As you may or may not have heard in the media lately, there’s a new potential candidate for the Republican nomination for President in 2008. It looks like former Senator Fred Thompson is looking to throw his hat into the arena. And as a serious movie buff, I couldn’t be happier. You wanna talk about experienced candidates, let’s talk about Fred Thompson.

How is he on terror? Well, he put boot to ass in Die Hard 2 and let John McClane do what needed to be done. For those of you who aren’t old enough to know John McClane, he was Jack Bauer back when Jack Bauer was still a vampire. And Thompson did all this while successfully running an airport at Christmas time. Strong on terror and great at multi-tasking.

And in this new age of Russian instability, only one man in the race has so perfectly faced off with the Russians. First he oversaw untangling a spy mess as director of the CIA in the thriller No Way Out. Then he went head to head with them in the Atlantic as rear admiral in charge of the navy in The Hunt for Red October. If there’s anyone who can dance with Russian intrigue, it’s this guy.

Sure, he might have been an arms dealer at one time in the movie White Sands. But he was entirely uncredited and no one can make those charges stick. If you want to talk about uncredited, let’s talk about his uncredited service for this country when he was on the court-martial tribunal in Flight of the Intruder. Let’s talk about that, huh?

And legal experience? You want to talk legal experience. How about five seasons of Law and Order. Huh? How do you like them apples? Oh, sure, he’s a real lawyer. And yeah, he served on the Warren Commission. And if you want to get nitpicky he was also a senator for eight years. But let’s try to keep our eye on the ball. The man was ALREADY president in the direct-to-video film Last Best Chance. Methinks maybe we found what whet his appetite. And before that he served as the White House Chief of Staff during the attempted assassination of the president during In the Line of Fire.

Fred Thompson is a man of experience, integrity and bad-ass films. Let’s hope people remember that come January, and that no one asks him in the debates about Iron Eagle 3 or Baby’s Day Out.

C. Robert Cargill – - – Email Me

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Austin-based Cargill, who not only loves but owns The Cutting Edge, writes on movies and DVD five times a week.