Spike Lee

While Democrats mock Mitt Romney for his alleged lack of interest in the “very poor” and focus their political pitch on income inequality, one can’t help noticing the Obamas running around to $35,000-a-head fundraisers with the very rich and very famous in New York City and Hollywood.

Michelle Obama kicked off February with an exclusive fundraiser in Beverly Hills at the home of Netflix executive Ted Sarandos and his wife Nicole Avant, who raised Hollywood millions for the Obamas in 2008, and then became their ambassador to the Bahamas. Now Nicole Avant’s back managing Obama’s Hollywood money march. Many of Tinseltown’s titans ponied up: Jeffrey Katzenberg, Harvey Weinstein, Haim Saban, and Steve Bing, among others. (Katzenberg’s also given $2 million to the Obama-affiliated super PAC called Priorities USA Action.)

Director Spike Lee, along with his wife Tonya, came on Wednesday's Today show to promote their new children's book, but he couldn't leave without blaming the NRA for the Gabrielle Giffords shooting and slamming the United States of America for being "the most violent country in the history of civilization."

Initially both Lees just talked about their new book, Giant Steps to Change the World, but Today co-anchor Meredith Vieira couldn't let the controversial director of such films like Do The Right Thing and Malcolm X go, without pressing him to comment on the Tucson massacre as seen in the following January 12 exchange:

(audio here)

(video after the jump)

Discussing “post-racial” inauguration, CNN doesn’t call Lee on outdated racial term.

We’ve heard ad nauseam from a hopeful media -- Daniel Schorr of NPR, commentator Juan Williams and The New Republic among them -- that Obama will be a “post-racial” president. At least some of his supporters haven’t gotten the message.

Popular filmmaker and Obama supporter Spike Lee used a passé racial term for Washington D.C. when he appeared on Friday’s CNN Newsroom. Lee called the nation’s capital “Chocolate City.”

Speaking from Utah, Lee was promoting his Jan. 19 “Inauguration Forum” at D.C.’s Howard University, when he  rhetorically asked anchor Fredricka Whitfield’s permission to call the capital Chocolate City. Whitfield is a Howard graduate.

Did you know that the Republican Party is totally white and is stuck in TV Land shows like "Leave it to Beaver," "Father Knows Best," and "Howdy Doody?"

So said film director Spike Lee Wednesday as he discussed the meaning of Tuesday's elections and the first black president with MSNBC's "Morning Joe" team.

Lee also said history will view things in terms of "BB" and "AB", meaning Before Barack and After Barack.

Does that mean next year is 1 instead of 2009?

While you ponder, here are some of the lowlights (video embedded right):

B.C. and A.D?  Get with it, old man.  History is henceforth divided into the eras of B.B. and A.B.—Before and After Barack. And George W. might have been "misunderestimated" as he engaged in "strategery."  But that's so, like, yesterday.  Barack Obama is "pre-deortained."  By whom?  Spike Lee stopped short of saying God's hand is at work.  But he was clearly speaking in quasi-religious terms in discussing The One on today's Morning Joe.

Click on image at right to view video.

On Thursday's "Good Morning America," journalist Bill Weir touted left-wing filmmaker Spike Lee as a "social critic" and ignored any mention of the director's bizarre conspiracy theories, such as his 2005 contention that the United States government intentionally blew up the levees during Hurricane Katrina in order to flood African American areas. Instead, Weir marveled, "No director in Hollywood has attacked the thorny issue of race quite like Spike Lee."

While promoting Lee's new World War II film, the anchor of the weekend edition of GMA enthused, "'Do the Right Thing' and 'Malcolm X,' still loom over his 15 other feature films as ground breaking emblems of righteous anger." Weir also labeled the more hopeful tone of Lee's "The Miracle at St. Anna" as a "reflection of one social critic's mood in an age of change." Of course, Weir neglected to mention that this same "social critic" has also declared "it's not far-fetched" to think that the levees in New Orleans were destroyed by the United States government.

Spike Lee seems intent on inadvertently subverting Barack Obama's campaign. As we saw previously, Spike Lee suggested that rappers could be an important campaign asset for Obama. And now in an interview with an MSNBC reporter, Lee asserts that history can be divided into two epochs. Here is a transcript (emphasis mine):

 REPORTER: I'm joined now by Spike Lee who we found on the floor of the Democratic convention. First of all, it's such a key...

SPIKE LEE: Amongst the Indiana delegates...

REPORTER: And Florida too. Powerful delegations.

LEE: (garbled) Florida and Indiana. That's all right.

Film producer Spike Lee believes Barack Obama has a secret weapon that will be a big asset to his campaign: rappers.  Yes, in Spike Lee's opinion hip-hop music will be a key element in getting Obama elected. Lee expounded upon the importance of hip-hoppers in this election in the New York Times The Caucus:

Mr. Lee, who has often uses hip-hop music and casts hip-hop stars in his films, said that rappers should, well, feel free to mince their too-hot words at such a crucial time in American politics.

In particular, the platinum-selling artist Ludacris referred to Senator Clinton as an “irrelevant” epithet and attacked Senator John McCain with the line, “Paint the White House black and I’m sure that’s got ’em terrified/ McCain don’t belong in any chair unless he’s paralyzed.”

For good measure, he referred to President Bush as “mentally handicapped.”

In this corner, Clint Eastwood, Dirty Harry himself. And in that corner, the self appointed guardian of America's black population, Spike Lee. It's shaping up to be a battle royale, folks, with Lee rabbit punching the aging action star while Eastwood uses his smarts and experience to deliver a knock out blow.

In round one, Lee came out swinging at Director Clint Eastwood's WWII films, "Flags of Our Fathers" and "Letters from Iwo Jima," claiming that Eastwood "erased the role of black GIs from history." Lee tried on his self-righteous air of moral certitude and labeled Eastwood a racist. "Many black veterans who fought in Iwo Jima were hurt that there was no representation of them in both of those films," Lee said in an interview in Rome last year.

But not to fear for Eastwood losing the bout, as he is about to show us all that Spike Lee doesn't have what it takes to go toe to toe with a master.

What is it about Hollywoodans that makes so many of them believe that any time political leaders they revere get caught in a scandal, it's because of some vast conspiracy?

While you ponder, consider how just days after "View" co-host Joy Behar suggested that Democrat presidential candidate Barack Obama's pastor "might be being paid by the Republicans," film director Spike Lee said, "It looks like [Rev. Jeremiah Wright's] being paid to keep talking."

I kid you not.

As reported by Britain's Guardian Thursday (emphasis added, h/t Deceiver via NBer bias-fighter, picture courtesy New York magazine):