Posted on 02/24/2005 8:57:10 PM PST by beaversmom
CBN.com – Hollywood's left wing agenda is infiltrating so much of today's culture that its imprint is seen not only in television and movies, but even in our politics which was evident in the 2004 presidential campaign.
The Hollywood elite worked tirelessly trying to defeat George W. Bush and stop him from being elected a second term. But Hollywood is out of step with the rest of America.
The group Citizens United can't help but rub it in a bit. They have billboard signs. One has a headline. “Four more years, thank you Hollywood”. A second one – “President Bush, W. still president. Thank you Hollywood”.
This year's Academy Award nominations show how the values of Tinseltown differ from the values of the American public. A movie that elevated assisted suicide gets nominated for best picture. Despite great directing, Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ” did not.
Michael Medved is a best selling author, film critic, and commentator. In his new book, “Right Turns: Unconventional Lessons from a Controversial Life”, Medved makes some keen observations on why he believes the right side of the political divide is better than the left. He spoke with Pat Robertson on The 700 Club recently regarding his political journey.
PAT ROBERTSON: Michael, it is good to have you with us. I have to read a lot of books on the show, about three a week. This is one o the few that I really enjoyed. It is a great book and is a delightful read. Ladies and gentlemen, it is about an exciting journey from a man who has seen it all. You don't want to miss getting this book. Michael, I loved the story about your grandfather. This man worked with his hand and suffered and struggled.
MICHAEL MEDVED: Sure, that is America. America is a country of second chances. My grandfather came in 1910 from the Ukraine. He was a barrel maker. My dad's recollections of him is taking out splinters. My dad got a scholarship and fought in the Navy in World War II and was able through the GI Bill to get an education and PhD. That is America.
ROBERTSON: You kept pointing out the small businessman and the little Jewish shop keeper and grandmother who sells novelties in the front of her house. That was the genius of America. These are capitalists.
MEDVED: My grandmother. May she rest in peace. She was a refugee from Nazi Germany. One thing that is amazing to me is being part of the Jewish community and a proud part of the Jewish community, there are so many people who elevate leftist activism. What got us in the American main stream is a free market system. People like my grandmother who worked day and night except not on the Sabbath and worked day and night toiling away at a little shop. My book is arranged in lessons. One of the lessons that I learn in my life is that business is not exploitive. It is heroic. The idea of business is giving people something they want to buy.
ROBERTSON: And making life for – better for them.
MEDVED: It does benefit us. These people are not greedy, but trying to make a living.
ROBERTSON: That's the point.
MEDVED: If you get ahead in America, it is an indication of serving other people, providing a good or service that they want. That's always been my philosophy as a film critic and my big argument with Hollywood. The worst material they create is not there to give the public what they want. It is there to indoctrinate. My work in the film industry. People in the entertainment industry are bred in gold, but it is Oscar gold, the validation of their peers as being told you are doing good and that is important money to that.
ROBERTSON: What is it about Hollywood? It is not really -- is it all of Hollywood or a small code of writers? There are only a couple hundred of writers. You are talking about a group of people who have very much isolated themselves from the mainstream.
MEDVED: One of the most important things is the question of attitude of religious faith. A lot of folks, there are some people in Hollywood from a Christian background and many people from Jewish backgrounds. But what they have in common is a commitment to radical secularism. The most important message is that the religious community of America have a great deal to offer this country including more movie profits as Mel Gibson showed if you connect with the community.
ROBERTSON: You supported (Adlai) Stevenson. He called me. I guess he liked my radical taste. But many felt all of the intelligent people would support him. What did he say?
MEDVED: This is a blessing in “Right Turns” about liberals’ love of losing, it makes them feel virtuous. My dad took me when I was eight years old to a Stevenson rally. A lady came up and said, ‘Governor, I am sure you are going to win because every intelligent person in the country is voting for you.’ He said, ‘Unfortunately madam, I need a majority.’
ROBERTSON: You hitchhiked all over the country as a Yale student. You went everywhere. What did you learn from all of these journeys?
MEDVED: I learned that America was different from what people think in the Ivy League. I traveled in the southern United States for the first time in the later 1960s when the south was all red necks and Ku Klux Klan. I didn't find that. I hitchhiked 82,000 miles.
ROBERTSON: That is better than four years at Yale.
MEDVED: It teaches you about the real America. So when people in the late 1960s period -- they said we were like Nazi Germany and spelling America with a K for KKK. I knew because I met those people. I hitchhiked in the country.
ROBERTSON: People on the coast don't know anything about middle America.
MEDVED: Part of what they know is from movies which of course, always exaggerates.
ROBERTSON: Affirmative action. You have a great chapter in your book. It is a great book and I like it. What about this flashy dressed black guy who pulled the con on the San Francisco Police Department.
MEDVED: This pushed me away from the Democratic Party, my ancestral home like yours. I was living in Berkeley, California. I wanted to get a job in advertising doing good. I signed on to an advertising agency. I was told this is the biggest African-American advertising agency in California. It was actually the only one at the time. It was not an advertising agency. Basically we got a job with the San Francisco, Oakland, and Berkeley Police Departments on a federal grant to do minority recruiting and I was the only employee. I am not black.
ROBERTSON: They bring you on because you are the token white?
MEDVED: They kept me in the back room. This guy Nicholas pitched the whole thing. He was a great guy and interesting guy and good talker. I don't blame him, I blame the system.
ROBERTSON: He was a complete con. He didn't have advertising, it was just him?
MEDVED: He had nothing but a telephone number. But he was able to go forward and say. Then they had to, under law, give him the contract and then we did the TV ads. It was interesting. It also changed me. You see, that is part of the story I am trying to tell. I feel some of this stuff was providential. I got in a con and it had me working directly with police officers and that changed my life.
ROBERTSON: One of the fascinating …
MEDVED: The police see the world more clearly than the professors and they really do. I worked with these folks and rode along in overnight patrols and all of the sudden; you can see a different side of humanity and how much we all depend on brave men, willing to use force to protect us in the military and police.
ROBERTSON: I wish we had more time. Ladies and gentlemen, you will love this book. It is a good book and fun and the kind you want to read more of. Not all of them are that way. “Right Turns”. Michael, thank you for what you do.
MEDVED: God bless you.
Michael Medved ping. Anyone want on or off the ping list, please send me an e-mail.
I like how he defended Gibson and the Passion.
And these billboards are funny, but I'd be reticent about bragging, even in good fun, when the ultimate battle with Hollywood via politics will be when Hillary runs. Hollywood support for her will dwarf anything we've seen before, and I can just imagine the taunting they'd give us if the unthinkable happens.
But then again, greater Tinseltown participation would make it easier to show Hillary for the out-of-touch leftist that she truly is, so maybe Hollywood will keep it more on the low-down in 4 yrs so as to avoid one of those infamous Whoopi Goldberg/John Mellencamp expletive-ridden tirades against the GOP.
I really think that our best chance against Hillary is in her Senate re-election run in '06. If she can be derailed there, folks will think long and hard about voting for a "one hit wonder" in '08. Hillary is not the "comeback kid" that Bill was/is.
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