In one of the most anticipated box office showdowns of the summer, ”The Hangover Part III” is hoping to get a jump start on “Fast & Furious 6.”
Fortunately, we’re living in the golden age of television, with wonderful 13-part series running on the cable networks.
Orange County health officials said a baby died from whooping cough last week.
This is the first whooping cough death the county has seen in decades. Officials said it’s been at least 20 years or more since someone died of the disease.
Whooping cough, also called pertussis, and other diseases are making comebacks, because so many parents are deciding not to vaccinate their kids.
“It’s really unfortunate. We’re saddened to hear that an infant died of something like this,” said Dain Weister with the Florida Department of Health in Orange County.
Officials said the family chose not to vaccinate their child. Some parents are choosing not to fully vaccinate their children because they worry there is a link between the vaccinations and autism.
Actor and comedian Jay Mohr waded into the gun debate on Twitter after Monday’s deadly terrorist attacks at the Boston Marathon.
“What bothers me most about today is that we’re getting used 2 it. ENOUGH. 2nd amendment must go. Violence has 2 stop. Culture MUST change,” the Jerry Maguire actor tweeted Monday night.
As an entertainer, Mohr makes his living from an industry that profits from a culture of violence: movies, music and video games.
Speaking of which, Mohr voiced Tony Montana in the video game, Scarface, described thus:
You play as the ruthless Cuban gangster Tony Montana. Sosa took everything you had and you are going to get it all back. Tony continues too buy business. He continues to deal drugs. He continues on his quest to kill Sosa.
Just another day in Sunday school.
The two Boston bombs were made with pressure cookers. A talking head on TV noted helpfully that these are “readily available.” Ya think? Just like toasters, coffee makers, and iron skillets.
Maybe Mohr will starting tweeting about a need for a national pressure cooker registry.
I quit HBO a few years ago, so I’ve never seen its show “Girls” that absolutely everybody (in NY and LA) has been yacking/tweeting/texting/blogging about.
The show’s creator and lead actor is Lena Dunham, who you may remember from that Obama campaign ad last summer.
Progressive audiences love the show because they deem it edgy. Or crude. Many progressives cannot discern the difference.
Dunham likes to parade her nude, chubby tattooed self before the cameras. She even played topless ping-pong this season. Edgy!
So it was hilarious to read the LA Times television critic, Mary McNamara, twist herself into knots about wanting to like the show despite the fact that it makes her…
Wow, doesn’t that sound like a blast?
McNamara goes on to point out that the episodes are barely plotted and often resort to story gimmicks. Worse:
After two years of “Girls” it is still unclear what Dunham has to say about life, beyond the unsurprising revelation that it is difficult and confusing to be young. And her decision to tell her characters’ stories almost exclusively through their sexual lives is the opposite of revolutionary; young women have been reduced to the sum of their parts and partners since time began.
Well, well.
Maybe Lena Dunham has nothing to say. She just has a knack for yanking the strings of progressives looking to be edgy.
“Why were military personnel used as props for an entertainment industry awards show?”
And isn’t it interesting that Obama, who let people die in an Islamist takeover in Benghazi, had his wife present an award for a movie about rescuing people from an Islamist takeover in Iran.
We didn’t watch the Oscar show until the very end, when our DVD ended and ABC was the channel the cable box was tuned to.
Suddenly, there’s Michelle Obama inserting herself into things.
…She declared of the Best Picture nominees, “They reminded us that we can overcome any obstacle if we dig deep enough and fight hard enough and find the courage within ourselves.”
And stab enough people in the back to get your movie made. Or suck…
Alas, none of the films nor her aides reminded her to mention the military, not those personnel behind her nor those serving overseas, an odd omission for the White House that nevertheless was pleased to have them arrayed behind her like, well, set decoration.
She did have time to give a crumb to the gay community, applauding the movies that inspire us ”no matter who we are or what we look like or who we love,” adding that “they are especially important for our young people.” (Except when they contain gruesome violence, traffic in stereotypes or use gratuitous profanity, I guess.) Real heroes, such as our servicemen and servicewomen, inspire us, too, I would think.
