Posted on 12/24/2007 6:44:12 AM PST by Invisigoth
“Charlie Wilson's War” is a rattling good movie. It is also a good history lesson. And it is a good civics lesson, if a discouraging one.
It is, if you do not know, the story of how a liberal Democratic congressman from Texas, a drinker, a womanizer and probably a cocaine user, single-handedly upped U.S. support for the mujahideen in Afghanistan.
(Excerpt) Read more at northstarwriters.com ...
In related news:
Joe McCarthy was in retrospect, clearly right.
Hollywood. Media. Public schools...
After much thought, having seen the film twice, and considering who wrote the script (Aaron “mushroom” Sorking) I have concluded that this represents and ingenious new strategy on the part of liberaldom: After fifteen fruitless years of trying to deny that we actually defeated the Soviet Union in the Cold War, they have now decided to say that we did, in fact “beat” the russkies and that it was all the doing of a heroic dem congressman. In the movie, Ronaldus Magnus is barely mentioned and even in the History Channel accompanying piece, he is only given credit for signing off on the Stingers.
Saw the film yesterday. Despite the presence of horse-face Julia Roberts, the film was actually one of the most patriotic films I’ve seen Hollywood do in a while, and quite enjoyable to watch. Philip Seymour Hoffman is outstanding.
Ping!
You nailed it.
So it's o.k for liberal generated cutesy wars like Kennedy and LBJ's VietNam, and Wilson's war, and Clinton-the-liberal-womanizer's war against the Serbs, but damn those conservative wars, like the ingenious Iran Contra's war to free Central America from commie style dictatorships and the Bush Iraq quagmire, not to mention Daddy Bush's Panama and Reagan's Grenada and the failed Beriut deployment.
But wait, there’s more. The anti-americanism may be toned down but ol’ Aaron gets in quite a few anti-christian digs. Recall when we first meet Charlie in his office there is a pastor from his hometown in his waiting room who wants him to influence a judge to rule against an ACLU lawsuit to remove a creche in front of the local firehouse. Charlie blithely dismisses him, saying he can simply move it across the street to one of the neighborhood churches. Later that night, we see preacher-dude’s uptight, button-down daughter in Charlie bachelor pad in her undies, smoking a joint and sipping his booze (inferring, I guess, that “Christers” are all hypocrites).
Furthermore, Julia Robert’s socialite character is portrayed as a rather strident born-again at the shindig she throws for Zia ul-Haq when Charlie asks her to tone down the crusader talk in her speech. And let us not forget the nasty-looking cardinal who we see throw her a lascivious glance as she takes the podium.
The ritual christian-kicking was unusually subtle for Sorkin, but it was there nevertheless.
LOL, I'm also at a loss in not seeing what others appreciate, but I think of Sarah Jessica Parker when using that description. I thought it was really strange that the reviewer, Llewellyn King, is a member of the North Star Writers Group.
I would be more inclined to use the phrase “co-opt” (that’s polite-speak for “steal” or “take credit for”).
We’ll be seeing this again when the war on Islamofascism is finally won.
I saw the history channel piece and thought it was balanced. It positioned Reagan as not just signing off on the stingers, but overruling his Joint Chiefs, NSA, CIA, State Department, and most of Congress on that issue. And THEN getting the Saudis to match dollar for dollar our arming of the mujahadeen. It also made the point - in Charlie’s words himself - that our mistake wasn’t in arming the Afgans against the Soviets, but in not staying engaged in Afghanistan afterwards enough to help rebuild it and maintain some leverage in the politics (rebuilding it was needed - 1/3 of its population was killed or displaced by the soviets).
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