While admitting that it was a shame that President Obama was a no-show for Sunday's unity rally in Paris, MSNBC contributor Howard Fineman offered that actor George Clooney's "Je Suis Charlie" speech at Sunday evening's Golden Globes award show was in some sense just as well a representation of America's solidarity with France.
Fineman made the remarks during a January 12 Hardball roundtable discussion about the Golden Globes, to which cinemaphile Chris Matthews assented. Here's the relevant transcript (emphasis mine):
CHRIS MATTHEWS: Hollywood did itself proud, I think, last night by being serious about this. And I'm back with the roundtable: Perry [Bacon of the Washington Post], Kasie [Hunt of NBC News], and Howard [Fineman].
Howard, you first. You know, a lot of these things are basically beef parades, as one of the great characters said out there, they're for show and sex. I thought last night, besides having all that, had some seriousness. I was proud of the fact that Clooney could speak so well about something and that way that he did it. And we weren't over there [in Paris]. The president wasn't there. Somebody had to speak out.
HOWARD FINEMAN: Two things. First of all, that event in itself stands for everything that the dictators and the theocrats are afraid of.
MATTHEWS: The three-hour show last night.
FINEMAN: Well, creativity, freedom of expression. So the event itself is always an answer to what was going on in Paris. But in addition to that, you had people who are global figures who have, because of social media, I think they're more important than ever and more connected than ever to people around the world. And you had George Clooney. Yeah, I think it's sad that in a way George -- we didn't have the president or the secretary of state over there, but at least we had George Clooney, and that's not to be dismissed. That's not to be dismissed.
MATTHEWS: Well said.
