LIBERTY WEEKEND--HERE IT COMES, READY OR NOT

Tall ships and taller tales.

The good news about the Statue of Liberty’s 100th birthday party is that it’s held only once a century. The bad news is that once a century is too often.

By 8 a.m. Monday, the so-called countdown to Liberty Weekend--which followed the countdown to the countdown--had already soared to a sickening zenith. By that time, New York Mayor Ed Koch will have extolled his city on both ABC’s “Good Morning America” and “The CBS Morning News.”

“The magnificence of New York, at 16 minutes before 8,” proclaimed David Hartman, “and when we come back, the man who runs the place, his honor.” What a low blow: “Good Morning America” was coming back.

By that time, also, New York Gov. Mario Cuomo had retold his son-of-refugees-makes-good saga for a captivated Hartman. “Melting pot.” Hartman repeated, lingering on Cuomo’s words as if whiffing an exotic new aroma.

By that time, also, Ned Beatty and Joan Rivers had told America what they think of America in an initial wave of celebrity vignettes on “The CBS Morning News” that “you won’t want to miss,” promised co-host Forrest Sawyer. Sure you do.

Moments later, the show’s weathercaster/reportercaster, Steve Baskerville, was airborne over New York Harbor (he was either in a blimp or was the blimp) and delivering the startling news that Ellis Island was the traditional first stop for arriving immigrants.

“I want to take you from Ellis Island across the country now,” Baskerville added. Suddenly, instead of the Statue of Liberty, viewers were seeing a weather map.

Give us a break! Please , one tiny, minuscule break.

Hand it to NBC’s “Today,” which decided to remain indoors most of this week and not invade Governor’s Island along with giddy “Good Morning America” and “The CBS Morning News.” Hence, “Today” became network TV’s only morning relief from Libertyphilia.

When you think about it, though, people attacking the Statue of Liberty centennial’s commercialism are on the wrong track.

Sure, the celebration of Lady Liberty is looking like a cluttered airport souvenir shop, a selling orgy producing amber waves of cash. The rouged-up commercialism is the most sincere side of this carnival, however. It’s honest. It’s up front. It’s charmingly American. It’s Van Nuys Boulevard in all its exquisite garishness, deserving a song by Randy Newman.

When you see sellers using the statue and other American icons to market their products, there’s no pretense. It’s to the point, wondrous, crude truth. Surely no one mistakes packaging for patriotism. When KTTV runs a movie package this week titled “Ladies of Liberty”--beginning with “Little Women” no less--you just have to love it. It’s America’s anthem.

Other elements of the Americasell are less endearing.

We have a handful of people on TV defining America for the rest of America, force-feeding the Statue of Liberty as something that is more intrinsically American, say, than the Indians.

How did Forrest Sawyer put it? “The dream that drives the entire nation.” Good journalist, Sawyer. But do we really need him or anyone speaking for the “entire nation?”

This whole event is reminiscent of the annual Super Bowling of America. You have the feeling that the tall ships here are really the New York Chamber of Commerce and ABC (“the official television network for Liberty Weekend”), that they cooked up this thing and got everyone else--including the press--to dance on a string.

We know about the paid commercials, but what about the free shilling?

The ABC and CBS morning shows have been festooning New York this week, lecturing the nation as if America’s largest and most storied city were some sort of secret until now. They’ve done everything but recommend hotels.

TV networks that have fed the nation New York for years (when they weren’t feeding the nation Los Angeles), were again serving the same meal. The features just oozed and oozed.

“How do you begin to describe this city, to experience it, to get a sense of it?” boy journalist Ron Reagan began on “Good Morning America.” Easy answer: You do it the way it’s been done thousands of other times.

Koch endorsed the city. Cuomo endorsed the city. Everyone else said it was a great city. Ashford and Simpson loved it. Geraldine Ferraro loved it. Stiller and Meara loved it. John Rubinstein loved it, although he produced a Dodgers baseball cap.

Hartman’s co-host, Joan Lunden, took America on a walking tour of the city Tuesday. The show’s weathercaster, Dave Murray, went fishing in the East River and pulled out a Yankees cap. On CBS, Baskerville stood at the East River and explained the city.

Have you noticed also that almost everyone on TV this week seems to have had parents who were poor refugees? “It was my mother who went out and scrubbed the floors and did the wash for other people,” James Reston told an interviewer. Isn’t there anyone left in America this week who was born rich and privileged and flaunts it?

A “CBS Evening News” story Monday cut through the smug “huddled masses” euphoria, noting the apparent discriminatory practice of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) in welcoming far more political refugees from Communist regimes than from other authoritarian countries.

And who has the Western Region of the INS picked to represent California as a U.S. citizen at a special swearing-in at a New York ceremony Thursday? Not a Latino, but Yakov Smirnoff, a Soviet-born comedian best known for making Lite beer commercials.

And one more thing: How ironic this surge of adulation for Lady Liberty in a land where only two years ago a female vice presidential candidate was a political oddity and where it probably will be many years before a woman can be elected President. It seems that many men prefer women as worshipped objects on a pedestal than as full partners.

On Tuesday, meanwhile, “The CBS Morning News” showed a Statue of Liberty look-alike contest. The winner was a woman who had covered herself with green paint.

And, as they say, the best is yet to come.