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MavKikiNYC · 10-02-2002, 03:32 PM

BABS BLOWS HER SHAKESPEARE

By RICHARD JOHNSON with Paula Froelich and Chris Wilson
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BARBRA Streisand is set to massacre her staff in the wake of her second super-embarrassing blunder in the space of a week.

On Friday, word got out that Streisand had fired off a memo to House Democratic leader Dick Gephardt urging him to resist the White House plan to attack Iraq. Unfortunately, not only was Streisand's memo faxed to a Republican's office by mistake, it was riddled with spelling errors - like "Gebhardt" - that made the diva look like a dunce.

Then, on Sunday night, Streisand performed at the Kodak Theater in L.A. for the $6 million National Democratic Gala. During her show, she lectured the crowd, and declared: "I find George Bush and Dick Cheney frightening. Donald Rumsfeld and John Ashcroft frightening . . . I find bringing the country to the brink of war unilaterally five weeks before an election questionable - and very, very frightening."

Babs then took a stab at eloquence with: "In the words of William Shakespeare, 'Beware the leader who bangs the drums of war in order to whip the citizenry into a patriotic fervor, for patriotism is indeed a double-edged sword.' "

But Streisand, who needs to brush up on her Shakespeare, was taken in by the online illiteracy that passes for erudition. As cyber-gossip Matt Drudge pointed out on his Web site, the "patriotism" line is not from the playwright. It first appeared last year when it circulated via e-mail.

Streisand clearly doesn't know propaganda from poetry. She insisted in a statement via her rep Dick Gutttman: "It doesn't detract from the fact that the words themselves are powerful and true and beautifully written. Whoever wrote this is damned talented, and should be writing his own play."

For the first time in many years, La Streisand's other mouthpiece, Ken Sunshine, was speechless when asked about the Shakespeare snafu. But he gamely declared, "Nobody else has the guts to say what's really on her mind about serious issues."

Streisand's script and some altered lyrics she sang to "The Way We Were" were written by Alan and Marilyn Bergman, who will likely take the fall. Meanwhile, Streisand laid into her staffers on her Web site, babrastreisand.com, blaming the memo misspellings on "a new employee."

"It seems that when Republicans don't like what you say, they attack you on the lowest and least pertinent level," Babs complains on her site's "Truth Alert" section. "The manner in which this memo was leaked obliterated the imperative message of the note by drawing attention only to the fact that a few words had been misspelled."

The site goes on to explain that Streisand dictated the memo over the phone to "a new employee who sent out a first draft before it had been reviewed or checked for spelling . . . The ironic further truth [is] the fact that Barbra is a former spelling bee champion!"

10-02-2002, 03:32 PM	#1
MavKikiNYC Diamond Member Join Date: Feb 2002 Posts: 8,509	BABS BLOWS HER SHAKESPEARE By RICHARD JOHNSON with Paula Froelich and Chris Wilson ------------------------------------------------------------------------ BARBRA Streisand is set to massacre her staff in the wake of her second super-embarrassing blunder in the space of a week. On Friday, word got out that Streisand had fired off a memo to House Democratic leader Dick Gephardt urging him to resist the White House plan to attack Iraq. Unfortunately, not only was Streisand's memo faxed to a Republican's office by mistake, it was riddled with spelling errors - like "Gebhardt" - that made the diva look like a dunce. Then, on Sunday night, Streisand performed at the Kodak Theater in L.A. for the $6 million National Democratic Gala. During her show, she lectured the crowd, and declared: "I find George Bush and Dick Cheney frightening. Donald Rumsfeld and John Ashcroft frightening . . . I find bringing the country to the brink of war unilaterally five weeks before an election questionable - and very, very frightening." Babs then took a stab at eloquence with: "In the words of William Shakespeare, 'Beware the leader who bangs the drums of war in order to whip the citizenry into a patriotic fervor, for patriotism is indeed a double-edged sword.' " But Streisand, who needs to brush up on her Shakespeare, was taken in by the online illiteracy that passes for erudition. As cyber-gossip Matt Drudge pointed out on his Web site, the "patriotism" line is not from the playwright. It first appeared last year when it circulated via e-mail. Streisand clearly doesn't know propaganda from poetry. She insisted in a statement via her rep Dick Gutttman: "It doesn't detract from the fact that the words themselves are powerful and true and beautifully written. Whoever wrote this is damned talented, and should be writing his own play." For the first time in many years, La Streisand's other mouthpiece, Ken Sunshine, was speechless when asked about the Shakespeare snafu. But he gamely declared, "Nobody else has the guts to say what's really on her mind about serious issues." Streisand's script and some altered lyrics she sang to "The Way We Were" were written by Alan and Marilyn Bergman, who will likely take the fall. Meanwhile, Streisand laid into her staffers on her Web site, babrastreisand.com, blaming the memo misspellings on "a new employee." "It seems that when Republicans don't like what you say, they attack you on the lowest and least pertinent level," Babs complains on her site's "Truth Alert" section. "The manner in which this memo was leaked obliterated the imperative message of the note by drawing attention only to the fact that a few words had been misspelled." The site goes on to explain that Streisand dictated the memo over the phone to "a new employee who sent out a first draft before it had been reviewed or checked for spelling . . . The ironic further truth [is] the fact that Barbra is a former spelling bee champion!"