It is not enough that President Obama pops up at every sporting event in the nation. Now the first lady feels entitled, with military personnel as props, to intrude on other forms of entertaining (this time for the benefit of the Hollywood glitterati who so lavishly paid for her husband’s election). I’m sure the left will holler that once again conservatives are being grouchy and have it in for the Obamas. Seriously, if they really had their president’s interests at heart, they’d steer away from encouraging these celebrity appearances. It makes both the president and the first lady seem small and grasping. In this case, it was just downright weird.
Weird, but still small and grasping.
No one, it seems, gets within a mile of the White House with any sense of restraint. No one there would dare suggest nearly half the country didn’t vote for him and doesn’t much like him and might want to be left to their small daily pleasures. (Greta Garbo said it best.) And no one there is apt to explain that the White House, the military and the first lady (not this one in particular) are institutions bigger than the Obamas and their e-mail list.
A tweet:
I hope to one day open a Nicolas Cage themed bar called The Cage. Every drink order must be either shouted or whispered.
Has any other actor appeared in so many bad movies?
It’s amusing to watch Hollywood act prissy about the movie Zero Dark Thirty because it implies that enhanced interrogation led to the death of Osama Bin Laden.
For all its prettiness, the movie business is dominated by cutthroats. Hence the joke that you can tell your friends in Hollywood because they stab you in the front.
So Hollywood has moral objections over such things as water-boarding. Reports say that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the villain who masterminded 9/11 and who personally sawed off Daniel Pearl’s head in the infamous video, was subjected to multiple water-boardings.
So, as awful as that seems to be, would you prefer that over President Obama’s method, seen here?
The summary execution of bad guys, and whoever is unlucky to be standing nearby, including kids, strikes me as far more extreme than scaring the crap out of someone. It also is useless in obtaining the intelligence that might prevent further successful attacks on the USA.
But Hollywood backs Obama while objecting to an historical fact in a movie.
Did enhanced interrogation work? Let Panetta answer this one.
Just because a lot of pretty Hollywood people doll up and go on TV doesn’t mean the Golden Globes mean spit.
…The Hollywood Foreign Press Association isn’t as advertised. It’s actually a small motley group of 85 mostly freelancers who won’t grant membership to the real foreign journalists at the prestige media outlets across the world. Oscar-winning documentary director Vikram Jayanti, in his 2004 film The Golden Globes: Hollywood’s Dirty Little Secret called the group a bunch of “freeloaders” who know more about hors d’oeuvres than auteurs and select winners based on “who kisses butt best”.
The HFPA was even accused in a lawsuit filed by its former publicist of accepting “payola” — like taking lavish gifts from studios in exchange for nominations — and other questionable practices. The companies who put on the Golden Globes: NBC and Dick Clark Productions, now owned by Guggenheim Partners, could clean up the HFPA but choose not to. The HFPA surely won’t because it pockets an estimated $30 million in broadcast fees for the awards show…
The rest of her column is wonderfully, deservedly bitchy.
Max Fisher in the Washington Post
Americans know Jackie Chan best for his cheery, acrobatic performances in action movies such as “Rumble in the Bronx” and “Rush Hour,” made successful by his amazing martial artistry and self-effacing comedy. Chinese know Chan, a Hong Kong native, for largely the same reasons. But they also know him for something most Americans might find surprising: He is passionately political, a staunch defender of the Chinese Communist Party and harsh critic of anyone he sees as opposing Beijing. Today, that includes the United States.
Chan, responding to widespread criticism of China’s recent censorship of a popular newspaper, insisted in a Chinese TV interview that the United States is “the most corrupt country in the world.” He scolded Chinese who criticize their country in a way that foreigners can hear or see, adding that he’s careful to only praise China when giving interviews in the U.S.
… An excerpt from a TV interview:
Jackie Chan: The New China. The real success has been made in the past dozen of years. Our country’s president also admits they have the corruption problem, and some other stuff, but we are making progress. What I can see is our country is continuously making progress and learning. If you talk about corruption, the entire world, the United State, has no corruption?
