______________________________________________________________
BUSH BRO IN CHARGE OF WTC SECURITY ?
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=BUSH+BRO+IN+CHARGE+OF+WTC+SECURITY&btnG=Google+Search
SHAGGY DOG TALES OF ANTI BUSHES WINS APATHY FOR BUSH WITH SUCH
REMARKS AS "BUSH BRO IN CHARGE OF WTC SECURITY" EASILY CHECKED OUT
ON GOGGLE OR SO I THOUGHT...
__________________________________________________________________
+++++++++++++
YouTube - 9/11 Debunked: Bush Brother Never in Charge of WTC SecurityDebunking every single 9/11
conspiracy theory, one at a time.
HTTP://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sh8hErn2UZU -
+++++++++++++
Video: 9/11 Debunked: Bush Brother Never in Charge of WTC Security9/11 Debunked: Bush Brother
Never in Charge of WTC Security ... 9/11 Debunked: WTC - Zero Hallmarks of Controlled Demolition.
Added 27 days ago ...
HTTP://bravenewfilms.org/blog/15837-9-11-debunked-bush-brother-never-in-charge-of-wtc-security -
++++++++++++
Security, Secrecy and a Bush Brother 911Blogger.com"I think someone" (said M.Bush was in charge of
WTC security) "on the Cspan show and ...
what about the bush brother that was to meet with hinkleys brother, ...
HTTP://www.911blogger.com/node/2530 -
oR WAS IT ALAX JONES ON C-SPAN SAYING SOME THING LIKE THAT...
?????????????
Alex Jones Presents Infowars.com to Fight the New World Order ... George W. Bush's brother was on the
board of directors of a company providing electronic security for the World Trade Center, Dulles
International Airport ...HTTP://www.infowars.com/print/Sept11/bush_security_link.htm -
Suspected 9-11 Criminal Coconspirators 100777.comMarvin Bush — brother of George Bush; on board of Securacom, ... a “security services” company which was in charge of “security” at WTC on 9-11; ... HTTP://100777.com/911/suspects - BetterBadNews » POPULARITY OF ONLINE VIDEO STUNS PUBLIC WITH ... MARVIN BUSH OWNED COMPANY IN CHARGE OF WORLD TRADE CENTER SECURITY ON SEPT 11. ... any information about the President’s brother, Marvin Bush either. ... HTTP://www.betterbadnews.com/.../ - ++++++++++++++++++++++++ ++++++++++++++++++++++++ ++++++++++++++++++++++++ ++++++++++++++++++++++++ IS THAT KIND OF THINKING SUFFICIENT TO SCRATCH THE SURFACE OR PEAR BEHIND THE CURTAIN OR IS THERE MORE 9-11 HISTORY MYSTERY TO DIG UP AFTER 5 YEARS THAN MEATS THE EYE EVEN OF THE SHOOT FROM THE LIP BOOK SELLING SEMI WANtobee's SEMI PUNDITS & SPIN ARTISTS. I CARE ABOUT WEATHER THE FACTS ABOUT BUILDING #7 WERE ACCURATE. HOW WAS A NEAR PERFECT COLLAPSE ACHIEVED CAN THAT HAPPEN AGAIN? WAS IT SIMPLY NATURAL CAUSES? WHAT OTHER BUILDINGS ARE BUILT BY THE SAME METHOD ARE THEY EQUALLY AS VULNERABLE DO YOU WORK OR LIVE IN ONE? ++++++++++++++++++++++++ ++++++++++++++++++++++++ Marvin Bush Bullhorned Over 9/11 Security RolePresident's Brother Headed WTC Security Firm During Odd Lapses in Security ... Interestingly, Marvin Bush's firm was reportedly also in charge of Dulles ... HTTP://www.infowars.com/articles/sept11/marvin_bush_bullhorned_over_911_security_role.htm - AlterNet: Blogs: PEEK: Bush's Kid Brother Neil Under Investigation ... I'm trying to remember whicH Bush brother was the bank-robber. .... In Communist China they execute people such as Neal Bush and charge the family for the ... HTTP://www.alternet.org/blogs/peek/67245/ - BetterBadNews » POPULARITY OF ONLINE VIDEO STUNS PUBLIC WITH ... MARVIN BUSH OWNED COMPANY IN CHARGE OF WORLD TRADE CENTER SECURITY ON SEPT 11. ... any information about the President’s brother, Marvin Bush either. ... HTTP://www.betterbadnews.com/.../ - Suspected 9-11 Criminal Coconspirators 100777.comMarvin Bush — brother of George Bush; on board of Securacom, ... a “security services” company which was in charge of “security” at WTC on 9-11; ... HTTP://100777.com/911/suspects -
|
|
LSD MKULTRA CHENEY RUMSFELD
You can't Prove it So I am Not Guilty of anything.
