The hit TV series
West Wing is now featuring
Alan Alda as Senator Arnold Vinick, the GOP Presidential nominee
described as "a social liberal and fiscal conservative with a maverick streak and a direct manner".
The new wannabe TV series Commander-In-Chief stars Donald Sutherland as House Speaker Nathan Templeton, an over-the-top hawk and creationist, who wants to elbow his way into the White House.
Their connection?
Alda made his career with a decade-long stint as Dr.
Hawkeye Pierce on another hit TV series,
M*A*S*H.
Sutherland played Dr. Hawkeye Pierce in the black-comedy movie hit M*A*S*H. He portrayed a darker, more mean-spirited version of the character that Alda later made more likeable.
Now, three decades later, both men who played the anti-war, anti-authoritarian Hawkeye Pierce portray would-be Presidents with the foreign policy instincts of Dick Cheney. Hmmmm...
Personally, I'd vote for Radar O'Reilly, played by Gary Burghoff in both the film and TV series. He would have heard New Orlean's levees overtopping before Katrina was a tropical depression, and the federal paperwork would have been signed before the states requested it.