Conspiracy Theory [1997)

Great courage only manifests itself under conditions of great fear.

And Dr. Steve Pieczenik was right when he wrote recently that the conspiracy theorists have won.

And so it is worth revisiting where we have been.

Worth spicing up the espionage tank with a genuine slice of spookery.

No spoofs here.

Citizen detective reborn.

The Justice Department would do well to revisit this film.

Laughable Loretta Lynch.

And her feckless predecessor Eric Holder.

A travesty of justice. A mockery.

These two buffoons.

Enter Mel Gibson as the outcast.

Newspaper clippings.

A wizard with a highlighter.

Making copious connections. Connecting dots with more efficiency and efficacy than Saul Berenson’s wildest pragmatic dreams.

Because of inspiration. That spark. Banzai! Geronimo!!!

She has a dog in the fight.

America.

Back when the Twin Towers were still standing.

A horrible gift. To be able to see through the news.

To be able to “translate” it at a high level of accuracy.

Patrick Stewart is our Sidney Gottlieb.

And maybe the details are Hollywooded, but they are basically true.

McGill University. Perhaps he would have made a better Ewen Cameron.

A little Hannibal Lecter escape.

Man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.

The moment I first believed.

Amazing grace.

William Colby. DCI. Talking about the CIA’s heart attack gun.

The Church Committee. 1975.

But not all psychiatrists are bad.

Indeed, the most dangerous thing is when they change sides.

Or rather, when their “community” becomes so corrupt that the good guys become a de facto vestige of the original principles…operating outside of the official apparatus.

These would be the patriots like Dr. Pieczenik.

The brave man who called bullshit on the bin Laden “assassination”.

Described by Antoine Marfan in 1896.

You can’t kill a dead man.

But damage control is always as attractive as it is elusive.

And so slimed. Tagged. Made.

Conspiracy Theory is not a masterpiece, but it’s an essential film.

Because it comes back to love. Comes back to the real “why”.

We don’t need Simon Sinek or the RAND Corporation to tell us this.

We just need Mozart. And Alex Jones.

And we might look in vain for the man behind the curtain.

Because each man (or woman) leads to another man (or woman).

When you meet shameless liars, then you have found the stink.

And if you follow the stench, you get closer to the source of repugnance.

Moments of tenuous trust.

Knowing you’re dealing with actors.

Several layers of reality.

Mine. Yours.

But you’ve never seen her run!

Julia Roberts.

In a role of which to be proud.

Pretty Woman doesn’t matter.

Make a good film. Make a statement. Leave something timeless.

What is this counterintelligence organization?

And where was it when Snowden took a vacation?

We get a black site.

Remember when the FBI had to overcome armed DoE agents at Rocky Flats?

Just like the end of Spies Like Us.

Humor and dead-on detail.

Maybe you only live twice…

But you can do it silently for love.

Love of country.

Love of people.

Devotion to principles worth upholding.

A dirty business.

With some golden hearts here and there.

Well-done, Richard Donner.

-PD

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Twin Peaks “The One-Armed Man”[1990)

Sometimes we spend more time searching for what to watch than

watching that upon which we decide.

It’s an old phenomenon.

“57 Channels (And Nothin’ On)” Bruce Springsteen was singing in 1982.

And so by the confluence of circumstances these days

I am bringing you more musings on the greatest TV series ever.

I think it’s safe to say.

I’ve approached a few other television programs.

TV is not my natural interest.

The medium tends towards the antithesis of my love.

For cinema.

So I sat down. More or less.

I rummaged a bit. Upon the Hulu trash heap.

No deep cuts tonight.

Straight to a standby.

Because now Orlando has a special agent in charge.

A government operation always has the killer wrapped up by midday.

With a bow around him.

And his wallet on his chest…open to show his photo ID.

I’m assuming.

None of that proves anything.

Either way.

What’s at issue is a trend. A government which operates as a serial killer.

For the sake of survival we avoid (at all costs) the news outlets which have led us so far astray in the past.

These unrepentant charlatans continue their mockingbird mimesis.

I’ve seen good Americans question because something is not quite right.

