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Subscribe to RSSKENNER, La -- It was a substance-free, 12-minute prime-time performance that remains unlikely to sway a single vote, but Clint Eastwood's cameo appearance and conversation with an empty chair representing President Barack Obama in Thursday night's final hour of the Republican convention coverage remained a prime topic on the campaign trail Friday.
Mark Wilson / Getty Images
Actor Clint Eastwood speaks to an empty chair Thursday during the final day of the Republican National Convention at the Tampa Bay Times Forum.
Mitt Romney's top strategist told reporters on the candidate's campaign plane Friday that the moment should be judged as a performance, and that while not everyone may have liked it, Eastwood's very presence -- and concern for out-of-work Americans in particular -- made the rambling remarks by the 82-year old Academy Award winner worthwhile.
"The fact that he’s there shows he’s speaking his mind and if somebody wants to say I would have liked this different performance or that difference performance, have it," Romney campaign strategist Stuart Stevens told reporters, comparing the remarks to two famous Eastwood films. "Some people didn’t like 'Dirty Harry,' some people didn’t like 'Gran Torino,' that’s OK."
And while Ann Romney and several of Romney's top advisers remained stone-faced during Eastwood's appearance, Stevens said Mitt Romney very much enjoyed it.
"I was backstage with him and he was laughing," Stevens said."[Romney] thought it was funny."
A Romney adviser confirmed the remarks were ad-libbed, and the use of an empty chair as a prop was not discussed by the campaign. If there was any panic during the remarks, the adviser said, it might have come from the control room, where convention planners watched Eastwood continue for more than double his allotted time.
"He did what actors do sometimes, he did a little improv. If someone wants to say this wasn’t Clint Eastwood’s greatest performance, have at it. It doesn’t matter, you know," the adviser said. "It’s I think people saw that Clint Eastwood was not only endorsing Romney but endorsing the need for change. I liked that."
Meanwhile in Virginia, Romney running mate Paul Ryan faced a question by a reporter from NBC’s Hampton Roads affiliate WAVY if Eastwood's remarks were a distraction.
Hollywood legend Clint Eastwood made a surprise appearance at the Republican National Convention, but his rambling speech, which included a make-believe conversation with President Obama, got a mixed reception. NBC's Tamron Hall reports.
"I think Clint Eastwood was just being Clint Eastwood,” Ryan said in the interview to air Saturday. “One of the most profound things Clint said was that 23 million people out of work struggling to find jobs is just unacceptable."
Vice President Joe Biden, who was the butt of several of Eastwood's sharpest jokes, didn't mention the 'Dirty Harry' actor's performance during campaign stops in Ohio Friday.
But, according to pool reports, a supporter did allude to Eastwood's chair act, insisting to Biden during an impromptu stop at an Ohio fairgrounds that "You gotta keep the chair."
Biden didn't directly acknowledge the "chair" comment but gave the woman, Bev Kalmer of Poland, Ohio, a kiss on the lips.
Ann Romney, who spoke in prime time on the first full night of the convention, told CBS that Eastwood is "a unique guy and he did a unique thing" during his RNC appearance.
Asked if she was surprised by the unusual speech, she laughed and said merely "I didn't know it was coming."
Related: Clint Eastwood's 'invisible guest' RNC appearance is a hit online
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Eastwood.......an iconic idiot.............Actors should leave real life,......to real people. Go back to your imaginary world.
I think the republican convention actually added a lot to he political rhetoric. 1. Romney has no control over anything. Including his wifes expression which was truly a mastercard moment. No pun intended. Ineptness just seems to follow him like a shadow. 2. It is apparent to a broader audience that they are factually challenged. Instead of stating what they would do truthfully, they have to make up stuff. Thankfully some eyes are starting to open.Why don't we have another republican convention next week. To top this one! Too bad I couldn't watch it because of all the lies they were telling but I would another one.
It was more sad than serious or laughable. This isnt Dirty Harry. This is a dottering old man who once was a great star and now seems to be lost. It was embarrassing and regardless of the spin doctors something that left the party stunned. Why in the world everytime there is a huge gaffe do we hear from Ann Romney? Is Mitt unable to speak? Hope Clint got back to the home ok. just sad.
