by cameron | Nov 11, 2009 | capitalism
Tonight we finally got to see Michael Moore’s latest film, Capitalism: A Love Story.
While it’s undeniably a powerful film that everyone should see, I have one major complaint with it – he let Obama off the hook.
Everyone knows that Moore isn’t a big fan of Bush and Cheney. That has been very clear in his last couple of films. So it isn’t surprising that in Capitalism, he continues to (rightfully) blame a lot of America’s current financial woes on the Bush / Cheney administration.
However Bush isn’t in office today. And Moore’s only critique of Obama is to mention VERY briefly that Goldman Sachs were the biggest private investor in Obama’s election campaign. Apart from that slight jab, he not only completely let’s Obama off the hook for the current crisis, he actually continues to paint Obama in a positive light, as a beacon of hope that things are changing in the USA.
Now while I know Obama wasn’t in power during the years when the Clinton and Bush administrations whittled away most of the regulations in the financial system, it definitely WAS Obama who, late last year, convinced Congress to pass the bailout vote – a disastrous piece of legislation that Moore spent a great deal of time discussing. Yet in all of his coverage of that event, he never once showed an image of Obama or mentioned Obama’s critical role in making sure the bill passed.
And I have to ask – why not? I know that Moore championed hard for Obama on the election trail. But I thought that would make sure that he would have determined to hold his man to at least an equal if not higher standard than the other guys. It looks like I was wrong. At least in this film, Moore has given Obama a Get Out Of Jail Free card. It saddens me.
There’s a great scene in the film where Moore debunks Ronald Reagan and explains how RR was just a pretty boy frontman for the financial cartels. It’s sad that he can’t see that Obama is EXACTLY the same.
On another note, I hope that Moore’s next film shines a light on his own religion. He says he’s been a practising Catholic all of this life. In this current film, he makes the Catholics out to be good guys. I wonder if he has the integrity to turn his keen eye on his own? He could start by interviewing Irwin Zalkin.
by cameron | Oct 16, 2009 | Podcast
I was an early follower of @GayMarriageAus because I’m a big supporter of gay marriage rights. I was delightfully surprised, though, to find out that the person behind it is a 17 year old high school student, Rebecca. I chatted with her recently about why she’s supporting gay rights.
We also talked about The Australian Sex Party (who will be guests on the show in coming weeks) and the current legislation in Australia pertaining to gay rights.
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by cameron | Aug 12, 2009 | Uncategorized
According to the quiz, I’m a Centrist. What are you?
by cameron | Jul 20, 2009 | geopolitics
Most of the media coverage of the recent bombings in Jakarta seem to be skirting around the edges of… something.
It seems that the target of the Marriott bombing was a regular business meeting held there – but a regular business meeting involving which companies and organisations?
From combing the various reports, it appears that it was a meeting run by a US-based consulting company called CastleAsia "a Jakarta-based consultancy helping multinationals access local markets." Several mining-related companies were involved, including:
Considering the recent attacks on employees at the Freeport mine in Papua, which have been linked to the country’s own security forces, and Freeport’s history of paying huge amounts of money to members of the corrupt Indonesian military for "protection" and it’s shocking human rights record, perhaps the media and our governments might somehow start to connect these acts of violence with the actions of foreign-owned mining companies in Indonesia?
There are lots of suggestions that Jemaah Islamiyah (or a JI splinter group) is behind the bombings but, as far as I’m aware, they are yet to claim responsibility. On top of that, some analysts are suggesting that JI has been wiped out.
Who stands to benefit from the bombings?
Perhaps it *was* JI and perhaps it *is* a senseless bombing of innocent civilians by a group of crazed religious fundamentalists. However it might also be an easy escape goat, a diversion tactic, a neatly-packaged up scenario to stop most of us thinking further about the issue.
Who stands to benefit from the bombings?
The Marriott share price went down.
The Freeport share price went UP.
Who might want to cause trouble in Indonesia?
The guy who lost their recent Presidential election, Prabowo Subianto, a former General and son-in-law of former President Suharto? Let’s remember that Suharto, friend of Australia and the USA, was an incredibly corrupt and evil man. He was also a great friend of Freeport – as was his son-in-law, Prabowo.
Is there some connection between the election result and the recent violence? Have Freeport changed who they are paying protection money to and this is the payback?
