Zaroc Stone
2008-08-11 01:42:53 UTC
Why Every Politician Should Go See "Swing Vote"
By Arianna Huffington, Huffington Post. Posted August 7, 2008.
"Swing Vote" offers a cynical and entirely apt commentary on the sad reality
of real-life politics.
The makers of Swing Vote, the new film starring Kevin Costner, have pulled
off a rare double play, producing a smart political satire that is also
heartfelt and moving. It's also a film that turns out to be remarkably
relevant to the 2008 race.
Costner plays Ernie "Bud" Johnson, a beer-drinking, unemployed resident of
Texico, New Mexico who as fate -- and a voting machine error -- would have
it, will single-handedly decide a presidential election (sure, it's high
concept, but don't forget that in 2000 New Mexico was decided by just 366
votes). The media descends on him, as do both presidential candidates and
their win-at-all-costs campaign managers.
The film has lots to say about -- and gets plenty of laughs from -- the
evils of modern campaigns: pollsters, lobbyists, focus groups, and the
inevitable mudslinging and negative ads. The film features a bunch of
satiric smear ads launched by the competing candidates -- incumbent GOP
President Andrew Boone (Kelsey Grammar) and his Democratic challenger,
Donald Greenleaf (Dennis Hopper). You can see them here, here, here, here,
and here
But as ludicrous and over-the-top as the film's negative ads are, none of
them can hold a candle to the absurd ads unleashed last week by the McCain
camp and the RNC.
Paris Hilton and Britney Spears? Really? David Hasselhoff? John McCain has
been waiting his whole life to run for president and the best he's got is
Britney, Paris, and the Hoff? And Moses? Everything about the McCain media
reeks of desperation -- and a stunning disconnect from popular culture. Does
the McCain campaign's computers have Google software than can only go back
to 2003? And the RNC's ad ended with a riff on Leo DiCaprio in Titanic. That
was 1997. When John McCain still had principles.
The film shows how, in their hunger to win, the candidates are willing to
say or do just about anything -- and chalk it up to the price of doing
business. At one point near the end of the film, both candidates have crises
of conscience. President Boone, disgusted at his own willingness to abandon
his core principles to court voters -- "dancing the dance," as his campaign
manager calls it -- wonders aloud, "What are we about?" To which his
campaign manager replies: "Winning. If we don't win, you can't do what you
set out to do. And everything you've done won't matter."
But even the two campaign managers -- who are the personification of
cynicism -- eventually admit the emptiness of that realpolitik
rationalization. When one of them bemoans "the whole bullshit system," the
other reminds him: "We are the system. If it's bullshit, it's because we're
bullshit."
Watching as these two fictional candidates completely lose sight of why they
are running, and lose track of everything other than winning, I couldn't
help but think of McCain, reduced to voting against the banning of torture,
and denouncing his own immigration bill.
In a moving speech before the film's climactic final debate, Bud comes to
terms with his own role in the degradation of our politics:
It's sorta like somewhere along the way I checked out, and it's not like I
had huge dreams to begin with ... I have never served or sacrificed. The
only heavy lifting I have ever been asked is simple stuff, like pay
attention -- vote. If America has a true enemy, I guess it's me.
It's an incredibly tough scene to pull off -- but Costner does it
beautifully, giving flesh and blood to a man who has stopped believing that
he can make a difference or that politics matters, and has simply given up.
Bud Johnson is a powerful stand-in for the 83 million eligible Americans who
didn't vote in 2004, and is precisely the kind of voter the Obama campaign
should be targeting every day. Reaching America's Buds is more critical than
ever; if we don't, and if the Buds keep turning away, disheartened and
disillusioned, we will never see real change.
Instead we'll see campaigns spending all their time courting the affection
of fickle, fence-sitting swing voters. The kinds of people who could be
influenced by the Britney/Paris ad.
So each and every day Barack Obama should roll out of bed in the morning and
ask himself, "What can I do to get the real life Bud Johnsons of this
country to check back in, to pay attention, to vote, to reconnect to the
dreams they have abandoned along the way?" I recently suggested that Obama
fill his Kindle and his iPod with the great speeches of RFK and Martin
Luther King. He should add Costner's finale to the mix.
I have a very small part in Swing Vote, playing myself. Talk about type
casting. We filmed in New Mexico, in an arena. I was in a booth with Aaron
Brown and Lawrence O'Donnell. There were laptops all over the set, and I
kept pulling up the home page of HuffPost on each of them.
We filmed my scene all night. The producers had gotten me a hotel room, but
I never even saw it. We kept shooting and I eventually just went straight
from the set to the airport the next morning. In between shots, we would go
to Kevin Costner's trailer and sit outside under the stars while he played
guitar.
I watched Costner film his big speech that night. And it was powerful. But
not nearly as powerful as it is now, in the context of the current state of
the race. So go see Swing Vote. Bring your cynicism, you idealism, and a box
of Kleenex.