JAGER: Clint Eastwood IS the personification of TODAY'S Republican Party. It was entirely appropriate that he was the final speaker. As everyone walked away, including everyone who watched on television across the nation and the world realized the GOP was telling themselves and everyone else: "Here is our final big gun, our final spokesman who will leave with you the image of who we are!" Eastwood's image exactly exemplifies everything the Republican Party has become. Pitiful!
Beside the commenters who just automatically hate everything Republican, the reason Eastwood's speech "confused" so many people lies in the fact that it was spoken off-the-cuff. We have become so conditioned to scripted, staged, teleprompter-read speeches that we are shocked when someone speaks extemporaneously.
I can just imagine how MSNBC would have reacted to politics in an earlier century.
There is also a huge, steaming pile of tut-tutting about disrespecting the President. Americans have always spoken plainly to their leaders, from the beginning of the republic. The Office of President is to be respected. The current occupant, of whatever party, not so much. Does MSNBC not remember history farther back than 2 weeks?
I would agree in part. But what is really confusing is that the Romney handlers and the party cannot get through any event without a major blunder. It seems to me that Romney is always off script or so it appears. Then they roll Ann Romney out on script to clean it up. As for the tut-tut, the lack of civil discourse in DC and the acceptance of it by you and others is a main reason that nothing happens in DC. There are no Statesmen any more. Its all party and all about the party and not about We the People.
Barack Obama:
Alias Barry Soetoro pawns himself as Barack Obama, the humanitarian, the POTUS, the campaign for hope and change. But we know better. Barry is a radical Marxist who was raised by Communist parents and Communist grandparents. His mentors were known Communists, his contacts in college were strictly Marxists supporters, Marxist professors and a group of Pakistani activists as stated in his book, “Dreams From My Father”.
Barack Obama, tell us about Frank Marshall Davis or Bill Ayers. Surely you remember Mr. Davis. After all, your mother knew him all too well. Mr. Ayers, a known terrorist, responsible for at least a dozen bombings, helped your early Illinois campaign by raising money, thru his organization Underground Weather. Tell us about your trip to Pakistan (’81) with Pakistani Wahid Hamid.
Share with us your ideals of socialism, after all you’re a member of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), referred as the “New Party”. Please tell us why you have been influenced by the writings of Karl Marx, the prelude to Communism. Share with us your association with Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Do you justify this man’s message by condemning our country by saying, “God bless America? No, God Damn America”? Was this a forethought supporting your belief in Marxism?
Are these the individuals who have inspired you to public office? Are these the individuals who have inspired you to plot against the United States? Are they the people for whom you’ve entrusted your Muslim faith?
Please tell us why you mocked the Holy Bible and Jesus’ sermon on the mount, calling the sermon a radical message. You have mocked Christianity and this country. Barack Obama, you have betrayed this nation and all its’ people. Your skin is dark because of your race, but your soul is darker because of your deception.
United States of America………………YOU didn’t build it Barack Obama.
Liberals turn conservative truth into lies, while conservatives turn liberal lies into truth.
TopDrum: Tell why you are a fan of the Jerry Springer Show! Tell us where you got your information. Could it be from your Jerry Springer mentality learned from your Jerry Springer rank and file conspiracy theorists, who write such BS only by a mentality as low life and pathetically uneducated as you and your ilk?
Top Drum is a one trick pony.
ED: TopDrum is a regular on the Jerry Springer Show. That's his level of intellect, his level of education, his level of entertainment, and his level of ethics.
Obama's best line "You did not build that but I sure will steal it from you."
Tweets from Clint Eastwood's Chair:Wanna make my day, Mr. Eastwood? Then, fix my wobbly leg.More at: http://wp.me/p1VsTV-2v8
The problem I have with this NBC article is that it is obviously opinion, especially the introduction, but not classified as such. Concerning the skit, I thought Eastwood did a pretty job of mocking Obama, and I write that as someone who had an Obama sign on his lawn four years ago. He will not get my vote second time. There are probably a hundred different, major ways that Obama has disappointed me. I figure Romney couldn't do any worse. Most of these Eastwood critics don't have as much talent overall as Clint does in one of his thumbs.
Really makes you wonder where the vacancy is here: Eastwood's mind or the chair. I love the guy, but wow, how embarrassing! Maybe he's what the GOP and Romney/Ryan are all about, anyway.....just a lot of hot air about not much of anything!
Romney was laughing, the creep that cut the hair of the boy in school is still there.
I wouldn't vote that creep dog catcher. Bigots they are with no respect for the office of the President of the USA.