Host: America.
Chan: The most corrupt in the world.
Host: Really?
Chan: Of course. Where does this Great Breakdown [financial crisis] come from? It started exactly from the world, the United States. When I was interviewed in the U.S., people asked me, I said the same thing. I said now that China has become strong, everyone is making an issue of China. If our own countrymen don’t support our country, who will support our country? We know our country has many problems. We [can] talk about it when the door is closed. To outsiders, [we should say] “our country is the best.”
Well, there is Chicago. And Illinois, where the past three governors have gone to prison. But heck, at least we punish corruption. Most of the time.
One of the most interesting actors to watch, Gosling knows how to pick good parts for himself. Here was at age 12, already comfortable on camera.
Will the left go after Matt Damon for being in the pocket of Arab oil interests while propagandizing against domestic energy production?
Rhetorical question.
A new film starring Matt Damon presents American oil and natural gas producers as money-grubbing villains purportedly poisoning rural American towns. It is therefore of particular note that it is financed in part by the royal family of the oil-rich United Arab Emirates.
The creators of Promised Land have gone to absurd lengths to vilify oil and gas companies, as Scribe’s Michael Sandoval noted Wednesday. Since recent events have demonstrated the relative environmental soundness of hydraulic fracturing – a technique for extracting oil and gas from shale formations – Promised Land’s script has been altered to make doom-saying environmentalists the tools of oil companies attempting to discredit legitimate “fracking” concerns.
While left-leaning Hollywood often targets supposed environmental evildoers, Promised Land was also produced “in association with” Image Media Abu Dhabi, a subsidiary of Abu Dhabi Media, according to the preview’s list of credits. A spokesperson with DDA Public Relations, which runs PR for Participant Media, the company that developed the film fund backing Promised Land, confirmed that AD Media is a financier. The company is wholly owned by the government of the UAE.
Madonna offered a profanity-laced endorsement of President Obama at her concert Monday night, which involved the singer stripping down to her underwear to reveal the president’s name written on her body.
“You all better vote for f—ing Obama okay,” she told the crowd at Washington’s Verizon center.
Later in the show, Madonna took off her shirt and pulled down her pants to show she had “OBAMA” written in all capital letters across her lower back.
“When Obama is in the White House for a second term I’ll take it all off,” she said to cheers and whistles from the audience.
She then began singing a slow, seductive version of “Like a Virgin” while rolling around on a piano top.
…if we blame the movie for the burning of our foreign outposts and the brutal murders of four Americans (including our Libyan ambassador who was reportedly raped), we won’t blame the burners and the looters and the murderers and the rapists.
You see, if we blame the movie for the Middle East burning, we won’t blames the Islamists who are doing the burning and looting and raping and murdering.
Which means we won’t further connect the dots and blame Obama’s failed Middle East policy; the Obama Doctrine of backing away from the region and allowing events to unfold as America stands idly by — as the Islamists in the Muslim Brotherhood grab hold of power in Egypt, a country that was once our largest and closest ally.
Blame the filmmaker.
Hunt him.
Out him.
Demonize him.
And all at the direction of a president of the United States who has sworn to uphold the Constitution, you know, the same Constitution that treasures the right of free expression and speech above all else.
But no one asks … What about Bill Maher?
Bill Maher?
Bill Maher made a comedy/documentary called “Religulous” that’s most famous for mercilessly mocking Christianity. But what people forget is that the last twenty-minutes or so of the film make a damning case against Islam.
Bill Maher made a film that mocked Islam.
Oh, yes, he did.
Bill Maher also contributed $1 million to a pro-Obama super PAC.
And I’m sure that upon being reminded of this, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will tremble with self-righteous indignation and demand Maher take his money back.
After all, if movies create the terrorists who in turn create the terrorism, what about Bill Maher?
