Studio Barons Are Not the Oppressed Class

Responding to: Make Mark Ruffalo Great Again — Kimberley A. Strassel · 2026-09-03

What the Piece Argues

The piece argues that President Trump’s push for a federal Hollywood production tax credit — endorsed by his “Hollywood ambassador” Jon Voight on Truth Social and embraced by California Democrats Schiff and Newsom — is fiscally reckless because the underlying cause of the production exodus is California’s tax, regulatory, and labor climate, not insufficient federal subsidy. It indicts a Republican caucus that cannot pass homeowner capital-gains relief or fund the military but found time for studio barons and “megastars,” characterizing the arrangement as corporate welfare that adds billions to a $40 trillion national debt. With the Reuters/Ipsos poll showing 71% of voters disapproving of the president’s handling of cost-of-living — the top midterm issue — the GOP’s pivot to championing what the source calls “the Chanel class” is positioned as fatal for the 2026 elections.

Receipts

Strassel’s headline frame — “Make Mark Ruffalo Great Again” — recasts an industry job-loss figure (100,000 since 2022, per her own column) as celebrity welfare for the “Chanel class,” shielding the donor class’s preferred policy mix from the cost of its consequences.

• The framing wants you to believe:

  • The roughly 100,000 industry jobs lost since 2022 are mostly “Chanel class” celebrities and above-the-line talent
  • Subsidies for Hollywood are wasteful giveaways that don’t work — California doubled its credit last year and “here we are”
  • Voters are united in wanting cost-of-living action, not celebrity bailouts
  • The bailout adds billions to $40 trillion in debt without economic justification
  • California is to blame for its own industry decline, and federal dollars are not the answer

• What’s really going on:

  • The 100,000 jobs figure is dominated by below-the-line craft and service work — set dressers, electricians, grips, drivers, caterers, set builders, production assistants — unionized working-class jobs concentrated in the LA basin, not Mark Ruffalo’s
  • The “subsidy race to the bottom” line ignores the documented record: states with competitive production credits (Georgia’s 30 percent, New York’s 30 percent, New Mexico’s) have demonstrably retained and grown film industry employment; the credit works, the question is who gets it
  • The Wall Street Journal editorial page — Strassel’s employer — has spent years editorially defending the carried-interest loophole, endorsing the 2017 tax cut (which the Joint Committee on Taxation scored at roughly $1.5 trillion in lost revenue over ten years), and opposing antitrust enforcement in oil, healthcare, and other concentrated sectors
  • News Corp, owner of the WSJ, is a media conglomerate whose controlling family has been valued in the tens of billions (approximately $20 billion per Forbes and Bloomberg tallies); the editorial page’s anti-subsidy position is consistently applied to redistribution that benefits workers while subsidies for capital go undefended
  • The piece never mentions comparable federal subsidies to banks (2008 TARP, $700 billion authorized), automakers (2009, approximately $80 billion in committed loans), agricultural producers, or the tax preferences the editorial page defends for the wealthy; the selectivity of “no subsidies” is itself the giveaway
  • Anchor citation: The 100,000 jobs figure (industry estimate, cited in Strassel’s own column) and the documented growth of state film credits in Georgia, New York, and New Mexico (state economic-development reports)

The Response Ladder

Polite Reframe

When to use: A persuadable moderate or fiscally-conservative friend asking in good faith why the GOP is doing this. The audience that already shares the diagnosis but needs the clean words.

A woman I know — let’s call her Brenda — works two jobs outside Cleveland, drives a fifteen-year-old Civic, and has not taken a week off in three years. Last week her senator announced support for a federal tax credit to “save” the entertainment business. The studios that would receive the credit have already received, from the state of California, a doubled film tax credit that did not stop the production exodus Brenda’s senator is now promising to reverse federally.

Brenda is not above the line. She is below it. She is the working family whose wages are not propped up by federal subsidy. She is the taxpayer already carrying the $40 trillion in national debt the studios want to add to. Her senator, who cannot pass capital-gains relief for the house Brenda cannot afford, who cannot fund the military her cousin serves in, who cannot pass the online-safety legislation that would protect her children, found time for this.

