George Clooney has a message for Democratic office-holders who voted for the war in Iraq, only to claim later that they'd been misled by President Bush:
"F— you!"
The movie star's argument — directed at the likes of presidential wannabes Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, John Kerry and John Edwards — is actually more nuanced than that.
But not by much.
"The fear of being criticized can be paralyzing," Clooney writes today on Huffingtonpost.com — pumping up the volume after banging the drum of Hollywood liberalism in his Oscar acceptance speech.
"Just look at the way so many Democrats caved in the runup to the war. In 2003, a lot of us were saying, where is the link between Saddam and Bin Laden? What does Iraq have to do with 9/11? We knew it was bulls—.
"Which is why it drives me crazy to hear all these Democrats saying, 'We were misled.' It makes me want to shout, 'F— you, you weren't misled. You were afraid of being called unpatriotic.'"
Clooney exhorts the lily-livered Dems to stop being cowards and put some steel in their spines.
"It's not merely our right to question our government, it's our duty. Whatever the consequences," he lectures.
"We can't demand freedom of speech, then turn around and say, 'But please don't say bad things about us.' You gotta be a grownup and take your hits."
I actually agree with one thing Clooney is saying: It is ludicrous that Democrats would try to excuse away their vote in favor of the Iraq war by saying they were mislead. Baloney. They should take responsibility for their decisions. I do not, however, believe that they made the decision because they were afraid of being called unpatriotic. I think they made the decision because they didn't want to go against the grain and risk ticking off voters who were solidly behind the decision.
Really, though, if anything should tell us that Clooney and his Hollywood liberal pals are far out of the mainstream of American politics it should be the fact that the already far-left "Party of Howard Dean" isn't far-left enough for them. One gets the idea that nobody short of Vladimir Lenin himself would be far-left enough for Clooney.