LSD MKULTRA DICK CHENEY
DON RUMSFELD
typical example:
"While researching the CIA project MKULTRA, I find that Richard Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld
were working for President Ford at the time that The President apologised to the widow Olson...
The offical story is that the CIA gave Dr Olson LSD and it drove him insane and that is
why he"fell or jumped" out a hotel window to his death.
The US government gave the widow a large cashpayment and
said they were sorry...
Check out these interesting White House Memos...
The Olson family says it was a murder coverup...
The CIA killed him because after eating LSD he quit his job at Ft. Deitrick Biological
weapons laboratory and he was a security risk...
He had a "radical change of beliefs" and decided that
designing bioweapons was a bad thing to do with his
life...
|
|
En liten social kommentar från The Mothers of Invention (Frank Zappa - "Freak Out", 1966)
Som en slags vinjett för det som komma skall vill jag ha en artikel som
ursprungligen publicerades i The Oregonian: "It can't happen here -- Or can it?" av
Richard L Clinton (april 2003):
Two old friends of mine -- a Jewish couple in their 80s, both retired university
professors who fled Nazi Germany in the late 1930s and eventually became
U.S. citizens -- made a stunning remark to me a few months ago: "You know, all
our lives we have blamed our parents and our parents' generation for allowing
Hitler to gain control. Now we're beginning to see how powerless they must
have felt to stop what was happening all around them."
My friends' melancholy comment came back to me and a palpable chill ran
down my spine when I read about the Gestapo-style arrest of U.S. citizen
Maher "Mike" Hawash. Two weeks ago, police took the 38-year-old Intel
software contractor from his Hillsboro home and put him in solitary
confinement (according to his wife) in a federal prison. No charges have been
filed against him, and his attorneys reportedly are forbidden to discuss the
case. What is happening to our country?
|
========================================================= =========================================================
1dd4d8220.bmp
 http://thegiganticheartlessmultinationalcorporation.com/id553.htm How to brainwash anybody a confession of a "salesman"A Game in Which the Rules Keep Changing excerpted" http://www.rense.com/ufo6/mindcontrol.htmThe Grey Area of Legitimacy I'm not saying that legitimate healings do not take place. They do. Maybe the individual was ready to let go of the negativity that caused the problem in the first place; maybe it was the work of God. Yet I contend that it can be explained with existing knowledge of brain/mind function. A Game in Which the Rules Keep Changing The techniques and staging will vary from church to church. Many use "speaking in tongues" to generate catharsis in some while the spectacle creates intense excitement in the observers. The use of hypnotic techniques by religions is sophisticated, and professionals are assuring that they become even more effective. A man in Los Angeles is designing, building, and reworking a lot of churches around the country. He tells ministers what they need and how to use it. This man's track record indicates that the congregation and the monetary income will double if the minister follows his instructions. He admits that about 80 percent of his efforts are in the sound system and lighting.
Powerful sound and the proper use of lighting are of
primary importance in inducing an
altered state of consciousnes--I've been
using them for years in my own seminars.
However, my participants are fully aware
of the process and what they can expect
as a result of their participation.
