Dirty Harry's Misfire
Clint Eastwood's odd appearance at the GOP convention threw off the timing of the night and stepped on Romney's acceptance speech.
Dirty Harry's Misfire
John Baer, Daily News Political Columnist
Maybe Clint Eastwood is a closet Obama backer who duped the GOP into thinking he’s supporting Romney.
How else to explain the bizarre, distracting, pace-breaking, mood-altering, prime-time act Eastwood put on at the Republican National Convention Thursday night?
At a minimum, his long-winded and often rambling routine involving an empty chair representing Obama skewed the timing of the evening and forced Romney’s acceptance speech past the 11 p.m. hour.
The 82-year old actor Academy Award-winning actor/director (whose later work, especially his 2008 “Gran Torino,” I happen to love) seemed simply out of it for most of his too-long time at the podium.
His “performance,” with hair askew and an ill-fitting suit jacket either showed his years or the results of a Jack Daniels warm-up. It's getting bad reviews. Mostly because it was so odd.
Equally odd, however, was the wholly enthusiastic audience reaction to anything and everything Eastwood said.
At one point, for example, talking to the empty chair (Obama), he referred to U.S. troops in Afghanistan and asked, “Why don’t you bring them home tomorrow morning?”
The audience roared its approval despite the fact that (a) former GOP nominee John McCain had the same audience cheering his position against a quick or date-certain withdrawal from Afghanistan and (b) Romney agrees with Obama’s timeline for withdrawal.
Eastwood also pretended Obama was speaking back to him, at least twice suggesting Obama was telling both he (Eastwood) and Romney to go f—k themselves.
“I can’t do that to myself,” Eastwood said.
It was a strange note in a convention focused on family values.
The Associate Press reports Romney aides were wincing backstage.
Eastwood, a former GOP mayor of Carmel, has long backed Republican candidates and presidents even though he supports gay marriage and is a staunch environmentalist.
But his big “surprise” appearance, intended to fire up the GOP faithful, turned out to be a misfire.
It only misfired to democrats. It obviously went over their heads— 835union
I felt so bad for Clint, first his wife has that rediculous show making her look like a golddigger and their daughter a spoiled rich brat and now Clint making a fool of himself in front of millions. Clint you are destroying your legacy, stop the insanity.— neddyflanders
Look, I lean pretty left on a lot of issues (not all). I am a huge Eastwood fan from childhood. All of this bizarre attention to his speech is repulsive. It’s all that anyone is talking about and it has gotten completely ridiculous. Who cares? It’s a convention, they are just one big commercial for all of the money men that are running the parties – you’re going to see the same if not more next week when the Dems put their circus on. Instead, why not get yourself educated about the issues that matter to you, find the candidates that best address them and take your vote to the ballot box. God, I think I just turned 82 there …— Herbert2- Very uncomfortable to watch, and very sad and pathetic.— ej610
- The spagetti western Idol had no clue where he was or what he was there for. He took the Chrysler money to do his commercial but his party was against the bail-out and alot of those GOP senators got gov money to build plants down south for forgein automakers. The Chinese unemployment rate will go down if Mitt Bain Romney wins. And how did the Cuban phoney from FL. come up with his family escape from Castro 3yrs. before he came into power please explain Marco Bozo.— angrywhtguy
- Clint Eastwood is a good actor and an innovative moviemaker. I didn't watch his speech. I read the text of it. I found it kind of dumb and I have a great sense of humor. Many of the comments on this story are juvenile, uninformed rants by folks who hate liberals and Democrats. If the Romney/Ryan ticket is to be the cure-all for our country, why the venom and rancor? And why stray from the subject, which was Clint's speech? Stay on point, please.— sooszq
- Clint's speech was BAD....— Potstirrer
- Say what you want about Mitt the Twit. At least we know
A.) where he was born
B.) what religion he practices.
Can't say that about the Kenyan. Cmon they have his grandmother on tape verifying he was born in Kenya. Think your grandmother knows/knew where you were born?— MilesLong1 - Proof that Reagan didn't have the monopoly on senile Hollywood participation at the GOP lovefest.— richojr
- Clint just wanted to give the rest of Hollyweird the literary FINGER! Good for you Clint...You made my day.— phillysgone
- Good old Dirty Harry. At last someone sums up the Republican message.— Bob Woods
- The great unintended consequence of Eastwood's performance (and that's what it was) is that people like Baer aren't talking about how much they disliked Romney's speech.— AvoidSundanceVacations
- I guess they contacted Clint after Phyllis Diller died.— DwightinDC
- Actually, I thought the motif worked quite well, as Mr. Obama is, most definitely, an empty suit.— hondo1
- all the people criticizing eastwood today loved him in his superbowl ad. if he did the same exact thing at the DNC only targetting romney, they'd hail him a genius!— Mr.Sinatra
John is the author of the book "On The Front Lines of Pennsylvania Politics: Twenty-Five Years of Keystone Reporting" (The History Press, 2012). Reach John at baerj@phillynews.com.
