First of all, Clint Eastwood must have sat down with the Republicans (who have been planning this convention since before Romney was even picked to be the nominee) and convinced them that:
1) He could give a good, rousing political speech;
2) He would be a good surprise to drum up excitement;
3) He was worth showing in prime time right before the most watched speech of the convention;
4) He didn't need to show them his speech beforehand;
5) He could speak without using the teleprompter;
6) His whole schtick would be speaking to an imaginary Obama in an empty chair;
7) He could go out there with his hair looking like a total mess (you know there's a small army of people in the back to make sure that the clothes, hair, and makeup are looking right); and
8) As a known Ron Paul supporter, he wouldn't use the speech to promote Ron Paul in any way, shape, or form.
Clint Eastwood is still acting in movies, and some of his greatest performances have been in the last few years. They only announced that there would even be a special guest two days ago, so Clint was clearly lucid this week. If the Republicans had believed that he was some senile, doddering old man who was likely to show up in full "Grandpa Simpson" mode, they never would have given him a spot, and certainly not a spot that half the country was likely to be watching on live television.
Secondly, there's the content of the speech.
There were the digs at Oprah, Biden, and Obama, but for what appeared on the surface to be a rambling mess, there were quite a few uncomfortable points made.
I haven't cried that hard since I found out that there is 23 million unemployed people in this country. Now that is something to cry for because that is a disgrace, a national disgrace, and we haven't done enough, obviously -- this administration hasn't done enough to cure that. Whenever interest they have is not strong enough, and I think possibly now it may be time for somebody else to come along and solve the problem.
Romney is known for firing people, but there's also the underlying assumption in this statement that it's the role of government (and not private business) to create jobs. Clint said that the administration "hasn't done enough," implying that Obama should have been more aggressive with his policies. He capped it off with "I think possibly now it may be time for somebody else to come along," which is a stunningly tepid call for a change in leadership.
I know even people in your (Obama's) own party were very disappointed when you didn't close Gitmo. And I thought, well closing Gitmo -- why close that, we spent so much money on it.
The Republicans built Gitmo; it was their idea. Romney has never (to my knowledge) said anything about closing Gitmo. The implication in this phrase is that almost all Republicans want to close Gitmo and it's an idea that a few Democrats have gone along with. Then Clint twisted the knife by saying that we'd spent a bucket of money on it--an overt dig at military spending.
I know you (Obama) were against the war in Iraq, and that's okay. But you thought the war in Afghanistan was OK. You know, I mean -- you thought that was something worth doing. We didn't check with the Russians to see how did it -- they did there for 10 years. But we did it, and it is something to be thought about, and I think that, when we get to maybe -- I think you've mentioned something about having a target date for bringing everybody home. You gave that target date, and I think Mr. Romney asked the only sensible question, you know, he says, ``Why are you giving the date out now? Why don't you just bring them home tomorrow morning?''
What Clint said here is that being against the Iraq War is perfectly reasonable, and only a crazy person like Obama would support the war in Afghanistan. He made it sound like Romney was being the adult in the room in calling for a complete and immediate pullout. Again, this is about as far from mainstream Republican thinking as you can get.
I never thought it was a good idea for attorneys to the president, anyway. I think attorneys are so busy -- you know they're always taught to argue everything, and always weight everything -- weigh both sides... They are always devil's advocating this and bifurcating this and bifurcating that. You know all that stuff. But, I think it is maybe time -- what do you think -- for maybe a businessman. How about that?
Here Clint was saying that all lawyers are flip-floppers. Clint knows perfectly well that Romney has a law degree. Bush ran for office as a businessman, and nobody has forgotten that.
You can maybe still use a plane. Though maybe a smaller one. Not that big gas guzzler you are going around to colleges and talking about student loans and stuff like that. You are an -- an ecological man. Why would you want to drive that around?
Romney mocked the President by saying that he was worried about climate change, and on the surface this sounds like the same dig, but it's not. Clint was saying that the President is worried about nonsense like, um, student loans. The official Republican platform calls for the end to federal student loans. This is a huge issue nationally, but not one that the republicans are exactly parading around.
I would just like to say something, ladies and gentlemen. Something that I think is very important. It is that, you, we -- we own this country. We -- we own it. It is not you owning it, and not politicians owning it. Politicians are employees of ours. And -- so -- they are just going to come around and beg for votes every few years. It is the same old deal. But I just think it is important that you realize, that you're the best in the world. Whether you are a Democrat or Republican or whether you're libertarian or whatever, you are the best. And we should not ever forget that. And when somebody does not do the job, we got to let them go.
We own the country? Politicians are our employees? They pander for votes every few years? I LIKE TO FIRE PEOPLE?
We don't have to be -- what I'm saying, we do not have to be mental masochists and vote for somebody that we don't really even want in office just because they seem to be nice guys or maybe not so nice guys, if you look at some of the recent ads going out there, I don't know.
Saying outright that you don't have to vote for someone you don't like in front of a convention center full of people who are going to have to hold their noses in November is just the icing on the cake.
Finally, Clint must have known that going out there and talking like that would completely and utterly deflate the polished, competent, unified narrative that the Republicans were working so hard to create this week. What did Romney even say during his speech, other than mocking climate change? I saw the whole thing and that's all I remember. But Clint's speech... it's all over Twitter, it's spawned several different memes, and the spectacle of it was dominating DU last night and is still dominating DU today. It's going to go down in history along with Stockdale's "Who am I? Why am I here?" and Michael Dukakis in the tank as one of the greatest political blunders ever, and the beauty of it is that Clint Eastwood's not even the candidate.
As a pro-Mitt Romney speech, it was a complete and utter disaster. The only Romney policy that Clint seemed to represent accurately was the doctrine of American Exceptionalism.
As a stealth Ron Paul speech, though, it was brilliant.
Had Dirty Harry gotten up and made a Ron Paul speech, he would have been pilloried by the Republicans. But since Clint Eastwood, 82-year-old with "senile dementia," got up and made that speech, nobody can really attack anything he said without looking like they're attacking old people in general. I doubt the Romney campaign is even going to try to repudiate any of it, but we all heard what he said.
Clint couldn't have done a better job if he'd rolled onto the stage inside a giant wooden horse.