Bat-Bush: A New Hope for Conservatives

Republicans trying to justify the last eight years have reached a new level of desperation, comparing President George W. Bush to the comic-book hero of America's No. 1 film.

No, I'm not talking about the "Space Chimp."

In a new opinion piece from the Wall Street Journal, Southern California mystery writer Andrew Kavlan--author of 'You'll Never Have Lunch With a Terrorist In This Town Again'--claims that the new Batman film "The Dark Knight" is a love letter from a conservative Hollywood that is "forced to put on a mask" in order to speak what it knows to be the truth; namely that "doing what's right is hard, and speaking the truth is dangerous."

Because the truth of our dangerous world hurts, says Kavlan, conservative filmmakers have had to resort to fantasies like 'Lord of the Rings,' 'The Chronicles of Narnia,' and '300' to spread their message, which is, mainly, that "sometimes men must kill in order to preserve life; that sometimes they must violate their values in order to maintain those values." And sometimes Prince does the soundtrack.

But let's take a quick step back. How, in fact, is President George W. Bush--the helmsman of the most disparaged administration since, well, Clinton's--comparable to this tough, decisive and plastic-coated version of the winged hero? Kavlan claims:

A. They are both "vilified and despised for confronting terrorists in the only terms they understand"
B. They sometimes have "to push the boundaries of civil rights to deal with an emergency"
C. They both understand "that there is no moral equivalence between a free society and a criminal sect bent on destruction"

Would it be too easy to point out that they are also both the sullen, neglected, entitled sons of wealthy and powerful men who, when given the freedom of adulthood, create widespread, high-tech havoc? Maybe. So instead let's make a different comparison.

"The Dark Knight" is not the only blockbuster superhero movie out at the moment. There's also something called "Hancock," in which Will Smith plays an alcoholic superhero whose recklessness while saving victims routinely causes untold damage throughout society.

Read into it what you want.

B. Brandon Barker is the author of 'Superman's Diary' and the novel Operation EMU.