God and Country

God and Country (free on Tubi at this link, FreeVee on Amazon Prime, Plex, and others) is a 2024 American documentary film directed by Dan Partland and produced by Rob Reiner. The film discusses the emergence of Christian nationalism and its close relationship with far-right politics in the United States, exploring its perceived threat to democracy and the politicization of Christianity. This is important information, especially for Christians like myself who don't recognize our faith tradition in the Christian nationalists supporting Trump.

I'm begging you to watch this. I'm counting it as a horror film for October.

trailer:

There are links to more information on Chritian Nationalism at another of my blog posts at this link.

#Unfit

#Unfit: The Psychology of Donald Trump (free on Tubi) is a 2020 documentary focusing on mental health professionals and medical doctors discussing the behavior, psyche, and stability of President Donald Trump, as well as his effect on American culture.

I usually devote October to horror movies, but since Trump is an actual horror and election day is coming up I'm posting this movie as a reminder of just how dangerous he is. We've known for years, of course, but a reminder is not a bad thing.

free via YouTube:

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VOTE BLUE

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Bad Faith

Bad Faith (Tubi) is a 2024 documentary about the rise of Christian Nationalism in the USA. I've known about this movement since the 1980s, but it seems many people have been unaware. Please become aware.

from IMDb:

Exposes how Christian Nationalism has become the most powerful anti-democratic force in America. Leaders join forces to defend our country from this march to fascism, but American citizens seem unaware of the threat.

If you'd like to do a little online research I can suggest as starting points the Wikipedia articles on the follwing:

Christian Nationalism
Dominionism
The Seven Mountain Mandate
Christian Reconstructionism
The New Apostolic Reformation (NAR)

You'll find links to Wikipedia's sources and information on religious leaders and politicians who support Christian Nationalism.

Watch free on Tubi at this link.

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Le Samourai

Le Samourai is a 1967 neo-noir crime thriller film starring Alain Delon. I watched it on Max, as I steadily work my way through my watchlist on that service.

trailer:

Criterion calls Alain Delon's performance "career-defining" and calls the film "An elegantly stylized masterpiece of cool". Roger Ebert has it on his list of Great Movies. 100% of the Rotten Tomatoes critics gave it a positive review.

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I planted some seed labeled as "butterfly mix" back in the spring. So far this is all I have to show for it:

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We finished our re-watch of Good Omens season 1 and have now finished season 2. I'm delighted with this, though heartbroken (cries tears), and am looking forward to a third season. I'm re-watching the X Files late at night in an attempt at fighting the persistent insomnia, but I swear X Files is not as filled with conspiracy theories as the House Hearing on Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena. I weep for America. You can watch it here:

or read a transcript at the C-SPAN web site.

Happy Earth Day!

Today is Earth Day. I remember the first one back in 1970, and I have to admit I find the degree of our progress to be discouraging.

Memphis Sanitation Strike of 1968

The Memphis Sanitation Strike began on February 12, 1968, as a response to the deaths on February 1st of 2 sanitation workers. From the King Institute:

On 1 February 1968, two Memphis garbage collectors, Echol Cole and Robert Walker, were crushed to death by a malfunctioning truck. Eleven days later, frustrated by the city’s response to the latest event in a long pattern of neglect and abuse of its black employees, 1,300 black men from the Memphis Department of Public Works went on strike. Sanitation workers, led by garbage-collector-turned-union-organizer T. O. Jones, and supported by the president of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), Jerry Wurf, demanded recognition of their union, better safety standards, and a decent wage.

The union, which had been granted a charter by AFSCME in 1964, had attempted a strike in 1966, but failed in large part because workers were unable to arouse the support of Memphis’ religious community or middle class. Conditions for black sanitation workers worsened when Henry Loeb became mayor in January 1968. Loeb refused to take dilapidated trucks out of service or pay overtime when men were forced to work late-night shifts. Sanitation workers earned wages so low that many were on welfare and hundreds relied on food stamps to feed their families.

On 11 February, more than 700 men attended a union meeting and unanimously decided to strike. Within a week, the local branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People passed a resolution supporting the strike. The strike might have ended on 22 February, when the City Council, pressured by a sit-in of sanitation workers and their supporters, voted to recognize the union and recommended a wage increase. Mayor Loeb rejected the City Council vote, however, insisting that only he had the authority to recognize the union and refused to do so.

The following day, after police used mace and tear gas against nonviolent demonstrators marching to City Hall, Memphis’ black community was galvanized.

Martin Luther King Jr.'s Mountaintop speech, the last speech he delivered was given here in Memphis during that strike, and he was assassinated here the next day. You can read the full text of that speech here and listen to him in this video:

 

 

It closes with this:

And then I got into Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were out. What would happen to me from some of our sick white brothers?

Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the mountaintop.

And I don't mind.

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!

Abuse of Power by Armed Agents of the State

If you watch the news at all you may have seen our suffering here in Memphis. My heart is heavy, though anyone who is surprised by police thuggery hasn't been paying attention. I wish I thought there'd be systemic change and reform, but I don't. From the Associated Press:

The video is filled with violent moments showing the officers, who are also Black, chasing and pummeling Nichols and leaving him on the pavement propped against a squad car as they fist-bump and celebrate their actions.

From Reuters:

Tyre Nichols repeatedly cried, "Mom! Mom!” as the five Memphis police officers now charged with the Black motorist's murder pummeled him with kicks, punches and baton blows after a Jan. 7 traffic stop, video released by the city on Friday showed.

From the Wikipedia article:

Tyre Nichols died January 10, 2023, three days after being beaten by five Memphis Police Department officers during a traffic stop. The Memphis Police Department initially stated that Nichols had been driving recklessly, but its chief later stated that footage showed no evidence of probable cause for Nichols to be stopped (though stressing that cause might nonetheless have existed). Following the traffic stop, an initial altercation ensued during which officers deployed pepper spray and a taser. Nichols fled on foot, and within a short distance, a second altercation occurred when Memphis Police Officers caught up with him, then punched and kicked Nichols's face, and hit his back with a baton. Media outlets reported that the footage did not show Nichols appearing to provoke officers during the beating. He was hospitalized in a critical condition and ultimately died.

Five officers, all African American, were fired from the police department. An autopsy commissioned by his family found "extensive bleeding caused by a severe beating". On January 26, the five officers involved were arrested and charged with murder, kidnapping, assault, and misconduct. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and the United States Department of Justice have both opened investigations. Furthermore, two Memphis firefighters who were involved in the initial patient care of Nichols were relieved of duty, pending an internal investigation.

This is a synched video of the entire attack. Individual videos are embedded separately below. You must click through to watch it on YouTube because it is age-restricted due to its brutality.

Video 1 (Police-issued body worn camera at an intersection. There is no audio for the first minute.):

Video 1 from City of Memphis on Vimeo.

Video 2 (Pole camera shows officers beating Tyre Nichols, no sound from this camera):

Video 2 from City of Memphis on Vimeo.

Video 3 (Police-issued body worn camera video at a second location, a residential neighborhood. There is no audio for the first minute.):

Video 3 from City of Memphis on Vimeo.

Video 4 (Police-issued body worn camera video at a second location, a residential neighborhood.  There is no audio for the first minute. Tyre Nichols surrounded by officers, none of whom render aid):

Video 4 from City of Memphis on Vimeo.

Jeffries and McCarthy

After 4 days and 15 votes and contentiousness that led to threatened violence, McCarthy finally won the House speakership. This is the first time since the 1800s that it has taken this many votes to elect a Speaker, and in those cases the issues were slavery and abolition. After the voting was over the House Minority Leader and the House Speaker each gave a speech. I offer video here of the speeches in the order they were given.

Hakeem Jeffries:

Kevin McCarthy:

And then afterwards, McCarthy thanked Trump: "I do want to especially thank President Trump," McCarthy told reporters early Saturday morning. "I don't think anybody should doubt his influence. He was with me from the beginning … he was all in."

I watched it all gavel to gavel. As with the insurrection coverage, I think it's important whenever possible to watch these historic happenings live rather than depend on bits and pieces of later coverage. I will be watching tonight as the House considers its new rules.

The Last January 6 Committee Hearing

If you didn't watch it live, you can see it in its entirety here at C-Span, or you can watch it via YouTube embedded below:

It's a Dark Day

I live in a state with a trigger law if Roe v Wade is overturned banning abortion unless the mother's dying. Our new law makes providing or attempting to provide an abortion a Class C felony and states that:

As enacted, enacts the "Human Life Protection Act," which bans abortion in this state effective on the 30th day after the U.S. Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade or an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to allow states to prohibit abortion; creates exception for situations where the abortion is necessary to prevent the death of pregnant woman or prevent serious risk of substantial and irreversible impairment of major bodily function; prohibits prosecution of a woman upon whom an abortion is performed or attempted.

Tennessee Lookout says,

Tennessee’s law makes abortion a crime: a Class C felony for physicians – or anyone else – who performs an abortion, punishable by up to 15 years in prison and a fine of up to $10,000.

It has one exception: abortions necessary to prevent death or “serious risk of substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function.” Physicians in those circumstances must be prepared to provide proof as a defense to criminal prosecution.

