Posted on 04/28/2020 4:55:44 AM PDT by Kaslin
Like many Americans, I have watched too many movies during this seemingly unending stretch of glorified house arrest.
Many of these films I have found on Turner Classic Movies. Even back in the good old days, when I was a free citizen of the United States -- remember that place? -- TCM was my default channel.
Yes, I know, leftist TCM maven Ben Mankiewicz co-founded the proudly stupid “The Young Turks,” but he and the other hosts keep their politics out of it. Better still, TCM shows uncut movies others do not dare, Blazing Saddles included.
By now, I have seen most of TCM’s movies, but one aired this past week I had not even heard of. On a whim, I DVR’ed it. Good move. Called Gabriel Over the White House, this 1933 liberal wet dream proved to be the most unapologetic celebration of fascism ever put on film.
I watched it wide-eyed. The movie opens with the inauguration of Jud Hammond. A laissez-faire back-slapper, Hammond sees the White House as a way to enrich himself and reward his cronies, Depression be damned. The audience assumes Hammond is a Republican.
Out joyriding one day, Hammond crashes his car and lapses into coma. While still comatose, the Angel Gabriel visits Hammond and turns him into a committed and caring progressive. Is there another kind?
Upon waking, Hammond convenes his cabinet of corrupt self-servers and rejects their plea that the party must come first. Instead, Hammond insists their first priority be the American people. He refuses to use the U.S. Army against a marching mass of the unemployed and fires the secretary of state when he objects.
“I suggest you read the Constitution of the United States. You’ll find the President has some power,” Hammond warns his cabinet members.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Progressives and Fascists are exactly the same thing. They used to not hide it. After the Nazis and their “excesses”, the Progressives began to play the game with a little more subtlety. But it’s always been the same game.
I’ve watched all Frank Capra movies from that era, very pro American.
I’ve watched all Frank Capra movies from that era, very pro American.
Yes, it has.
Progressivism is actually regressive.
The Pharohs had total power and relied on experts to rule over the masses.
That is Progressivism in a nutshell.
Sinclair Lewis published It Can’t Happen Here in 1935 . . . wonder if this movie was the inspiration?
That novel should be required reading. As should be the correspondence between FDR and Mussolini in FDR’s first term. That would open a lot of eyes.
President Trump decentralised during the corona crisis, the opposite of Franklin Roosevelt's reaction to his crises, or that of any prior President.
Trump is the opposite of fascist. He is a cincinnatus.
This is one main reason the Left hates him so.
Note tagline. That's another reason.
A third reason is that the Left is merely filled with hate, anger, and evil. Hate is their default position.
There are similarities between President Hammond's takeover of America and Adolph Hitler's takeover of Germany. Hammond declared he had the solution to unemployment and enlisted those unemployed in a "construction army," as did Hitler. Hammond declared martial law, as did Hitler. Hammond created the Federal Police, as did Hitler with the Sturmabteilung. Hammond suspended Congress, Hitler suspended the Reichstag. And being appointed Chancellor, Hitler effectively became a dictator who promised to use this power to cut through the red tape and bureaucracy, just as Hammond pledged to do. It is unknown if Hitler viewed this film.
But since Hammond is a progressive it's all okay, I guess.
“Produced by William Randolph Hearst”
https://www.history.com/topics/early-20th-century-us/william-randolph-hearst
Hearst’s papers catered to urban working people, many of whom were recent immigrants. His papers favored labor unions, progressive taxation, and municipal ownership of utilities.
I watched TCM a lot. Saturday evening it plays showed a true classic, introduced by Mankiewicz and a guest, someone accomplished in the business. Last time I watched the guest was Ava Duvernay. She has directed two films and is basically an AA director, and her choices for the Saturday films were... rather poor. Drove me away...
Great post! See my tagline.
However, these naive children have been playing with themselves in that echo chamber of a corner long enough that they've convinced themselves they are the smartest people in the room. They've similarly convinced themselves through their own parochialism and refusal to accept real diversity of thought that their ideas are the ideas.
From there it is an easy leap - not even a leap, more of a step in the direction they were going anyway - to decide that their ideas should be imposed on the poor ignorant masses who haven't had the benefit of their "education." Their self aggrandizement reeks of condescension.
The left's ideas and ideals sound good, but crash hard against the rocks of cold hard reality. Anyone with an iota of common sense and or appreciation of history can see that. This is why our frustrated children from the corner turn to, even lust for fascism and power. For them the old joke about "socialism, ideas so good they have to be imposed on everyone" isn't a joke, it is their reaction to the rest of the sane world laughing at them.
Hollywood kissed Hitler’s ass in the 1930s, because they wanted to keep access to the German market.
Charlie Chaplin was the only one who resisted, and Hollywood made him pay.
Hardly! Sadly, since the death of Robert Osborne, TCM has become a "woke" nightmare for those of us to simply watch great movies without backward-looking judgments from the lefty hosts. Not a day goes by without comments on racism, misogyny, the black-list, the horrors of black-face, etc.
Worse still, given their access to the vast vaults of MGM and Warner Brothers, they persist in scheduling dreck from the 1960s and 1970s. For every showing of "Black Mama, White Mama (1973), there is one less opportunity to view true classics.
The same day they aired “The Dark Horse” about a political “machine” backing a dimwit for governor.
As well as “Seven Days In May” about a military coup overthrowing the President.
I still watch a lot of TCM. I ignore the late 60's/70's stuff and concentrate on classics. Every couple of weeks, I advance through the guide on DirecTV and see if I want to record something on the DVR. I usually ignore the woke hosts. I like Eddie Muller on Noir Alley, and I like Alicia Malone because I think she's hot. I never watch the guy with the Joker-mouth.
TV Tropes has a very good write up on this film:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/GabrielOverTheWhiteHouse
“One of the most unintentionally scary films ever, and likely more influential at the time than we realize...”
A Couple of Tropes mentioned:
The Purge: Mafia members, suspected mafia members, and presumably everyone else the President doesn’t like are executed en masse. The President also dissolves Congress by force when they try to impeach him-it’s never explicitly stated if any of them survived.
State Sec: The “Federal Police”. Apparently the archangel Gabriel favors summary executions.
Dark Messiah: Things are bad in America, with the country mired in the Great Depression and organized crime running rampant. Hammond has some ideas about how to fix things. Ideas like dissolving Congress, taking dictatorial control, establishing a secret police, and standing mobsters up against the wall for summary execution.
Day of the Jackboot: A good thing from the movie’s perspective, and some people at the time (This example contains a YMMV entry. It should be moved to the YMMV tab.) including Franklin D. Roosevelt, who said it “would do much to help.” The fascist themes and iconography are impossible to miss by the point where Beekman, formerly the President’s civilian aid, is dressed in the military uniform of the Federal Police and executing gangsters.
Thank You.
TCM has spiraled downhill since the death of Robert Osborne.
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