The Real “Celebrity” Politician: John McCain

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

John McCain has released a second swiftboat attack ad on the "celebrity" theme(again designed expressly for consumption by the McMedia – shouldn’t the campaign be charged with the "fair value" of all this free advertising the networks are giving him?)

Maureen Dowd – whom I cannot stand – nevertheless insightfully pointed out in her opinion Op-Ed Columnist – McCain’s Green-Eyed Monster – Op-Ed – NYTimes.com:

Some of McCain’s old pals in the Senate are cringing at what they see as his soulless transformation into what he once scorned.

“John’s eaten up with envy,” said one. “His image of himself was always the handsome, celebrity flyboy.

“Now somebody else is the celebrity,” the colleague continued, while John looks in the mirror and sees his face marred by skin cancer and looks at the TV and sees his dashing self-image replaced by visions of William Frawley, with Letterman jokes about his membership in the ham radio club and adventures with wagon trains.

John McCain parlayed his "celebrity" status as the dashing admiral’s son returning home from a Vietnamese prisoner of war camp as a "war hero" into a political career. He has carefully crafted his "war hero" status over the years. It was his entree into politics, and it has defined his sense of entitlement to high office ever since. McCain believed that he could ride his "war hero" status into the Oval Office, but now along comes this new kid on the studio lot who is younger, smarter, more handsome, and has demonstrated box office appeal.  McCain has turned into the embittered has-been actor envious of the rising young star, like Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard:

Joe Gillis:   You’re Norma Desmond.  You used to be in silent pictures.  You used to be big.

Norma Desmond:  I am big.  It’s the pictures that got small.

And like the demented Norma Desmond, John McCain has been telling us for the past decade, "All right, Mr. DeMille, I’m ready for my close-up."

McCain has, in fact, racked up a rather impressive list of television and movie appearances that would make any young up-and-comer actor or actress jealous. The Internet Movie Data Base (IMDB) has what is purported to be a complete list of credits for McCain’s television and film appearances. John McCain (I)  Check out this list. With this number of appearances, John McCain must be a member of the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Union.

McCain’s most notable appearances have been his guest appearances on Saturday Night Live.  Particularly in 2002 when he hosted SNL.  McCain played the creepy husband "Dave" who was freaking out his wife.  After the Sturgis Bike Rally this week, I’m sure Cindy McCain can relate to the freaked-out wife in this skit.

I searched for clips of the episode on YouTube, but oddly enough the embed codes for the posted clips have been disabled at the request of the poster.

Luckily, Dan Abrams at MSNBC’s Verdict captured the essence of McCain’s appearances on SNL in the report he aired Wednesday night. (Was loofah/falafel boy Bill O’Rielly inspired by McCain’s performance in this creepy skit?)

A.B. Stoddard comments that "there’s too many Americans who don’t remember any of this, that haven’t seen his cameo appearances… maybe know he’s been on Leno and Letterman and can handle it, but don’t know John McCain as a political celebrity."  Well, some of us do A.B.  We offer this clip here as a public service.

By the way, disregard any comments from Republican strategist Brad Blakeman in this clip.  I don’t know why Dam Abrams invites this dick in a suit onto his program, other than to mock him and make him look like the fool he is.