[Peace-discuss] Chalmers Johnson on "Charlie Wilson's War"

[Laurie at advancenet.net]

I suppose one cold describe it as "Animal House" for the masses; but I
prefer to think of the film as a comedy that satirizes the characters that
it portrays showing how hypocritical, unethical, opportunistic, and Ugly
American Americans can be.

However, one of the people I went to see this movie with drew some of the
same conclusions as drawn below, got upset, and walked out of the movie.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: peace-discuss-bounces at lists.chambana.net [mailto:peace-discuss-
> bounces at lists.chambana.net] On Behalf Of C. G. Estabrook
> Sent: Tuesday, January 08, 2008 2:42 PM
> To: peace-discuss at anti-war.net
> Subject: [Peace-discuss] Chalmers Johnson on "Charlie Wilson's War"
> 
> http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/print/174877/Tomgram%253A%2520%2520Chal
> mers%2520Johnson%252C%2520An%2520Imperialist%2520Comedy
> 
> [....]
> 
> One of the severe side effects of imperialism in its advanced stages
> seems to be that it rots the brains of the imperialists. They start
> believing that they are the bearers of civilization, the bringers of
> light to "primitives" and "savages" (largely so identified because of
> their resistance to being "liberated" by us), the carriers of science
> and modernity to backward peoples, beacons and guides for citizens of
> the "underdeveloped world."
> 
> [....]
> 
> When imperialist activities produce unmentionable outcomes, such as
> those well known to anyone paying attention to Afghanistan since
> about 1990, then ideological thinking kicks in. The horror story is
> suppressed, or reinterpreted as something benign or ridiculous (a
> "comedy"), or simply curtailed before the denouement becomes obvious.
> Thus, for example, Melissa Roddy, a Los Angeles film-maker with
> inside information from the Charlie Wilson production team,
> <http://www.alternet.org/stories/71286/>notes that the film's happy
> ending came about because Tom Hanks, a co-producer as well as the
> leading actor, "just can't deal with this 9/11 thing."
> 
> [....]
> 
> The tendency of imperialism to rot the brains of imperialists is
> particularly on display in the recent spate of articles and reviews
> in mainstream American newspapers about the film. For reasons not
> entirely clear, an overwhelming majority of reviewers concluded that
> Charlie Wilson's War is a "feel-good comedy" (Lou Lumenick in the New
> York Post), a "high-living, hard-partying jihad" (A.O. Scott in the
> New York Times), "a sharp-edged, wickedly funny comedy" (Roger Ebert
> in the Chicago Sun-Times). Stephen Hunter in the Washington Post
> wrote of "Mike Nichols's laff-a-minute chronicle of the congressman's
> crusade to ram funding through the House Appropriations Committee to
> supply arms to the Afghan mujahideen"; while, in a piece entitled
> "Sex! Drugs! (and Maybe a Little War)," Richard L. Berke in the New
> York Times offered this
> <http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/16/movies/16berk.html?_r=1&oref=slogin>
> stamp
> of approval: "You can make a movie that is relevant and intelligent
> -- and palatable to a mass audience -- if its political pills are
> sugar-coated."
> 
> [....]
> 
> My own view is that if Charlie Wilson's War is a comedy, it's the
> kind that goes over well with a roomful of louts in a college
> fraternity house. Simply put, it is imperialist propaganda and the
> tragedy is that four-and-a-half years after we invaded Iraq and
> destroyed it, such dangerously misleading nonsense is still being
> offered to a gullible public. The most accurate review so far is
> James Rocchi's summing-up for
> <http://www.cinematical.com/2007/12/21/review-charlie-wilsons-war-
> jamess-take/> Cinematical:
> "Charlie Wilson's War isn't just bad history; it feels even more
> malign, like a conscious attempt to induce amnesia."
> 
>    ###
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