The influential Film Actors Guild has released the following video to pledge their support for President Obama and his progressive agenda.

It’s been more than seven months since Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore (and that chick from “Legends of the Fall”) made their pledge to end “twenty-first century slavery.” I understand that this is a five-year project, but can they at least give us a status update, perhaps via Twitter?

IMDB reports that Sean Penn is suffering from “severe exhaustion” after the filming of his latest film, “All the King’s Men.” Penn remarked,

“The first week back, you want to make up for all the time you spent away from the kids – mistake. You have to pretend you’re still away except you’re not, so you just sleep and they come to see you, otherwise you’re ill. This one [All The King's Men] has been extremely rough. I’m pretty burnt out and I’m going to have a couple of years off at least now.”

This statement is nearly incoherent, but I think he’s saying he’s really wiped out from reading aloud words written by other people.

In the movie Penn plays a governor. Sadly, since pretending to be a politician has proven so cripplingly exhausting for the guy, actually being a politician must be just plain prohibitive. Those of us pining for Jeff Spicoli to launch a Senate campaign will likely be disappointed.

You have to sympathize with Sean Penn, however. Make-Believe is a taxing endeavor. In fact, the last time I played charades, I had to take a 2-week sick leave from work. And when I played Captain Hook in a 5th grade production of “Treasure Island,” I quite rightfully demanded an extended, excused absence from school.

What a treasure. I tremble to think—what would we do if we didn’t have Sean Penn to tell us how evil America is? What if we didn’t have people so wealthy and out of touch—so wholly without a terrestrial frame of reference—telling us that our values are fraudulent and wrong?

I need to revisit Rosie O’Donnell’s interview with Geraldo Rivera on Fox News a few weeks ago; there is just too much good stuff in here:

“And as a Democrat, as a member of this democracy…I feel I have a responsibility to speak out, as does every other person who disagrees with this administration. And it’s scary in a country that you can say something against the President and then worry about your career.”

We have heard this before. Whether it is the Dixie Chicks or Linda Ronstadt, celebrities respond to the opinions of private citizens—e.g. the people who pay for the goddamn tickets to their shows—as if they were the instrument of some evil Republican state apparatus. They portray themselves as persecuted, lone brave voices for justice and understanding, in real danger of impingement on their first amendment rights.

It is really pretty pathetic that anybody needs to point this out, but the Constitution does not guarantee against personal or professional consequences if you choose to make bombastic, inflammatory political statements.

Indeed, if any of these self-important shits were to talk to somebody in the masses of non-celebrities out there, they would discover that keeping one’s political opinions to one’s self at the workplace is a good, discreet, professional way to behave.

I can think of several reasons why Rosie O’Donnell isn’t getting the same work she used to, and has to “worry about [her] career.”

1) She is a revoltingly corpulent bizarro with no discernible talents
2) Her politics are in-your-face, over-the-top, half-brained and run contrary to the basic sensibilities of the majority of Americans

This is not McCarthyism, Rosie. You suck and people don’t want to listen to your fat fucking face.

Among the inaugural posters on the Huffington Post was John Cusack, who contributed an elegy to Hunter S. Thompson which, given that Thompson died over 2 1/2 months ago, surely has less to do with delivering timely and relevant commentary than with Cusack’s self-congratulation on being present at the grossly overrated author’s memorial. Unfortunately, the medium for masturbatory celebrity journaling did not exist in February when Thompson shot himself, so Cusasck brings it to us now. You’re my fucking hero, John.

When I made the post about Arianna Huffington’s new project, I wasn’t aware that Maggie Gyllenhaal had said only days earlier that America was to blame for 9/11. Here’s the quote:

“I think what’s good about the movie is that it deals with 9/11 in such a subtle, open, open way that I think it allows it to be more complicated than just ‘Oh, look at these poor New Yorkers and how hard it was for them,’ because I think America has done reprehensible things and is responsible in some way and so I think the delicacy with which it’s dealt with allows that to sort of creep in.”

And here is the video.

I think it’s hilarious how frequently these celebrities use words such as “subtle,” “delicate,” and “complicated,” to describe their own convoluted worldview, and yet how easily they ascribe “reprehensible” actions to the USA. Where is that cool, detached objectivity when it comes to the nation which– largely through the sacrifice of people younger than you, Maggie– guarantees your freedom to absolutely shit on it?

For all these celebrities’ emphasis on nuance (whether in pretending to be other people or in condemning the USA), their political arguments do not contain much detail. How are we supposed to argue against Maggie Gyllenhaal? By enunciating every single non-reprehensible action of the USA? That doesn’t seem very practical. If all they ever do is issue vague indictments such as “America has done reprehensible things” or “Bush is evil,” how can we ever have an intelligent debate about anything?

One more thing, Maggie. I read that you grew up on the Lower East Side. I can’t be certain how or if you were actually affected by the terrorist attacks on Manhattan, but I am guessing that because the World Trade Center was populated by people in business, finance, etc., and not wealthy bohemian pseudo-intellectuals, you and yours did not know suffer the same loss that other New Yorkers did.