RIP, Meathead

 Rob Reiner and his wife had their throats slashed by their son yesterday, at least that’s what the news report said when I saw it last night. To hear news like this fifty years ago would have been shocking—Desi Arnaz and wife Lucille Ball were found bludgeoned to death by their son, little Ricky. That headline would have stopped all of America in its tracks. Now we hardly raise our eyebrows. Now it’s just another dysfunctional Hollywood couple with a disturbed son who snapped in the most violent nation on the face of the earth, the United States of America.

For people of a certain age, Rob Reiner will forever be Meathead, the radical hippy son-in-law of Archie Bunker in All in the Family. But he was much more than that. He gave us A Few Good Men, When Harry Met Sally, and The Princess Bride. For these three films alone he has left a terrific legacy. But now he’s dead and will most likely be remembered more for how he died than how he lived.

I’m one of those people who basically can’t stand Hollywood and Hollywood people. The way I see it, Hollywood is populated by self-obsessed narcissistic weirdos. The only thing worse than a room full of actors and directors is being in a room full of the children produced by these people. These people have basically nothing in common with everybody outside of Hollywood, ie…their customers. In fact, they despise us. See, they are the only people on earth who believe the “right” things, and every time one of them wins an award (at one of their 63 different award shows they throw for themselves) they simply can’t resist lecturing us rubes in the heartland about all of our shortcomings. As far as Rob Reiner goes, much has been made of his politics in the last 24 hours. I simply take it as a fact that any lifelong show business dude will have the political views of a leftist. Who cares? When I think of Rob Reiner I think of those three movies I mentioned and…Meathead. I have nothing against the man. At this moment, after his violent and tragic death at the hands of his own son, the man’s politics is about as irrelevant as it gets.

Of course, because this is 2025 and Donald Trump is in the White House and simply can’t resist inserting his thoughts into everything, the President of the United States offered up this nugget:

I just can’t process what could possibly have been running through his mind when he not only wrote this…but pressed “send”. Can anyone reading this imagine any other President saying anything like this…ever? I mean…even if he truly loathed the guy, why in the name of everything that is holy would he try to make this tragedy all about him?

But, I ask questions that I already know the answers to. At the end of the day there isn’t a thing I can do about it besides being patient waiting for the day when there’s someone in the White House that has enough self awareness to know that not every thought that enters your mind needs a public airing.