Clint Eastwood's wildest quotes

Hollywood icon Clint Eastwood took the stage in Tampa to roaring applause. “Save a little for Mitt,” he joked. But then he saved little in his attacks against President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden.

( Also on POLITICO: Clint Eastwood’s rambling RNC speech)


Eastwood addressed many of his remarks, bizarrely enough, to an empty chair beside him — in which he pretend Obama was sitting.

For instance:

“What do you mean, ‘Shut up?’”

“What do you want me to tell Romney? I can’t tell him to do that to himself. You’re getting as bad as Biden.”

( PHOTOS: Clint Eastwood gets political)

“You thought the war in Afghanistan was OK. I mean, you thought that was something that was worth doing. We didn’t check with the Russians to see how they did there for 10 years. But we did it.”

“I think if you just kind of stepped aside and Mr. Romney can kind of take over. You can still use the plane. Though maybe a smaller one, not that big gas one when you’re going around to colleges and talking about student loans and stuff like that. You’re an ecological man. Why would you want to drive that truck around? OK.”

“I’m not going to shut up. It’s my turn.”

And here are some of his other memorable lines:

“We all know Biden is the intellect of the Democratic Party. He’s just kind of a grin with a body behind it.”

( Also on POLITICO: 10 Clint Eastwood campaign slogans)

“I never thought it was a good idea for attorneys to be president anyways… I think it’s maybe time for a businessman. How about that? A stellar businessman.” (As many have pointed out, Romney went to law school, too.)

“There’s a lot of conservative people, a lot of moderate people, Republicans, Democrats in Hollywood. It’s just the conservative people, by the nature of the word itself, play it closer to the vest and they don’t go around hot dogging it. But they’re there. Believe me they’re there.”

“I remember three-and-a-half years ago when Mr. Obama won the election and, though I wasn’t a big supporter, I was watching that night when he was having that thing and they were talking about hope and change; and they were talking about, ‘Yes, we can,’ and it was dark outdoors and it was nice and people were lighting candles. I just thought this is great. I mean everybody is crying. Oprah was crying. I was even crying. I haven’t cried that hard since I found out that there’s 23 million unemployed people in this country. Now, that is something to cry for. That is a disgrace, a national disgrace.”

“OK, you wanna make my day? Alright. I’ll start it. You finish it. Go ahead, make my day.”