Six Conversion Techniques
Cults and human-potential organizations are always looking for new converts. To attain them, they must also create a brain-phase. And they often need to do it within a short space of time--a weekend, or maybe even a day. The following are the six primary techniques used to generate the conversion. Isolation Intimidation, Deprivation and Indoctrination The meeting or training takes place in an area where participants are cut off from the outside world. This may be any place: a private home, a remote or rural setting, or even a hotel ballroom where the participants are allowed only limited bathroom usage. In human-potential trainings, the controllers will give a lengthy talk about the importance of "keeping agreements" in life. The participants are told that if they don't keep agreements, their life will never work. It's a good idea to keep agreements, but the controllers are subverting a positive human value for selfish purposes. The participants vow to themselves and their trainer that they will keep their agreements. Anyone who does not will be intimidated into agreement or forced to leave. The next step is to agree to complete training, thus assuring a high percentage of conversions for the organizations. They will usually have to agree not to take drugs, smoke, and sometimes not to eat...or they are given such short meal breaks that it creates tension. The real reason for the agreements is to alter internal chemistry, which generates anxiety and hopefully causes at least a slight malfunction of the nervous system, which in turn increases the conversion potential. The "Sell It By Zealot" Technique. Before the gathering is complete, the agreements will be used to ensure that the new converts go out and find new participants. They are intimidated into agreeing to do so before they leave. Since the importance of keeping agreements is so high on their priority list, the converts will twist the arms of everyone they know, attempting to talk them into attending a free introductory session offered at a future date by the organization. The new converts are zealots. In fact, the inside term for merchandising the largest and most successful human-potential training is, "sell it by zealot!" At least a million people are graduates and a good percentage have been left with a mental activation button that assures their future loyalty and assistance if the guru figure or organization calls. Think about the potential political implications of hundreds of thousands of zealots programmed to campaign for their guru. Be wary of an organization of this type that offers follow-up sessions after the seminar. Follow-up sessions might be weekly meetings or inexpensive seminars given on a regular basis which the organization will attempt to talk you into taking--or any regularly scheduled event used to maintain control. As the early Christian revivalists found, long-term control is dependent upon a good follow-up system. Wearing Down Resistance Alright. Now, let's look at the second tip-off that indicates conversion tactics are being used. A schedule is maintained that causes physical and mental fatigue. This is primarily accomplished by long hours in which the participants are given no opportunity for relaxation or reflection. Increasing Tension The third tip-off: techniques used to increase the tension in the room or environment. Introducing Uncertainty About Identity Number four: Uncertainty. I could spend hours relating various techniques to increase tension and generate uncertainty. Basically, the participants are concerned about being "put on the spot" or encountered by the trainers, guilt feelings are played upon, participants are tempted to verbally relate their innermost secrets to the other participants or forced to take part in activities that emphasize removing their masks. One of the most successful human-potential seminars forces the participants to stand on a stage in front of the entire audience while being verbally attacked by the trainers. A public opinion poll, conducted a few years ago, showed that the number one most-fearful situation an individual could encounter is to speak to an audience. It ranked above window washing outside the 85th floor of an office building. So you can imagine the fear and tension this situation generates within the participants. Many faint, but most cope with the stress by mentally going away. They literally go into an alpha state, which automatically makes them many times as suggestible as they normally are. And another loop of the downward spiral into conversion is successfully effected. Jargon The fifth clue that conversion tactics are being used is the introduction of jargon--new terms that have meaning only to the "insiders" who participate. Vicious language is also frequently used, purposely, to