Ron Swanson, new American hero.

Funny Lovable Guys Who Weren't Supposed To Be Either.

“ Great Fun! Ron Swanson has potential to become the new Archie Bunker.  In his heads-up, El Jefe said,  "Hard to believe he's on NBC."   Maybe not.  Two of  television's top pop icons of all time resulted from left-winger miscalculations. First, Norman Lear's  Archie Bunker (All in the Family).  Quoting from myself in 2005: “ ... Lear lifted, whole, the BBC television series Till Death Us Do Part. Watch this clip and you'll see what I mean . What appealed to Lear was the Brit version of Archie Bunker who was, with his conservative tirades, the perfect foil for the calm, reasoned socialist clap-trap served back by what would become dotty daughter Gloria, and son-in-law Michael 'Meathead' Stivic (Rob Reiner in a non-acting role). [...] Much to Lear's surprise (Liberals are always surprised to discover that their ideas don't work as planned), the American television viewing public saw in Archie Bunker someone who manifested their own hopes and fears;  and validated their own contempt for liberal ideas like "The Great Society."  He was the hero;  Meathead was the fool.    [continued]   After a few years Lear simply became heavy handed, and began to force his views in some very unfunny episodes. In one, a war hero friend of Archie's, whose son had been killed in Vietnam, sides with Meathead in an anti-war diatribe, and wishes his son had fled to Canada to avoid the draft. As noxious as the show's content would become, it's own inertia carried it for another few years, but it was no longer particularly funny (Like MASH, after Alan Alda took control) .Nobody cared when the show ended in a spectacularly crappy one-hour special in 1983.  Except to note how spectacularly crappy the ending was.  Next, Hawkeye Pierce, the smart-ass hero of Mash. The  1970 film was written by Ring Lardner Jr, (joined the US Communist Party in 1936), and produced by fellow traveler, and uber leftist Robert Altman. The film's anti-war, anti US message went mostly unnoticed by moviegoers, who simply saw funny where they were supposed to see tragedy. The television spin-off (1972 to 1983) started out funny, and ended with leftist Alan Alda (the television Hawkeye) following Lear's formula of writing preachy  left-wing scripts, which he then directed himself delivering.    Nobody cared when the show ended in a spectacularly crappy one-hour special in 1983.  Except to note how spectacularly crappy the ending was.    So, who's writing Ron Swanson's stuff at NBC?  Maybe the right people haven't complained yet. ”