And what if the terrorists learn that the president of the United States is benefitting from a million dollar contribution given by a filmmaker who mocked Islam? How will Hillary Clinton claim with any credibility that the United States government has no connection to this outrage? How will White House spokesman Jay Carney say this with any credibility:
“The reason why there is unrest is because of the film,” he said at one point. “This is in response to the film.” At another moment, he said, “The cause of the unrest was a video.” At yet another, “These protests were in reaction to a video that had spread to the region.”
And the lapdog media just can’t stop humping a leg of lies.
It’s weird, though, isn’t it?
I mean, how Hollywood has been silent in its defense of the filmmaker Obama is currently scapegoating (and in some cases, Hollywood is grabbing a torch), even as they embrace Bill Maher.
Well, I guess some anti-Islamic filmmakers are more equal than others.
And thank heavens, we have Barack Obama to tell us who the more equal ones are.
Hey, jihadis: check this out!
Jonah Goldberg on the media bias that led to ABC’s Brian Ross hasty attempt to link the Tea Party to the Aurora shooting.
…I have to believe Ross didn’t want to get the story wrong.
It would be nice to know if Ross checked to see if there were any Jim Holmes around Aurora who were connected to the Occupy Wall Street movement or any who were Muslims. Or was the tea party simply the first place he looked? And if so, why?
One possible answer is that even allegedly “objective” journalists follow certain narratives based on their own, unspoken ideological assumptions. When a Muslim shouting “Allahu akbar!” mows down colleagues at Ft. Hood or tries to blow up strangers in Times Square, the reflex is to seek proof that it was an “isolated incident” or a “lone wolf.”
But when a white non-Muslim shoots up a political rally or a movie theater, the media reflex is to prove their suspicions of sinister right-wing plots. Going with your gut can be great advice for sleuthing out stories, but awful guidance for reporting them.
Which brings us to Sorkin, the creator of HBO’s “The Newsroom,”perhaps the most execrable pop-culture agitprop since Michael Moore’s “Fahrenheit 9/11.” In Sorkin’s fantasy show about a news program that breaks with the media herd, smugly liberal reporters almost always have the right instincts.
Sorkin accomplishes this in part by giving himself the benefit of hindsight, by setting “Newsroom” in 2010. Hence, when the Times Square bomber is apprehended, the news team congratulates itself by choosing to do the “boring version of the story” in which the “system worked” and the terrorist “acted alone” — something they couldn’t possibly have known yet.
Meanwhile, the real story for Sorkin’s fantasy journalists is exposing the pernicious threat of the tea parties (and their James Bond-villain backers, the Koch brothers) as they peacefully unseat incumbent Republicans in primaries. Holding the actual government accountable isn’t a big priority for Sorkin’s Fifth Estate because, after all, the system works when liberals run it. The job of the media is to keep a weather eye on the existential threat from the American right.
…which is fine by me. He earned it honestly.
But it takes a great deal of nerve to mock Mitt Romney for his $230 million net worth.
Oprah, Uma, David — ugh.
Russell Brand goes nuts over a paparazzi, grabbing and tossing his iPhone.
…he started taking pictures of the 36-year-old British comedian and actor with his iPhone.
Brand allegedly “flipped out,” snatched the cell phone and threw it at a building, breaking a window in the process.
Earlier Wednesday, Brand tweeted about the incident to his more than four million followers, writing, “Since Steve Jobs died I cannot bear to see anyone use an iphone irreverently, what I did was a tribute to his memory.”
This morning I flushed my toilet in tribute to Brand.
The Oscars are an exercise in vanity, so why not double down with some Green vanity?
…at the Academy Awards, Missi Pyle, part of the ensemble cast of”The Artist,” will walk the red carpet in a flowing blue gown made from organic silk, hand-dyed with natural mineral pigments and lined with recycled polyester.
The gown was designed by Valentina Delfino, one of hundreds of designers around the world who submitted sketches to the third annual sustainable couture competition known as Red Carpet Green Dress in the hopes of presenting their creations on the most glamorous — and watched — red carpet in the world.
