RSSJuly 07, 2008
Quick Quiz: Jesse Helms (Part 1)
Paul Slansky thinks Jesse Helms requires so much posthumous kicking around that it can't all be contained in a single quiz, but rather needs to be luxuriated in throughout the week.
1) In his 1950 debut in politics, Jesse Helms worked for segregationist North Carolina Senate candidate Willis Smith. Helms helped come up with this ad: "White people, wake up before it's too late. Do you want Negroes working beside you, your wife and your daughters, in your mills and factories? [Smith's opponent] Frank Graham favors mingling of the races." What else did Helms do to insure Smith's victory?
He started a whispering campaign about Graham having fathered an illegitimate half-black child.
He doctored a photograph to show Graham's wife dancing with a black man.
He phoned people in the middle of the night claiming to be Graham and asked for their votes.
2) What did New Yorker writer Rick Hertzberg say about the passing of Jesse Helms?
"Far too late for it to do anybody any good, Jesse Helms has died."
"Remember how exhilarating it was to hear that Jerry Falwell was dead? Here comes that feeling again."
"My only regret is that he didn't live long enough to see the swearing-in of President Obama."
3) As Steven A. Holmes put it so brilliantly in his New York Times obit, "Mr. Helms liked his art uncomplicated." What would be an example of the kind of art that was too "complicated" for Mr. Helms, and that prompted him to try to cut the funding for the National Endowment for the Arts for subsidizing it?
A photograph of a man peeing into another man's mouth.
A photograph of an anus with a bullwhip sticking out of it.
Both of the above, and also a big jar of urine with a crucifix submerged in it.
4) Which of these best sums up Jesse Helms's reaction to "complicated" art?
"I wonder what the artist was trying to say there."
"Okay, I don't get it but someone else might."
"I can't figure it out so I hate it and no one should be allowed to see it ever again."
5) Which of these assessments of Jesse Helms was ludicrously offered up by the increasingly widely despised George W. Bush?
"Jesse Helms's legacy is one of hatred, homophobia and racism."
"Senator Helms certainly was no bigot. He was a man, however, not into subtlety."
"Jesse Helms was a kind, decent and humble man."
More to come.
Filed under: Quick Quiz, Jesse Helms, Jesse Helms dead, Jesse Helms died, Jesse Helms RIP, Jesse Helms senator, Jesse Helms NEA, Jesse Helms National Endowment of the Arts, Jesse Helms racist, Jesse Helms racism, Jesse Helms segregationist, Jesse Helms segregation, Frank Graham, Jesse Helms Frank Graham, Jesse Helms Willis Smith, Willis Smith, Jesse Helms Robert Mapplethorpe, Jesse Helms George Bush, Jesse Helms, George W. Bush
Loading comments…
