The 10-member Republican field of presidential candidates is so lame that lawyer-lobbyist-actor Fred Thompson, who hasn't even officially thrown his hat into the ring, is now statistically tied with Rudy Giuliani for the lead in the race for the GOP nomination.(Some outlets are reporting that Thompson's one-point advantage in the Rasmussen poll puts him ahead of Rudy, but as I warned you here, the media generally aren't very good at reading poll results.)
Anyway, Thompson's apparently the flavor-of-the-summer in Republican circles. Here in RascalLand, the writer of this letter to the editor of the Rockford Register Star is more than ready for Freddy, and there are plenty more like him all across the fruited plain.
Which raises anew a question I posed last month in another context: Why are Republicans, given their vaunted hatred of Hollywood, seemingly more likely than Democrats to fall in love with actors? Ronald Reagan, John Wayne, Fred Thompson, et al. What's the deal?
The vast majority of Americans know nothing of Thompson beyond what they've seen of him in movies and on television. Are the ordinary folks who see him as presidential timber merely enamored of the kind of fictional characters he plays? Do they know that he's not really a Washington outsider? Are they aware that he was paid tons of money over several decades to pimp for corporations in the corridors of political power? Are they aware that his military experience has been pretty much limited to roles in movies like "The Hunt for Red October"?
I may be wrong about this, but it's my guess that the Democratic presidential nominee, whoever that turns out to be, will be happy if his Republican counterpart is Frederick Dalton Thompson.
3 comments:
Be careful what you wish for, Rascal. Who would have thought that someone with a history of drinking and drug problems, who dodged Vietnam by getting into the National Guard and then didn't show up half the time, who failed at just about every business he tried and whose only political asset was his father's name, would be elected not once, but twice as President? Frankly, I want to see the Republicans nominate Newt.
Newt, Freddy, Mr. Straight Talk, the guy who's descended from polygamists, the cross-dresser from New York, whomever. I think it's going to fun no matter whom the GOPers nominate. I guess my point was that Freddy's surge of popularity is just a bubble that eventually will burst and that he's nobody to fear. Our national situation today is much, much different from what it was in '00 and '04 when W won. We're at a crossroads, and I don't see us taking the road to the right.
Rascal - I wonder if any opponents of stem cell research are so pure of thought and character as to swear off any treatment coming from such research? I think it would be a nice debate question. Something like, 'Would you refuse treatment for Alzheimers if you knew the treatment was developed from embryonic stem cell research?' I wonder how a sleazebag like Newt (I know, he hasn't declared yet), would answer the question.
Post a Comment