Not much has moved along.

Same old song and dance.

The essence of code.

To be talking about two things at once.

Key would reveal what those two things are.

[Making code-breaking possible.]

Cipher and code.

A long-term project.

Professionals.

Acting honorably.

Priceless propaganda.

The real story…

is not pretty.

America wants the truth.

From Rosser Reeves (hard sell) to soft sell to no-sell.

That is the future.

Anti-marketing.

Perception management will be a reservist function.

There will be no marketing of ideas.

Until that time (a goal, not a calendar date), closer and closer to brute truth.

That the greatest crime would be for a federal employee to leads his or her countrymen astray.

That such activity should cease cold turkey and news anchors be caught like deer in headlights before blank Tele-Promp-Ters.

No directly line from Langley, no news.

A very valuable oversimplification.

And we have the honorable men and women in the FBI who come through Quantico.

The LGBT culmination will feature a J. Edgar Hoover auto-icon (à la Jeremy Bentham) dressed in drag.

And the message will be clear: no more obfuscation.

That at least one agency (the FBI) has a vested interest in bringing criminal elements within the CIA and DoD to justice.

This is the only route which saves the FBI.

The same for every agency. The U.S. government (across the board) has zero credibility (at home and abroad).

It can work.

Who will be the first to rebuild the country?

Comey? He shares the same birthday with me.

But it might take a madman like Trump to throw the moneychangers out of the temple.

[poor choice of metaphor…on several levels]

Trump still thinks it’s Islamic terror. Trump needs to visit a decent bookstore.

Get some books which the State Dept. calls disinformation (those are the good ones) and go to work.

Get the country back on track.

9/11 makes sense only as a largely inside job.

The assets or operatives employed may have left trails to incriminate (blackmail) future targets (Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, etc.).

Their domestic movements were picked up by Able Danger.

Translation: DoD (rightly) doesn’t trust CIA.

But let’s give the Agency its due.

Dirty deeds, done for no more than the risk-free rate.

NSA just sits back and giggles.

Could take down any of these punks.

So that everyday the transmission of fraudulent information passed on as news is hell on Earth.

Skills is one thing.

Brazen is another.

Too close to the fire.

Emotional intensity.

Not a disorder.

-PD

Casque d’Or [1952)

This is one of my favorite films ever made.

Maybe Jacques Becker was just a minor auteur, but he holds a large place in my heart because of this film.

It’s what we can’t have in life.

Who.

Back that reification up.

The pretty blond.

The girl will pay us no mind.

Because we are just carpenters.

Workers.

No, even lower than that.

We are failed workers.

It makes you wonder whether Hitchcock felt most alienated from the objects of his desire while directing them?

There’s that reification again. Thingification.

If we’re learned anything from Marxism, it’s that.

Humans are not “its”.

But our language is structured to make them so.

Blonde on blonde.

Perhaps a pickguard on a Telecaster.

Even in black and white we can tell that Simone Signoret is a blond.

Her beauty is flooring.

Serge Reggiani had to play the role of a traitor in Les Portes de la nuit, but here he is the hero.

The perfect friend.

Faithful.

Criminals stick together.

A code.

And it is touching.

Because the code can bite the big cheese in the ass.

Different systems of justice.

The criminals don’t call the police.

Justice is swift.

It’s all a bit savage.

But how else should we describe the heart in love?

Here we see Reggiani maddeningly in love.

Fatal beauty.

Simone Signoret.

With her hair helmet.

Completely lost in translation.

Everyone has a mustache here.

Maybe that’s why I can relate.

Reggiani plays a schmuck like me.

And it works.

Someone falls in love with him.

All he has to do is be himself.

But most of all this film shows the sadness of love.

All the many things that can go wrong.

The tunnel vision.

The heroic focus.

The jealousy of spectators.

Two in love.

Why can’t they be let alone?

To be happy.

Les Apaches.

“un dégueulasse”

Here it is again.

Just as À bout de soufflé passed on some fashion (garments) to C’est arrivé près de chez vous, so too Casque d’Or hurls that word at a key moment.

dégueulasse…

Could have. Should have. Would have.