The proposal is described as “great bipartisan.” Bipartisan, in this context, means: the Democrats wanted it first — Adam Schiff held a hearing on it in March, Gavin Newsom proposed a $7.5 billion federal tax credit last year — and the Republicans discovered it. Both parties now agree Brenda should subsidize it.

The president’s argument is that money spent on tax incentives will be made up tenfold in Treasury revenue. The piece itself labels that claim “fantasy.” California’s own credit was doubled last year; here we are. If doubling it at the state level did not reverse the exodus, doubling it federally — at higher cost to Brenda — is not the remedy. It is the same remedy in a larger dose.

King’s late-period framing, drawn loosely from Where Do We Go From Here and adjacent 1967 work, of the gap between charity and justice is the test here: tossing coins to those the system grinds down is, at best, the warm-up act. The actual work is restructuring the edifice that produces the condition. A film credit is the coin. The edifice — California’s tax and regulatory overhead, its labor climate — is what the piece itself names as the cause. The credit does not touch the edifice. It rewards the executives for relocating within reach of the credit and punishes the working taxpayer who funds it.

If Brenda’s senator wants to help American entertainment, they can vote for the things they have refused to vote for — capital-gains relief for homeowners, military funding, online safety legislation. Those are not glamorous. They do not produce a red-carpet moment. They do not require a Hollywood ambassador at the podium. A politician who cannot pass any of these but found time for a Hollywood bailout is not a fiscal conservative. They are a campaign-finance-conservative. They are a celebrity-access-conservative.

Brenda will keep driving her Civic. The studio executives will collect their credit. The senator will issue a statement about fiscal discipline.

That is not what fiscal discipline looks like. It is what corporate welfare looks like when the politicians stop pretending it is something else.

Mockery and Ridicule

When to use: A conservative talk-radio listener or Twitter exchange where the performative defense of “the Hollywood bailout” is happening. For the bystander who hasn’t yet noticed the bait-and-switch.

Let’s make sure we understand what is happening here.

A studio executive makes $30 million a year. The studio loses some production to Georgia. The studio’s CEO flies to Washington. The CEO meets with the president. The president posts on Truth Social that Republicans and Democrats should “get together” to “save” the movie business. The studio CEO flies home. The studio’s $30-million-a-year CEO is now in possession of a federal tax credit funded by the people who work the cash register at the studio’s theater.

This is described as “great bipartisan response.” Bipartisan. The word bipartisan now means: the Democrats wanted this first, the Republicans discovered it, and both parties agreed to make you pay for it.

California — the state that already doubled its film credit last year — somehow still saw production leave. So the theory of the federal credit is: doubling a state subsidy that didn’t work is cured by doubling it again, federally, with a layer of debt service on top. If a pill doesn’t work the first time, take two. If two don’t work, take them federally.

A nurse in Des Moines hears this and asks the obvious question. “I cannot afford my insulin. Why is my senator voting to subsidize a studio?” The senator explains that the subsidy will be made up tenfold in Treasury revenue. The nurse, being a reasonable person, asks for the spreadsheet. The senator’s office produces a press release. The press release contains the words “great American jobs.” The spreadsheet is forthcoming.

Vern Buchanan — congressman from Florida, deficit hawk, fiscal conservative — saluted this with “whatever we can do to be supportive is a good thing.” Vern cannot pass capital-gains relief for homeowners. Vern cannot fund the military. Vern cannot pass online safety legislation. But Vern found a studio baron in distress, and for the studio baron, there is always money.

Adam Schiff — who led the charge to impeach the president twice — proposes Republicans and Democrats “work together” to “bring the movie magic back to America.” Adam Schiff wants you to subsidize his state’s employers. Gavin Newsom — whose state is doing the fleeing — abandoned his Trump trolling long enough to gold-stamp the plan with “Amen.” Newsom, who runs the state that drove production out, is now demanding the federal government make his donors whole.

This is the operation. A California Democratic corporate-welfare scheme, repackaged as a Trump Truth Social brainstorm, voted on by the same Republicans who cannot fund anything else, in a session where the military is unfunded and capital-gains relief for homeowners is unfunded, because the studio barons and the megastars are simply more important than the voters.

The voters will be told, at the next award show, while the megastars read mean jokes about the president from the stage, that this is what fiscal conservatism looks like.