Pyle is the first actress in an Oscar-nominated film to wear the annual competition’s winning design. She was selected for her willowy, 5-foot-11-inch frame, her interest in sustainability — and all the attention surrounding “The Artist,” which is up for 10 awards.
Sometimes you just have to laugh. The LAT assigned three reporters to investigate the voting membership of the Motion Picture Academy. The story ran big with multiple pages and graphs.
The gist: the Academy is too white and too old. Lord knows, this issue keeps me awake at night.
What they never asked about was politics.
I’d bet that 80% or more are liberal Democrats. These are the people who tell America stories, who actually shape the public’s understanding about the role of business, about environmental causes and about history.
Propagandist Michael Moore has denied being a member of the hated “1%” of richest Americans.
Judge for yourself. As Reason noted:
Moore’s estate can go toe-to-toe in size, nouveau-riche ostentatiousness and pure bad taste with any in the area, which is saying something given that his neighbors include not just fellow Hollywood celebrities such as Bruce Willis, Madonna, and Tim Allen—but also corporate execs such as ex-Chrysler Chairman Bob Eaton and other Big Three execs, Auto mogul Bill Schuiling and boat-magnate John Win, the very people whom the protesters despise.
Michigan View reported:
Moore bought the original 2,500 square foot home, local real estate sources say, then gobbled up two surrounding lots to expand his massive estate. Antrim County public records show the property in the name of Moore and his wife, Kathleen Glynn, and lists its taxable value at nearly $1 million. Local real estate agents estimate the real value of the 7,500-12,000 square foot compound at $2 million (see an overhead view at BigGovernment.com here). A Michigan View survey of the area (see nearby photos) finds an exclusive community of homes and boat slips with housing values ranging from to $500,000 to Moore’s high-end $2 million.
How can he afford it? Celebrity Net Worth says:
Michael Moore is a controversial documentary filmmaker with a net worth of $50 million. Moore’s biggest three movies; Bowling For Columbine, Fahrenheit 911 and Capitalism A Love Story have earned over $300 million at the box office.
Fahrenheit 911 raked in $230 million in theaters and another $3 million in DVD sales. After the theaters take their traditional 50% cut, that leaves roughly $130 million. Take away marketing, production and distribution expenses and Moore is conservatively left with $80 million. Moore was able to secure a deal from Miramax which guaranteed him 27% of his film’s net revenues, or roughly $21.6 million. Michael also was entitled to 50% of the profits of Sicko which are estimated to be $17 million.
Moore is the author of several best selling books and received a $1 million advance for “Dude Where’s My Country” plus a generous percentage of the book sales.
So the vaunted anti-capitalist is a very successful capitalist.
And hypocrite.
He is indeed among the “1%” and by choice. If he put his money where his mouth is, he’d give enough away to be among the 99%.
Actress Ellen Barkin, whose work I respect, sounds off in a Q&A in LA Times Magazine:
You’re certainly not shy about speaking your mind, and you’ve even put your money behind what you believe politically.
Well, we’re experiencing divisiveness in terms of our politics. Like, the Religious Right has identified themselves because of the propagandizing and illiteracy of…
Disagree and you’re ignorant, ya know.
I don’t know…News Corp, maybe? They have identified themselves with this extremist, right-wing insurgency of a party—this Tea Party. They call it a grassroots movement. Grassroots? You’re attached to the wrong ship.
And that just shows you the enormous—and don’t misquote me here!—the enormous success that has killed us in terms of Fox News. The blatant lying that passes itself off as journalism. I don’t even need to get there to go mental. Can you imagine a legitimate newsperson—Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather, Tom Brokaw—just lying on the news?
Walter Cronkite famously reported the Tet offensive in Viet Nam as a loss for the USA, when in fact it was the opposite. That one report had a huge influence on public opinion.
Dan Rather quite clearly did lie on CBS about George W. Bush and his National Guard service. He lost his job over it.
Tom Brokaw was part of the MSM mob that made life miserable for Richard Jewell, who was wrongly fingered as the Atlanta Olympics bomber. He won $500,000 from NBC for damage Brokaw did to him.
