America 250

Where this should be a celebration that the United States has persevered through a quarter millennium, it is more often an excuse to attack President Trump.  The most noteworthy incident is the reflecting pool.  It has long been a problem that multiple presidents have address - including Obama, but it has never risen to the level of criticism as now.  There has been vandalism in order to foil President Trump's efforts to repair a leaking national landmark before today's historic anniversary.  How did monument repair become so controversial?

The issue is that too many Americans are no longer proud to be Americans, especially when there is a president of whom they disapprove.  Too often, America's failings and faults are taught while its goodness and virtues are ignored.  Prior to 1988, when high school students were asked to identify famous Americans from history who were not presidents, answers such as Ben Franklin, Betsy Ross, or Paul Revere were common.  However, that has switched.  Today's students are likely to answer Martin Luther King, Harriet Tubman, or Rosa Parks.  Of course, all of these people are famous Americans, but why the change in emphasis?  This was not by accident.  That second list shows that the emphasis is now about slavery and civil rights.  Yes, America has faults, a laundry list of them, which are rolled out on a regular basis to denigrate the country.  It used to be balanced by the greatness of America, but that has faded over the last 30 to 40 years.

People living in Western countries are most likely to learn the negatives about their country than the negatives of others.  Americans know the warts and all of America, but virtually none of the negatives of China, Cuba, Venezuela, or Iran.  Inevitably, knowing what is bad about your country but not the failings of others will diminish one's opinion of it in comparison to others.  Frequently, when asked what other country is better, a ludicrous answer like 'China' will be offered.  Look at the highspeed trains!  But the thing is, people vote with their feet.  If they can get to a Western country, they do.  People with direct knowledge of these other countries flee to the United States and don't leave.  They know the truth.

The United States is the greatest country in the world.  It is unfortunate that too many of its citizens do not know that.

Happy Independence Day!

Margin Call (2011)

In 2008, Eric Dale (Stanley Tucci) was working on a report about serious financial issues at a New York investment bank when he was laid off.  On his way out the door, he offered a thumb drive to Peter Sullivan (Zachary Quinto), a junior member of the risk management team and offered the warning to 'Be careful.'  Sullivan was a rocket scientist who found that the pay was much better in banking.  He spent the evening working on Dale's research and filling in gaps that required his technical skills.  The results were grim.  Though it was late at night, he called his supervisor, Will Emerson (Paul Bettany).  Emerson reviewed the data and called his supervisor back to the office.  Sam Rogers (Kevin Spacey) called in Sarah Robertson (Demi Moore) and Jared Cohen (Simon Baker), who in turn summoned the CEO, John Tuld (Jeremy Irons), at 4 in the morning.  The mortgage-backed securities were a threat to the bank's solvency.  Could the bank divest itself of these worthless securities before the market discovered what Sullivan's research had determined?

The story takes place over a 24-hour period, giving a glimpse of how the 2008 Crash unfolded.   Where The Big Short gave a view of the overall crash, this looks at only one bank and its efforts to avert bankruptcy.  The characters don't get a lot of development as there are so many.  Quinto is playing Spock here, an analytical character who provides advanced knowledge with which his superiors will make decisions.  Yes, a role he had already perfected.  Bettany is a charming rogue and the top trader at the bank, something of a cynical nihilist.  Strangely, he is a rock upon whom both juniors and seniors rely.  Impressive.  Kevin Spacey plays the manager of the trade floor and the man who must sell worthless securities before the market realizes they are worthless.  Can he do that?  Is that ethical?  Jeremy Irons dominates when he arrives, offering insight on how an investment bank survives and what justifies dumping worthless product on customers.

Highly recommened.

Letters from Mexico

In March 1848, the Polk Administration provided a vast collection of correspondence related to the ongoing war in Mexico.  The letters included reports from the field, communications between the generals and the War Department, troop counts, financial reports, general orders, administration of martial law, and many other topics.  The letters provide details about the workings of the army, the jealousies among commanders, difficulties involved in fielding volunteer troops, and a close-up look at the personalities of the generals and officials.

Volunteer troops had a huge impact on the conduct of the war.  Initially, they were brought in for only 3- or 6-month tours.  Later, that was extended to 1-year and finally they were required to sign on until the end of the war.  As these troops were typically raw recruits, training was required.  The troops were sent to Camargo or Meir on the Rio Grande before finally being deployed.  By the time the volunteers were seasoned and competent, it was time to send them home and a new wave of neophytes replaced them.  As such, military victories were often not exploited.  General Scott crushed the Mexican Army at Cerro Gordo in April 1847 but then was unable to drive onto Mexico City until August because most of his volunteers left in May and June.

The squabbles among and between the generals and the Polk Administration are embarrassing.  Winfield Scott comes across particularly badly in his letters.  Though he certainly had cause to believe the administration didn't have his back, he proved to be paranoid, acting as if the administration was trying to make him fail.  On the other hand, Zachary Taylor came off well.  Though there is a clear current in his correspondence that he viewed himself as mistreated by having his army transferred to General Scott, he was not a whiner and comported himself professionally.  Of course, he had William W. S. Bliss as his adjutant, a man of tremendous ability who managed the general's paperwork.  The letters do not offer the homespun sound of Taylor.  Scott wrote or dictated his letters and it shows.