make participants uncomfortable. Lack of Humor: No Release, No Resistance The final tip-off is that there is no humor in the communications... at least until the participants are converted. Then, merry-making and humor are highly desirable as symbols of the new joy the participants have supposedly "found." http://thegiganticheartlessmultinationalcorporation.com/id553.htmhttp://www.rense.com/ufo6/mindcontrol.htmHUMAN RIGHTS WATCH General The following is a list of Human Rights Watch publications that report on more than one country or region. The publications listed here are currently in print and are arranged chronologically by the date of publication. To read a brief description of a particular report, click on its title in the index below. To return to the top of the index click on the title over its description. In Its Own Words: The U.S. Army and Antipersonnel Mines in the Korean and Vietnam Wars Still Killing: Landmines in Southern Africa Exposing the Source: U.S. Companies and the Production of Antipersonnel Mines Uncertain Refuge: International Failures to Protect Refugees Human Rights Watch World Report 1997 Putting Human Rights Back into the Habitat Agenda SILENCING THE NET The Threat to Freedom of Expression On-line Children In Combat HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH WORLD REPORT 1996 General Reports http://www.hrw.org/research/gen.html (1 of 3) [11/16/2007 4:12:58 AM] Nimba Creations Special EffectsFilm & TV Special Effects, Animatronics, Prosthetics, Props, Creatures & FX. Movie Special Effects UK. http://www.nimbacreations.com/ - 8k - Cached - Similar pages Nimba Creations Special Effects; Animatronics, Prosthetics, Props ... Nimba Creations Special Effects - animatronics, prosthetics, props, creatures & models for film, TV and exhibitions. Movie Special FX supplies & products ... http://www.creativematch.co.uk/viewlisting.cfm/40234 - Nimba Creations - Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaNimba Creations is a UK special effects company which supplies animatronics, props, prosthetics, models & creatures for films and TV. ... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nimba_Creations - I. SUMMARY
United States Policy Company Responses Recommendations
II. THE GLOBAL LANDMINE CRISIS III. U.S. ANTIPERSONNEL MINE PRODUCTION, STOCKPILES AND EXPORTS Production Stockpiles
Exports IV. IDENTIFYING AND CHALLENGING U.S. COMPANIES The Arms Project Investigation The Recalcitrant Producers
The Case Against General Electric Companies Renouncing Future Involvement V. RECOMMENDATIONS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Appendix A: U.S. Antipersonnel Mine Component Suppliers Appendix B:U.S. Companies Renouncing Future Involvement
in Antipersonnel Mine Production Appendix C: Human Rights Watch Letter Sent to Forty-Seven U.S. Companies
Appendix D:U.S. Antipersonnel Mine Types
This G o o g l e serch used the folowing string< anti-personal mines to fuses look like toys
to attract children >We followed the sugestions < anti-personal mines candy wrapper fuses >
and found this Not what WE were looking for. The identy of the fools that created and make
kiddy land mines !!
What Scumbags thought that up What company what country ??
Anti- (human) personal mines, many which are designed
to attract children with fuses which look like candy wrappers or toys!
File Format: Microsoft Word 2000 - View as HTML ... Open a pickle or olive jar. Get some sliced meat or cheese from the delicatessen counter and eat it up, making sure to ditch the wrapper. ... http://www.ats_krew.tripod.com/stealthisbook.doc - File Format: [RTF] Rich Text Format - View as HTML ... from the delicatessen counter and eat it up, making sure to ditch the wrapper. ... Also write to the Geographical Branch, Department of Mines and Technical Surveys ... http://www.geocities.com/hang0all/STEALTHISBOOK.doc - Isaac Asimov was wrong! Robots kill!
Landmines are limbless robots killers that follow their bosses'
orders from Hitler's bunker to the Pentagon!
Isaac Asimov, like many others, was wrong. Robots are not
our friends. They are products of industry and, as such,
display the traits of their origins, the primary characteristic
of which is massive public relations and advertising campaigns
created to make robots acceptable to the public they were made
to replace.
Sci-Fi films assist in that goal by promoting the myth of
"happy robots" or "sexy androids" while totally ignoring millions
of murderous robots in the form of anti- (human) personal
mines, many which are designed to attract children with
fuses which look like candy wrappers or toys!
The land mine is an anti personnel weapon simply calling
it a device obscures/denies the fact that they are designed
to kill and maim children.
Isaac Asimov was wrong!!. Robots ALLREADY are killers!!.