Women seeking an abortion face no criminal penalties. And a woman’s mental health is explicitly excluded as a serious risk of substantial and irreversible impairment.

A physician performing an abortion under these circumstances would also have to be ready to provide proof that he or she made a best-faith effort to deliver the fetus alive, unless the doctor could show that doing so would cause death or grave harm to a woman.

The gleeful and patronizing public statements provided by our governor and our two U.S. senators -Blackburn and Hagerty- are horrifying.

I'm venting on Facebook, as those of you who are my friends there can attest, but here I'll just share where this leaves us in Tennessee -not in a good place.

I welcome discussion, but I don't welcome drive-by smirks or gloating or suggestions that adoption is a substitute for bodily autonomy.

Gaslight (1944)

Gaslight is an award-winning 1944 drama film directed by George Cukor and starring Charles Boyer, Ingrid Bergman, Joseph Cotten, and Angela Lansbury. This was Angela Lansbury's first film.

The term "gaslighting" comes from this movie. The word is often used in politics, as when journalists used it to describe the actions of Donald Trump (our gaslighter-in-chief) during the 2016 presidential election and during his term as president. You can find many examples of how his behavior fits this term by using a simple search for the words Trump and gaslight. Vox has a good explanation of what the term means:

The term “gaslighting” comes from the movie, and so its definition is rather specific: when a person lies for their own gain to another person so repeatedly and with so much confidence that the victim begins to doubt her own sanity. And, as the film puts it, a bit of Stockholm Syndrome develops as well: The victim, now uncertain that she can perceive reality correctly, becomes dependent on the gaslighter, more attached to him than ever.

You can watch it free on Roku.

It's also available via Internet Archive:

Filmsite has some information of the history of the film and a detailed plot description. The Hollywood Reporter has a positive review at the time of the film's release. Rotten Tomatoes has a critics consensus score of 88% and an even higher audience score.

Maude's Dilemma

Maude's Dilemma is a 2-part episode from 1972. It's funny to read the history of this story and see the objections to it coming from religious -not political- circles. How we ever let a women's health issue become a political one is beyond me. Don't kid yourself. This isn't about "life" but about control and imposing religious beliefs. If your religion has certain requirements I suggest you abide by them, and if it has certain beliefs it requires of you then I suggest you believe them. I object to you requiring them of me.

part 1:

part 2:

Glory and Freedom of Ukraine Has Not Yet Perished

The national anthem of Ukraine:

Ukraine’s glory hasn’t perished, nor freedom, nor will.
Upon us, fellow kin, fate shall smile once more.
Our enemies will vanish, like dew in the morning sun,
And we too shall rule, brothers, in a free land of our own.


We’ll lay down our souls and bodies to attain our freedom,
And we’ll show that we, brothers, are of the Kozak line.
We’ll lay down our souls and bodies to attain our freedom,
And we’ll show that we, brothers, are of the Kozak nation.

Free Speech

Freedom of speech is a right guaranteed by the 1st Amendment, which says, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

What it isn't is a trump card to say whatever you want whenever and wherever you want. For example, if Facebook takes exception to something I've written there and removes it and punishes me by putting me in Facebook "jail" this is not a violation of my constitutional right to freedom of speech but an enforcement of the terms of service I agreed to when I signed up. If Blogger objects to something I've written here and takes action against me because of it they have not violated my free speech rights but have enforced the terms of service they set out as a condition of using their platform. If I come to your house and offend you with what I say and you've had enough and kick me out you have not violated my freedom of speech rights but instead have acted to defend your space against speech you find objectionable. If I use my account to repeatedly spread COVID-19 misinformation in violation of Twitter's terms of service and they permanently suspend my account it is not a free speach violation but an enforcement of their rules for engagement on their platform.

This ain't rocket science, people.

I've seen more cries of "but ma freedom!" in the past few years than I ever did before, and it's always by people trying to assert rights that they do not understand. There are no limitless rights to say anything you want whenever and wherever you want to, and actions have consequences.

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Please note: I've seen a recent post mentioning free speech on a blog I follow. My own post has been scheduled well in advance and is not a response to hers or related to her post in any way.

Epiphany

The Magi Journeying by James Tissot

Happy Epiphany!

Today we celebrate the coming of the Wise Men as Christ is revealed to the gentiles.

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If you want conversation on the insurrection, which was one year ago today, I'm available on Facebook. It feels like that's a more likely venue for ongoing conversation, comment threads, political memes, etc. Bloggers don't often come back to check comment threads here. I do continue to be disturbed by the attempted coup and the continued defense of it, but I don't choose my FB friends based on agreement with me on politics.