One humorous exchange was between Scott and General Gideon Pillow.  Initially, Scott wrote to Pillow and requested that he 'correct' his account of a recent battle.  Pillow had arrogated to himself credit for several aspects of the battle.  It comes as no surprise that Pillow was later arrested by Scott, who demanded a court martial.  With all this bickering among the generals, it's a wonder that the war was won.

Scott's most dramatic letter was in answer to his recall.  He composed a laundry list of mistreatments he had received from the Polk Administration.  Indeed, from his perspective, it looked as though the President wanted him to fail.  However, his claims sounded surprisingly convincing.  Was Polk trying to sink his lead general and thus lose the war?  The reply from War Secretary William Marcy was devastating, answering most - though not all - of Scott's claims, often disproving them with copies of Scott's reports.  Ouch!

Highly entertaining for those interested.

Freedom of Which Religion?

Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.

John Adams

When the First Amendment was drafted, the United States was almost exclusively Christian.  Many of the states had an established religion and religious tests to hold office.  New England was established by a persecuted religious group who fled England two centuries before: The Puritans.  Pennsylvania was founded by a Quaker.  Virginia was Anglican.  The Scotch-Irish of the Carolinas were Presbyterians.  The Founders were aware of the diversity - being themselves members of the various denominations of Christianity - and also knew of the catastrophic wars that had torn through Europe.  In fact, Europe still had state-established religions.  The First Amendment addressed that directly, offering a live and let live solution to the frequent hostility among the various flavors of Christianity.  However, they never considered Hinduism, Islam, Voodoo, Satanism, or various other faiths.  Why would they?  And that was an oversight.

Islam is not compatible with the US Constitution.  If a majority of the citizens of the United States were to become Muslim, the Constitution would necessarily be discarded as against the Koran and failing to adhere to Sharia.  Remember, when the First Amendment was adopted, Islam and Christianity had been at war for more than a thousand years.  Islam was anathema to Western Civilization.  Why would anyone think that Islam would be openly integrated into a Western nation via an 18th Century amendment written for the governing of a universally Christian country?

Obviously, the history here is irrelevant.  The Supreme Court will not limit what religions are covered by the Freedom of Religion clause.  Well, maybe Pastafarianism.  The Founding Fathers did not foresee a time when uncontrolled migration would change the religious landscape.  Case in point, the huge influx of Catholics in the 19th Century was tumultuous because the US was a Protestant country.  This saw the rise of Nativism, which was an anti-Catholic movement in the mid-19th Century, most notably against the Irish.  Why would a different version of Christianity be such a problem?  Because they held allegiance to a foreign prince: the Pope.  As late as JFK - the first Catholic president - there were concerns that the Pope would determine US policies from Rome.

Western Civilization is dependent upon Christianity.  It is one of the primary foundations.  If it goes, so goes Western Civilization.  The West needs to prevent incompatible belief systems from taking hold.  It may be too late for some Western nations.

Citizen Vigilante (2026)

Somewhere in Europe, a mother shopped with her son.  As they left the store and walked toward home, a black man with a knife stabbed the mother in the neck.  She bled out on the ground.  Michael Sanders (Armie Hammer) was an American who had come to Europe upon his father's death.  He found the situation intolerable and was only too happy to explain how things should be.  Though he owned rental property, he refused to let the government use any units to house immigrants.  He lectured a trio of rowdy youths about proper behavior, warning them to clean up their act; the next time he met them, there was no warning.  Judges who released criminals became his targets.  Then there were the criminals themselves; he was not forgiving.  Much of the populace celebrate his vigilantism and he is regularly discussed by the evening news.  Chief Henry (Costas Mandylor) was determined to end his reign of justice.

As a Uwe Boll film, it is badly made.  The same scene will be filmed from three angles and he will use the complete footage.  For example, the cop approached the door and set an explosive charge on the lock.  Different angle, the cop approached the door and set a charge on the lock.  Third angle, the cop approached the door and set a charge.  At another point, several police are mowed down in automatic gunfire.  It looked like 2 dozen men were killed but there were about 8 bodies on the floor when the action ended.  Yes, different angles again.  Then there is the non-linear filming.  At another scene, the police are carrying out bodies from an apartment building.  What is this about?  It is the site of Sander's massacre of a Muslim family, which proved to be the finale of the movie.  Boll must be trying to ape Pulp Fiction.

The news reports are astonishingly wooden, as if the female newscaster was reading the script for the first time.  Because much of the acting is wooden, Hammer comes across as an old pro.  Of course, it isn't a demanding role.  Sanders is intensely serious and takes no guff.  He explains to most of his victims why he is punishing them and how they deserve it.  He is Death Wish and the Punisher mixed together.  Mandylor proved to be bland, speaking with an unidentifiable 'European' accent.  The rest of the cast are unknowns and have tiny roles.