Overall, the media Barkin respects reports the news through their liberal filter. The don’t overtly lie, they report a limited story.
Let alone the entertainment factor—you know, news as entertainment. And because of the enormity of the money behind that machine, they have convinced this ever-growing group of really struggling, working-class people, that these f–kers can somehow, in some way, represent them. They do not. I mean, let’s not even start, because that’ll take up a whole month if I go down that road.
Barkin cannot escape the liberal mind bubble to imagine, just for a second, that there’s an alternate view of the world besides her own.
Trapped in that echo chamber, she can only make foolish conclusions — that conservatives are evil, expert manipulators of the masses.
Setting aside the merits of conservative arguments, to believe what Barkin believes you’d have to believe that Fox News trumps the liberal mainstream media, Hollywood and most of academia.
Barkin mad, indeed.
Producer Gavin Polone points out that Moore has suckled at the Wall Street teat.
One of the many things that bug me about the industry in which I work is the large population of phonies who claim to be liberal, caring, green and unaffected by their wealth and fame but in reality are just as self-centered and addicted to their huge, over-air-conditioned living spaces and private planes as those at whom they point their fingers. And none is more phony and finger-pointing than Michael Moore.
Moore seems to be everywhere of late, talking about the “occupy” movement and fashioning himself its spokesmodel. I saw him on CNBC blowing hard and receiving kid-gloves treatment from Carl Quintanilla. On Piers Morgan Tonight, Moore said, “How could I be in the 1 percent?” When Morgan made the statement that Moore is “worth millions,” Moore responded with “No, that’s not true.” He went on to justify that comment by saying, “Even though I do well, I don’t associate myself with those who do well.” Although Morgan started off a bit confrontational, he, like most other interviewers, backed down fast. In my opinion, a lot of important issues are being brought up by the “occupiers,” but overall, this protest would be better served if those speaking on its behalf were of cleaner hands and less hypocritical than Moore, who has suckled mightily at the teat of “those who do well.”
In 2005, the Weinstein Co. set up financing of about $500 million to fund production and distribution. The investment vehicle was created and syndicated by a little firm called Goldman Sachs. One of the films that was produced by TWC using funds from that investment was Moore’s documentary Sicko. Given the success of his previous film, Fahrenheit 9/11, which he made with Harvey and Bob Weinstein, Moore was able to command a terrific deal for himself.
While I don’t know for sure what Moore received on his movie, given his previous success, it likely was several million dollars. Sicko, produced by TWC but released in 2007 by Lionsgate, did not perform as well as Fahrenheit, earning $36 million at the box office. But Celebritynetworth.com pegs Moore’s net worth at more than $50 million, and Moore is suing TWC for $2.7 million more in profits from Fahrenheit. (Reports at the time of the lawsuit said Moore already had received $19.8 million from TWC for that film alone.)…
Morgan Freeman demonstrated once again why it’s best for actors to be scene and not heard by charging that the Tea Party hates Obama because he’s black.
“Stated policy, publicly stated, is to do whatever it takes to see to it that Obama only serves one term,” he said. “What … underlines that? Screw the country. We’re going to do whatever we do to get this black man … outta here.”
Freeman added: “It just shows the weak, dark, underside of America. We’re supposed to be better than that. We really are. That’s, that’s why all those people were in tears when Obama was elected president. ‘Ah, look at what we are. Look at how, this is America.’ You know? And then it just sort of started turning because these people surfaced like stirring up muddy water.”
Meanwhile, Florida GOP straw voters — many of them Tea Partiers — overwhelmingly chose Herman Cain as their choice for president.
Memo to Freeman: Herman Cain is black.
Lionel Chetwynd, with some 60 film or TV credits to his name, knows Hollywood, especially making films with military themes.
He finds the upcoming kill-Osama movie being made by the Hurt Locker duo to be troubling.
In making a docudrama (and I believe I have done more than any other active American filmmaker) there are three critical factors: proximity of production to actual events, access to the actual participants, and release date. And in each and every one of these elements this proposed project doesn’t merely fail the smell test, it leaves a trail that reeks from the White House to the smart bistros of Beverly Hills.
