Sunday,
June 22, 2008
Does US Want Another Cowboy President? Italian Journalist asks.
The
ANNOTICO Report
Often
time it takes one with a more distant view, to get an appropriate overview.
An
Italian journalist points out how
Very astute.
Who Wants Another Cowboy President?
Khaleej Times -
By
Phillip Knightly(One Man's View)
21 June 2008
It took an Italian journalist to point out to me
just how much the
Free of any of the patriotic fervour that influenced the American participants, the Italian spoke frankly.
The American reaction to 9/11, he
said, could not be rational because it was dominated by the need for revenge, a major theme in
cowboy movies. He pointed out that President George Bush's statements about
9/11 ? "We're coming to get ya" ... dead or alive... You're either with us or
against us ... us and them ... he tried to kill my Daddy"
? could have come straight out of a cowboy
movie script.
It's no surprise then that the President's favourite film is "High Noon" the story of a
sheriff (Gary Cooper) who rids a small town of evildoers despite the refusal of
the townspeople to help him. Does George W. Bush see himself as Gary Cooper?
There are indications that he does, right down to his decision to go it alone
in
I learn from an article by Rich Hall that since
Franklin D. Roosevelt only three presidents have NOT cited a Western as
their favourite movie.
For instance, Lyndon B. Johnson opted for "Stagecoach", John F
Kennedy for "Bad Day at Black
Rock", Nixon, and
Hall believes this is because
But perhaps the American public has
had enough of trigger-happy cowboys as Presidents. Reagan and Bush Senior, with their
easy victories over B grade movie villains " in
Hall says Bush Senior may have hoped to make
Americans complicit in the
Now whether you can draw some general conclusions
from all this, whether you can use it all to predict the outcome of the
Presidential election, is another matter. Hall says you can. "The
campaign trail is the last chance for any of these characters to appear
affable and morally uncomplicated. It's their trailer, their forthcoming
attractions. They're showing you just enough to get you to buy a ticket. As
soon as they're elected they'll go south on everything they've promised."
If Americans simply want to replace
George W. Bush with a new sheriff, then they'll vote for McCain. But suppose they've had enough
of violence, and their other obsession, money, dominates their thinking.
Hall says, "Guns may be blazing out there in the desert somewhere but
we're here in the gambling hall and frankly the pot on the table is
dwindling." In such circumstances Americans will vote for the person who
they think most likely to fatten it up. The economy will once again be the
issue and they will vote for Obama. His favourite
film? "
Although you have to wonder what draws Obama to a
story about an exile running a nightclub in wartime
Phillip Knightley
is a veteran journalist and commentator based in London
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