About Last Week...

Being Where?

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On occasion, there are concepts and thoughts and ideas that once you are exposed to them you immediately think:  “that’s brilliant!”

And then – because it was so obvious - you kick yourself for not having thought of it first.

For example, putting air – which is free – into thin plastic bags – which are cheap - and then selling the resultant product as packing material.  Well, duh, of course.  Why didn’t I think of that?

Or the advertisements encouraging people to buy a box of baking soda, take it home, and immediately pour it down the drain.  Buy, throw away, buy again…that is truly inspired.

That’s up there with “rinse and repeat” on shampoo bottles – unless you were on the very wrong end of a skunk, you really don’t have to repeat.

And then there are ideas you know you should have thought of first. 

I write about politics and such.  “Being There” with Peter Sellers is one of my favorite movies.  How did I miss the very clear fact that Kamala Harris is actually Chauncey Gardiner?

Well, Pete Colan, writing for American Thinker   (I have been published there myself) did not miss the fact.  His piece is insightful and its main premise utterly true:  Kamala is Chauncey.

For those heathen among you who have not seen the film, Peter Sellers stars as Chance the Gardener.  Since his childhood, he has only ever known living in an old DC brownstone with a wealthy man and the maid, Louise.  He is mentally handicapped, to an extent – maybe merely slow and impossibly naïve work better as a descriptor.  He did not go to school and he did not leave the house except to go into the backyard and tend to the garden and greenhouse, hence the name (one can presume the first name of “Chance” is a roman a clef given to him, though not of another person but of his entire existence.)

The “old man” dies, the estate lawyers show up, and Chance is simply tossed on the street, impeccably dressed in the old man’s hand-me-downs and carrying an umbrella and beautifully ancient piece of luggage.

Besides the garden and the maid, Chance knew of only one other thing – television.  He mimicked it, he learned from it, it shaped his entire life, and was his only friend, as it were.  Walking down the street he looks into a TV store window, sees himself on the video camera and, confused, he steps into the street where he is hit by a limousine carrying the wife – played by Shirley MacLaine – of one of the richest and most powerful in the nation.

As noted, he is impeccably dressed and very well mannered and, instead of being taken to a hospital for his not at serious injury, MacLaine takes him home – her dying husband has a medical team on duty at all times.  She asks his name on the car ride to the estate – he says ‘Chance the Gardener.”  She thinks he says “Chauncey Gardiner” and – with the clothes and the manner – immediately pegs him as one of her kind, an uber-WASP merely befuddled by the accident.

The story continues – Gardiner is introduced to titans of industry and eventually the president talking the whole time in cliches and/or snippets of dialogue he picked up from the television.  He is considered to be brilliant – his manner is patrician, his statements are homilies to meaningless profundity, and important people start getting ideas.  The relatively unpopular president’s term is up soon, so maybe, well, why not, Gardiner as the perfect fill-in?

Hello, Kamala.

The parallels are striking.  Harris became vice president purely because of her perceived identity – Chauncey the same.  Harris has trouble conveying any ideas in a coherent fashion – Chauncey’s quotes are taken as being intelligent and pointed even though they are really about TV and gardening.

Chance literally grew up in a “hot house,” spending  much of his time in the greenhouse behind the brownstone.  Harris (and Gavin Newsom, by the way) was tended to by the San Francisco  California establishment as if she were a hot house orchid.   

The president is floundering, and through the party and donor and deep state machinations, she replaces him.  The end of the film implies – as Chauncey literally walks across water – that that will happen soon with him.

Harris replaces Joe Biden on the ticket because the powers that be are worried about keeping the office – Chauncey is the same.

Chauncey’s meteoric rise to national prominence is enabled by his new wealthy benefactor and – with a few words placed in the right ears - he becomes an instant media celebrity.  After three years of toilsome mockery, Harris has become the media darling.

Chauncey started his rise by being hit by a car – Kamala started her rise by being hit on by California political powerhouse Willie Brown.  In fact, more than hit on – Harris – an obscure deputy district attorney – was put on a pair of state boards after the two began having an affair (Brown was married at the time.)  The odds of a relatively attractive woman having an affair with Willie Brown are far higher than of being hit with a car, but the appearance of randomness is similar.

Both speak gibberish, both have no real reason being where they are, and both would fade from public memory instantaneously if not constantly reminded about them in the media.

Colan notes (and quotes Roger Ebert) in the ending of his piece:

In the final sequence, Chance is seen walking on water which is a feat attributed to only one other person in human history. Obviously not a prophet, but instead elevated to that level by people who saw in him only what they wanted to see, and not who he really was.

Sound familiar?

Quoting Roger Ebert again:

“What are we to assume? That Chance is a Christ figure? That the wisdom of great leaders only has the appearance of meaning? That we find in politics and religion whatever we seek? That like the Road Runner (who also defies gravity) he will not sink until he understands his dilemma?”

“The movie's implications are alarming. Is it possible that we are all just clever versions of Chance the gardener? That we are trained from an early age to respond automatically to given words and concepts? That we never really think out much of anything for ourselves, but are content to repeat what works for others in the same situation?”

So, while we wait for that much-anticipated first unscripted interview, town hall, debate, etc., be prepared for the idea that it won’t happen. I believe her campaign staff has seen this movie and is following the script.

And Mr. Colan hits the nail on the head.

Sooo jealous.

As this was a single-issue ALW, I am making the entirety open to all.  As for the epigram, how about a quote from Chauncey:

“I like to watch.”

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