The most troubling discontinuity from accepted norms has to do with access. As any filmmaker, of any political stripe, can tell you, the Pentagon has an open door policy. They will offer their aid and facilities to any filmmaker with only two provisos: the entire content of the script is submitted and deemed to be generally consistent with the real world military; and, once you accept their support you must agree to their oversight of how you employ their resources.
The second of these is quite legitimate and consistent with case law and the doctrine of “fair use”: once you involve someone in your project you cannot use that involvement in ways they have interdicted — a cousin, if you will, of the Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination. What is the consequence of breaking your end of the bargain? You are liable for civil damages.
But the non-litigious Pentagon simply maintains a policy of subsequent non-cooperation with offenders. Everyone knows that, and that’s the deal. Which brings us to the Bigelow-Boal film The Hurt Locker. According to knowledgable sources in the American military, during the filming of The Hurt Locker Ms. Bigelow violated her agreement with the Pentagon, amongst other things using an American military vehicle to enter a Palestinian area to film a demonstration. Scenes were added but kept from the Pentagon, depicting U.S. personnel abusing detainees.
Notwithstanding this, the filmmakers came back for Pentagon help in this new film and were granted two meetings with the under secretary of defense for intelligence, Michael Vickers, a senior political appointee. Of the Obama administration. To be given that level of access to the Pentagon after previous bad faith by the filmmakers is such a departure from current practice one is forced to suspect significant pressure was applied to the Pentagon by its civilian political masters.
Glen Reynolds writes that Hollywood once suffered from a 20% excise tax (gross) on movie tickets at the end of WWII as a deficit reducing measure.
They rallied a bunch of big stars to produce a film short arguing for an end to the tax, employing supply side arguments.
…Today, those industries are a major source of Democratic contributions and spread-the-wealth rhetoric, even as they prosper based on this tax cut, and numerous other bits of favorable treatment scattered throughout the Internal Revenue Code. It’s time for a change.
Were I a Republican senator or representative, I would be agitating to repeal the “Eisenhower tax cut” on the movie industry and restore the excise tax. I think I would also look at imposing similar taxes on sales of DVDs, pay-per-view movies, CDs, downloadable music, and related products.
I’d also look at the tax and accounting treatment of these industries to see if they were taking advantage of any special “loopholes” that could be closed as a means of reducing “tax expenditures.” (Answer: Yes, they are.)
America, after all, is facing the largest national debt in relation to GDP that it has faced since the end of World War II, so a return to the measures deemed necessary then is surely justifiable now.
The president’s own rhetoric about revenues certainly suggests so. Perhaps the bill could be named the “Greatest Generation Tax Fairness Act” in recognition of its history.
Should legislation of this sort be passed — or even credibly threatened — I think we can expect to see Hollywood rediscover the dangers posed by “job killing tax increases,” just as pro-tax-increase Warren Buffet changed his tune once his own corporate-jet business was threatened.
And, given the entertainment industries’ role as the Democrats’ campaign finance ATM, it seems likely that the president might soon reconsider his rhetoric as well.
And that’s not the only “revenue enhancement” we might employ. I note that FCC Commissioner Meredith Attwell Baker, who approved the Comcast merger, left the commission to take a lucrative job at Comcast, just as many members of the not-so-successful Obama economic team have left their government positions for lucrative jobs in private industry.
Obamacare drafters went to work for the health care industry at inflated salaries. And drafters of the Dodd-Frank financial bill have gone on to big-shot lobbying and consulting jobs at high salaries.
Because much of their value to their employers comes from their prior government service, I think that the taxpayers deserve a share of the return, say in the form of a 50 percent surtax on any earnings by political appointees in excess of their prior government salaries for the first five years after they leave office.
Some would say that a 75 percent tax on “revolving-door profiteers” would be more appropriate, and I’m certainly willing to entertain arguments to that effect; I’d also like to extend this to members of Congress, but I don’t think Congress would ever pass that bill…