The point of this movie is the message.  Citizen Vigilante is an answer to the dramatic rise in crime across Europe and the various governments unwillingness to address it.  One of the storylines in the movie echoes a real incident: a 14-year-old girl was raped by 7 teens who were given suspended sentences.  Sanders claims that he will provide justice until the populace learns to provide it for themselves.

The movie is poorly made, poorly scripted, and full of holes, but the message is explosive.  Where most movies and TV shows will paint the white majority as a bunch of intolerant racists and the immigrants as entirely worthy, this movie flips that narrative.  The movie is a call to arms, a demand that the politicians reverse course, and perhaps a standard for the abused populace to gather behind.

Recommended.

Perry Mason

The day after Christmas in 1931, an infant, Charlie Dodson, was kidnapped for a ransom of $100,000.  Though the ransom was paid, the child was dead. The police suspected the child's father.  However, his alibi checked out and the child's mother was arrested and charged.  The kidnappers were discovered dead in a murder-suicide scenario.  Emily Dodson (Gayle Rankin) had been having an affair with the lead kidnapper.  E. B. Jonathan (John Lithgow) had accepted the case when the father, Matthew Dodson, was accused.  However, Matthew's father, Herman Baggerly (Robert Patrick), was unwilling to foot the bill for an adulteress.

Sister Alice McKeegan (Tatiana Maslany) was a radio preacher with a nation-wide following.  Herman Baggerly was a supporter of her ministry, and the Dodsons were members of the church.  Alice involved herself in the case, much to the irritation of the church fathers and her own mother, Birdy McKeegan (Lili Taylor).  Curiously enough, the lead kidnapper and Emily's lover had been an accountant for the church.  It is noteworthy that Sister Alice is largely based on a real person, Sister Aimee Semple McPherson (1890-1944), a radio preacher based out of Los Angeles.

Perry Mason (Matthew Rhys) was a divorced father, a dishonorably discharged officer from the Great War, a failed dairy farmer, and a private eye living a hand to mouth existence.  He is a man with few friends and spends much of his time depressed or drunk, often both.  He has the emotional self-control of a toddler who wants his mother to buy a toy at the store.  He is only too happy to cheat, if that is what it takes to get his way.  "There's what is legal, and there's what is right."  Perry is E. B. Jonathan's investigator, who more often argues with his boss; it is a wonder that E. B. put up with him.  This Perry Mason is a foul-mouthed slob.  The number of F-bombs dropped might compete with a Tarantino film's use of the N-word.  This guy is an interesting character, but he isn't Perry Mason.

Della Street (Juliet Rylance) was E. B. Jonathan's secretary, though she spent most of her time arguing with her boss, quite similar to Perry.  She must be repeatedly reminded to answer the phone.  Della lived in a boarding house; one of the other boarders, Hazel (Molly Ephraim), is her lover.  Yes, Della is a lesbian; must get that representation in there.  Oh, Assistant DA Hamilton Burger is also homosexual; don't want to leave the fellas out.  It turned out that Della did most of the work for the law firm and expects to be a partner in a couple of years.  Really, E. B. proved to be an empty suit with an over-inflated ego.

As a Depression-Era show, one expects a downer soundtrack.  Such is delivered.  There is a repeated melody that signals sadness and depression.  There are no breaks in the gloomy setting, just one long tale of woe and dread.  It's a miracle that there were not more suicides among these characters.

The trial, which serves as Perry Mason's first as a lawyer, is ludicrous.  DA Maynard Barnes (Stephen Root) pinned his entire case on the fact that Emily was having an affair with the kidnapper.  He proved beyond any doubt that she was an adulteress, therefore you must find her guilty of murdering her child and sentence her to hang!  Not only is his case thin on evidence, he knows the detectives on the case were corrupt; heck, he demanded that the detectives eliminate anyone who knew too much.  Yes, the whole justice system is rotten to the core.  Half of the stuff that Perry and his fellow investigators, Pete Strickland (Shea Whigham) and Paul Drake (Chris Chalk), uncover proved to be inadmissible.  Sure, that's nice for the audience to see the full story but it helped the case not at all.  Then there was the imaginary cross-examination of the actual killer that harkened back to the Raymond Burr series.

Excellent cast, a terrific film noir setting, this had lots of potential.  However, it should have been some original character, not an origin story for Perry Mason that changes all the characters.  Watch Spider-Noir instead.

And Hormuz is Closed Again

Well, that didn't last long.  The US cannot prevent Israel and Hezbollah from fighting, but Iran won't keep the peace unless their proxy is safe.  There are too many moving parts in the Middle East to maintain the fragile peace.  If we aren't going to bomb Iran into the stone age, then it will just be another Afghanistan or Iraq.  Neither of those have turned out well.  Keep an eye on the nukes, bombing as needed, and protect US shipping.  Otherwise, let the region find a balance.  Beyond preventing Iran from becoming a nuclear power, this isn't our problem.