I love and admire Sam Waterston, whom I have met and talked with personally, and I was a stong supporter of Chuck Hagel, who is talked about as a Unity 08 candidate. But now I read this article about all the old pros gathering to engineer the Unity ticket, and I wonder if this veneer of being a grassroots movement isn't really a sham. Read here my comments:
The nascent Bloomberg campaign has brought out some heavy hitters:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22445078/page/2/
However, most of these are men with a reputation of being Democrat hawks and Republican moral issue liberals - precisely the opposite of Chuck Hagel, or at least the Chuck Hagel we were induced to support for President. In fact, I don't see what Bloomberg would plan to do differently from Hilary Clinton, as most of these men had no trouble working with Bill. And if Giuliani or Romney were Republcan nominee, looking at their records rather than their rhetoric, Bloomberg would offer no alternative to either of the major party nominees in expectation of social policies. Perhaps, like Ross Perot, he would speak forcefully about Social Security and Medicare reform, but the problem there has never been in the White House, Democrat or Republican, but in Congress. How would an independent President wield any more clout over them?
The clear need on a third party line in 2008, something neither major party is likely to offer, is someone who stands with the Christian Right on moral issues and against them on war and foreign policy. As far as I can tell that candidate is Ron Paul, who is unlikely to get the Republican nomination, but it could also be
Chuck Hagel. But that candidate is not, unless he says something surprising, Michael Bloomberg. So why do they think they can enlist the kind of grass roots volunteers that Ron Paul has garnered to run a man who DOESN'T offer any discernable alternative. And why would Chuck Hagel want to join such a campaign?
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The Real McCoy
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Waterston was recruited for Unity08 by one of the group's cofounders, Gerald Rafshoon, who served as Jimmy Carter's communications director. The two met when Waterston played the lead in 1989's "The Nightmare Years," a mini-series Rafshoon produced. Unity's efforts to get a party-neutral ticket fit with Waterston's outlook, as he's maintained centrist views for longer than he can remember. He's not registered with any party, though he recalls being a Democrat "many, many years ago." But like many, he became disenchanted by partisan scare tactics. "I found myself doing things like voting for Barry Goldwater in New York because I was so appalled by the 'Be afraid, be very afraid' Johnson ad," he says. "I was trying to send a message, but of course that got lost. Then I started voting independent because I was under the impression that if you left the parties, they would miss you. They don't miss you."
Waterston's itinerant political instincts are clearly in opposition to his professional ones. His longevity on "Law & Order" is particularly impressive considering the show's bias toward narrative over backstory. Its policy of making characters cleave to the story, rather than vice versa, enables it to absorb cast shake-ups easily. But Waterston has planted deep roots in the show in a way that no other actor has, with the possible exception of the late Jerry Orbach. Waterston is so integral that the district-attorney role, which in the past was limited to brief, intermittent appearances, has been expanded to give him more screen time—but he'll still be seen less than he was in his old role. "Sam has never been an expendable part of the show," says creator and executive producer Dick Wolf. "After all these years, I've never once seen him phone in a performance."
With his newfound free time, he'll do more of his favorite kind of acting: stage roles. Waterston doesn't mention Jack McCoy as his career highlight; he talks up his many Shakespeare roles, as well as his debut at the age of 6 in a production of Jean Anouilh's "Antigone," directed by his father. (His role: The Page. The entirety of his dialogue: "5 o'clock, sir. Cabinet meeting, sir.") He'll spend more time at the place he and his wife, Lynn, have called home for going on 30 years, a northwestern Connecticut farm complete with cows, sheep and goats. There he's neither a name actor nor a political messenger, he's jes' folk. "If anybody comes looking for me, people in town don't say where I live," he says. "They know exactly where I live, but they say, 'Oh, he moved'." A likely story for a guy so good at staying put.
© 2007
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