bill:politics

Beautiful, heartaching, swinging country version by the Burns Sisters of Little Steven’s I am a Patriot provides the soundtrack for a video view of last summer’s Cindy Sheehan-led peace protests in Crawford, Texas. The song is so appropriate and never more so than when Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld are giving speeches claiming that people like me, who disagree with their tactics and policies, are either traitors or providing sustenance to the terrorists. As if their oh so precious Bible were not the only document they possess written down by man but whispered by their Almighty!

(Tech note: I initially attempted to embed the video in this post for your convenience but despite trying a couple of WordPress plugins couldn’t make it work; the fault is mine, I’m sure, and not the plugin authors’.)

America: from Freedom to Fascism

Determined to find the law that requires American citizens to pay income tax, producer Aaron Russo (”The Rose,” “Trading Places”) set out on a journey to find the evidence. This film which is neither left, nor right-wing is a startling examination of government. It exposes the systematic erosion of civil liberties in America since 1913 when the Federal Reserve system was fraudulently created. Through interviews with U.S. Congressmen, a former IRS Commissioner, former IRS and FBI agents and tax attorneys and authors, Russo connects the dots between money creation, federal income tax, and the national identity card which becomes law in May 2008. This ID card will use Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) chips which are essentially homing devices used to track people. This film shows in great detail and undeniable facts that America is moving headlong into a fascist police state. Wake up!

After watching the two trailers available I think Russo has gone off the deep end. Maybe it was too many years in Hollywood. This movie, self-described as a documentary, seems to be little more than an update of the income tax denier movement with national ID paranoia added in. The movie repeats the assertion that there is no constitutionally valid federal statute which provides for the federal income tax and that the Real ID act wil be the final straw in transforming America into a fascist state controlled by the bankers and corporate elite.

Even the comic strip artists seem to understand reality better than the Bush Administration: Pearls Before Swine. Though what worries scares me is that the Administration actually does understand what’s going on better than me or Stephan Pastis and their public positions are obscuring the true objectives of their actions.

Check out the trailer for The Constant Gardener, opening in a couple of weeks. Ralph Fiennes, Rachel Weisz, and Bill Nighy star in Fernando Meirelles’s film adaption of John Le Carre’s bestseller about corporate skullduggery and government complicity. Meirelles’s last movie was the Brazilian international hit City of God which, coincidentally, is sitting on my Tivo waiting for me to stop playing on the computer to watch. This movie is definitely making a political statement, have no doubt, but seems like it will be highly watchable. [via The Movie Blog, which I hesitate to link, due to nasty in your face ads that I usually don't see thanks to RSS, but this one time...]

The Blog of the American Constitution Society: Cracking Down on Porn: Protecting Children or Naked Censorship?. There’s always a reasonable sounding cover story for taking away our rights.

Congratulations to Steven Greenstreet and crew as their blue v. red study This Divided State won Best Documentary at the 2005 Santa Cruz Film Festival!