Maybe someone can explain it, but I find Gran Torino baffling in light of Eastwood's actual politics. Maybe it's some 11th dimensional chess in which he wants to portray racists as good people, but that is *way* too subtle for the guy, and the performance and message of the movie too sincere for it.
Eastwood famously almost never edits screenplays he directs. Obviously he chooses which projects to do but a lot of the time the politics of his movies is more about the screenwriter's views than Eastwood's
I think it's just the conservative view of racism, which consists mostly of slurs by a good-hearted powerless guy and can be solved completely on the individual level.
I think it fits into modern conservatism They want to be truthful racist but also the redeemer/avenger against bad racism
This is also how they go “southern democrats were racist therefore democrats are racist” You point out that those segregationist all switched parties and their brain breaks
I think he was saying “racism is how American men bond, and they never really mean it”.