Gore Vidal on the Candidates: 5.22.2008

[reprehensor]

Run time: 06:48 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuW_slx6i2s   Posted on YouTube: May 24, 2008 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: May 24, 2008 By DU Member: reprehensor Views on DU: 4729

 
This is Part 1 of 2. Part 2 is here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAzKpkEp_Y4

Vidal: "9/11 was a coup d'etat in which the American government was overthrown. And in no time at all with that crazy little Attorney General we had, Gonzales... everything he did while Attorney General was to make legal, every illegality, and every breach of the Constitution that Bush had in mind... or Cheney had in mind... And Cheney is a devotee of torture and all sorts of undesirable things, but he's got away with it because our media is so corrupt... and the Congress is hopeless."

Interviewer Jon Snow: "Gosh, you haven't got a good word to say for anybody."

Vidal: "NO, I don't. And they are in trouble, not I."

Snow: "They being?"

Vidal: "The current regime. A criminal regime. There are going to be trials once this is over."

----------------------------------------------

This 13 minute interview was broadcast in an edited form on the UK Channel 4 News, on May 22, 2008. You can view the edited 8 minute version here: http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/politics/international_politics/gore+vidal+ready+to+kill/2238447

But I find this raw version a bit more interesting. :)

McCain is put through the grinder, and both Democratic candidates are criticized, but Vidal is no Republican, he does not throw them under the bus. Vidal seems resigned to accept that Clinton will not be the Democratic candidate for President, and acknowledges that he thinks she is the better candidate, because Clinton knows more about the Republic. What's left of it, that is.

That said, Vidal points out that the doorman would make a better President than W.

Could McCain win? Yes, by theft. Just like 2000 and 2004, which were Gore and Kerry victories.

As always, Vidal's unbridled opinion is a dash of cold water for the sleepy Republic.

[papau]

1. BBC's HARDTALK program got a very entertaining insightful interview with Gore Vidal this time! :-)

[PDJane]

2. Thank you for this...........

He's a crotchety, angry and brilliant old man, and I think his voice needs to be heard more.

[jimmyfungus]

9. The Views of Gore Vidal: INCONVENIENT TRUTHS

Brilliant indeed, but I wonder if he would be more influential if he would moderate his views slightly. Gore Vidal even views the military actions of Franklin Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln as uncalled for and unnecessary in his books. Gore Vidal, in this vid, lumps in the incursion into Afghanistan with the invasion of Iraq...I think that is a mistake, as most people view the Afghanistan war as just and legal, it only enables Gore Vidal's critics to dismiss him as on the fringes and too extreme, when most of what he is saying is brilliant and dead on.

As for the Bush administration being put on trial for war crimes, that all will depend on the mood of the American people. The Democrats haven't bothered to go after Bush as much as they should because it wasn't politically convenient. The polls are so favorable to the Democrats at this time, why should they bother rocking the boat by trying to hold Bush and Cheney accountable? Bush and Cheney may slither out of this one.

I think what may predict what a Democratic administration will do on this issue can be partially predicted by who Obama chooses for his running mate. If it is a more centrist figure, it may indicate Obama trying to create a tone of conciliation...A far left, pit-bull type might indicate Barack is in a fighting mood. For more on that Barack decision see this article here:
http://jviz.blogspot.com/2008/05/obama-running-mate.html

[Joe Chi Minh]

13. You seem to mistake the small Republican rump with the American people.

[Pastiche423]

20. The Afghanistan war was NOT just, nor was it legal

Not a single Afghani was among the "hijackers". Unfortunately, their land was wanted for a pipelone.

[SaveOurSovereignty]

3. Good stuff

great post thanx alot

[CadenBlaker]

4. I love this man.

Although I disagree with him on his pick for President, I admire him and respect him.

[reprehensor]

5. Then you must know of the best Vidal site...

The Gore Vidal index:

http://www.pitt.edu/~kloman/vidalframe.html

Tons of great stuff there.

[govegan]

19. Thanks . . . and thanks for bringing up the video

I hope lots of folks get to view it!

The doorman at the hotel would be a better president, indeed!

