Thirteen Days [2000)

I almost didn’t watch this.

Because of arch-cocksucker Philip Zelikow.

But I was curious.

Biden is no JFK.

And Milley is just a woke version of LeMay.

Or Maxwell Taylor.

Biden wants war.

He desperately wants war.

Milley wants war.

He went and did a photo op on the Polish-Ukrainian border as 14 “wide-body aircraft” (per day…the average) behind him were unloading military gear bound for Ukraine.

https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20220304-near-ukraine-border-western-arms-arrive-quickly-and-discreetly

Gee.

That certainly gives the impression that NATO supports Ukraine.

And why would NATO do that?

Ukraine is not in NATO.

Can it then be extrapolated (when joined with the fact that NATO has continuously expanded eastward since the end of the Cold War to now include not just one member that borders Russia [Norway], but five members [Norway, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania]) that it is indeed NATO, and not Russia, that is the root cause of this current conflagration in Ukraine?

This is the Cuban Missile Crisis all over again, except this time we are REALLY in Russia’s backyard (at their fucking door, you might say).

I support U.S. troops.

I pledge allegiance to the USA.

Not to NATO.

The USA needs to swiftly exit NATO.

Because doing so would be in the best interest of the USA.

Doing so would be in the best interest of those men and women who serve our country in our armed forces.

So what is happening in Ukraine?

Is Russia “losing”?

Is Russia withdrawing from Kiev?

Did they ever even really make it into Kiev?

Was it a goal to make it in?

If so, why?

Was/is Zelensky the problem?

Z seems to stand for something other than Zelensky.

Unless Z represents the Westernization of Зеленский (or зеленський).

Would it surprise you to learn that Zelensky’s native language is Russian (and not Ukrainian)?

https://www.france24.com/en/20190416-russian-speakers-ukraine-candidate-talking-language

Does he not even speak Ukrainian fluently?

That would be rather embarrassing if he didn’t.

The operation (Operation Z) is now switching its focus solely to Donbass?

Why?

Was it a poorly-planned operation?

Or did it achieve what Putin hoped it would achieve?

Whose idea was the invasion?

Putin’s?

In what way (and by whom) was he advised?

Have any of his advisors been reprimanded or fired?

I have seen a marked change in the reporting from Pravda over the past 12-24 hours.

It appears (according to that site [which indeed does seem to have a liberal/communist slant {makes sense considering the history of the publication}]) that some rather huge breakthroughs have been made in the Ukraine-Russia negotiations in Turkey.

Strangely, other Russian sources (RT, TASS, and Sputnik) are not exactly echoing this messaging.

So to read Pravda tonight, you would think that we are out of the woods.

I don’t quite believe that yet.

But I hope that it is true.

Russia has made their point.

Putin is a man of action.

Far more so than any American leader (including, especially, Donald Trump).

There is a lack of leadership in the USA.

Trump has ceased to be that leader for some time.

His moronic position on the COVID vaccines made him irrelevant.

And his estimation of Zelensky as a “hero” has continued Trump’s plunge into near-absolute irrelevance.

Trump could rescue his political career.

But he would have to do two things:

A.  Call out the COVID vaccines as being bullshit (#NeitherSafeNorEffective [which they most certainly are])

https://open.spotify.com/track/3VXsCvRbs1B6BmsVoeAvrQ?si=78fb9343ac9c4f02

B.  Call for the USA to leave NATO

Short of that, Trump is just a washed-up has-been.

We looked to him to call out the bullshit.

And then he BECAME the bullshit.

It’s not good enough.

Putin is a man of action.

Trump left us hanging.

And just about every position he is taking (vaccines, Ukraine…) verifies that he is full of shit.

America is in deep, deep trouble if he is our best politician/leader.

Maybe Tulsi Gabbard is the answer.

At least she has the balls to call out NATO (the ONLY American politician that I’ve heard do so in a LONG time).

But I haven’t heard her say shit about the killer vaccines.

