Gee, I wonder where we've heard that before. Hmm..Hurricane Katrina, maybe? 9/11, perhaps? Let's take a stroll down memory lane to World War II. Hitler invaded Poland in 1939, having begun to kill Jews in 1938. The U.S. got involved in 1941. Okay, that was almost 70 years ago, and everyone who wasn't white and Christian was invisible in the U.S.. Doesn't make it forgiveable, it just states the facts of the times.
Today, members of the U.S. Congress wrote a letter to Bob Iger (CEO of Disney) and Peter Chernin (CEO of Fox), urging them to negotiate in good faith with the writers because of all the money that's been lost. Real smart, guys.
The writers went through Thanksgiving and Christmas on strike, because no one in a position of power told big business what to do. Until now! Pilot season could have been saved, and we could have been a little further into the season of Boston Legal and Desperate Housewives. My friends at Swingline Productions could be creating new episodes of Law and Order Criminal Intent.
Let's review. When big business tried to crush the writers by stonewalling them, our government said nothing. Nobody in government had the foresight to see (or the guts to speak out about the fact that) that billions would be lost; that the American people, and people in many other countries would lose out on great content in film and television, because the creatives who help make it happen asked for what was just, appropriate, and in keeping with tradition.
The Republican Governor of California—also a former movie actor—could have veered from the typical anti-union, pro big-business agenda, and spoken out. Wouldn't that have been something? It wouldn't surprise me if another former actor and ex-governor of California would have kept his mouth shut on the issue. Ronald Reagan—star of Bedtime for Bonzo—was a Democrat-turned-Republican.
Republicans are said to be "pro-business". One would think that every entrepreneur should, by virtue of that "pro-business" agenda, be a Republican. But that "pro-business" hype is a lot like many things in the Republican platform—reminiscent of the warning label "Objects in mirror may be larger than they appear.". The Republicans are pro-business when the businesses are big enough to be substantial campaign contributors. To them, "pro-business" means anti-union.
Ronald Reagan, who busted the air traffic controllers union in 1981, had a Washington, D.C. airport named for him. It gets worse. He was a former president of the Screen Actors Guild. The irony is saddening. The one good thing about him is that he knew how to tell a joke. I find it quite funny that it was during his presidency that the comedy club boom started. The great comedian Richard Belzer attributed the boom (in part) to Reagan's presidency. Comedians had such good fodder for material by 1982 that the comedy clubs just started popping up. Every cloud has a silver lining, I suppose.
Republicans supposedly feel that government shouldn't get in the way of business, and should let the market dictate who succeeds and who fails. Let's review. Many writers in New York and Hollywood own production companies. These companies are small businesses, producing scripts for big corporations like GE (NBC), Disney (ABC Television, and more media than you can shake a stick at), and Sony (CBS). So, when it's small business against big business, I guess the size of the contributor determines which side the Republicans take. Fun, huh?
The writers went through Thanksgiving and Christmas on strike, because no one in a position of power told big business what to do. Until now! Pilot season could have been saved, and we could have been a little further into the season of Boston Legal and Desperate Housewives. My friends at Swingline Productions could be creating new episodes of Law and Order Criminal Intent.
Let's review. When big business tried to crush the writers by stonewalling them, our government said nothing. Nobody in government had the foresight to see (or the guts to speak out about the fact that) that billions would be lost; that the American people, and people in many other countries would lose out on great content in film and television, because the creatives who help make it happen asked for what was just, appropriate, and in keeping with tradition.
The Republican Governor of California—also a former movie actor—could have veered from the typical anti-union, pro big-business agenda, and spoken out. Wouldn't that have been something? It wouldn't surprise me if another former actor and ex-governor of California would have kept his mouth shut on the issue. Ronald Reagan—star of Bedtime for Bonzo—was a Democrat-turned-Republican.
Republicans are said to be "pro-business". One would think that every entrepreneur should, by virtue of that "pro-business" agenda, be a Republican. But that "pro-business" hype is a lot like many things in the Republican platform—reminiscent of the warning label "Objects in mirror may be larger than they appear.". The Republicans are pro-business when the businesses are big enough to be substantial campaign contributors. To them, "pro-business" means anti-union.
Ronald Reagan, who busted the air traffic controllers union in 1981, had a Washington, D.C. airport named for him. It gets worse. He was a former president of the Screen Actors Guild. The irony is saddening. The one good thing about him is that he knew how to tell a joke. I find it quite funny that it was during his presidency that the comedy club boom started. The great comedian Richard Belzer attributed the boom (in part) to Reagan's presidency. Comedians had such good fodder for material by 1982 that the comedy clubs just started popping up. Every cloud has a silver lining, I suppose.
Republicans supposedly feel that government shouldn't get in the way of business, and should let the market dictate who succeeds and who fails. Let's review. Many writers in New York and Hollywood own production companies. These companies are small businesses, producing scripts for big corporations like GE (NBC), Disney (ABC Television, and more media than you can shake a stick at), and Sony (CBS). So, when it's small business against big business, I guess the size of the contributor determines which side the Republicans take. Fun, huh?
