{"id":5886,"date":"2016-04-17T14:00:17","date_gmt":"2016-04-17T19:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/richard.rathe.org\/?p=5886"},"modified":"2016-04-17T14:17:10","modified_gmt":"2016-04-17T19:17:10","slug":"binge-watching-great-movies-about-real-conspiracies-that-affect-us-all","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redmangrove.org\/rathe.org\/richard\/2016\/binge-watching-great-movies-about-real-conspiracies-that-affect-us-all","title":{"rendered":"Binge Watching Great Movies about Real Conspiracies that Affect Us All"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was on a short business trip recently and had a chance to view three\u00a0new movies about real conspiracies<\/strong> that affect us all. This prompted me to go back and re-watch some documentaries from the recent past. Talk about dark night of the soul!<\/strong> Here are my brief reviews\u00a0in no particular order…<\/p>\n

\"spotlight-2015\"Spotlight<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was aware of the ongoing scandal of pedophile priests<\/strong>\u00a0but I had no idea how extensive the cover-up had\/has been. This movie is almost pitch-perfect as it depicts the true story of reporters following leads ever deeper into a black hole of institutionalized criminality<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Big Short<\/strong>\"the-big-short\"<\/p>\n

This is a great film in all respects. The protagonists are quirky\u00a0and\u00a0imperfect, but each has a moral compass and limits on what he\u00a0will do to make a buck. The basic premise is that everyone from the Fed Chairman on down\u00a0to the home loan sharks in Miami could not or would not see the\u00a0reality that was right in front of them<\/strong>. The rogues gallery of financial malefactors is both comical and repellent (see next). The main characters all confront the truth in different ways. I was struck by how sad this film is in spite of the heroes’ success.<\/p>\n

\"inside-job-2010\"Inside Job<\/strong><\/p>\n

This documentary from 2010 is the logical compliment\u00a0to the Big Short<\/strong>.\u00a0The best parts are when they catch actual high-placed financiers and government officials telling lies on camera (amazing really!). The end of the film documents something I’ve felt since that time… In terms of effect on real people, the crimes were\/are monstrous, and yet only a handful of the actual criminals have been punished!<\/strong> Blame for that outcome lies squarely\u00a0with\u00a0President Obama<\/strong>,\u00a0who hired many of the same players for his administration rather than prosecute them. I still can’t get my head around it. We may never recover!<\/p>\n

CitizenFour<\/strong>\"citizenfour\"<\/p>\n

Arch criminal or whistleblowing hero there is no doubt that\u00a0Edward Snowden<\/strong> changed everything. In light of what has happened since released NSA secrets have mostly supported his\u00a0whistleblower status. Watch it and make up your own mind.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"united-states-of-secrets\"United States of Secrets<\/strong><\/p>\n

This PBS Frontline Series<\/a> from 2014 is the logical\u00a0companion to CitizenFour<\/strong>. Bulk Data Collection<\/strong> is now the norm, the\u00a0FISA Court<\/strong> is nothing but a\u00a0rubber-stamp and the Fourth Amendment<\/strong> is nowhere to be seen when it comes to electronic communication. I also recommend reading The Shadow Factory<\/strong><\/em> by James Bamford, where it becomes clear that with a little intelligence sharing between agencies and good police work we might have disrupted the 911 plot<\/strong>. Instead we let fear run away with us<\/strong> and gave our government free rein and an unlimited budget to spy on us. The dust-up over iPhone encryption is just the latest chapter.<\/p>\n

\"merchants_of_doubt\"Merchants of Doubt<\/strong><\/p>\n

Also from 2014, this documentary reveals the techniques used to manipulate us by\u00a0sowing fear, uncertainty and doubt. Hosted by a magician who is a self-described “honest liar”, the film shows how real lies are told and re-told on a massive scale. I was surprised that most of the\u00a0techniques used today were all worked out by the Tobacco Industry<\/strong> decades ago! The art of telling a\u00a0little lie to sell a\u00a0big lie\u00a0using\u00a0deception, obfuscation & misdirection<\/a>. The successful feint of big tobacco to get us\u00a0focused on\u00a0flame-retardant\u00a0upholstery rather than\u00a0the cigarette that actually caused the fire was a genius move. On the hopeful side, several past and current heroes are profiled including Stanton Glantz<\/a> and James Hansen<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"taxi_to_the_dark_side\"Taxi to the Dark Side<\/strong><\/p>\n

I’m embarrassed to admit that I had forgotten most of the events covered by this 2007 documentary of our acts of brutality at\u00a0Abu Ghraib<\/strong> and Guantanamo<\/strong>. The “Taxi” of the title belonged to an innocent Afghani man who was picked up by the US and died a few days later during interrogation. The basic point is that these atrocities where not the result of “a few bad apples”<\/strong> but rather a normalized fact accepted by the chain of command. See it!\u00a0I can’t do it justice in words. The interviews with Donald Rumsfeld<\/strong> and\u00a0Dick Cheney<\/strong> are especially chilling.<\/p>\n

\"the-fog-of-war\"\u00a0The Fog of War<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was eligible for\u00a0the draft near the end of\u00a0the Vietnam War<\/strong>. (I “lost”\u00a0the lottery.) I remember hearing\u00a0Robert McNamara<\/strong> on TV explaining our intricate plans to “win” the war and prevent the dominos from falling. His regret and contrition are obvious in the film, but what is more important are his observations about the limits of power and intellect<\/strong>. Regrettably the lessons he had to teach were lost on the Bush Administration and a new generation has been forced to give up their lives in\u00a0political wars.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was on a short business trip recently and had a chance to view three\u00a0new movies about real conspiracies that affect us all. This prompted me to go back and re-watch some documentaries from the recent past. Talk about dark night of the soul! Here are my brief reviews\u00a0in no particular order… Spotlight I was … Continue reading “Binge Watching Great Movies about Real Conspiracies that Affect Us All”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,129,20,3,8,47,28],"tags":[246,248,261,262],"class_list":["post-5886","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-commentary","category-history","category-movies","category-people","category-reviews","category-science","tag-fud","tag-politics","tag-surveillance","tag-war"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/redmangrove.org\/rathe.org\/richard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5886","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/redmangrove.org\/rathe.org\/richard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/redmangrove.org\/rathe.org\/richard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redmangrove.org\/rathe.org\/richard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redmangrove.org\/rathe.org\/richard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5886"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/redmangrove.org\/rathe.org\/richard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5886\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5911,"href":"https:\/\/redmangrove.org\/rathe.org\/richard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5886\/revisions\/5911"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/redmangrove.org\/rathe.org\/richard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redmangrove.org\/rathe.org\/richard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/redmangrove.org\/rathe.org\/richard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}