An Essay: There's Something Familiar About 'Half-Blood Prince'

For that she got the State Department. Nice work.  

I’m obviously not the first one to equate Lord Voldemort with Vice President Cheney, whose latest brouhaha is that he urged the CIA to, uh, not mention a secret plan to assassinate or capture top leaders of al Qaeda. His enthusiasm for secrecy, his lengthy stays in that secure hidden bunker, and his apparent seriousness when he suggested voting for Obama amounted to aiding and abetting terrorism is the kind of cynical sorcery that would make any prince of darkness proud.

And how about that Bellatrix Lestrange, one of Voldemort's principal Death Eaters? As played by Helena Bonham Carter, she’s a beautiful woman given to sudden treacherous moves.

Hmmm, couldn’t she be Sarah Palin, who recently quit her governorship amid a swirl of vague, rambling reasons, one of which was to take her “fight for what's right -- for Alaska -- in a new direction”? 

Yes, you can reverse the Democrat versus Republican allusions. Although who’d be Harry Potter in a Republican perspective? Bobby Jindall? And would Newt (suddenly that’s a meaningful first name) Gingrich be Albus Dumbledore, the force of conservative good?

One interesting point: In both cases, Lieberman works nicely as the morally ambiguous Snape. At any rate, this exercise made for a delicious daydream over my popcorn.

And it put a little extra zing into a summer movie, knowing that art and real life are never too far apart.

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