Who died and made Ronald Reagan Jesus? Seriously, the last time a biography of a major figure garnered this much hand wringing and sight-unseen denouncement it was 1988 and Martin Scorsese’s Last Temptation of Christ was being protested in shopping malls across the country. People, who had not seen the film, only heard about it, were so incensed that they tried to prevent the film from being distributed and tried to interrupt the screening process. Now, religion is a touchy subject, obviously. And Jesus is such a central presence in so many peoples’ lives that I understand their instinct to protect him, even if I think it’s counter to his very message.

But Ronald Reagan? We are not allowed to say anything negative about Ronald Reagan? A television network cannot air a biography about the man’s life that dares to mention that the first family barely spoke to each other, even though we all knew the family was a mess when they were in the White House? We cannot present a film that addresses the shamefully blind eyes Reagan as President turned on the growing AIDS epidemic? We can’t even mention Nancy and her astrologers?

Nope. Because if a network does that, there will be boycotts. Were there boycotts when a miniseries presented Joe Kennedy as a philandering S.O.B.? Or, as she aparently rightly pointed out, when Martha Stewart was presented as a chablis-throwing harridan? No. But, apparently, Republicans are special. They get to piss and moan anytime the “liberal media” says anything remotely negative about them and Les Moonves will cave. Because, according to Ed Rollins, “now is a bad time to piss off Republicans”.

Why? Because they might announce in the next State of the Union that some guy in Sudan claims Les Moonves has weapons of mass destruction and invade CBS Television City? Because they will pass more laws limiting our civil rights, making it legal to incarcerate the CSI: Miami cast without due process? Because they might force the Supreme Court to say Friends is the number one show in households even though Survivor had more total viewers?

Who cares if CBS pisses off the Republicans? Do you have any idea the ratings this miniseries would have generated now that everyone is so up in arms about it? This wasn’t a business decision. This was an act of cowardice. CBS has the right to air or not air whatever they want, whether the Republican National Committee or Sean Hannity or our distinguished leader like it or not. Les Moonves should have aired the thing, dealt with the consequences and gone to his shareholders having won the November sweeps.

And why does Ronald Reagan get this kind of special treatment, anyway? His administration saw far more disturbing scandals that Clinton’s did. (An illicit hummer versus selling weapons to terrorists. Gee, which one is more dangerous?). He ignored the greatest health crisis in the country because it was mainly affecting gays. And let’s just say he wasn’t the greatest success as a father. But actually portray any of this in a movie and it’s a license to whine.

Well, to those Republicans (and by no means do I mean all Republicans – I’m talking the dittoheads and O-Reilly-ites and Bushies who think free speech is only for those who agree with them), I’d like to say this:

Grow the fuck up.

In a country with free speech, people might say mean things about people you like. Reporters might uncover stories about your friends doing bad or wrongheaded things. Others might actually have opinions that differ from your own. You know what you do when that happens? You come back with your own opinion. You don’t browbeat your opponent into submission. And stop assuming that the American people are stupid.

That’s the story that is not going to be addressed. The reason that Hannity and his ilk were so furious about this TV Movie is that they fear anyone who watches it will take it as gospel. How facile, how idiotic, how devoid of higher brain functions do these pundits think we are? The very presence of actors usually tips us off that we are not witnessing a documentary. And even if we were, we understand the artistic process, we understand subjectivity, we understand a lot.

Look, I realize that at the end of the day Les Moonves made a business decision. I think he’s a wussy, but I understand why he did it. I also understand why someone would be concerned about a movie about Ronald Reagan starring the husband of Barbra Streisand. But to actually try to force the thing off the air is un-American.

There’s a lot of anger in this country. Democrats are angry because, well, we won the election in the first place. And some madmen killed 3000 of us for no damn good reason and then the President (who, you’ll remember, we didn’t exactly elect) used those murders to justify a war we did not want to fight and, now it turns out, knowingly used dubious, if not falsified, information to do it. And our economy is tanking. And the President, who should be bringing us together in this time of crisis, can’t seem to bring a noun and a verb together let alone the country. So when the idiots in charge spend all of their time worrying about a miniseries and not the body bags coming home, when the Attorney General is too busy buying cloth to cover the boobies on a statue of Justice to respect our civil rights, when the President decides to attack gays on the same day it’s announced that he lied in the State of the Union, forgive us if we really don’t give a shit if Judy Davis makes Nancy Reagan seem a little unfriendly. Forgive us if we’d actually like to exercise those First Amendment rights we still hold on to. Forgive us if we don’t give a shit whether we’re nice to Ronald Reagan or not.

I don’t know who I’m mad at more, here, but I know I’m mad. And I know I’m not the only one. I just want to encourage everyone to do two things.

Sign up for Showtime.

And sign up to vote.

If these vocal Republicans have to spend so much time whining, maybe it’s time we gave them lots more free time with which to do so.