A couple of today’s stories feed into our next topic about news and popular culture.
First up are the reports that Mel Gibson may be the new favorite for replacing Arnie as governor of California. The Age reports that conservative Republicans are disappointed with Schwarzenegger’s move to the center and are hoping for a more gung-ho approach from Gibson. The story was sparked by the establishment of a Mel for Governor web site.
This is a made for media story: Terminator versus Mad Max. But there is probably not a lot to it with Gibson’s spokesperson pretty much dismissing the rumors. It does give way to this entertaining take in the LA Times:
I want ‘em both to run. I want a bruising Schwarzenegger versus Gibson primary. Even though I’m sick of Schwarzenegger’s script-twist speechifyings, how could I — how could anyone — resist the gladiatorial pas de deux of The Terminator versus The Patriot?
• Schwarzenegger wows Latino voters with his “Hasta la vista”; Gibson goes pre-Columbian — some lines in his new movie “Apocalypto” are in Mayan.
• No one chooses his father, but Schwarzenegger’s was a Nazi brownshirt, a storm trooper. Gibson’s is a renegade Catholic, part of a fringe splinter ideology that doesn’t believe the Holocaust happened and that no pope has been legally chosen in the last 40 years. And Gibson’s hugely successful “The Passion of the Christ” dipped into the old-time-religion poisoned well for its “Jews killed Christ” theology…
• When it comes to the death penalty, Schwarzenegger seems to be OK with lethal injection; I wonder whether Gibson would try to bring back the rack.
• Schwarzenegger has seven Mr. Olympia trophies. Gibson has two Oscars. Both are statues of naked guys, but Schwarzenegger’s are anatomically correct, and how.
• Schwarzenegger still owns Hummers, as far as I know; I saw “Road Warrior” — Gibson knows how to survive a gas crisis.
In other news a fascinating feature about the possibility of a Hillary versus Condi 2008 US Presidential race. This has been discussed before but is the subject of renewed speculation with the publication of a book on the subject by Dick Morris a former key Bill Clinton political adviser. One of the interesting aspects of the story is the way Hillary is deliberately building her presidential “brand”
Hillary Clinton has always wanted to be the first woman president of the US. Shortly after her husband’s election in 1992 the couple’s closest advisers discussed plans for her eventual succession after Bill’s second term. Things didn’t turn out quite that way, but her election to the Senate in 2000 gave her the national platform she needed to launch her new image – the “Hillary Brand” – and begin her long march back to the White House.
While this is another example of the clebrification of politics and the hyping of political news, the underlying possibilities of this story are wide reaching. If this race occurs, and it seems that it is becoming a more likely possibility, no matter who is the ultimate victor, the race itself would change the nature of American politics. The symbolic significance of two women – one of them black – running for the White House would shift the cultural center of politics. This is an example of how real issues of political importance – gender and diversity – can be negotiated even through a staged popular culture performance. We can’t just bemoan the lack of seriousness in current reporting, we have to also look at the new possibilities that are opened up by new styles of public culture.
