his firing—which was immediately followed by a lucrative new contract for Juan with Fox—Juan was the guest host of Bill O’Reilly’s Factor. Instead of exercising a little low-keyed humor that would have made NPR even more the Ogre, Juan whined. And whined. And whined.

Whining is what Fox and conservatives accuse liberals of doing. But it appears that liberals haven’t cornered the market in whining. Juan and the other Fox conservatives have shown an ability to whine with the best of them.

One is tempted to resort to a favorite new phrase among distaff conservatives: Man Up.

Man Up, Juan. Stop your whining, enjoy your monetary largess, and get on with your life.

Incidentally, the perfect, though undoubtedly political incorrect, response of a Harry Reid or other target of a “Man Up” would be, “Hey Sweetheart, grow a pair.”