An open thread dedicated to discussing books, movies, and tv shows we love. And occasionally some politics.

Star Wars, Loss Leaders, and the Democratic Party

I said last week that George Lucas had a record of disappointing his fans, yet getting them to return for more, that was only outdone in American culture by the Democratic Party.

I was just trying to be funny, while also insulting my current least-favorite institution, but it made me start to think about why people, including me, kept coming back for more Star Wars episodes. I'd been disappointed at the end of the saga with Return of the Jedi, and then, after 16 years, had been disappointed again with The Phantom Menace. Why did I buy a ticket to see Attack of the Clones (god knows, the title itself should have warned me away)? And after Attack of the Clones, in which Lucas, bored perhaps with trashing the genre of science fiction, irritatingly took up trashing the genre of detective fiction as well (that really steamed me, since I love detective movies and could see the horrible ham-handed attempt to evoke Bogart's Philip Marlowe, perhaps, or another of the great detective heroes working their street connections)

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iy3yoSwBA_c]

why, in the name of all that's holy, did I go back to see Revenge of the Sith?

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4l5eZp8Ae9c]

I kept hoping it would get better. Why?

Well, for the same reason that I hoped the Democratic party would get better when I was trying to reform it under Howard Dean (and even, to some extent, under Kerry, who had, in late November 2004, finally woken up to the fact that things had gone terribly wrong in this country). Seriously, after growing up under the Democratic party of the 80s, who spent most of their time whimpering under Reagan, after seeing the rise of the corporate Clintons who'd sell their grandmother for more money and power, after watching the utterly shameful abandonment of African-American voters (and really, all voters) in both 2000 and 2004--didn't I know that I wasn't going to get anything good out of the Democratic party? Why did I think it was going to get better?

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qcQ1XM-Oqk]

The more I thought about the Democratic Party and George Lucas, the more familiar the feeling of continually disappointed expectation became. It reminded me of my relationship with my former best friend. We met in college, and formed an incredibly strong bond, as was often the way with young feminist women in the 80s. We had such a close relationship that I assumed we'd be friends until one of us died (or perhaps beyond, as I occasionally thought in my more mystic moments). About 11 years later, our relationship started to fall apart, and, like a dodo-head, I wouldn't accept it. I kept plugging away, thinking surely we could salvage this.

I kept thinking it would get better. Why?

Because it had been so good once.

That's the answer. That's why so many of us kept going back to Lucas, hoping for a return to the glory days of Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back. We couldn't believe that a story that began so well could decline into crap and actually stay there. There was goodness there; there was something we loved; where did it go?

That's why I kept trying, for about ten years, to save a relationship long dead. There was goodness there; there was something I loved; where did it go?

That's why so many of us kept going back to the Democratic party, hoping for a return to the glory days of the New Deal and the Great Society. We couldn't believe that a party that had brought us this:

There are two ways of viewing the Government's duty in matters affecting economic and social life. The first sees to it that a favored few are helped and hopes that some of their prosperity will leak through, sift through, to labor, to the farmer, to the small business man. That theory belongs to the party of Toryism, and I had hoped that most of the Tories left this country in 1776

But it is not and never will be the theory of the Democratic Party. This is no time for fear, for reaction or for timidity. Here and now I invite those nominal Republicans who find that their conscience cannot be squared with the groping and the failure of their party leaders to join hands with us; here and now, in equal measure, I warn those nominal Democrats who squint at the future with their faces turned toward the past, and who feel no responsibility to the demands of the new time, that they are out of step with their Party.

And this:

And even this!

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmlcLNA8Zhc]

(Yes, I know everybody hates the sweater speech, and thinks Carter is crap, but in fact, what he was saying about energy was true, and he was saying it because he was worried about the welfare of the nation. Truth + concern for the well being of the nation puts him ahead of most Democrats prominent since 1988).

Anyway, we couldn't believe that the Party that had related to us in that way, and had made, at least some of the time, an honest effort to improve the well-being of the country, could possibly be turned permanently into this:

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3ooMrgXido]

Or this:

http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/15100-democrats-share-the-blame-fo...

Or, Jesus Christ dancing on a toadstool, this:

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBLNohqquRk]

Then I started thinking about the concept of a loss leader.

loss-lead·er
(noun)
a product sold at a loss to attract customers.

Traditionally, a "loss leader" is a great deal you offer the customer in order to get them to buy more goods or services from you. It's a bit before my time, but apparently the Chevy Corvette was intended to be a loss leader--they assumed men wouldn't be able to afford it and would buy a lower-priced Chevy of some other model. (It turned out they loved it and bought it in droves). This is a subjective perception, so I could be wrong, but I believe the concept of the loss leader has expanded in our current era to include YouTube and Pandora offering you free service with few commercial interruptions at first. Then the incidence of commercials increases, making the desire to pay for the ad-free content more and more intense.

Now, I don't actually believe that the FDR and the Dems, back in the 30s and 40s, thought to themselves "Hey, if we just do some good things for the little people for 25 years or so, we'll be able to be total bastards for the rest of the party's existence, giving the wealthy elites everything they want and riding the biggest gravy train in the world!" anymore than I believe that Lucas said to himself "All I have to do is make two good movies, and those idiots will keep coming back forever." But it's pretty plausible that Lucas did say after the fact "I never have to do anything for the rest of my life but recycle some Star Wars imagery and characters through some shabby, sub-par narratives and those bozos will keep coming back." And it's very plausible that the Democrats know that we're so attached to the historical past of FDR and Huey Long, JFK and RFK, that we'll keep coming back, like idiots, to try to reclaim old glory--

or, like me with my former best friend, to reclaim old loyalty and affection.

One day, after trying to pin her down to a lunch date for three weeks, I just let go.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=de8h27wsxpY]

I recommend it.

Small addendum: that video clip was in the back of my mind the whole time we were conceiving of this website.

Thanks for being here guys. I'm glad you're in the bus with me.