Pat Dollard | Young Americans

Class? Meet No Class…

September 2, 2008

Kudos to Say Anything

A while back it was reported that on September 2nd Obama would be jetting off to Switzerland to attend to big-money fundraisers organized by Hollywood A-lister George Clooney. The price to get in the door was set to be $1,000 with an additional $10,000 payment required if you want a plate to put your food on.

Well now it’s September 1st, the Republicans have all but canceled their national convention due to a hurricane scare in the gulf coast, and according to George Clooney as of yesterday the fundraiser is still on:

Clooney said the movie - though poking fun at the world of intelligence - had no political intent. Speaking of politics, wouldn’t Clooney, who is planning a fundraiser for presidential hopeful Barack Obama in Geneva, Switzerland next month, rather have been at the Democratic Convention in Denver, this week instead of in Venice? ‘I’m sort of happy to be here. It is one of my favourite places,’ Clooney said. ‘The stars of the convention should be the people who are being elected.’

Consider this: If John McCain and the Republicans had held their convention as scheduled without making any modifications to accommodate the situation in the gulf region they would have been excoriated in the media. Talking heads would have raged, and Keith Olbermann would have launched into a special comment that would have undoubtedly invoked the image of McCain and/or Bush as modern Neros fiddling while America burned.

But apparently it’s ok if Obama jet-sets with some deep-pocket Hollywood types off in Switzerland for a couple of days.

I think it’s bad enough that Obama is campaigning and fund raising so much on foreign soil. The trip through Europe? Now an elitist-of-the-elite gathering in Switzerland? But refusing to call off, or even just delay, the event while your political colleagues are focused on what could have been another major disaster in the gulf coast region just takes the cake.