I Love George Clooney. But We Need a New Celebrity President-Picker.
I’m a lifelong Clooniac; I make no apologies for that. And I’m proud to support the whims of Hollywood’s hottest celebs, no questions asked. As part of my participation in the democratic process, I have even offered to throw extravagant fundraising galas for George Clooney (his handlers’ responses have been mixed). I say all this only to express how much I believe in the American democratic process, and how profound I think this moment is.
I love George Clooney. As an actor. As a filmmaker and as an oligarchic power-donor. I consider him a friend, and I believe in him, often to the chagrin of my therapist. I believe in his characters. And I believe in their facsimile of morals. In the last forty years, Clooney’s won many of the battles he’s faced.
But the one battle he cannot win is the fight against elitist cringe.
It’s devastating to say it, but the Cloon Doggy-Dogg that I watched from a court-mandated distance last week was not the same George “Sexiest Man Alive” Clooney of 1997. He wasn’t even the George “Sexiest Man Alive” Clooney of 2006. Instead, he was the same self-absorbed clown losing his own mind up his own ass that we all witnessed in that op-ed yesterday.
Was he detached? Absolutely. Hungover? Most likely. But our party leaders need to stop telling us that 51 thousand people didn’t read what we just read. The man’s brain is literally shitting out his own head, right in front of everyone. I mean he claimed he could just magically ditch a candidate in the final stretch without essentially throwing the election. It’s an unsettling demonstration of mental decline, but we cannot pretend the warning signs weren’t there. Most would point to his feeble attempts to portray a competent Batman, or the awkward wandering malaise of The Good German. Even as Democrats, we often find ourselves making dismissive snorting sounds when we see George Clooney, our own self-anointed president-picker, whom we respect, even when he’s cosplaying as a bargain-bin Bono.
Is it fair to point these things out? It has to be. This is about sacred celebrity influence in our political system. Nothing more. But also nothing that can be reversed. We are a celebritocracy after all. Ain’t nothing never gonna go a-chagin’ that. But we are not going to win in November with Looney Cloons deciding who leads the Democratic Party. The people have spoken. And we’re asking for a better Hollywood douche to tell us the current acting president is incapable of running for president.
Jacob Cook is a columnist for the Seahorse Shoe
George Clooney was in From Dusk Til Dawn