It is not. It is what corporate welfare looks like when the donors wear tuxedos.

Nuclear Satire

When to use: When you need the full indictment. For the reader who has been carrying this and needs the receipts named without restraint.

The Hollywood bailout is not a policy proposal. It is a coronation. We are watching the federal government of the United States, $40 trillion in debt, gas prices rising, seventy-one percent of voters disapproving of the president’s handling of the cost of living, debating how to transfer public money to the personal accounts of people who play make-believe for a living and the people who bankroll the people who play make-believe for a living. This is the business of the United States Senate. This is the cause that Vern Buchanan dropped everything to support. This is what Jon Voight, the Hollywood ambassador, came down to Washington to bless. This is what Adam Schiff, the man who impeached the president twice, called “bring the movie magic back to America.”

Bring the movie magic back to America. As if the movie magic were a prisoner of war. As if the movie magic had been deported to Vancouver. As if somewhere in Los Angeles a grief-stricken family is holding a candlelight vigil for the absent scene that was filmed in Toronto. As if a Grip on a soundstage in Atlanta is sitting on a folding chair, head bowed, waiting for the federal credit to bring the magic home.

The studios are not in distress. The studios are in transition. The transition is from cable to streaming. The transition is from a labor market with leverage to a labor market without leverage. The studios want the federal government to absorb the cost of that transition, because absorbing the cost of a transition is what the federal government does for them. They have absorbed the cost of every other transition in their corporate history, and they will absorb the cost of this one, because the alternative is for Disney’s CEO to take a slightly smaller bonus.

The president says the money spent on tax incentives will be made up tenfold by Treasury. The piece itself names that claim “fantasy.” California’s own credit was doubled last year; the exodus did not reverse. So the theory of the federal credit is that the failure of a state credit at scale X is cured by a federal credit at scale 2X. This is the medical theory of doubling the dose of the medicine that did not work. The patient is the studio. The doctor is the Congress. The prescription is more of what failed.

And who is on board? The same Republicans who cannot fund the military. The same Republicans who cannot pass capital-gains relief for homeowners. The same Republicans who cannot pass online safety legislation that would protect children. They cannot pass any of these. They can pass this. In the source’s own words, the party “finally found an oppressed class worth uniting for.” Vern Buchanan, deficit hawk, saluted it. Adam Schiff, impeacher-in-chief, gold-stamped it. Gavin Newsom, who runs the state that drove production out, said “Amen.”

The mechanism is the one Malcolm X named in the broad spirit of The Ballot or the Bullet (paraphrase; specific date/venue not verified here): the man who created the problem is the criminal, and you don’t take your case to the criminal. The studios created the cost structure that drove production out. Now the studios want the public to subsidize their relocation to wherever the public money is. They will collect the credit. They will pay themselves the bonus. They will fly to the award show. They will read mean jokes about the president from the stage. The voters who funded it will go to work tomorrow at the wage the studio did not pay them.

A federal subsidy is a confession. The federal government is confessing that the studios cannot make a profit without public money. The studios are confessing that they will not fix their cost structure without the public to absorb it. The politicians are confessing that they will not pass capital-gains relief for homeowners, will not fund the military, will not protect children online — but they will find time for this.

The voters are not asked to confess anything. The voters are asked to pay.

This is what corporate welfare looks like when the corporate welfare has a red carpet.

Profane Scorched-Earth

When to use: The reader who has had it. The reader who is done being polite about what is being done to them. The reader who needs the profanity landed like a hammer because the situation is a hammer.

The studios don’t need a federal subsidy. The studios need to be told to fuck off. They need to be told to fuck off in writing, in legislation, with the names of their CEOs attached, with the dollar amounts of their compensation attached, with the dollar amounts of the proposed subsidy attached, and they need to be told to fuck off in the same week that the Senate cannot fund the fucking military and cannot pass capital-gains relief for a fucking homeowner.

A nurse in Des Moines cannot afford her insulin. A teacher in Memphis cannot afford her rent. A veteran in Phoenix cannot get a fucking VA appointment. And the United States Senate has found time — has carved out time, has used its last shred of legislative energy before the midterm — to debate how to transfer public money to the personal accounts of people who play make-believe for a living.

