If you don't think it was brilliant, then ask yourself, "Why is there so much commentary on it?" The answer is that Clint knows how to manipulate an audience, as any good actor/director must know. The fact that it bothered the over-rated Roger Ebert proves that. It also seems to have bothered President Obama. Small wonder. The nearest to an empty suit is an empty chair.
Please note: This is a purely technical commentary on my part. I'm a registered libertarian myself. So I'm just sayin'.
More here.
Eastwood apparently so annoyed the egomaniacal president that the leader of the Free World felt compelled to hit back via Twitter (“this seat is taken”) at the movie star. Talk about losing your presidential aura. Empty chair = Obama is now a powerful association. Will the chair be in ads?
Mark my words.: The impact of this going be quite large.
Further evidence.
Bob Newheart, who performed this very act for many years, tweeted that his lawyers were going to sue. I presumed he was joking.
ReplyDeleteI would prefer that entertainers stay clear of politics, but with so many of them coming for Obama and raising money for Obama, I didn't mind ole Clint coming out and doing his bit for Romney with a little humor and straight-shooting commentary.
The crowd apeared to love Clint Eastwood's speech and I believe most of the TV viewers did as well.
I was hoping you would weigh in, Paul.
ReplyDeleteClint Eastwood came across as a weird and befuddled old man when he talked to that empty chair. To claim otherwise is to utterly miss the general mainstream understanding of his, uh, performance.
ReplyDeleteNo, to understand the mainstream understanding of this is to be yourself befuddled. The mainstream understanding of it is called defensive spin.
ReplyDeleteI thought it was very good. Eastwood got his points across very well, each one clear as a bell. He left nothing to be confused about.
DeleteThis coming from someone who is looking at the third parties to see if there is a good platform out there. Obama's done too much tampering with what he does not understand, and Romney was a very average governor here in Massachusetts. Maybe the Green Party should get more votes, because they are addressing real issues in a point blank manner. If I don't find someone to vote for, then I will have to figure out which of the two ridiculously unfairly- and richly-promoted candidates will do less damage in the next four years, until we can get another choice.
As an old-time — and longtime — conservationist, I am unsympathetic to the Green Party and the environmental movement in general. I won't vote Libertarian, even though I am registered as one, because I would be throwing away my vote. The incumbent wasn't qualified for the job and has shrunk, not grown, in office. Average would be a distinct improvement. I am impressed, oddly enough, by Romney's very squareness.
ReplyDeleteI've never voted for the Green Party before, but I am trying to get creative with my vote, to let it count for something besides Romney or Obama. And I have thus far only looked at the Green party's platform, which is the only reason I bring it up. Here is a summary of where they want things to go: Summary of the Green New Deal. Here is presidential candidate Jill Stein talking about that in her People's State of the Union: A Green New Deal for America.
DeleteI cannot say that I think Jill Stein would make a better president than Romney or Obama. It's that the party is addressing important issues, it's that that is what they are about. By the way, that's the same with Libertarians. My brother ran for Congress in 10th Congressional district of Virginia back in 1982 as Libertarian. It's all about issues. He was dealing in whether he would get 2 or 3 percent of the vote if I remember correctly. It's about unselfishly making headway on important issues in the face of the juggernauts of the ruling parties.
What I get from both Obama and Romney is that this election is about Obama being president for four more years, or Romney getting to be president for at least the next four years. For Democrats is about a Democrat being president and for Republicans about a Republican being president. These agendas are more important than what either would do as president. Not so with the "third" parties, or what we should rather call the systemically ignored parties.
My idea is that maybe an alternative vote will help bring force against the parties in power, such that the issues become most important.
Where is there a presidential candidate who is running because he is a hero of some sort? There is no one we can point to and say, "That person there ought to be our president."
Romney was not my first choice - I was intially for Texas Gov Rick Perry. He's a military veteran, a 10-year Texas Gov and the state is doing fine, jobs wise.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, he was just awful in the debates, although he improved at the end. I liked what Perry said at the time, "We already have a good speaker and debater - Obama - how's that working for you?"
But now, like Frank, I kinda like Romney's low key, "square" approach. It is so unlike Obama's three-year ego trip (When Neil Armstrong died, Obama posted a photo of himself looking at the Moon, rather than a photo of Armstrong).
If I had to have a boss, and thankfully at this stage of my life, I don't, I would prefer Romney to one like Obama, who is full of himself and not too good at his job.
So, in turn, I prefer Romney to be our president over Obama.
So does ole Clint.
This is probably the only place where I, sitting in India, get to hear both good and bad about Eastwood's performance. I haven't seen it yet (oh, we here are dealing with our own major news -- a coal scam) but the "mainstream" media has consistently derided it, calling it widely lampooned, when they were the ones doing the lampooning. Pretty cyclical logic. Besides, I hardly think Eastwood, the maker of such brilliant gritty films as Mystic River and Million Dollar Baby would be off his knockers, as some seem to go so far to insinuate. Jesus!
ReplyDeleteRight on, Vikram. Clint remains a sly old fox, the same guy nobody thought would do anything more significant than play Rowdy Yates in the TV series Rawhide. Just think of how many times Clint has been right and the critics wrong.
ReplyDelete