LOONEY CLOONEY

Academy reponsible for civil rights movement.

March 6th, 2006

Well, for those of you that, like me didn't watch the Academy Rewards Sunday, I read the transcripts, it seems we all missed the historical perspectives of George "Looney" Clooney. Apparently, Mr. Looney was rewarded for his work exposing a CIA plot to gain access to foreign oil, with a shiny golden god and a few moments to defend the Academy's "out of touch" nominations. It appears that the "Media" has been responding to an ever persistent claim that the Academy awards have lost touch with the values of the American people. According to Mr. Looney, the Academy was instrumentally ground breaking by being "the ones who talk about AIDS when it was just being whispered, and we talked about civil rights when it wasn't really popular" and giving "Hattie McDaniel an Oscar in 1939 when blacks were still sitting in the backs of theaters." Of course the Academy did nothing about black sitting at the back of theaters. Their primary concern with AIDS didn't occur until it began affecting Hollywood's promiscuous lifestyles. As far as the civil rights movement, I must have missed the large groups of Academy members marching along side Martin Luther King. In fact, if I'm not mistaken, isn't it the black community that has been complaining for years that too few black actors are even considered for high profile roles and that even fewer are nominated for high awards. Mr. Looney does have one

thing right though, the Academy, over the years has become nothing more than a soapbox for social and political statements. Regardless of whether these statements come in the form of anti-Bush rants during acceptances or from the actual nominations themselves. While most of the on stage rants were subdued this year, most likely because of past public reprisal, the nominations were nothing but a social and political wish list for liberals. This is evident by the award given to Mr. Looney. The film "Syriana" where the US Government and CIA is portrayed as a diabolical evil entity. Then look at Looney's other nomination as director of "Good Night, and Good Luck," a film that tries to draw obvious parallels between the years of McCarthyism and the US government. It doesn't take much to understand that Looney Clooney is "Proud to be part of this community (the Academy), and proud to be out of touch" more than he's proud to be an American and in touch with his audience.

Looney's Full Acceptance Speech

- Richard Okelberry, Managing Editor