Three is a trend in journalism, but two is all Blog P.I. needs, as completely separate but nevertheless intriguing comparisons of George W. Bush with Bruce Wayne (and vice versa) have been flying all across the Internets the last few days.
Making the rounds of the political blogosphere is an op-ed by novelist Andrew Klavan from today’s Wall Street Journal titled “What Bush and Batman Have in Common”:
There seems to me no question that the Batman film “The Dark Knight,” currently breaking every box office record in history, is at some level a paean of praise to the fortitude and moral courage that has been shown by George W. Bush in this time of terror and war. Like W, Batman is vilified and despised for confronting terrorists in the only terms they understand. Like W, Batman sometimes has to push the boundaries of civil rights to deal with an emergency, certain that he will re-establish those boundaries when the emergency is past.
And like W, Batman understands that there is no moral equivalence between a free society — in which people sometimes make the wrong choices — and a criminal sect bent on destruction. The former must be cherished even in its moments of folly; the latter must be hounded to the gates of Hell.
“The Dark Knight,” then, is a conservative movie about the war on terror. And like another such film, last year’s “300,” “The Dark Knight” is making a fortune depicting the values and necessities that the Bush administration cannot seem to articulate for beans.
It may also be worth noting that comic book writer and artist Frank Miller, author of the graphic novels “300″ and 1986’s “The Dark Knight Returns,” upon which all non-Schumacher Batmans since have been modeled, is working on a new Batman graphic novel: “Holy Terror, Batman!” Yes, it’s Batman vs. al-Qaeda.
The second Bush-Batman juxtaposition, which I first saw on Digg yesterday, is a series of Leno-esque person-on-the-street interviews by Philadelphia sketch comedy troupe Secret Pants. The interviewer has a set of quotes that were spoken either by President Bush from 1600 Pennsylvania or Adam West from the 1960s TV show. Passersby are asked to guess which. It’s definitely worth your 3:35:
I have been dealing with this issue as well
simonstudiotheatre.blogspot.com/2008/07/batman-panopticons.html
the philosophical and political issues were played well. Dark Knight is most certainly an argument for voting Republican. Surveillance to fight violence? The need to lie to save Democracy and Justice? I don’t think Obama would feel comfortable dealing with the Joker. The line between murder and torture were delineated between Two Face and Batman. BatMan is a Republican who understands the Black Hat that justice sometimes has to take…. he tortures, but never takes a life. We need to get BatMan a job at Guatanomo. BatMan McCain for president!
(firstly) Alfred is not justifying his actions. So it can’t be taken that he feels that is was a moral argument. (Two) the entire movie evolves from a delineation between “Two Face”, “BatMan” and “The Joker”. “Two Face” even in his human pre-identity never has the moral backbone that “BatMan” has (that is a given from the comic book). Harvey Dent tortures and is not afraid to kill. He makes that very clear and takes on the character of “Two Face” before he becomes “Two Face”. BatMan corrects this action, but has no problem torturing the “Joker” wen he is in jail. Therefor we can assume that “BatMan is not beyond torture, but will not take the death penalty into his own hands. One can assume that BatMan would understand Guantanamo… but would never kill because he is not due process. A government sanctioned war is part of due process (Three) As for the Joker… he remains the terrorist… or even a “Super” Terrorist in that he would kill… even if he does not benefit. Remember Joker is not about the money and personal benefit. He BURNS the money. Joker wants to terrorize for the sake of terror because he is angry. He has no meaning at all. The Joker has no structure he believes in. One might even argue that the joker doesn’t even care about his own life and takes destroying the establishment to be his first priority, He has Harvey Dent put his gun to his head to see if he can prove that Dent in no better then him. He laughs at BatMan to encourage him to break his own values and kill him.
Why the Bush/Batman analogy doesn’t work:
Batman knows when to turn off his eavesdropping machine and realizes that his use of it could quickly get out of hand. He resorts to using it only once and decides to destroy it afterwards.
Batman only resorts to torture in the most dire and immediate of circumstances.
Batman is all about due process of the law. At no point in that movie does he toss someone into a cell in Cuba for 4+ years and not charge them on anything.
Batman actually has the balls to fight bad guys himself, whereas Bush sat out Vietnam.
Batman actually goes after people who pose a real threat to his town.
Batman is smart. Bush is stupid. Duh.
I’ll bite. I see one big, huge, and all-important difference. Batman does what he can to try to alleviate the fear of the public and make them hopeful and resilient, knowing that public fear helps the Joker, not public order.
I promise I will read all your comments just as soon as I’ve actually seen the danged movie. Soon, I hope.
Thank-you.
That youtube video was Amazing! It shows how both writers of a TV show and the President speeches -or of his own words- share such commonality that regular folks can’t tell the difference. In regards to Bush is Batman(TV) and Batman(TV) is Bush truly nails that in this video. Thank-you for the Link.
The bonus in that video of a BDS old fart tops it off sweetly! I could only imagine the froth and bloodshot eyes from him while ranting.
Sweet Indeed!
This is a fantastic video. It just goes to show that we’re told the same messages over and over for decades.
While both Batman and Bush claim to be fighting terrorists, I disagree that The Dark Knight was a conservative movie about the war on terror. I think the real similarities between Batman and Bush have to do with the American Dream and the public’s idea of the “rugged individual.”