Limbless landmine's they may be, but they follow their
bosses' orders from Hitler's Bunker to the Pentagon!...
110 Million land mines in 70 nations.This is 10 times the
number of Human Beings that perished in the Holocaust
of WW2.
Do the math It's nearly half of the total population living in America.
================================
Did you mean: ultraviolet
Ultraviolet - Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaFalse-color image of the solar corona as seen in deep ultraviolet light at 17.1 nm by the Extreme ultraviolet Imaging Telescope instrument aboard the SOHO ... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultraviolet - Ultraviolet WavesUltraviolet (UV) light has shorter wavelengths than visible light.
Though these waves are invisible to the human eye, some insects, like bumblebees, ...
The Official Web Site of Ultra VioletUltra Violet's latest NYC show opens. (for more information click here). (To continue perusing the old website, scroll down) ... http://www.ultravioletweb.com/ - MySpace.com - ULTRAVIOLET SOUND (is making some new shiz) - los ...MySpace music profile for ULTRAVIOLET SOUND (is making some new shiz) with tour dates, songs, videos, pictures, blogs, band information, downloads and more. http://www.myspace.com/ultravioletsound -
User:David Shankbone
Marcel Duchamp, Ultra Violet
and Taylor Mead backstage at
'Conquest of the Universe' (1967)
(photo: Wynn Chamberlain)
**** (1967)/I, A Man (1967)
Ultra Violet continues to exhibit her art worldwide. Her work was included in the Audart exhibition commemorating the tenth anniversary of Warhol's death in 1997. In August - October 2004 she exhibited at the Washington County Museum of Fine Art and during 2004/05 her work was shown at the Gallerie Ferrero in Nice. Her work was also included in the Andy Warhol birthday exhibit at the Shoreham Hotel in 2005 and exhibitions in Houston, Paris, Seattle and the Czech Republic in 2006. UltraViolet2007.jpg http://www.ultravioletweb.com/Ultra Violet (2007)
(Photo: David Shankbone)
ULTRA NOW
(link to Ultra's website)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (Redirected from User:DavidShankBone)• Ten things you may not know about Wikipedia • Image results for ultra violet http://www.warholstars.org/indfoto/iultra.html Did you mean to search for: ultraviolet ============================================================
==============================================================
Posted on Tue, Nov. 13, 2007
CIA admits to recording interrogations of top al Qaida captives
Greg Gordon McClatchy Newspapers
last updated: November 14, 2007 07:47:17 AM
WASHINGTON — The CIA has three video and audio recordings of interrogations of senior al Qaida captives but misled federal
judges about the evidence during the case against terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui, federal prosecutors revealed in a Nov. 9
court filing that was made public Tuesday.
The disclosure is unlikely to undo Moussaoui's conviction because the agency said the material on the tapes doesn't pertain
to his case.
However, the disclosure that the government taped some interrogations of high-value detainees could invite fresh scrutiny of
the CIA's treatment of so-called "enemy combatants" who were held at secret prisons or U.S. bases overseas.
John Radsan, a former CIA assistant general counsel who teaches at the William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul, Minn.,
called the revelation of the tapes "huge" news.
"So far, there has been great mystery about what was actually done to the high-value detainees," he said. "A videotape is
worth a thousand words."
New Attorney General Michael Mukasey's Senate confirmation last week was threatened for a time by his refusal to declare as
illegal an interrogation tactic known as "waterboarding", in which a suspect is doused with water to create the sensation of
drowning.
The government's letter said that "the CIA came into possession of the three recordings under unique circumstances involving
separate national security matters," leaving unclear whether the tapes show CIA interrogations or possibly questioning by
agents of another country. At least one senior al Qaida member, Ibn Sheikh al Libi, reportedly was turned over to Egyptian
authorities for questioning in 2002, but much of what he allegedly confessed proved to be false.
Prosecutors revealed the existence of the tapes in a letter to Chief Judge Karen Williams of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals in Richmond, Va., and to U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema of Alexandria, Va., the trial judge in the tumultuous,
4 1/2 year prosecution of Moussaoui.