Obama/Biden-2012
Eastwood is in no danger of losing his crown as a Hollywood icon of epic proportions. Just review a list of his top ten movies and you'll know that. What he has lost is his ability to ad lib in a manner that makes sense, gets a few laughs and in the end comes off as brilliant. One of the most difficult things for the elderly to admit to is that they've lost a great deal of their former intellectual and emotional agility. If all of Eastwood's kids and his current airhead wife really love him, they'll attempt to tell him these things - that he's better off NOT making an ass of himself in front of hundreds of millions of people. Learning with dignity that it's time to retire is huge and he clearly hasn't yet come to that point. Thanks a bunch, Clint, for your monumental failure of a performance - you did a great thing for Mittens and Jar Jar.
It really does not matter if you liked Clints speach or not. As long as we get 0loser out of the White House.
Clunk Driftwood.
On the serious side, artists (including actors), and the creatively gifted, employ their imagination. There's a line, however, between creativive genious and just plain crazy. And having a "discussion" with someone who is not present is a sure sign of being delusional. This guy has made a very public display of classic symptoms of schizophrenia. He's a danger to himself and others, and needs to be hospitalized before someone gets hurt or killed. Yeah, make his day ... in the psychiatric ward.
His best line was to the empty suit in the empty chair. "I can't do that to myself!" His next line should have been "And I am tired of you trying to do that to me!"
Talk about over reaching. He adlibbed, it was clever and funny. If you are for Obama I get it you did not like it. If you are not, then it was funny.
The empty chair symbolized the empty suit Obama has become. Thought I would explain it one time. Personally, I like the empty suit better.
Why bother with conventions? It looks like everybody has made up their minds about the election.
The fools on both sides of the aisle are now just preaching to the choir.
And as is always the case, the hypocrisy is mind numbingly consistent and shrill.
As a Dem. I still like Clint, Clints not all bad one of his best friends is Morgan Freeman a real Dem., Clint just forgot where his roots begin being poor and a young starting actor and was fooled by these Republican "Lies" like most old people.
As to Eastwood, thanks for the opening Clint!
I'd welcome the chance to roast either of the beady eyed jackals Romney or Ryan in an empty chair like that!
Really USED to like Clint...
If you took away all of Clint Easwood's money you would still have a pretty impressive human being who you would like instinctively. If you took away all Romney's money you have someone you wouldn't look at twice.
So some say Clint was funny. Since when are mean spirited comments funny? Such commentary is done solely to degrade and destroy someone's character.
I've never found mean spirited people to be funny... and that includes Eastwood with his politics of personal destruction.
Way to go Clint! I was laughing my butt off during his speech and loved every second of the well overdue mockery of Obama!
Hang on to your ... what ever. Turn about's fair play for some long overdue mockery of Robme.
Great performance by Eastwood putting "Mr. Obama" in hs place unlike other Follywood libs who bow at his feet. The libs were having convulsions and sissy fits crying foul as they ignore their own low blows at Romney. Eastwood gave them a good dose of their own medicine and they are howling mad like the Fiesty One.
One thing missing in everyone of the liberal assessments of the appearance of a fine gentleman is this.
That chair was as empty as the chair in the oval office!
The whole Republican Party is an improve with an empty chair. WAKEUPAMERICA.
Geez, can you imagine the gall of any Democrat telling someone else to wake up? Stunning. 4 years of selfish corruption, four years of MASSIVE debt, 4 years of Obama taking care of his government worker base that needed reform, 4 years of blaming Bush Jr. while acting much like him, 4 years of more folks in poverty, 4 years of massive black unemployment, and four years of propaganda.
Who needs to wake up? These folks are brainwashed tyhese Democrats, they think their leaders are good people. When Obama fades away a multi-millionaire and his kids go to private schools, you still won't get it. You'll worry about tuition loan rates, and never question the multi-millionaire professors who helped you get that trillion dollar debt.
Why don't we raise taxes on Democrats who want 16 trillion dollars of debt for the children? Why are they so selfish?
Clint has become a senile old fart ! It's so sad to see this pathetic display !
Liberal troll... Can't argue the message, attack the person. Pathetic.
If Eastwood had reversed the role and talked to an empty chair representing Romney, the left would be praising him as one of Hollywood's greatest actors.
Instead, we hear the typical hateful intolerance from the left towards anybody that dares to speak out in a dissenting tone.