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A little over a week ago President Obama absolutely wiped the floor with the celebrities and media pesonalities gathered for the White House Correspondent’s Dinner, a story that got buried after Osama bin Laden got buried – well shot in the head and buried at sea. The day before, armed with media props and a cool demeanour the Decider in Chief bitch slapped Fox News, Donald Trump, Matt Damon, Paul Ryan, Michelle Bachmann, Mitt Romney and Tim Pawlenty, just to name a few. He was also self-effacing, and managed to stay cool as Seth Meyers cracked jokes about Osama bin Laden and his whereabouts. All in all a strong performance, but before I ruin any of the jokes I’ll let the President himself deepen those laugh lines.
Fortunately the President’s speech had a lot of Hollywood tie-ins (King’s Speech, The Lion King, Matt Damon, etc.), otherwise this wouldn’t be the appropriate forum – well, I probably would have written about it anyways. But really, although we like to scoff at the vocal and politically engaged Hollywood elite, Matt Damon does, in my opinion, have a reason to be disappointed. If for no other reason than for his handling of Wall Street, namely reform without teeth or meaning, and continuing the the revolving door policy. For instance, despite being at the center of almost every major American economic meltdown, there’s no SEAL team descending on the headquarters of Goldman Sachs. Indeed CEO and chairman Lloyd Blankfein is doing God’s work. William D. Cohan, author of Money and Power, said it’s a wonder people didn’t rise up – Matt Damon did, and I respect that. My two cents on politics. King’s Speech was a good movie, by the way – this is a movie blog after all.
I love political thrillers. Well in this case, “thriller” is being a bit generous, it’s more of a drama, the numerous shots of Sean Penn and Naomi Watts watching news clips in airports isn’t exactly edge of your seat action and suspense. Not to sell this film short, Valeria Plame is quite the femme fatale. Watching the film a had a lot more respect for her service and realized how badly the Government screwed her over. This film does a good job of covering all the bases and clears up a lot of the misconceptions about the scandal. For those who don’t know, Valerie Plame was an undercover CIA agent with a husband who was a former Ambassador to Niger. She suggested he be sent to investigate the possible sale of yellow cake to Saddam Hussein. He didn’t find anything but his visit and report were still used as a pretext for war with Iraq and when he realized what had happened he wrote an op-ed column and became one of the first to speak out against the case for war, in realiation, White House staffer Scooter Libby outed his wife as an agent publicly, endangering her contacts, operations and ending her career. As I said it is a political drama with many intricacies, and not so much action, but it is nonetheless a very compelling story, it also shows what a difference the media makes in todays politics. I was initially skeptical, given Sean Penn’s outspoken stance against the war in Iraq, but the film is very fair and balanced, not pushing an agenda but presenting all the angles. It was argued that Joe Wilson’s media campaign was shameless self-promotion, it’s not presented as such but the film is smart in showing lecture halls before and after his media exposure and Ambassador Wilson is obviously and understandably invigorated by his new found fame. His career, even facing off against Saddam Hussein before the first Gulf war, was very distinguished but not recognized or celebrated. If you’re into politics, political thrillers or anything definitely see this movie. It’s full of intrigue and personal drama, and offers an initmate look into the personal struggles of two people caught in the crosshairs of the media and government. What the White House and CIA did to one of their own is simply deplorable. It’s both agrivating and fascinating, it’s amazing how two people, a married couple, with the husband not knowing much about his wife’s work, were both such central figures in the lead up to the war in Iraq. I do however have one beef with the producers, and with the CIA, as a Canadian I’m tired of American spies using our nationality as cover, in Syriana, Mission: Impossible, and in this film. American tourists looking for a better reception overseas by sewing maple leaves on their backpacks is one thing, but spooks using our good name can have serious ramifications – Canadians travelling abroad might find themselves being taken away by immigration officials for a little chat more frequently, for instance. Thanks Hollywood, and the CIA. Then again that’s the only cover one could easily take, they’re not going to pass for Tibetan Monks, per se.
Wait a minute, didn’t this movie come out years ago? Yes, it came out in 2002, I try to stick to current films, but after watching 
Brief Synopsis
Lament for a Wall Street Protest
Democracy in your face. Pepperspray at close range, protestors were then handcuffed and dragged away.
In the last couple of weeks, the Occupy Wall Street protests have been broken up in New York City and elsewhere – students in California braving batons and pepper spray in truly disturbing clashes with campus police. Despite their staying power – after almost two months the news media is tired of reporting on them – they didn’t really accomplish much, despite their creative consensus building and action committees. Nevertheless it’s still remarkable, and the results will hopefully be felt, come election time in the United States. Even since the 2008 financial crisis, plenty of work has been released dealing with the financial system, in all different kinds of media from film to literature. From the documentary Inside Job to the more recent film Margin Call, all laying bare the machinations of the financial system. There is plenty to protest about, the revolving door between Washington and Wall Street, the billions in executive bonuses, but more importantly how Banks and other financial institutions privatize profit and socialize losses.
William D. Cohan wrote a book called Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World said in an interview with Jon Stewart on the Daily Show “I’m not a violent person [...] but I dodn’t understand why there hasn’t been protests in the street about Wall Street did here.” That comes form someone who worked on Wall Street for almost twenty years. While the immediate reaction was one of disgust the mobs didn’t come until recently, probably a combination of things but most immediately as a result of the U. S. reaching the debt ceiling. In the end people took to the streets, but it seemed they wanted to start society anew, reduce the role of government, but spread the wealth – that’s not going to fly. In the end they didn’t have a consistent message, they were just there, and now they’re gone. Polls showed that at the beginning, most Americans were behind the protestors, but as things dragged on support waned. The problem was, there was no clear message, what started as a protest against greed and corruption on Wall Street, turned into a free-for-all on the wealthy and government in general. I’m not saying they need a PR consultant to give them a slick slogan and talking points, but they do need a direction, some kind of goal.
It’s a crying shame, had they focussed on real, actionable change, they might have got something done – two concrete policy issues come to mind: financial reform and taxes. The promised changes in financial regulation have no teeth – Wall Street lobbyists are helping write it, and only a small portion of the promised reforms have actually been enacted, the rest hasn’t been written yet. With regards to taxes, the rich need to start carrying more of the tax burden, period. While concrete policy intiatives might be a little lame for the hemp-wearing drum-beating crowd, it might have had more of an effect.