Treason and Plot

Remember, remember!
The fifth of November,
The Gunpowder treason and plot;
I know of no reason
Why the Gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot!

We need a catchy poem like this about the 6th of January.

Theories of International Politics and Zombies

Theories of International Politics and Zombies is a 2014 book by Daniel W. Drezner, an American professor of international politics at The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, an author, a blogger, a commentator, and a nonresident senior fellow at the Project on International Order and Strategy at the Brookings Institution. I found this a fascinating look at how zombies might play out in real life and an interesting way of looking at different philosophies of international relations without getting distracted by particular controversial issues. The overview of this book at Princeton University Press says,

What would happen to international politics if the dead rose from the grave and started to eat the living? Daniel Drezner’s groundbreaking book answers the question that other international relations scholars have been too scared to ask. Addressing timely issues with analytical bite, Drezner looks at how well-known theories from international relations might be applied to a war with zombies. Exploring the plots of popular zombie films, songs, and books, Theories of International Politics and Zombies predicts realistic scenarios for the political stage in the face of a zombie threat and considers how valid—or how rotten—such scenarios might be.

You can read the author's blog here.

Here he's speaking at the Harvard Coop in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Here he speaks at the Centre for International Governance Innovation:

This is from Tedx:

The Shallows' 42

I haven't seen this film, but I've never seen Jaws, either. This one does have a 42.

trailer for The Shallows:

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Speaking of infrastructure, were we speaking of infrastructure? ... the "M" Bridge across the Mississippi River at Memphis has been closed, including river traffic under the bridge, because a serious structural crack was found during a routine annual inspection. The bridge may be closed for months. There's another bridge, but it's a much narrower 2-lane bridge, and some of those big trucks won't even fit. I'm glad I don't make that commute every day.

The Trial of Derek Chauvin, charged with killing George Floyd

I find myself unable to watch all of the trial, though I'm trying to keep up. We have a TV channel we can watch over the air with our regular antenna, but you can watch it via several different online sources. These are today's links to live coverage: PBS News Hour; Now This News; ABC; CBS News; NBC News; Law and Crime Network

I hadn't seen the full video of the killing before the first day of the trial and offer this link to it here with the warning that it's hard to watch.

You can see video and voice-over description of the events in this video:

Unity

"Biden made his whole thing about bipartisanship and unity and Republicans are going to join him in precisely none of it then blame him for being unable to fulfill his promise and say that in fact he actually divided things worse. That about cover the next four years?" -Luke O'Neil. O'Neil has a Twitter account here.

And there it is. McConnell won't even allow the normal transfer of committee chairmanships to the majority party, but Trump cultists are complaining that Biden carrying forward in presenting plans towards accomplishing what we all knew his agenda was is a sign that he's not trying to unify us? Biden's overt willingness to compromise and work with Republicans isn't good enough because he won't just do what the right-wing Republicans wanted before they lost the presidency and both houses?

"Unity and healing must begin with understanding and truth." -President Joe Biden (link)

Reaching out requires someone reach back to accomplish anything. "Unity" has never meant everybody is going to agree on everything. "Unity" means we're agreeing to work together towards the common cause of making things better. Some Republicans seem to think it means, "We lost, but you said "unity" so you should do what we want anyway". To them I'd like to say, "F***k your feelings" and "You lost, get over it, move on" and "Elections have consequences" -you know, like they told me...

but I won't.

No, in the spirit of Biden's longing for unity I'll say, "Can we at least talk about our differences and try to work towards an understanding?" Give up the baseless conspiracy theories and the "We were robbed" plaint and the threats of secession and work with us, for Heaven's sake.

Or not. But don't then complain that Biden divided us.

P.S. This post is in no way intended as a response to anything said by any of my blogging buddies. If it had been I'd've just come right out and said so and quoted y'all and linked to your posts, like I've done in the past. 

No, this post is in response to statements I'm seeing from politicians. I'll include a few examples below, just so you can see what I'm seeing if you've quit tracking news reports.

Rand Paul said this of Biden's inauguration speech

"If you read his speech and listen to it carefully, much of it is thinly-veiled innuendo calling us white supremacists, calling us racists, calling us every name in the book."

Josh Hawley (insurrectionist cheerleader) said,

"Democrats in DC say they want unity. They don’t want unity. They want total control. Control of what we say, what we think, and who we support."

Marco Rubio tweeted:

"A radical leftist agenda in a divided country will not help unify our country..."

In the midst of these lies and insults, the ongoing inflammatory rhetoric, Republican refusal to reach back and take Biden's hand, and continuing reluctance of elected Republicans to admit the truth that Biden won a free and fair election, you can't say Biden's the one at fault for continuing division. Well, you can, but that'd be another lie.