Words, words, words

The Unknown Known

Crit

You know, when Reagan was president, there was a consensus that he was likable. Even people who hated him as much as I did said, "But you have you admit, he's got charm." No, I didn't have to admit it, and I never did.

This guy, though--Donald Rumsfeld, if you've been living in a cave--charms me a little, perhaps because we have a shared affliction: logorrhea. At one point we hear him quote Hamlet, but the quintessential words from the Dane are the ones at the top of this post: late in the film, director Errol Morris shows a literal sea of words, and the camera trickery is just a heavy-handed representation of a metaphor that is inescapable. And I have to admit a connection with a guy who knows he talks too much but is apt to react to that self-awareness by talking about why he talks too much.