In it, they said that the CIA didn't notify them until Sept. 13 that it had discovered a videotape and the transcript of an
interrogation of an unidentified detainee. Prosecutors said they then asked the CIA to perform "an exhaustive review" for
any other recordings of roughly a half dozen al Qaida captives whom Moussaoui had sought as defense witnesses, and a second
videotape and a brief audio tape were discovered.
Among the prisoners whose testimony Moussaoui sought were Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who allegedly admitted masterminding the
9/11 attacks after he was waterboarded; Ramzi Binalshibh, a senior al Qaida member who allegedly coordinated the attacks;
and financier Mustafa Ahmed al Hawsawi. Summaries of statements from those three and several others were read at his trial.
"The fact that audio/video recording of enemy combatant interrogations occurred, and that the United States was in possession
of three of those recordings is, as noted, inconsistent with factual assertions in CIA declarations dated May 9, 2003 . . .
and November 14, 2005," the prosecutors wrote.
"When the CIA discovered this material — and it was the CIA that found it — the agency brought the matter to the attention of
the Department of Justice," CIA spokesman Paul Gimigliano said. He emphasized that "there was no prejudicial impact on the
defendant."
Edward MacMahon, a defense lawyer who represented Moussaoui in his death penalty trial last year, declined to comment. A new
team of defense lawyers who're handling Moussaoui's attempt to persuade an appellate court to allow him to withdraw his 2005
guilty plea didn't return calls.
McClatchy Newspapers 2007
Chilly bricks
American Holocaust Pestilence and Genocide The Spain that Christopher Columbus and his crews left behind before dawn on ..... the Spaniards did not believe them and pitilessly called them lazy dogs, ... www.thirdworldtraveler.com/History/Pestilence_AH.html - 47k - Cached - Similar pages The History of Puerto Rico by R.A. Van Middeldyk - Full Text Free ... José Barreiro, A Note on Tainos: Whither Progress? To Christopher Columbus, and the Spanish Catholic kingdom behind him, .... who had been torn to death by a Spanish mastiff commanded by two Spanish soldiers ... www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/41/013.html - 52k - Cached - Similar pages [PDF] What did Europeans see when they looked at the New World and the ... File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat Document 1: From a letter by Christopher Columbus. October 12, 1492 .... and bloodhounds, and our big mastiff dogs will tear them apart.” ... www.peterpappas.com/journals/dbq/new-world/new-world-5.pdf - Similar pages A Note on Tainos: Whither Progress Christopher Columbus, whose name literally means "Christ-bearing ..... who had been torn to death by a Spanish mastiff commanded by two Spanish soldiers. ... www.uctp.org/ANoteonTainos.html - 58k - Cached - Similar pages Anecdotes about Italy and Italians In 1492, Christopher Columbus set off on his first famous expedition to the ..... Mastiff Attack "Columbus believed that for fighting Indians one dog was ... italophiles.com/anecdotes.htm - 129k - Cached - Similar pages Orcinus The die for this worldview was cast with Christopher Columbus' first .... The women, then, fell sick of the smallpox, bread failed, and many died of hunger. ... dneiwert.blogspot.com/2006/12/eliminationism-in-america-iii.html - Learn By Faith He had the vision of the founding fathers asking for their work to be done, and performed that work for them, including for Christopher Columbus and others ... learnbyfaith.com/blog/ - 60k - Cached - Similar pages Dogs Lisa B. Haughton, LA, 05/2004, Lap Band, i have three dogs:mastiff mix, ...... Joan F. B., Erie, PA, love little poodles. had a special one who was my best ... www.obesityhelp.com/morbidobesity/members/members-interested-in.php?i=26 - Journal An Electronic Edition Christopher Columbus 1451-1506 ... Christopher Columbus, "Journal of the First Voyage of Columbus," in Julius ...... They had dogs, mastiffs, and hounds; and here they found a man who had a ... www.mith2.umd.edu/eada/html/display.php?docs=columbus_journal.xml&action=show http://3quarksdaily.blogs.com/3quarksdaily/monday_columns/index.htmlDispatches: Chumps and Outlaws There's a quasi-famous shot I keep remembering in Terry Gilliam's 1985 movie Brazil. In it, Jonathan
Pryce's character, who has come to realize he lives in a fascist state, drives down an expressway.
