“Life is like a regional health-care alliance. If you pull your risks with a community health purchasing cooperative and mix in a prospective payment review, you can reach an ideal cost-containment ratio while leaving the single payer system available. Now that’s good advice!”
First aired at the 1995 annual Gridiron Club Dinner, which traditionally features self-deprecating and comedic performances from politicians, Hillary Clinton’s “Forrest Gump” spoof achieved internet fame in May 2016 when a Reddit post titled “TIL in 1995 Hillary Clinton made a 5-minute cringe inducing parody of Forrest Gump” surged to the site’s front page.
The short clip mirrors iconic aspects of the original “Forrest Gump” blockbuster, portraying Clinton as a participant in a variety of historical events such as the infamous Watergate Scandal and parodies the famous opening quote in “Forrest Gump”: “My momma always said, life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get!”
Originally intended to promote Clinton’s 1993 health care plan, “Hillarycare,” the spoof now preserves and documents Clinton’s earlier political strategies.
Specifically, it visually demonstrates Clinton’s undying desire to appeal to the masses.
“Clinton is like your grandma’s trying to pretend to be into pop culture, but it just doesn’t work,” said sophomore Cheryl Wang. “She wants to get younger voters, because many millennials have a tendency to be liberal.”
Clinton may not have the same ability to attract frothing-at-the-mouth voters like Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders, but she still has the ability to cater to the demographic of on-the-fence voters who haven’t pledged their ballots to a particular candidate.
“She doesn’t really have the ability to rally people to the degree that Bernie and Trump have been able to achieve,” said senior Kushagro Bhattacharjee. “But I think her professionalism during the debates and her relatively positive track record can really tip over undecided voters in her favor, especially in an election like this [year’s].”
But spoofs like these, which highlight the extreme lengths that candidates will go just to garner more popularity and votes, may dishearten young voters who are still deciding which candidate to vote for in the upcoming election.
“I felt like [the video was] borderline insulting, like the way she was trying with her accent,” said senior Meghana Kaza said. “It was just strange, and kind of upsetting that she is probably going to win and she does that kind of stuff.”
Nevertheless, it's an unquestionable truth that candidates such as Clinton should play up to their strengths, instead of compensating for their weaknesses.
“Hillary can just get robotic at times. I feel like if she catered to her strengths more and stopped focusing on appealing to everyone,” said Kaza, “she could be much more liked in her group of supporters and with other voters in general.”
