Son,

Writer, actor, director – So he gets to comment on world events. Chris Matthews is asking him about Senator’s votes for or against the Iraq War.

Afleck notes the Youtube video about Cheney arguing against an invasion of Iraq. So Chris Matthews plays some clips from the Republican debate and the authority of the President to go to war. Every one of those guy, with the exception of Ron Paul, think the President had the authority. They run around it with qualifiers but none of them denied his authority. Matthews says they act like we are run by a military junta that only goes to congress as a courtesy. It is a good characterization.

Afleck presents well – noting the irony of Guiliani talking about constitutional authority in one breath and in the next denying the opportunity for the President to use line item vetoes.

Afleck says some problems need to be addressed from the bottom up, like poverty and education.

Matthews plays a clip of Carter attacking Cheney stating that “Cheney is a disaster.” Afleck says he is not a fan of Dick Cheney but that Carter probably went to far with his attack.

Afleck, “The one really thing that is bad about American politics is the catering to so many to gain votes. That is one of the good things about Al Gore right now because he can be more open and honest. Everyone is terrified of making a mistake.”

They have to take a commercial break but when they come back Matthews is going to ask Afleck what he thinks about the obsession of cable news with missing children. Cool. Ben Afleck is the one person who probably understands this issue (kidding folks).

Ben Afleck has a new movie out and he is on the stump to promote the movie – Why, I wonder, is Hardball a platform for Ben Afleck. How does talking with a Hollywood actor qualify as Hardball?

The one relevant question to Afleck by Matthews was simply, “When the candidates are debating, can you tell who is acting?”

Afleck is politically astute. He dodged the question by talking about the need for charisma. “Guiliani seems to be mitigating his social issues with this really hard foreign policy stand. Even evangelicals are gravitating to him and it has to be on the foreign policy issues. Guiliani has moved toward the Neo-con position of foreign policy… Some see Mormonism as almost heretical… The others like Brownback don’t seem to be attracting the evangelicals.”

OK they are talking about missing children and apparently Afleck’s new movie is about missing children. “I wanted it to have the integrity of being real but I wanted it to be surprising.”

Chris Matthews tells Afleck that he is a good political pundit, what a suck up. Not much Hardball. I guess there is some human interest in learning what Hollywood types think about politics.

It must be a slow news day.

Dad

See Also: On Writing, Blogging, Journalism