[Laughing Mirror]

10. He backs Obama

May 18, 2008
I knew JFK, says Gore Vidal, and believe me Obama’s the better leader

Gore Vidal, the writer and long-time Clinton supporter, tells why Hillary is insane to keep on fighting

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/tv_and_radio/article3952774.ece

He continues: “I’d always rather liked her. She’s a perfectly able lawyer . . . But this long campaign, this daily search for the grail, has driven her crazy.”

...

As for Obama, Vidal has taken time to warm to him. “I liked the idea of him, but he never managed to get my interest. I was brought around by his overall intelligence – specifically when he did his speech on race and religion.”

In Vidal’s opinion, “he’s our best demagogue since Huey Long or Martin Luther King”.

[bluereality]

12. Anyone with an ounce of intelligence backs Obama

The only candidate who opposed the war in Iraq since the beginning.

[TexasBushwhacker]

22. I wonder if he liked Obama from the beginning

or if he just thinks he's the best of the two Democrats we have left?

[nichomachus]

6. K&R

[many a good man]

7. "The Republican Party is a mindset, not a party"

"It controls public opinion."

Good stuff.

[eagertolearn]

8. It's refreshing to hear him say what many of us have been thinking.

I hope there will be trials. What I don't understand is why the republican party picks these bozo's to be their pretend leaders....are they easier to manipulate?

[Joe Chi Minh]

11. Thanks for this, reprehensor. I felt sure I'd heard Snow say there was to be

a longer version broadcast.

[MindMatter]

14. "That crazy little Attorney General we had"

[gateley]

15. Wow. K&R. This is so right on. Off to view part two -- thanks! nt.

[govegan]

16. sleepy republic or sleepy non-republic?

I like what Shaw wrote in The Intelligent Woman's Guide to Socialism and Capitalism, and specifically, "We are all brought up wrongheaded to keep us willing slaves instead of rebellious ones."

Vidal is a great wit of our time, as Shaw was in the early twentieth century.

But taking it in the lump I should say that the evil of the corruption and falsification of law, religion, education, and public opinion is so enormous that the minds of ordinary people are unable to grasp it, whereas they easily and eagerly grasp the petty benefits with which it is associated. The rich are very charitable: they understand that they have to pay a ransom for their riches.

Isn't this part of what Vidal is driving at? "Well, so the wealthy newspapers tell us," as Vidal responds to the question about the "white working class." It is that base evil of corruption and falsification.

What makes it so hard to discover and to believe is that the false teaching is mixed up with a great deal of truth, because up to a certain point the interests of the rich are the same as the interests of everybody else. It is only where their interests differ from those of their neighbors that the deception begins.

As Vidal says, of course the lies are told sometimes at a very primitive level, but they are believed at a very primitive level as well. Such as that Mr. Magoo is somehow credited with stature and feats that are as different from reality as a free radical from an antioxidant.

[rusty quoin]

23. I think of Hannibal Lector telling Clarise Starling...

"We covet what we see." (Hope I have the quote right.) Regular uninformed people do not see the misdeeds of the powerful. They don't see it, and don't read about it. Yet they see examples of what the right wing tells them, and it reinforces their belief system. I can change "we covet what we see," to we hate and blame what we see.

The right wing has been so successful with this, we are now depending on the educated and the young. I hope it works.

[govegan]

24. Yes, let us hope that the fire of rebellion burns in the bellies of the young!

n/t

[barack the house]

17. I would more label Vidal a independent and has said the congress is one party with 2 right wings...

Now I would say that with the will of the people we can make that second wing more left leaning.

[cynthia]

18. thank you for posting this interview with Gore Vidal

He is an intelligent and insightful man.

[autorank]

21. k*r My inspiration!!!! For years, truly

Our greatest political observer and commentator since Mark Twain.

[Dead Elephant]

25. Gore Vidal is part of a dying breed

He speaks the truth because he's lived it

[Bob Dobbs]

26. He has the courage to speak the unvarnished truth.

Untouched by willfull ignorance.

Thanks GV.

[Echo In Light]

27. "America has one political party with two right wings." G.Vidal