4 JANUARY 1992, Page 33

High life

What a wonderful year

Taki

I

New York think it imperative to start the New Year right, and nothing starts it better than bringing down a pompous ass a peg or two, namely Woodrow Wilson Wyatt Weeford, a once pinko turned establishment lackey. WWWW recently wrote that I got it wrong about Maxwell's gambling, and that the fat crook did not owe Maxim's casino any money when he died. The only trouble is that I never said that he did: What I wrote was that he lost millions in the last desper- ate week before he committed suicide, but did not specify that he lost it at Maxim's. And even if he had lost it at Maxim's, did Woodrow Wilson really believe the casino would tell him the truth? Casinos report only clients winning, never losing, but how is Wilson Weeford to know such things? After all, I hear he once shook the hand of

a man who drove the Queen Mother around, and that WWWW has been in a trance ever since. Mind you, he's got a beautiful daughter, so I forgive him, but next time, Wilson, leave the gambling bits to me. I've lost two fortunes on the green felt tables, and casino owners trust me and tell me things. They think very little of peo- ple who are friendly with the royals because they spend their money on the blue-bloods rather than on Lady Luck. What I suspect is someone gave WWWW a bum steer.

But on to more important matters. In the immortal words of Rupert Soames, I got so hog-whimpering drunk during Christmas Eve that it took me all that week leading up to New Year's to recover. This came after a wonderful week in London, culmi- nating with my party at Christopher's. My NBF, Lady Longford, told me it reminded her of the ball before•the Battle of Water- loo, but even I, in my inebriated state, thought she was stretching it a bit. But I went to bed at nine in the morning, which I guess means I was enjoying myself.

And unlike Donald Trump, Robert Maxwell, John Gutfreund and poor old Gorby, I thought 1991 a great year. All the crooks got caught, and all those dumb union leaders (New York Daily News) ditto. The dirt on Clarence Thomas did not stick, despite the efforts of the senate committee to bankrupt public debate by introducing the pathetic lies of Ms Hill; BCCI was exposed, and Princess Michael was yet again found to have borrowed words belonging to others. The bad news was that Croatia was left to fend for herself against the only communist totalitarian army of Europe, and that William Smith and the Kennedy machine once again hoodwinked the American public. And jury.

Further had news is that in 1992, with communism dead, we have something almost as bad to contend with: multicultur- alism. And Pomo-Afro-Homos. It means post-modern African-American homosexu- als, and they, too, are becoming a force to reckon with in the Republic. In fact things are getting so bad in the classroom that places like Stanford and Harvard are jock- eying to persuade Mikhail Gorbachev to teach their students. As Cal Thomas, a syn- dicated columnist, wrote, 'what on earth would Mr G bring to a classroom in the West? Successful economic theory?'

Needless to say, there is always the anti- dote of Pat Buchanan, who summed it all up with this: 'I think God made all people good, but if we had to take a million immi- grants in, say Zulus, or Englishmen; and put them in Virginia, what group would be easier to assimilate and would cause less trouble for the people of Virginia?'

Better yet, Christopher Buckley com- pared the United States with Colonel Renault of Casablanca fame. 'Everyone seems shocked at the drop of a hat . ' , writes Christo, and I for one intend to shock more in '92. Happy New Year.