Akkam’s Razor

I've always liked Bruce Willis.  The kid from New Jersey charmed his way into my heart while I was in grade school with Moonlighting (I was very mature for my age).  From their, he progressed into the modern incarnation of Detective John McClane in Die Hard and it's sequels.  He layed the tragic anti-hero in the no-happy-ending Twelve Monkeys, the Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, Pulp Fiction, and future AMC classic Armageddon.  Aside from some questionable films like the Look Who's Talking and the * Ten Yards franchises, he's had a great career.

I was disappointed to see that as the GWOT (Great War on Terror) ramped up, then rapidly shifted from the terrorists to Iraq, Willis increasingly became a pro-Bush actor.  It's is notable to say that he is involved in the making a pro-troop movie highlighting the heroic actions of a unit that was involved in the fighting with insurgents in Iraq.

Now I respect people to counter the consensus of Hollywood as a hotbed of liberalism.  At the same time, I expect them to be smart, and not make judgements based on rhetoric, or allow themselves to be portrayed as partisan shills, whether left or right.  Willis also said the following in an interview on Cinematic Happening Underground regarding his movie 16 Blocks:

Q: You are one of the few major Hollywood stars who are proud to be Republican…

Willis: Let me stop you right there. I'm a Republican — and everybody write this down because I'm sick of answering this fucking question.

Q: Can I continue –

Willis: You can continue, but let me answer that part of it. I'm a Republican only as far as I want a smaller government, I want less government intrusion, I want them to stop pissing on my money and your money, the tax dollars that we give 50 per cent of or 40 per cent of every year, and I want them to be fiscally responsible, and I want these goddamn lobbyists out of Washington. Do that and I'll say I'm a Republican. But other than that, I want the government to take care of people who need help, like the kids in foster care, the half a million kids who are in orphanages right now, they call them foster homes but they're orphanages. I want them to take care of the elderly and give them free medicine, give them whatever they need. There's tons, billions and billions of dollars that are just being wasted. Okay? I hate government. I'm apolitical. Write that down. I'm not a Republican.

Hmm.  My kind of Republican.  Shame we don't have any of them around. 

But then, something else happened.  No, not his run-in with Lindsay Lohan, or Demi and Ashton's marriage.  He suddenly got very quiet on foreign policy.  Michele Malkin's HotAir windbag originally told the following story:

Linklater said he had handed out DVD’s on set which carried claims that 9/11 was perpetrated by the US government to erect a police state to Bruce Willis, one of the stars of Linklater’s upcoming Fast Food Nation.

“He said it put him in such a head space that he will be quiet on issues of national policy.”

Linklater said Willis had told him in an e mail that the videos had changed his entire political paradigm. 

Then, allahpundit explains it away by saying the quotes were taken out of context.  Take note that both statements are from third-party sources.

In classic Hollywood style, the cliffhanger is resolved and the good guys win. Michael Yon e-mails:

Bruce got back to me this morning saying the press has misconstrued his statements and that this is untrue. Bruce said in part, “…the Linklater statements have been completely misconstrued, as usual by the media.”

[I]t’s clear that some media are just attaching Bruce’s name to gain traction. I will not talk about private communications so will keep this very brief by saying I know Bruce’s support for the troops is ongoing and, if anything, increasing. Bruce does not believe this conspiracy theory.

Also take note that the working title of the fourth installment of the Die Hard franchise is Live Free or Die Hard.  The synopsis is on ComingSoon.net:

USA Today adds that the film will feature McClane attempting to stop a techno-terrorist from shutting down the nation's computer systems on the Fourth of July. The story takes place around Washington, D.C.

"Our villain is high tech, but the way McClane deals with him is low-tech," Wiseman told the newspaper. "A fistfight still solves a lot of problems." He added that the fourth outing "will be a more epic movie. It's on a much grander scale. The threat is nationwide."

Yippie-Ki-Yay, motherfucka!

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