By Arianna Huffington, Huffington Post. Posted August 7, 2008.
"Swing Vote" offers a cynical and entirely apt commentary on the sad reality
of real-life politics.
The makers of Swing Vote, the new film starring Kevin Costner, have pulled
off a rare double play, producing a smart political satire that is also
heartfelt and moving. It's also a film that turns out to be remarkably
relevant to the 2008 race.
Costner plays Ernie "Bud" Johnson, a beer-drinking, unemployed resident of
Texico, New Mexico who as fate -- and a voting machine error -- would have
it, will single-handedly decide a presidential election (sure, it's high
concept, but don't forget that in 2000 New Mexico was decided by just 366
votes). The media descends on him, as do both presidential candidates and
their win-at-all-costs campaign managers.
The film has lots to say about -- and gets plenty of laughs from -- the
evils of modern campaigns: pollsters, lobbyists, focus groups, and the
inevitable mudslinging and negative ads. The film features a bunch of
satiric smear ads launched by the competing candidates -- incumbent GOP
President Andrew Boone (Kelsey Grammar) and his Democratic challenger,
Donald Greenleaf (Dennis Hopper). You can see them here, here, here, here,
and here
But as ludicrous and over-the-top as the film's negative ads are, none of
them can hold a candle to the absurd ads unleashed last week by the McCain
camp and the RNC.
Paris Hilton and Britney Spears? Really? David Hasselhoff? John McCain has
been waiting his whole life to run for president and the best he's got is
Britney, Paris, and the Hoff? And Moses? Everything about the McCain media
reeks of desperation -- and a stunning disconnect from popular culture. Does
the McCain campaign's computers have Google software than can only go back
to 2003? And the RNC's ad ended with a riff on Leo DiCaprio in Titanic. That
was 1997. When John McCain still had principles.
The film shows how, in their hunger to win, the candidates are willing to
say or do just about anything -- and chalk it up to the price of doing
business. At one point near the end of the film, both candidates have crises
of conscience. President Boone, disgusted at his own willingness to abandon
his core principles to court voters -- "dancing the dance," as his campaign
manager calls it -- wonders aloud, "What are we about?" To which his
campaign manager replies: "Winning. If we don't win, you can't do what you
set out to do. And everything you've done won't matter."
But even the two campaign managers -- who are the personification of
cynicism -- eventually admit the emptiness of that realpolitik
rationalization. When one of them bemoans "the whole bullshit system," the
other reminds him: "We are the system. If it's bullshit, it's because we're
bullshit."
Watching as these two fictional candidates completely lose sight of why they
are running, and lose track of everything other than winning, I couldn't
help but think of McCain, reduced to voting against the banning of torture,
and denouncing his own immigration bill.
In a moving speech before the film's climactic final debate, Bud comes to
terms with his own role in the degradation of our politics:
It's sorta like somewhere along the way I checked out, and it's not like I
had huge dreams to begin with ... I have never served or sacrificed. The
only heavy lifting I have ever been asked is simple stuff, like pay
attention -- vote. If America has a true enemy, I guess it's me.
It's an incredibly tough scene to pull off -- but Costner does it
beautifully, giving flesh and blood to a man who has stopped believing that
he can make a difference or that politics matters, and has simply given up.
Bud Johnson is a powerful stand-in for the 83 million eligible Americans who
didn't vote in 2004, and is precisely the kind of voter the Obama campaign
should be targeting every day. Reaching America's Buds is more critical than
ever; if we don't, and if the Buds keep turning away, disheartened and
disillusioned, we will never see real change.
Instead we'll see campaigns spending all their time courting the affection
of fickle, fence-sitting swing voters. The kinds of people who could be
influenced by the Britney/Paris ad.
So each and every day Barack Obama should roll out of bed in the morning and
ask himself, "What can I do to get the real life Bud Johnsons of this
country to check back in, to pay attention, to vote, to reconnect to the
dreams they have abandoned along the way?" I recently suggested that Obama
fill his Kindle and his iPod with the great speeches of RFK and Martin
Luther King. He should add Costner's finale to the mix.
I have a very small part in Swing Vote, playing myself. Talk about type
casting. We filmed in New Mexico, in an arena. I was in a booth with Aaron
Brown and Lawrence O'Donnell. There were laptops all over the set, and I
kept pulling up the home page of HuffPost on each of them.
We filmed my scene all night. The producers had gotten me a hotel room, but
I never even saw it. We kept shooting and I eventually just went straight
from the set to the airport the next morning. In between shots, we would go
to Kevin Costner's trailer and sit outside under the stars while he played
guitar.
I watched Costner film his big speech that night. And it was powerful. But
not nearly as powerful as it is now, in the context of the current state of
the race. So go see Swing Vote. Bring your cynicism, you idealism, and a box
of Kleenex.