The walls to either side of the road surface are covered in billboards and advertisements. As Pryce's
car drives away from the viewer, the camera ascends, revealing that just outside the walls, invisible
to drivers, lies a grim wasteland. The vivid and friendly billboards hide the truth, which is that the actual
world hidden from view by their flimsy walls is barren. It is post-industrially empty--and having stripped
it, the state consoles its subjects by substituting pasted-up two-dimensional images advertising island
vacations. When the movie opens, Pryce's Sam Lowry is an obedient, crushed civil servant whose only
escape is dreams. Now he, and we, learn that this reality is a façade; the truth is bleaker and wilder.
That one shot has always seemed to me the most succinct visual expression of the heady thought that
everyday life is an illusion. George Orwell, from whom the movie derives its worldview, is only its most
important recent progenitor; the history of philosophy teems with rehearsals of this idea. Marx's "all
that is solid melts into air" might as well have been the production motto for Brazil. To move right to the
putative beginning, Plato's cave serves as our most canonical and enshrined mythic allegory of the the
founding philosophical idea that something floats above the tangible, physical world: metaphysics.
Critiques of fascism, capitalism and socialism all present the lived world as somehow fake.
The difference between various versions of the false consciousness concept lies in what lies behind the
curtain. For Orwell, a fascist state imposes the veil, and behind lies an anarchic zone of freedom and
restored personal agency. In much of American literature and film (particularly the Western), heroes must
venture beyond the pale, into a realm of brutality and violence--paradoxically, this is done to ensure the
safety of us civilized sissies. In Marx, of course, it is the commodity fetish that hides the true reality of class
conflict, and capitalism that blinds us to the organic, uncommodified world. Though they differ in identifying
the obscuring entity, all of these lines of thought share the trope of reality's unreality.
Gilliam's shot gets at this so directly that it replays in my mind from time to time. When I first saw it, its
political aspect seemed a dystopian fantasy; over time, the film seems more and more prophetic and, frankly,
descriptive. (I know you've been expecting that point.) But before we came to be ruled by criminals, I also
saw the shot as a powerful descriptor of the contemporary world of big-box retailers and how they have,
within a generation, supersized the landscape of the U.S. I truly believe this, Prince Charles-ish as it may
sound: big box suburbia is an alienation factory. Here's the main reason: the sheer size of the various
megastores means that when you're inside one, your entire experiential world is produced by committee.
There's no randomness.
You might find yourself in a "marketplace" aisle, but it's all a Potemkin village staged by one massive concern.
Great big posters promise a vivid diversity of products inside; outside is best described by Rem Koolhaas' term,
junkspace. And other people? They have been turned into fellow shoppers or drones with no interest or
stake in the larger enterprise. Frank Lucas, the subject of the recent (and unenjoyable) Ridley Scott movie
American Gangster, makes this point in a funnier way (in this New York Magazine article):
"Lucas scowled through glareproof glass to the suburban strip beyond. 'Look at this shit,' he said. A giant
Home Depot down the road especially bugged him. Bumpy Johnson himself couldn't have collected protection
from a damn Home Depot, he said with disgust. 'What would Bumpy do? Go in and ask to see the assistant
manager? Place is so big, you get lost past the bathroom sinks. But that's the way it is now. You can't find the
heart of anything to stick the knife into.'"
There it is. Gangsters and cowboys are the ur-American figures for a reason: they represent freedom from
political philosophy and empty consumerism. If the everday world is false consciousness, these are the people
who live beyond it. The gangster lives in a world in which something like meritocracy holds--or at least, if not
meritocracy, then true randomness, something besides the loaded dice of the system. The cowboy lives beyond
the arm of the Law, and thus is free to be a freer, simpler, and ultimately more just version of the law. Both
figures operate in zones of freedom that exist because of the failure of the state. Having no respect for political
philosophy IS America's political philosophy.