Make-believe. The people who play make-believe for a living are making more money than the people who teach your children and heal your sick and fix your roads and pick up your garbage. That is not a fact the people who play make-believe for a living want you to know. So they fly to Washington. They meet with the president. They send their ambassador, Jon Voight. They get their Truth Social brainstorm. They get their “great bipartisan response.” They get their committee markup. They get their Ways and Means vote. They get the fucking tax credit.

The fucking tax credit. The same fucking tax credit that California doubled last fucking year, that did not fucking work, that the studios now want the federal fucking government to double again, because the theory of corporate welfare in this country is that if you give a studio a billion and the studio doesn’t make a profit, the answer is to give the studio two billion. The studios are the most fucking expensive toddlers in the fucking history of capitalism. They shit in their balance sheet and they want the taxpayer to wipe their ass.

Vern Buchanan, deficit hawk, saluted this. “Whatever we can do to be supportive is a good thing.” Vern cannot pass capital-gains relief for homeowners. Vern cannot fund the military. Vern cannot pass online safety legislation. But Vern found a studio baron in distress, and for the studio baron, there is always fucking money. Because the studio baron donates. The studio baron hosts. The studio baron puts the politician at the table at the award show. The studio baron makes the fundraiser possible. The studio baron is the fucking constituency the politician serves. The constituents in the district are the fucking constituency the politician pretends to serve.

Adam Schiff, who led the charge to impeach the president twice, is on board. Schiff wants Republicans and Democrats to “work together” to “bring the movie magic back to America.” The movie magic. The fucking movie magic. The movie magic is the personal account of the studio executive, and the personal account of the studio executive is what is being subsidized by the fucking taxpayer, and the fucking taxpayer cannot afford gas, and the fucking politician who cannot fund the military is finding time for this.

Gavin Newsom, who runs the state that drove production out, abandoned his Trump trolling long enough to gold-stamp the plan. Newsom. A man whose state taxes, regulations, and guild dynamics drove production to Georgia. Newsom’s response is to demand the federal government pay for Newsom’s state-level failure. Newsom is asking the federal government to make Newsom’s donors whole. The fucking audacity of it. The fucking, breathtaking, motherfucking audacity of Gavin Newsom.

And the president. The president posted on Truth Social. The president, who has the body of water between Rochester and Toronto to think about, also has the Hollywood bailout to think about. The president, who has seventy-one percent disapproval on the cost of living, has decided that the central message of his midterm sprint will be the federal bailout of the studio executive. The president who cannot get his party a message that lands has found a message. The message is the Chanel class. The message is the studio baron. The message is the megastar. The message is everything the voters hate about Washington, packaged as a “great bipartisan response.”

This is what they call fiscal discipline. They call it fiscal discipline because the word “corruption” is too fucking obvious. They call it fiscal discipline because the word “bribery” might come up in a hearing. They call it fiscal discipline because they are hoping you will read the press release and not do the fucking math. The math is simple. The math is: your senator voted to give a tax credit to a studio executive who makes $30 million a year, while your senator cannot vote to give you capital-gains relief on the house you cannot fucking afford.

King’s Riverside diagnosis, paraphrased from his “Beyond Vietnam” address at Riverside Church (date not independently verified here), was that a polity whose budget every year buys more bombs than schools is in spiritual hospice — the appropriations bill is a moral X-ray. The nation is now being asked to spend its political capital — its last shred of political capital before the midterm — on the studio executive, while the military is unfunded and capital-gains relief is unfunded and the cost of living is unfunded. The studio executive gets funded. The voters get a press release.

Malcolm X told an audience, in the broad spirit of The Ballot or the Bullet (paraphrase; specific attribution not verified here), that the man who created the problem is the criminal, and you don’t take your case to the criminal. The studios created the cost structure that drove production out. Now the studios want the public to subsidize the relocation to wherever the public money is. They will collect the credit. The studio executives will fly to the award show. The megastars will read mean jokes about the president from the stage. The voters will drive their fifteen-year-old cars to their second jobs and wonder why the fuck their government is doing this.

The studios don’t need a federal subsidy. The studios need to be told to fuck off. The voters deserve a government that funds the military, funds capital-gains relief, funds online safety, and tells the studio barons and the megastars to take their “great bipartisan response” and shove it up their red carpet.