It’s been a year since George W. Bush left office.  Do you miss him yet?  

I do.  

For all his foibles – utter inability to explain his policies to the American public, bending over backwards for bipartisanship with Democrats, foolish bailouts – Bush was a president who understood the battle between good and evil in our current war on Islamofascism, even if he wouldn’t call the war by its proper name. 

And Bush’s clarity had a measurable impact on our film culture.  Leaving aside the obvious mirror images (the success of 24 or Taken, e.g.), the Bush Administration saw a rash of huge blockbusters dealing with the dichotomy between good and evil, and the necessity of fighting evil with every resource at our disposal.  

The single top earner of the Bush Administration was The Dark Knight, a very thinly veiled defense of Bush tactics in the war on terror.  No better speech on the motivation for terror can be found in movies than Michael Caine’s assertion as Alfred that “some people just want to watch the world burn.”   (more…)

Anyone remember this HuffPost from Wings’ star Steven Weber back in April? You know, pre-Virginia, New Jersey and *drumroll please* Scott Brown?:

G.O.P. R.I.P.

So there it stands: a naked, pigeon-chested old man, random strands of white hair on its boney shoulders; its swollen-knuckled hands clasped over its dead genitals, looking at once forlorn and menacing, shivering with self-loathing and xenophobia, raging pathetically at its timely and appropriate defeat at the hands of Reason.

Ladies and gentlemen: The Republican Party.

With every passing day, the people who stubbornly, maddeningly cling to an obsolete ideal and who stand in the way of the cultural advancement of this country, this America, spew the base reality of their caustic ideology into the air.

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One of the things I think most about is national security. Oh sure, my posts here at Big Hollywood are usually snarky takes on the idiocy we witness daily from clueless Hollywoodites like James Cameron, but national security issues feature prominently in many of my writings elsewhere. I also belong to a group in New York City, whose members gather monthly to hear experts speak about the various threats we face, especially from Islamic jihad.

American Nick Berg, just before his beheading by jihadists in 2004

Yes, jihad. That’s what it is. Not “the war on terror,” not an “overseas contingency operation.” Jihad. Say it. It’s not that hard. I often wonder how the experts whose lectures I hear sleep at night, knowing what they know about an ideology whose adherents want to kill us all.

And I often wonder how serious President Barack Obama is about keeping Americans safe. Considering the results of his first year in office, I’m definitely not encouraged. (more…)

We can look back today and see that George W. Bush’s departure from Washington on 1/20/09 was when the oceans stopped rising, the Earth began healing and, for Hollywood, when an unprecedented era of right-wing oppression and stifling conservative ideological conformity ended.

It is hard to believe the oppression we endured under Bush from our vantage point here in this age of openness and transparency – are you as sick as I am of those endless health care reform negotiations that C-SPAN keeps broadcasting?  Before 1/20/09, our artistic community huddled in collective terror at the specter of a midnight knock on the door should they dare to dissent from the Bush regime’s party line in public.  Hollywood’s silence was deafening.

But with the dungeons of Guantanamo Bay finally closed, the threat of government repression of dissident voices has completely vanished, and the demonization of opposition voices is a thing of the past.  Once again, we have a mainstream media that dares to break and run with news stories that speak truth to power, aided by a White House press office dedicated to providing straightforward, truthful answers to reporters. (more…)

President George W. Bush left office a year ago today.  The occasion was marked for me, not so much as the grand event of inaugurating our first black President, as it was a societal harbinger of ominous times ahead.  Mr. Bush congratulated Mr. Obama warmly, embracing him with the camaraderie reserved for that elite membership of U.S. presidents.  The accompanying catcalls and boo’s cast a pall upon what was heretofore a somber, and joyous occasion; but now colored a sick patina as the true vitriol and hateful venom rose with cruel and vindictive openness.  The taunting jeers, the rude remarks, the derision of contempt.  Well…there goes the neighborhood, I thought to myself.

It seemed that occasion marked another milestone in America:   the death of class.

And long before the new politics of Chicago-style thuggery became evident in the new administration, I was appalled at the sheer intensity of hatred for President Bush.   Bush Derangement Syndrome became a pandemic.  I was expecting the CDC to announce immediate inoculation centers opening up to stem the outbreak.  Bush bashing became our new favorite national pastime, celebrated in the press and codified on college campuses everywhere. (more…)

Because he is a good and gracious man, George W. Bush worked with Ted Kennedy on No Child Left Behind. He held his hand out across the aisle (something Obama has yet to do), and brought the Senator on board to help craft and put his stamp on that piece of legislation.

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Just a couple years later, in the middle of a tough war in Iraq, Kennedy would play the scorpion to Bush’s frog when his ugly, ungrateful, unpatriotic, selfish, leftist default position would rear its ugly partisan head when he accused Bush of being a fraud who cooked up the war for personal political gain.

Today, let us celebrate the delicious irony that Kennedy the Horrible’s Senate seat is about to be occupied by a rock-ribbed conservative who believes in and campaigned on everything Kennedy the Horrible opposed. Yes, a pro-water-boarder will sit where “The Lying of the Senate” once did.  (more…)

President George W. Bush:

On the one-year anniversary of President George W. Bush leaving office, let us recall his words spoken in the National Cathedral, September 14, 2001 (please take a moment to watch the video):

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“This world He created is of moral design. Grief and tragedy and hatred are only for a time. Goodness, remembrance and love have no end, and the Lord of life holds all who die and all who mourn.

It is said that adversity introduces us to ourselves.

This is true of a nation as well… 

America is a nation full of good fortune, with so much to be grateful for, but we are not spared from suffering. In every generation, the world has produced enemies of human freedom. They have attacked America because we are freedom’s home and defender, and the commitment of our fathers is now the calling of our time.” (more…)

One year ago today President Bush left the White House. It’s been said before, but I think on this anniversary it bears repeating.

George W. Bush is an idiot.

That’s right. He’s a dolt. A moron. A cowboy. An anti-intellectual. A dummy.

I don’t use these words lightly and I firmly stand behind them. Of course, I’m not using the traditional definition of these adjectives. I’m using the current, leftist lexicon in describing the man.

The left loves to rename things. They call acts of terrorism “man caused disasters.” The call a bill that takes away secret ballots for workers the “employee free choice act”. Expensive health care is renamed “affordable” and when they flush $800 billion of taxpayer money down the toilet they call it an economic “stimulus.”

They call a bunch of snotty, elitist, knuckleheads who are completely clueless about economics and foreign policy “smart power.” And they refer to their leader, famous for dodging responsibility and voting “present,” as “pragmatic.” (more…)