Métro, boulot, dodo.

As long as we try, we can rest our minds.

We have fought courageous battles of love.

Perhaps we have lived to fight another day.

The soldier must always retain optimism.

When faced with survival all alone.

In the middle of nowhere.

-PD

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Salvatore Giuliano [1962)

When we dig into history we must wade through many boring reams of paper.

If, for instance, your FOIA request is granted, you might be inundated with a fecundity of information which makes comprehension initially prohibitive.

But we dig anyway…because we are human.

Once in awhile, a decent man or woman will tell us we have the right to know the truth.

If we find their ethics convincing, we might respect them for such a statement.

And so such is the milieu surrounding the story conveyed in Francesco Rosi’s Salvatore Giuliano.

I was tired.

And so I watched and watched and watched…and things became slower.

Nothing seemed to be happening.

It was like a particularly painful silent film.

But the sound eventually makes itself indispensable.

It is the sound of strange relationships.

Like the Mafia and the CIA.

Like the Cubans and the CIA.

Like the Mafia and the Vatican.

Like the P2 Masonic lodge and Operation Gladio.

These strange relationships.

What can we prove?

Should we cower forever beneath the hulking torts of libel and slander?

What balance of justice is there between the free speech of the impoverished and defamation?

I have nothing worth taking.

There’s a reason Palsgraf sued the Long Island Railroad Co. and not the man with the newspaper-wrapped box of fireworks.

Money.

Seeking a remedy at law (as opposed to a remedy in equity).

Such a strange language.

We don’t speak this way other than in legal circumstances.

Today, when Scalia strangely bites the dust…we remember his own supposed connection to the Propaganda Due lodge.

Strange bedfellows.

Blowback.

And Salvatore Giuliano. A real personage.

It all seems so reminiscent of the “strategy of tension”…Operation Gladio…the “anni di piombo” (Years of Lead)…

And I’m sorry to say that Wikipedia seems pruned and poised to mislead on these subjects. While the contributors have made certain that Daniele Ganser is profusely maligned, I find Mr. Ganser’s research and writing on the above subjects far superior to the damage-control tone of Wikipedia.

It is the same sort of failure (this damage-control tone) which pervades the potentially groundbreaking Wikipedia page on “9/11 conspiracy theories”. Some very important (rich) people have much at stake in keeping the (false) narrative constrained to a very tight frame.

Compare, for instance, the Wikipedia articles on “9/11 conspiracy theories” (don’t even bother reading the whitewashed main article on 9/11) and “flat earth”. There is no urgency to conceal in the flat earth article. The same, sadly, cannot be said for the “9/11 conspiracy theories” travesty.

And what does all of this have to do with Salvatore Giuliano?

Well, my friends, sometimes our enemies have very colorful histories.

Consider, for instance, Osama bin Laden.

The U.S. Republican presidential candidates (particularly the deplorably daft Marco Rubio) are (while no worse than their opposing party) willfully ignorant concerning 9/11.

Rubio and company (the six remaining Republican presidential candidates) have bought hook-line-and-sinker every bit of repugnant narrative which has emanated from the U.S. federal government since day one: 9/11/01.

How closely did we work with Osama during Operation Cyclone?

Charlie Wilson’s War doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface.

And what was the nature of the relationship between the CIA and the Pakistani ISI?

The much-maligned Michael Ruppert seems to have been right on the money in describing a confluence of oil, drugs (opium), and geopolitical chess when tracing the cui bono of 9/11 to the bonanza of Afghanistan. Of course, Iraq would soon follow.

And so what of Thierry Meyssan’s claims regarding the translation of the words al-Qaeda from the Arabic to the English as “the base” or “the database”? Such a translation seems entirely plausible when considering Osama’s coursework of business administration at King Abdulaziz University in Saudi Arabia. It is, therefore, a strange mesh of false jihad (for show) and organizational acumen. It seems that the billions (before adjusting for inflation) which flowed from the CIA to the mujahideen were, at least to some significant extent, used to fund Osama’s organization in Afghanistan during the Soviet war (1979-1989).

