Dems to Hollywood: The End (Fade to Black)

Boston.com

Scot Lehigh, Globe Columnist

AS DISPIRITED Democrats mull various routes back to relevance, here's a quick and easy first step: Say goodbye to Hollywood.

The attitudes and behavior of the film-industry elite are out of sync with much of the country, and linking the party with the West Coast glitterati makes national Democrats suspect with too many voters.

One need look no further than a recent New York Times survey to see the disconnect. Fully 70 percent of those polled said they were at least somewhat concerned that TV, movies, and popular music are lowering moral standards.

Beyond that, the self-absorption of Hollywood stars and producers makes them off-putting campaign props who too often distract from a candidate's intended message.

Indeed, watching Howard Dean campaign around unpretentious Iowa with Martin Sheen and Rob Reiner in tow in the days before the caucuses, one could sense that the former Vermont governor had lost his way. Sheen, who in particular seemed to believe the campaign's events were really about him, would recite a poem by Indian Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore, fairly radiating self-satisfaction as he built to a crescendo. He and Dean would share a few jokes built around the oh-so-clever premise that because Sheen played the president on "West Wing," it was witty to call him Mr. President -- and wittier still to have him refer to Dean that way.

It was a wearisome act that only served to undercut the blunt, unvarnished Vermont authenticity that had been one of Dean's principal attractions in the early days of his effort.

Fast forward to left-wing filmmaker Michael Moore, whose real emergence on the campaign trail began as a supporter of General Wesley Clark. (It apparently didn't occur to Clark that it might seem incongruous having a figure who had denounced the American-led NATO intervention in Kosovo -- one who labeled Bill Clinton "a sad, pathetic," "ruthless," and "cowardly" president who lied to justify military force there -- endorse the general who had led that effort.)

Moore soon plunged Clark into controversy by calling George W. Bush a "deserter," thereby wrapping legitimate questions about whether Bush had fulfilled his Texas Air National Guard obligation in the overheated rhetoric of Bush hatred.

The avidity with which some prominent Democrats later embraced Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11" -- a film whose thought-provoking antiwar message was cloaked in cockamamie conspiracy theories and drenched with disdain for Bush -- reflected their misreading of the country's anxious, uncertain mood. The image of Moore ensconced in former President Jimmy Carter's box at the Democratic National Convention showed that that mentality had infected even the highest reaches of the party.

For my money, only one star truly lent any campaign credibility. That was Michael J. Fox, who joined John Kerry on the husting to speak about the need for more stem-cell research. Listening to Fox's slurred speech and seeing the tremors he suffers from Parkinson's disease, one couldn't help but be moved. It wasn't so much Fox's fame that lent power to his words, however, as his condition.

Other stars may have helped Kerry raise money, but they also served to embarrass him, putting their unbridled contempt for Bush on proud display during a July fund-raiser at Radio City Music Hall. Whoopi Goldberg indulged in a long riff that used the name Bush as a sexual pun. Chevy Chase belittled Bush's intelligence and mocked his pronunciation of "terrorist" and "nuclear." (Didn't Jimmy Carter mispronounce the latter word too?) John Mellencamp sang a song that called Bush a "cheap thug who sacrifices our young." And so it went. Kerry then made the mistake of saying that the stars had conveyed to the audience "the heart and soul of our country." His campaign was soon on the defensive, left to assert the performers' right to express their opinions, while stipulating they did not necessarily reflect Kerry's views.

Now, the celebrities' contempt may well mirror the sentiment of confirmed Democrats. But it was hardly the way to win undecided votes. Or to offer an effective critique of a president voters are inclined to like personally, but whose policies have left us entangled in an unnecessary war and awash in red ink. In the same way, post-election polemics that denounce Bush supporters as simple-minded rubes are unlikely to persuade them to consider Democratic candidates in future elections.

The sooner the Democrats come to realize those points, the better their future prospects will be.