Get ready for the red-carpet parade of egos. It’s Oscar time again. Millions will tune in this weekend to gawk and swoon as the world’s most famous actors and actresses celebrate their favorite subject — themselves. As the night of a thousand stars approaches, what better time to commemorate Hollywood’s dimmest Democratic lights?
Liberal celebrities have been hurling sour grapes at President George W. Bush with renewed vigor. Best actress Oscar nominee Julia Roberts recently put on her micro-mini-political pundette costume and lambasted President Bush and his party. She told an interviewer last week: “The man’s embarrassing. He’s not my president and he never will be either.” A confirmed Democrat, Roberts reportedly quipped: “Republican comes in the dictionary just after reptile and just above repugnant.”
Clever, sweetheart. Now go ask your boyfriend (whoever it is this week) to look up “Democrat” in the dictionary for you. Democrat comes after demagogue and dementia and just above demon. And you want to talk embarrassing, honey? Two words: “Mary Reilly.” That 1996 box-office bomb, a spin-off of the story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, caused Robert Louis Stevenson to spin in his grave and should be required viewing for Academy Award judges.
Speaking of embarrassments, has Alec Baldwin defected to Cuba yet? The actor was one of dozens of celebrity blowhards who reportedly threatened to leave the country if Bush were elected. [Capitalism Magazine even offers to pay for his one-way ticket, if he promises to stay there!] Emulating his favorite president, Baldwin has since engaged in creative linguistic parsing — arguing that he only meant that he would go on a “long vacation.”
We’re waiting. And when Baldwin does go, maybe he can take Cher with him. What the late Sonny Bono, an honorable conservative and true gentleman, ever saw in this exhibitionist singer I don’t know. It clearly wasn’t her class or kind heart or sharp debating skills. Here’s the vitriol-filled case she made against Bush last fall: “Has everyone lost their f–king minds? Doesn’t anybody remember the illustrious Reagan-Bush years when people had no money and no jobs? What has happened to people’s memories? It’s like they all have Alzheimer’s or something … I don’t like Bush. I don’t trust him. I don’t like his record. He’s stupid. He’s lazy.”
Cher railed on: “If you’re black in this country, if you’re a woman in this country, if you are any minority in this country at all, what could possibly possess you to vote Republican?” Oh, I don’t know. How about being fed up with habitual lying, cheating, plundering, obstruction of justice and prostitution of foreign policy? What? You don’t remember those eight illustrious Clinton-Gore years when people had no character and no shame?
According to The Nation magazine, Cher doesn’t want a tax cut. Maybe we need a special box on the 1040 form so that Hollywood liberals can opt out of Bush tax cuts. Or maybe Cher should just donate any tax-cut windfall to fellow actress and Bush-basher Sarah Jessica Parker’s family. The star of HBO’s estrogen-driven show, “Sex and the City,” complained last fall that Bush would send her relatives to the soup kitchen.
“I’m very, very concerned about the Bush presidency. I’m worried about the kinds of cuts in domestic programs that mean something to a lot of people, including members of my family, who depend on certain things from the government,” Parker blubbered to The Washington Post. Never mind that Bush (alas) has proposed expanding Social Security and Medicare spending. Parker is a multimillionaire who earns $150,000 an episode, boasts a closet full of high-priced Manolo Blahnik shoes, and is married to an equally wealthy actor, Matthew Broderick.
Why are Parker’s family members depending on the government for anything? Parker ridiculed President Bush’s compassionate conservative philosophy. But compassion begins at home, babe. Sell off some of your Italian leather goods, skip the Oscars this year, and take Grandma and Grandpa out to Spago before their Spam runs out.