This is usually the place at which the spin doctors attempt to interpolate the concept of blowback. The idea that we “abandoned” Osama after we were done with him. But I don’t buy that for a second. He was too valuable. He was, literally, an investment.

Michael Ruppert said in his excellent tome Crossing the Rubicon that (to paraphrase) “the CIA is Wall Street”.

Ah, but I keep leaving Salvatore Giuliano in the dust.

Mostly because I don’t want to spoil it.

This is an essential film, but it is a lot of work for the piece of meat.

I can’t say on first viewing that it is little.

To truly appreciate this film one would need a significant knowledge of Italian history in the 20th century. I barely caught the Garibaldi reference (and he died in 1882).

Strange alliances. Corruption. Italy. Sicily.

And the Communists who peacefully organized on May Day to petition the government for assistance with running water and electricity (in 1947). (!)

The century would go badly for socialists in Italy. And that was no accident. They have NATO to thank for many problems. But they also have their own security services to blame as well.

Such a fear of communism. Like today. Such a fear of Islam.

And sadly, covert operations done in the coldly-utilitarian spirit of “the ends justify the means”…

But pay particular attention to the effort needed by the police (or was it the carbinieri?) to place the body (habeas corpus) in a convincing sprawl for a chalk outline. Yeah…whoops! Once again, the “death” of bin Laden is instructive.

It takes great lengths to hold no one accountable for internal weaknesses in such massive crimes.

And so perhaps with Salvatore Giuliano, the more apt metaphor is Lee Harvey Oswald (or, closer still, Jack Ruby).

-PD

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La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc [1928)

For this one I should really write a good piece.

Because this is a miracle of cinema.

Carl Th. Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc.

You might cue it up on Hulu (good luck with Netflix) as part of the Criterion Collection.

You might put your headphones on.

But the Criterion Collection presents this as a truly silent film.

We know that that wasn’t the case most of the time with “silent” films.

They had live piano accompaniment. Perhaps an orchestra.

In some countries (Japan?) they had sound effects performed live.

But watching La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc today is truly a lonely experience.

You might keep the headphones on out of habit (as if a sound might finally emerge…but it never does).

It takes a valiant effort to watch this film in its totality and not cry when the famous scene comes.

“The famous scene” I refer to is the one made famous by Godard’s best “movie”: Vivre sa vie.

Anna Karina sits in a movie theater and watches this very film. And we join her just in time to see the tears roll down her cheeks.

Joan of Arc.

She stood for something.

And somehow, a “religious” court found her guilty. She is labeled for all time, by this panel of judges, an “apostate” and an “idolater”.

What a tragedy!

It very plainly shows us the error of religion.

Joan’s religion is pure. Her dedication is personal.

And who ever gave “the Church” the power to kill?

There is no part of the New Testament which even suggests such a power should emanate from Jesus through the Apostles (his “descendants”) and on down the ages to “the Church”.

And so Christianity failed. There are a lot of apologies to be handed out. The Inquisition, etc.

[It should be pointed out that the Catholic Church rectified this mistake made by a regional element which was allied with the English against the French.]

But the important thing is that Joan stood.

She stood for something. Even if she was a fiery mystic like Hildegard von Bingen.

And who do we have to look to today?

I would say Snowden. Is Snowden the real article?

He is certainly filling the needed role.

The great evil now is the surveillance state.

It is plain and simple.

And Will Smith should win the Oscar for Best Actor in Concussion even if for one line: “Tell the truth!”

But there are far more important things on which we need the truth.

9/11, the War “on” Terror, ISIS…

Who is standing for those nearly 3000 who died horrible deaths in New York City?

When you wave a false flag, your soldiers don’t mete out justice.

When you wave a false flag, you get the wrong people.

No wonder Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had to be waterboarded 183 times.

And Guantanamo is full of goat farmers.

Therefore (q.e.d.), the 19 hijackers story (being impossible without the assistance of highly-placed “moles” in both the FBI and CIA) is the deadliest “Once upon a time…” ever written.

