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Josh Brolin, Elizabeth Banks, Ellen Burstyn

“How do you sleep while the rest of us cry?
How do you dream when a mother has no chance to say goodbye?
How do you walk with your head held high?
Can you even look me in the eye
And tell me why?” – Pink, “Dear Mr. President”

I am putting on some brand new shoes. Why? ‘Cause I am going to kick some dust, do some dancing, and maybe some other stuff that would not pass in polite company, on the political grave of the worst president in the history of our country, George W. Bush. It is the first time and it will not certainly be the last that I perform such an act. The son of another President, John Quincy Adams, who the American people hated so much, that he lost in a landslide to Andrew Jackson, left the White House after one term. He returned to the Congress where he was a lion in his efforts to rid this nation of the stain of slavery and later represented, before the Supreme Court, the Africans who had seized control of the Spanish slave ship, Amistad. Ulysses S. Grant, whose administration was rocked by scandals and poor decisions, redeemed himself in the final few months of his life by escaping his alcoholic haze, as he battled throat cancer from years of smoking, to pen what is still considered the greatest Presidential memoirs. Herbert Hoover, the man whose political ideology constrained him from being able to do what was necessary to help the American people during the Great Depression, after battling bitterness, became one of the greatest humanitarians in the United States during his post-presidency. Jimmy Carter, the gentleman from Plains who was overmatched in the shark pool called Washington D.C., for the last quarter century has been almost a secular saint in his efforts to help the poor, prevent diseases throughout the third world, and oversee electoral reform throughout the world. Somehow, I doubt our current lazy Commander and Chief is going to follow in their footsteps. He will more likely spend the next few years being a corporate toadie, playing golf, and attending baseball games (maybe as the next Commissioner of Baseball).

Now the true believer will claim that I am just a Bush hater, which is not accurate. My issue with President Bush, is that after 9/11 he could have gone down as one of the greatest leaders this country has ever had, and at ever turn, he screwed up or made the wrong decision. Over four thousand American kids are dead in a war without end, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis killed, the media was co-opted, a major American city went under while he strummed a guitar, our children’s future was mortgaged so his friends could get richer, the Justice Department turned into a partisan joke, almost every international relationship has soured, the arms race has escalated, oil prices have skyrocketed, the Constitution has been ripped apart in the name of power, cronyism has crippled almost every arm of the executive branch, corruption and graft are going wild, nothing is being done as global warming heats up the earth and causes extreme weather in places like Iowa and California, two trillion dollars has been sucked out of the American middle class as the housing bubble popped because the federal government was not doing its job, shoulders were shrugged as gas prices went through the roof, and those are just the high notes.

This guy almost seems to have the reverse Mida’s touch. He claims that he goes with his gut when making a decision. If that is the case, he must have a tapeworm the size of a Buick in his stomach. Now I try, I really have tried, to be fair to this idiot. I am not a partisan. I hammered Bill Clinton for his mistakes as hard as anyone but I cannot name one thing George has done right. Even naming his worst decision is like trying to guess how many jellybeans are in a jar. Was it naming Darth Vader, I mean Dick Cheney, as Vice President? Not keeping eye on the ball before September 11^th? Bringing Karl Rove into the White House instead of keeping that partisan attack dog outside like Clinton did with James Carville? Was it not having a game plan for the post-invasion Iraq? Was it going against his dad’s advice, naming Donald Rumsfeld to his Cabinet? Was it listening to the neo-cons? Was it the tax cuts that are going to cripple future generations? Was it his unleashing of homophobia and xenophobia in order to get re-elected? Maybe it is one of the seemingly light things he has done, like vetoing health coverage of poor kids? His standing in the figurative school-house door when it comes to stem cell research? The outing of a CIA agent? The failure to rebuild New Orleans? What a sad, sad little man.

That being said, does anyone want to see a George W. Bush movie? At this point isn’t he like a houseguest that has overstayed his welcome. After eight years of being on the public dole, love him or hate him, you just want him gone. You’ll even help load the moving van, maybe even pack him a lunch, but the last thing you want is to pay an Alexander Hamilton or two, to watch his highlight reel. It is just too soon, which is a shame because director Oliver Stone has returned to his former glory with this film.

In 2004, Michael Moore made the Academy Award-winning Fahrenheit 9/11 to influence the race between George Bush and John Kerry. While garnering huge crowds, the conservative echo chamber was able to use the film as part of their propaganda, just another example of Jewish, I mean liberal Hollywood. A mini-backlash occurred. Never mind that Disney soiled themselves out of fear about what the Bushes might do to them. Nobody wants to spit in the face of the people who make decisions on the taxes you pay and the regulations you might have to face. Even though George W. Bush is not running again, (thank God), I am sure the same thing will happen with this film.

Oliver Stone been involved in some of the best films to come out of Tinseltown in the last thirty-five years. He wrote Midnight Express (which President Carter claimed he watched instead of the Ronald Reagan/John Anderson debate), Scarface, and Conan the Barbarian. Once behind the camera, he wrote and directed such classics as Platoon, Wall Street, J.F.K., The Door, Nixon, Talk Radio, Natural Born Killers, and Salvador. Maybe it is age, maybe hubris, or just the wrong projects, but all the greatness Stone showed early in his career vanished the last decade. Any Given Sunday, his take on professional football, is almost forgotten. Alexander was just plain awful. World Trade Center, which in time will be recognized as an extremely good film, found almost no audience at the box office. Maybe he is feeling his oats again, with this film, Pinkville and Escobar, Stone has found himself again in the middle of the culture wars. Much like Nixon which gave us an extremely sympathetic portrayal of the former President, this film tries to do the same thing.

The thing I like about Stone as a director is that he gets the best out of his actors. Charlie Sheen has never come close again to the performances he gave in Platoon and Wall Street. Val Kilmer was perfect as Jim Morrison. Anthony Hopkins might have won an Academy Award as Hannibal the Cannibal, but he was even better playing Nixon. (Same character I guess.) Tom Cruise, Woody Harrelson, Kevin Costner, Eric Bogosian, and countless other actors have never equaled the performances they had in a Stone film. Josh Brolin, Elizabeth Banks, Ellen Burstyn, James Cromwell, Richard Dreyfuss, and Scott Glenn are all at the top of their game here and several of them deserve Oscar nominations. It is just too bad that no one will see their performances. Because just like a WNBA game, nobody is going to be in the audience for this one, no matter how good the play is. The talking heads will talk it up, try to make political hay out of it, but everybody’s mind is already made up about this President and too many of us are just too tired of him.

Verdict: A Home Run