This week's LA Times featured an article that appeared to take as a given that the American electorate is really, really stupid.
Fred Thompson is a very conservator former senator. He is also an actor, who has been working in movies and TV for decades. One of the roles he played, on the Stephen Cannell series WISEGUY, was a demigogue named Knox Pooley who led a neo-Nazi group of malcontents. I watched the story arc back in the eighties. It was most memorable -- to me -- for the whacked-out follower of Pooley who took hostages and then demanded, in quavering tones, "I ... wanna see ... Knox ... POOOOley!" A friend and I took to saying "Knox POOOOley" to each other as a punch line for weeks afterward.
This footnote in TV history has come to the forefront now, because folks are talking about fielding Thompson as a presidential candidate. And, believe it or not, people are wondering if opponents will use Thompson's WISEGUY role against him.
"How does a performer eyeing a presidential run deal with a video history that can be downloaded, taken out of context, chopped into embarrassing pieces and then distributed endlessly though cyberspace?" asks the article.
The reporter distinguishes Arnold Schwarzenegger's acting history as a killer robot, on rather snide grounds: "In some ways, Thompson is too good an actor and looks too convincing in the part — a problem Schwarzenegger never had."
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