As much sympathy as I have for all those who died on 9/11 (and it is substantial), we must recognize the web of death which emanated from that lie…that “Once upon a time…”. Try reading the 9/11 Commission Report without vomiting. Why, because it is graphic? No. Because it reads like “My Pet Goat” (which George W. Bush was busy reading in Florida while he should have been rushing for cover = fake terror [w/ real death]).

Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Syria…

It is disgusting. There is not a “dictator” or “warlord” in the world who has wrought the needless destruction which the United States of America (by way of lies) has visited upon the Muslim world in the past 15 years.

But let’s be fair. Our soldiers have been tricked. Their lives have been ruined in the course of fighting this imperial war. I am an American. I pity our military. They did not join up to fight shadow wars. They did not join up to be the tools of imperialists. They wanted to protect the United States. Their generals have only succeeded in making the world a more dangerous place.

And that brings us to ISIS. ISIS typifies everything fake about the War “on” Terror. From the bastards who brought you the self-inflicted wound known as 9/11 comes a new comedy starring those wild and crazy terrorists who sprang up from nowhere.

Just like al-Qaeda. Sprang up from nowhere. Of course, there was the Operation Cyclone-era groundwork laid (that would be, CIA funding), but in general the “roll-out” of al-Qaeda was fairly quick. But ISIS took the cake. The confectioners of fake terror (that would be, the U.S., U.K., NATO countries, Israel, Five Eyes, take your pick, etc.) really outdid themselves with their speed to market in introducing ISIS. In doing so, the New World Order (let’s call them) cannibalized their own product (al-Qaeda) just as Apple does each time it rolls out a new iPhone.

And so it has been transparent all along. The catchy name has incriminated ISIS (no fundamentalist terrorist group from the Middle East would ever name themselves after an Egyptian pagan god) from the beginning.

ISIS is like a water cooler joke at Langley. The spooks can’t believe how dumb we are.

And so it has been the U.S. airdrops which have sustained ISIS. Yes, Turkey has provided a good bit of sustenance (under the aegis of NATO).

And the aerial campaign against ISIS’ formidable Toyota (!) trucks? Nonexistent.

WE have been ISIS’ air force. We haven’t been bombing ISIS. At all. Ever.

Russia has made this clear.

Make no mistake, Russia entered the Syrian theater because of the insanity of NATO along her borders.

Since Russia has entered:

-Russian passenger jumbo jet blown up over the Sinai Peninsula

-sabotage operation of explosions which have knocked out a considerable amount of power in Crimea (in the winter)

– Turkish (NATO) shootdown of Russian fighter/bomber

These are not pleasant things.

It is hard to tell exactly what role the Paris attacks played.

I think they were an American operation which backfired when France leaned towards Russia. It is, however, possible that it was a French-engineered false-flag to allow France a pretext for joining Russia. Perhaps the DGSE saw no other solution than sacrificing a hundred or so Parisians to stop the American war of insanity in Syria.

What is most obvious is the general arc of this farce: 9/11 (absolutely false narrative regarding the guilty party), the War “on” Terror (more lies lies lies…never ending war…profits for Boeing, Raytheon, Northrop Grumman, United Technologies, etc. etc. etc. ad infinitum ad nauseam), and ISIS (as fake as the Kuwaiti babies being ripped out of incubators which was foisted upon the U.S. Congress thanks to Hill & Knowlton PR firm).

And so we stand. Each in our own little ways.

The panopticon is already constructed.

The camps are empty.

The data vacuumed up thus far will be mined from now till eternity.

Thus, Snowden needs to be eclipsed.

Who will be the next great human to take the world stage?

-PD

7 Comments

Sudden Impact [1983)

This is not a popular time to have sympathy for cops. That’s too bad.

This is not a popular time to have sympathy for the FBI. That’s unfortunate.

Not a popular time to champion the CIA. Pity that.

No love for the NSA. Shame…

We get one version of events. So much so that we chase after an alternative version. Which is credible?

Police have a very sacred trust. Once upon a time it was phrased as “to protect and serve.”

Abuse of power disgusts us. The pendulum swings to the other end.

Jingoism breeds contempt.

détournement

There are several wars on in the world. The U.S. is involved widely.