So, Frank Lucas is saying, you know something's wrong, something's Orwellian about a landscape when gangsters
and cowboys can no longer operate. Right? Right. Is our continuing fixation on gangsters and our barely
concealed adulation of gangsters any coincidence, then? Are these gangster shows our colorful travel narratives,
the compensation for living in a world as dreary as ours? My provisional answer is: yes. The one movie, by the
way, that makes this symbiosis of exurb and gangster clear is GoodFellas--specifically it's last shot, in which Ray
Liotta, banished to Arizona by the witness protection program, stands in front of the tract housing in which he lives.
As he looks hopelessly, forlornly at the camera, we cut abruptly to Joe Pesci shooting up the screen, Great Train
Robbery style. Tearing right through the veil. Now that's living! The gangster is the fantasy obverse of the man
who knows his limits.
These days, people are especially fascinated by amoral protagonists: the absence of moral judgment is what
everyone calls sophistication on The Sopranos and The Wire. This isn't new to American culture though. It's only
new to TV. For a century, there have been the ultimate landscape movies, Westerns, in which the man who must
blaze society's trail is unfit for polite society. (It's no coincidence that the bleak landscape in Gilliam's shot could
easily be a Western one.) As A.O. Scott wrote yesterday,
"The archetypal western hero is a complicated figure, and the world he inhabits is a place of flux and contradiction.
At the end, the stranger rides off into the wilderness, since the civilization he has helped to save holds no permanent
place for him... Modernity may be inevitable and desirable, but it comes at a price. The wilderness will be cut down
and cultivated; the original inhabitants will be dispossessed; and an element of romance will be lost."
Or will it? Do we not have other countries in which to unleash our wild freedom? The new frontier is the first frontier,
the Tigris-Euphrates valley, and our representatives act as gangster-cowboys there while we exult in the televised
fictions detailing the same. We sure do love some cleansing violence. And where better to stage it than a ruined,
apocalyptic landscape (even if we have to ruin it first ourselves)? That's the funny thing about Gilliam's vision. It's
equally bleak on either side. I think that's why it describes an enduring dialectic of paranoia. On the one hand, an
alienating and utterly superficial consumerist culture and on the other, bleak lawlessness.
Maybe it's worth remembering that gangsters, unlike cowboys, do try to ensure some kind of stable order. Lucas says
he wouldn't shake down the mom-and-pop stores, only larger establishments that had some profit in them. You don't
want to strip your ecosystem past the point of collapse. Similarly, there's a famous story about the establishment of
New York's most venerable pizzerias, those founded by apprenctices of the baker John Lombardi: Patsy's, Grimaldi's,
Totonno's, Lombardi's. These places don't serve individual slices, just whole pies. The reason, the story goes, is that
the mobsters who shook down pizza places exempted these oldest restaurants. Outta respect. But, so they wouldn't
take too large of a cut of their business, they let them off the hook on one condition: that they wouldn't sell slices.
There's something wise in this anecdote. Don't punish your poorest and oldest constituents. Take more money from the large outfits, who can afford it. The mob, it seems, practiced progressive taxation. That's more than you can say for our contemporary elites. No wonder Lucas is so incensed by superstores. Their business is conducted at such a metahuman scale, who could shake them down? This is the final meaning, I think of all the gangster and cowboy fantasies: they are symptoms of a time in which ordinary people have knowledge of events but almost no ability to affect them. Protest goes unheard, while our government and multinational concerns ensure their safety and privacy to the detriment of ours. Gilliam's movie rendered society as a choice between being a chump or being an outlaw. For now, we're one dreaming we're the other.The rest of my dispatches. http://3quarksdaily.blogs.com/3quarksdaily/monday_columns/index.html |
