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One of my favorite sideshows of modern presidential politics is the celebrity herd, the Hollywood actors and the rock stars among whom conformity of opinion is as thick as San Fernando Valley smog.

Whoopi Goldberg gave that smog an extra layer of zing last week at a star-studded fund-raiser for presidential hopeful John Kerry at New York's Radio City Music Hall. She told a few sleazy one-liners that riffed on the president's last name. The White House pounced. Mr. Kerry's camp backpedaled. It lasted for a couple of news cycles.

The thing that stuck with me, though, wasn't the off-color jokes (Miss Goldberg is no shrinking violet) or the invective (John Mellencamp called President Bush "another cheap thug who sacrifices our young").

It was the images. One in particular: It was the sight of Dave Matthews, the perennially popular bohemian rock star. He looked positively catatonic, like an "I, Robot" automaton, clapping along during a singalong finale that saw Mr. Kerry jamming on guitar amid singers such as Jon Bon Jovi, Wyclef Jean and Mary J. Blige.

I can understand why Mr. Kerry would want be to be seen in the company of Robert De Niro, Leonardo DiCaprio and Billy Crystal: Some of the celebrities' coolness might rub off on his stiff exterior.

But does Mr. Matthews really derive that much satisfaction from backing a quintessential establishment politician, to the point that he's willing to be seen dancing like your Uncle Ernie when "Y.M.C.A." comes on at wedding receptions?

The magnetic pull of the celebrity herd is irresistible. No one in show business who claims to possess a brain can deviate from it. He who does is either a bubblehead like Britney Spears (that gum-smacking scene in Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11" in which the pop diva calls for trust of Mr. Bush, is a favorite of the hiperati), a bluenose like Anita Bryant or a nutburger like Ted Nugent.

Conformity is forbidden in every other arena of the artistic life except politics. There, it's the rule. Indeed, when it comes to politics, celebs are every bit as predictable as your stereotypical 1950s suburbanite.

Every four years, they gather instinctually from the sands of Malibu, the penthouses of Manhattan and the chalets of Aspen. It could be that they heard the call to arms this year by reading a rabid Al Gore speech, in its long entirety, on Bruce Springsteen's official Web site.

If a foreign war or two interrupts the quadrennial mating call, the herd will spring into action, never hesitating to trample on the wartime impulse of the populace to rally 'round the flag. (Unless that foreign war -- in Kosovo, say -- is run by a commander in chief who is buddy-buddy with folks such as Harry Thomason and Harvey Weinstein.)