It’s not a popular time to say something kind about the military. Bummer.

What is at issue in all of these parallel phrases? Justice and compassion.

Efficacy. Human rights.

Right and left. Conservative and liberal. Even the widely disparaged neoconservative movement.

I have been quick to find fault with the so-called neocons. But there is an interesting fundamental point about them that perhaps few know: they used to be liberals.

I am reminded of Realpolitik. Kissinger.

The tendency creeps in to apologize for the shameless.

An apologist, after all, works in myriad ways.

It is good that all of these thoughts come to the surface upon viewing what many “serious” film critics would consider to be sub-par pulp.

Let me start (continue) by saying that Sudden Impact is a brilliant film.

There are moments when the balance between directing and starring (acting) seem to be too much for Eastwood, but those few moments are mostly on the front end of this picture.

Though it be, perhaps, sacrilege to suggest such, this is probably the best Dirty Harry movie.

The reason is directly attributable to Eastwood’s auteurish guidance.

Though the setting of San Paulo somewhat mirrors Bodega Bay from Hitchcock’s The Birds, it is mostly the same director’s Vertigo which provides a wellspring from which Eastwood draws liberally for the symbol-laden mood of this affair.

Sondra Locke is formidable as the Kim Novak character. Though Callahan himself never succumbs to catatonia, Locke’s sister in the film does. It reminds us of Jimmy Stewart’s incapacitation after seeing Madeleine “die” the first time (again with the Vertigo references). Of particular note is the camera work which follows Locke’s first killing in Sudden Impact. The circular, woozy pattern makes us think of Novak’s plunge into San Francisco Bay.

And that’s just it: Eastwood had the balls and brains to drag Hitchcock into the Dirty Harry series (itself set in San Francisco).

What this film achieves is imparting humility to armchair DCIs (like myself) who think we have it all figured out. Sometimes distance is good…for planning. Sometimes you need to hear a few bullets buzz past your ears to realize that a hot war is on. It’s not always easy to know who’s shooting…and from where.

There are multiple fronts. I often ponder my own mental weakness. Ultimately, no one has died in vain. The challenge is for us as a nation and a world to get better…quickly. It ends up sounding meaningless, but it’s about all one can say about this spinning globe of chaos on which we live.

-PD

4 Comments

Magnum Force [1973)

It begins like Vertigo…like Vivre sa vie…that barely noticed, unnecessary action of a person more or less staying still. Blinking perhaps. It is not quite corpsing. More subtle. It is a bold statement from director Ted Post. By the end of the credits we feel like those early audiences of The Great Train Robbery: staring down the barrel of a gun.

Post does a remarkable job of continuing the suspense of the previous film in this series (Dirty Harry) while working with an even more complex (and germane to our present times) plot. Inside job.

Over the course of the film we are made to suspect several different people…all of these essentially variations on the inside job trope. Almost like a continuum of LIHOP and MIHOP.

It begins with the strange rookie cops…taking some target practice in the middle of the night. Traffic cops. Kinda like those strange power-downs and repairs at the WTC leading up to 9/11/01. Something weird going on…

Eastwood smells it like the late John O’Neill of the FBI. But let’s back up to Briggs: Hal Holbrook. Reminds us of another “Lieutenant”…Richard Holbrooke. Should we be surprised that Richard’s original name was Goldbrajch? Of course not. Should we be surprised that he attended Brown University? Of course not. [see: Victoria Nuland, Roberta Jacobson, etc.]

Holbrooke served with “diplomats” like John Negroponte and Frank Wisner. Negroponte attended Yale…specifically Davenport College. Ah, Davenport…the alumni of this residential college include both Bush presidents, William F. Buckley Jr. (we’re really racking up the CIA/Skull & Bones points so far), Samantha Power, etc. It should be noted the physical proximity of the Skull & Bones “Tomb” to this residential college: literally a stone’s throw (right around the corner).

