Arnold Schwarzenegger

Terminator's Obama Bashing
For his raptuous monosyllabic pro-McCain speech Schwarzenegger has proved that it requires absolutely no great deal of intelligence to achieve a maximum (straining after) effect. The vigilant observer will immediately have recognized remnands from his Hollywood era. But there is a big difference between „Hasta la vista baby“ and claiming that Obama could have fixed the econonmic crisis by investing parts of his campaign funds that way instead of spending it on his run for president.

After having come across a few Republican slips during the candidates debates, Schwarzenegger should have not taken this as an invitation to join the ranks of cheap Obama bashing just a couple of days before election day. „Senator Obama has raised massive amounts of campaign funds more than anyone in the history,“ Schwarzenegger said. „If Senator Obama would have taken the money off that he used for his TV ads he could have bailed out the banks, paid of everybody’s mortgages and saved the tax payer tons of money,“ he then states in his best melodramatic act ever, cheered by a massive round of applause by Ohio’s swing-state-voters.

One not only asks what he was thinking but what he thought the other ones were thinking? Hopefully many voters won’t believe his act but question his lines which indicate, if you try to put some logic behind, that Obama should have given his money to fix a Republican made crisis before his possible term has even started – with a possible chance of handing over a rehabilitated economy to a, so God help not, McCain government after? Hopefully somebody will check the the Florida ballot boxes the day before just to make sure!

Luckily in the heat of the moment Schwarzenegger was not tempted to also question why Obama had not shared his mass of campaign money with McCain. Trying to bring down to a common denominator the reason why people are donating money to an election campaign and paying their taxes is not the best of all comparisons since this would also suggest that donating to any charity means a waste of tax money hence loss for the government. Schwarzenegger should just accept that there are in fact many people, including Joe the plumber, in (t)his America that happily donate a small part of their salary in order to have politicians with sensible arguments speaking to them rather than actors echoing pathos coming from a script.

Following the example of his Republican comrades in distributing anger amongst the voting communities, so much that police security will most probably be doubled up for election day, Schwarzenegger’s statement was beyond inconsiderate. Leaving his motive aside one can only hope that apart from the cheering swing-voters in his immediate presence, the rest of the viewers actually felt offended by so much nonsense.
And that the Onion newspaper will have picked it up and put it through their editorial mill churning everyday (political) dumbness. When will Schwarzenegger finally get the point that charisma and intelligence not only go together but is something to die for.

To watch the video: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/us_elections_2008/7703688.stm