Radical-left actor Ed Asner was blunt with Paul Bond of The Hollywood Reporter about how celebrities won’t be mobilizing against military actions launched by Barack Obama: "A lot of people don't want to feel anti-black by being opposed to Obama," he said.
"It will be a done deal before Hollywood is mobilized," Asner said. "This country will either bomb the hell out of Syria or not before Hollywood gets off its ass." Asner, 83, even doubts the value of protesting at this late stage in his life:
"We had a million people in the streets, for Christ's sake, protesting Iraq, which was about as illegal as you could find. Did it matter? Is George Bush being tried in the high courts of justice?" asked Asner. "We've been so God-damned stung in this country by false wars, repeatedly, that, how can you believe in any just war with the history we have had?"
He feels sad he voted for Obama: "I voted for him, but I'm not proud. He hasn't thrown himself on the funeral pyre. I wanted him to sacrifice himself. Instead, he has proved himself to be a corporatist, and as long as he's a corporatist, he's not my president," Asner said. "A lot of people have lost hope -- with the betrayals, the NSA spying ... People aren't getting active because 'Who gives a shit?' is essentially the bottom line."
His fellow CBS Seventies star Mike Farrell was also interviewed, and he wasn't happy with the president. "What he is talking about in Syria is a potential war crime," Farrell said. "It will be illegal, and if citizens are killed it certainly could be considered a war crime....This administration ought to insist that the international community charge [Assad] with a war crime and prosecute him, and in so doing Obama would be following the law instead of flaunting the law."
"It's incredibly improper for the president to call for a strike. I have said it everywhere I can and I suspect a lot of others will do the same, but whether there will be an organized effort, I don't know," Farrell admitted. "I'm frankly deeply disappointed in the president's foreign policy, war-making, his reliance on military rather then diplomatic responses, his use of drones, continued allowance of the Guantanamo prison. He's a disappointment to me and other people I know."