Wisner established the Operation Mockingbird propaganda program on behalf of the CIA. He also established “stay-behind” networks in Europe post-WWII. One can’t help wonder if these were the same (the Italian one at least) which were (was) activated for the false-flag terror in Italy as part of the “strategy of tension” (Operation Gladio). We won’t even get into Mossadegh and Árbenz. We will, however, point out the very interesting word found within the Iranian PM’s name depending on transliteration: Mossadegh vs. Mosaddegh. It seems Wikipedia is going with the latter spelling (interesting considering the recent admission [finally!] by the CIA that they overthrew the democratically-elected leader of Iran in 1953).

Back to Holbrooke…managing editor of Foreign Affairs (the official CFR publication) from 1972-1976. Holbrooke, like all good spooks, eventually ended up on Wall Street (Lehman Bros.) Ugh… Did you know the American Academy in Berlin has a Henry Kissinger Award??? …and that it was awarded to George H.W. Bush in 2008?!? Talk about a double whammy!! This “cultural exchange” was the brainchild of Holbrooke.

Chalk up for Holbrooke membership in the Trilateral Commission. He was also on the steering committee of the Bilderberg Group (I refuse to capitalize). All of this is a long set up to say that Hal Holbrook’s character Briggs couldn’t be more like Richard Holbrooke in terms of apparent philosophy.

When people like Briggs and Holbrooke have former Airborne Rangers and Special Forces at their disposal, things will end very badly for all involved. Unfortunately, the four rookie cops are some sick fucks! They’ve bought into the twisted philosophy of their ringleader Briggs. The Lieutenant must have been an early pioneer in the militarization of American police.

But the fuckers in charge forgot to check the titty bank (and the snatch bank). Enter Clint Eastwood.

The super-death in Technicolor and Panavision is not enough to shake the monk Harry Callahan from his herringbone duty. A can of Schlitz and a cold burger: Harry gets the job done.

Yeah, Davis is a little too prompt to the crime scene…kinda like FEMA on 9/11 with their Tripod II drill which so serendipitously helped Rudy Giuliani establish a new base after his bunker was brought down by controlled demolition (WTC 7). It’s splitting hairs to fixate on the date (September 10th, 12th, either way). They were there at Pier 29. Strange, don’t you think?

Bless you Ted Post, John Milius, and Michael Cimino for bringing us this death squad wake up in 1973. Rogue elements. It’s what people like Alex Jones have been saying all along. It’s not the whole police force. It’s not the whole CIA. It’s not the whole military. The criminal segments are elements (with high-level moles).

Enter Jade Helm. We hope Steve Quayle is wrong, but the idea is not outlandish (knowing what we do about our government).

May God make me misjudged. Like Callahan. The death squads can’t persuade him. Not like this.

Ruppert’s ghost lives on in cached posts.
It’s who you least suspect. No, not quite. Open your eyes.

We hate the goddamn system, but rough justice works both ways. Abide by nothing, expect the same. Dirty Harry is the cleanest of the bunch.

May God help us to survive the outgunned moment. Maybe it’s the USS Forrestal. James was right about Palestine. And now Wayne Madsen has strangely dispensed with the Drew Pearson citation.

Here be monsters!

-PD

5 Comments

The 39 Steps [1935)

Oh, to be a spy. At once the dream of the adventurous and the curse of the actualized. Why? Why does Robert Donat let Annabella Smith come home with him from the music hall??? Perhaps it is her allure… Her strange foreign accent. Once you take the first step, the case collapses to become a chute…a slide.

Perhaps Richard Hannay (Robert Donat) was simply curious. We know how the cat ended behaving thusly…

Perhaps Hannay was horny? It was, after all, 1935…things were lightening up a bit. No Tinder, but still…one might luck out at the music hall.

Well, Hannay has the misfortune of true cloak and dagger. Annabella Smith…Hannay asks if she’s ever heard of persecution mania? Yes, a good question until she comes stumbling from the kitchen with a knife in her back.

And so Hannay sees her fears materialize before his very eyes. Sure, she could have stabbed herself in the back, but it’s not bloody likely! And what’s this?

Her last words…cryptic…and a map of Scotland clutched in her hand.

Hanney has become a believer. It is that moment when hypothetical (suppose she’s right?) becomes, to a certain extent, proven.