-PD

 

2 ou 3 choses que je sais d’elle [1967)

I am at a loss for words.  But through your peripheral vision you can tell that I didn’t stop writing after that statement.  No, in fact…you can tell that I conversely became quite verbose.  So therefore the figure of speech was misleading.  Perhaps that is why Godard came to distrust language.  Who is Jean-Luc Godard?

And what does it matter?  This rhetorical device propels my analysis, yet the reader is more or less free to comment at the end of the article.  More or less.  Derrida.  Deconstruct at the weakest link in the logical chain.  Find where the text contradicts itself.  It is like a pivot chord in a musical modulation.  Napoleon would charge with all of his forces.  More or less.

The reason I express myself in this way is because, for me, film criticism is akin to ekphrasis.  Therefore, poetry.  As much as we want to be historians or scholars or social scientists, we must accept that we are really just poets.  Just.

Finally a title which meshes with my theme.  It’s not my theme, yet I have chosen it.  Vertigo.  It rejects diacritical marks…just as Shirley cards rejected the negro.  Godard realized this in Africa.  Filming.  The film had been optimized for white actors.

With all of these tangents it is a wonder that anyone makes it to the end of these ekphrastic rants.  Rambling rants.  Off-topic.  Hot topic.  Napalm.  Curtis LeMay.  Stone Age.

It occurs to me that I could very well play the reactionary, yet conscience intercedes.  Pax Americana.  No.  I cannot justify it.  I will leave it to the Navy…”a global force for good.”

It was wise that they finally discarded such a ridiculous motto.  Perhaps no one was buying it.  Sell war.  Buy war.

It is easy to get caught up in all of the James Bond gadgetry and thereby forget Vietnam..  Forget Iraq.  Forget Afghanistan.  Libya.  Syria.

For me there is no difference between the Brookings Institution and the American Enterprise Institute.  Pepsi and Coke.  Perhaps one is a little worse than the other.  They fundamentally define one another.  A dialectic.  Hegel.  Kant.  Fichte.

If I know one thing, it’s…a thesis.  If you knew better, you’d…antithesis.  Bon.  C’est tout.  …ou 3:  synthesis.

Jean-Luc Godard dropped out of the University of Paris.  It is credited as his alma mater on Wikipedia.  The Sorbonne.

This was before Hanne Karin Bayer became Anna Karina:  Godard’s first wife and leading lady.  But now we have Marina Vlady.  Made in Russia.

I get a text.  Putin missing.  I had seen.  DEBKAfile.  Approximately one million spots lower than my website on Alexa.

No, they will never give up on trying to impose order on the chaos of Finnegans Wake.  It is sheer egotism.  And I am the antithesis:  no plot, no characters.

And what of the synthesis?  Yes, you must reread and rewatch to uncover the nuances.  Godard’s oeuvre is one long statement.  Miss a film and you’ve missed a chapter of his life–a phrase in his grand statement.  Certainly.  Certainly.  Maybe.

“The comic book and me, just us, we caught the bus.”  From the basement Bob Dylan nailed it:  modern life as comic book.  Obverse and reverse.  Godard and Dylan.

All I have is cat food.  You have seven minutes left.  Three left.

Anny Duperey looks perfect…perfectly empty…staring off into space…smoking the ubiquitous cigarette.  The Shirley card loves her.  She shines.  She is radiance.  Might she be the next! big! thing?

It is with a heavy heart…that I relate that no, indeed, rather, Juliet Berto…for some time.

And thus our grand unstated theme:  cancer.  Like the hideous sound of jungle helicopters–desert jets.  Division.  Long division.

Juliet Berto won’t be reading this in any traditional manner.  She passed away in 1990 at the age of 42.

In 2 ou 3 choses que je sais d’elle, she made her screen debut.

Tristesse.  Sadness.  Yes, Godard was right.  It is undeniable.  Things have not gone well for capitalism.  He says neo-capitalism, but I say neoconservatism.  It is not quite antithesis.  It is already synthesis.  Beginning, middle, end.  [Not necessarily in that order…]

-PD