Name Confusion
After the politician John Howard was elected Prime Minister of Australia in 1996, jokes about the coincidence entered Australian comedy - notably in an episode of the satirical television series The Games. Often characters in The Games had the same names as the actors playing them - Howard's episode mocked the Sydney Olympics when staff hired the actor (played by himself) as a stand in for the Prime Minister, as they supposed foreign dignitaries would not know the difference.
John Howard the actor, identifying himself only as "John Howard", said "Sorry" to Indigenous Australians for their treatment by English settlers and their descendants. This was a direct comment on the repeated refusal of the then Prime Minister to make an apology on behalf of the Government of Australia.
The actor also appeared on the Australian "news channel" television show CNNNN (a mock 24 hour news channel comedy series created and performed by The Chaser) as a guest to discuss the Iraq war, being criticised by a presenter confusing him with John Howard the Prime Minister.
He is the subject of the song John Howard The Actor (an opening in protest) by Ross McLennan, ex-frontman of the band Snout, featuring the lyrics: My sympathies go out/Go out to John Howard the actor/His nomenclature/Messed up under history's tractor.
Read more about this topic: John Howard (Australian Actor)
Famous quotes containing the word confusion:
“The LORD will afflict you with madness, blindness, and confusion of mind; you shall grope about at noon as blind people grope in darkness, but you shall be unable to find your way; and you shall be continually abused and robbed, without anyone to help.”
—Bible: Hebrew, Deuteronomy 28:28,29.
“The confusion is not my invention. We cannot listen to a conversation for five minutes without being aware of the confusion. It is all around us and our only chance now is to let it in. The only chance of renovation is to open our eyes and see the mess. It is not a mess you can make sense of.”
—Samuel Beckett (1906–1989)