No time to split hairs quibbling…she makes it clear with her last breath: they killed me and you’re next.

Why trust? Perhaps the spy becomes tired. She is, after all, a mercenary in a foreign country. Yes, she is protecting the Kingdom, but for a price… Her homeland is elsewhere.

And so an act of transference occurs. Robert Donat now bears the burden of a secret…a hint of a secret…a trail.

He has a couple of choices. The decision he makes ends up saving his life, yet it is completely counterintuitive.

He decides to get the hell out of there. Annabella Smith is dead on the bed. Hanney makes a deal with the milkman (1935) and creeps off towards the train station.

To Scotland.

Things begin to go very hard for Mr. Hanney. He is pursued relentlessly. A daring escape from a train stopped on a bridge brings him eventually to the Scottish moors and the village circled on Annabella’s map.

On the way he must overnight with a farm couple… The man of the house is an overbearing null…the woman, an angel trapped in an unhappy provincial cage.

This is really the beginning of the James Bond idea. In 1935, they shared but a kiss.

Now, if you have made it this far you will be spared further spoilers…because that is not the purpose of my site. This isn’t Cliff’s Notes.

We must talk of the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States. Perhaps you have noticed the news element of my homepage? It is really not fair to criticize our CIA…it is too easy. There can be no doubt as to the difficulty of their work.

As a citizen of the USA I have dreamed of being a secret agent…just as many people do. It would be a treasonous dream for me to wish employment by the MI6. I am not British. So my thoughts have turned now and again to my own country’s external intelligence organization.

Oh, I am too old to be a covert agent…too out of shape to have a fistfight with a Daniel Craig type.

But we remember certain things from our readings. Wall Street = CIA. This was Michael Ruppert’s assertion in his excellent book Crossing the Rubicon. May Mr. Ruppert rest in peace. No doubt he tried to do the right things during his time on this earth. It was not until recently that I learned of his death.

Perhaps I began studying business as a roundabout way to court adventure. There is no doubt that my future is not on Wall Street. In fact, I don’t see much future at all.

Why? Because I am like Robert Donat’s character in this film. I can’t leave well-enough alone. Killing in self-defense or in the defense of others can be honorable, but stretched to its limits by tenuous connection it eventually becomes murder. When I read about the leading intelligence agencies of the world, I get the whiff of murder. I get the scent of those who are “just following orders”…just like those good little Nazi soldiers.

It is this thirst for justice which makes me unemployable. I know it.

And so I soldier on. I do my cardio. I lift my weights. I study my texts. I enrich my mind.

I am just a loner with my films. I would like to contribute, but I was born of no prestigious family. I don’t speak Dari or Pashto.

There are two camps of which I wish to be part of neither. Camp one holds that everything America does is just and good. Camp two holds that nothing America does is just nor good.

I do not wish for a clean slate. It is not possible. Those who wish for the collapse of society are fools. They are wishing for their own death and are far too optimistic about the practicality of starting over.

Now, dear film lover…you must be asking what this has to do with The 39 Steps.

Mr. Memory.

Office of Strategic Services.

Office of the Coordinator of Information.

Robert Sherwood. movie critic. Vanity Fair. Dorothy Parker and Robert Benchley. Algonquin Round Table. Rebecca and Foreign Correspondent. Hitchcock. Yes, it is a tenuous link.

Continuing…

Admiral John Godfrey. “M”

Centre for Spastic Children, Chelsea.

…and finally

William Stephenson (c’est-à-dire) James Bond

the Icelandic orphan

alluded to in Casino Royale (2006)

to wit

British Security Coordination

Camp X (Whitby, Ontario) [the original Farm]

Ian Fleming, Roald Dahl

Rockefeller Center (35th and 36th floors of the International Building)

under the cover of British Passport Control Office

For better or worse, CIA is MI6. Where does one stop and the other begin? To what extent is this a private army for the corporate members of the Council on Foreign Relations (Royal Institute of International Affairs)?

Surely we’re all playing by the Chatham House rules here, aren’t we, gents?

-PD