Chrysler Super Bowl commercial: Is Clint Eastwood a Democrat?
| Washington
Clint Eastwood鈥檚 Super Bowl commercial for Chrysler was, amid a sea of retread themes and less-than-inspiring plots (you鈥檙e so much better than , Doritos) pretty awesome.
If you didn鈥檛 see the two-minute ad yet, it ran during halftime of last night鈥檚 Super Bowl and featured a darkened Clint Eastwood rasping that it鈥檚 鈥渉alftime in America. People are out of work and they鈥檙e hurting. And are all wondering what they鈥檙e going to do to make a comeback.鈥�
鈥淎ll that matters now,鈥� Eastwood says in one particularly memorable line, 鈥渋s what鈥檚 ahead. How do we come from behind? How do we come together? And how do we win? Detroit鈥檚 showing us it can be done.鈥�
The ad鈥檚 political overtones were obvious - Detroit got back on its feet after being bailed out by the federal government, something Barack Obama instituted and something .
White House Communication Director Dan Pfeiffer tweeted almost immediately afterward, leading ESPN hoops super analyst Seth Davis to query Pfeiffer about the spot:
Saving the America Auto Industry: Something Eminem and Clint Eastwood can agree on
Did Clint just cut a re-elect spot for your boss?
Of course, Pfeiffer was referring to last year鈥檚 totally awesome Chrysler ad featuring Eminem and .
Obama strategist David Axelrod was likewise fired up, and tweeted:
Powerful spot. Did Clint shoot that, or just narrate it?
The Obama campaign has denied having anything to do with the ad and Chrysler has said 鈥渢he ad speaks for itself鈥� in this .
While Eminem said he would vote for Obama, Eastwood - one of the most iconic tough guys of the silver screen - is a little more complex.
But what are Clint Eastwood鈥檚 politics? That鈥檚 a bit more complex. Eastwood - unlike fellow Hollywood testosterone posterboy Charlton Heston, a staunch Republican - has a mixed history. He鈥檚 supported gay marriage and voted for former Democratic California Gov. Gray Davis, for example, but supported Arizona Sen. John McCain (R) in the 2008 election.
When Eastwood ran for mayor of what might be called a 鈥�1% hamlet鈥� of Carmel-by-the-sea, California, he was elected as a Republican. And that was good enough for President George H.W. Bush to consider him as a potential vice presidential pick - - during his ultimately unsuccessful 1992 reelection campaign.
In other words, the simplest answer to the question of Clint Eastwood鈥檚 current political persuasion is probably the best: he got paid by Chrysler, a deeply red-blooded American company, and did the spot.
But that hardly seems to matter, given the hard-hitting commercial and its deeply political subject. As National Journal鈥檚 George Condon writes, 鈥淎ll that was missing was him turning to Mitt Romney and challenging him to 鈥�.鈥�"
Like your politics unscrambled? Bookmark
