jeff eaton

Whenever news of killings, massacres, and general mayhem is circulated, let it be known that I am anti-killing and am shocked and horrified by brutality and murder no matter who the culprit is and who the victim is.

Let it also be known that when Americans or our trusted allies are the ones committing any sort of atrocities, I will be far more vocal in my shock and dismay. Why? Primarily, because America is composed (at least in part) of me and I share responsibility for actions taken by its representatives. When bad things are done by "our own," it is not time to circle the wagons. It is time to clearly and articulately delineate what is and is not acceptable. Healthy civilizations recognize this.

Any fool can whip up a healthy dose of rage at The Other for crimes and horrors both real and imagined. It takes dedication and a strong spirit to scrutinize one's own "team" and hold it accountable.

Anyone who believes that this is "traitorous," or that it in some way indicates greater sympathy with "our enemies," is a child and a simpleton. Conversation with them is a waste of time. Do yourself a favor and cut your losses: they aren't worth the effort. If I continue to converse with one of them after they have made that clear, it is most likely an accidental oversight on my part.

Just for reference.

When I saw the initial trailers for Lord of War, I was pretty convinced it was my kind of film. Black as black can be humor, a post-national Leggy Starlitz vibe, and some 80s music in the background. It'd be grim, but so was Grosse Point Blank, and it's on my favorites list.

I took a break from some code this evening, watched it on a whim, (thanks, Comcast On Demand!) and I can say a couple of things off the top of my head. First, Lord of War is a weak film story-wise. They weren't exactly going for super-spy thriller material, but most of the plot was telegraphed so far in advance that waiting for shoes to drop felt like a chore, not anticipation. And Nicholas Cage just plays... well... Nicholas Cage again. I suppose I can buy him as a Ukranian arms dealer from New York; if Clark Kent's glasses hide Superman, I guess Nicholas Cage doesn't have to bother faking an accent for this film.

Billed as a 'black comedy,' it was just black; nobody expects Keystone Kops from a movie about arms dealers, but what possibilities for brain-twisting irony and weirdness in a business like that seemed to be overlooked. Maybe I'm just war-inured after reading about military tech, international mercenery corporations, insurgency, and... well. Yeah. That.

That brings me to the second thought about this film. I can't help but think after watching that director Andrew Niccol had no real intention of making a black comedy. Lord of War, at its heart, is a dead-baby-photo thrust in the face of the viewer. There's some gore, but it's not really just about the violence that arms dealers facilitate. It's about the deadening of the human soul that goes with the territory of selling death.

Make no mistake about it: this movie is depressing in every sense of the word. Love is lost, lives are lost, souls are lost -- Nicholas Cage is invincible, unstoppable, but only in the most technical sense. By the time the film is over, he's won and he's no longer really human. He knows it, and even though he lies to everyone around him, no one is fooled -- not him, not them.

Perhaps it's not really, truly possible to enjoy a movie about people killing people without lying to yourself in one way or another. If I had, I'm not sure if I'd want to look in the mirror. I didn't enjoy Lord of War, and to be honest I think that's what the director intended.

A friend of mine -- someone I do respect and enjoy talking with on many subjects -- is also pretty conservative. In an attempt to counteract some of the jouyous liberal celebration regarding Scooter Libby's downfall, he posted a link to an article about The Untold Story of Judith Miller and Joe Wilson. It contained a giggle-inducing number of basic factual errors, but aside from that it trotted out the old accusation the the CIA has been 'out to get the President' since day one.

Using the CIA as an institutional fall-guy has been popular over the last couple of years. If you'll remember, when everyone realized that Iraq had no WMD's and was a complete non-threat to the US, much was made of Bad Intelligence Data From The CIA. "We were just going on what we were told" was the excuse du jour, before 'We were just trying to bring democracy all along' became the popular spin.

To those who had been following the build-up to war and investigating the intelligence from day one, this line was hilarious. Clearly, though, some people don't get the joke. For them, I've provided this helpful chart.

How Dangerous Was Iraq?

1. How Dangerous Iraq Really Was
2. How Dangerous the CIA Said Iraq Was
3. How Dangerous the White House Said Iraq Was

Look closely at it and ponder it for a moment. Iraq was a complete military non-threat. It wasn't even a paper tiger -- it was a paper badger. The White House, though, thought it was super-duper holy bejeebus let's blow stuff up dangerous. This was the argument favored by Sadaam, of course, who had a vested interest in telling everyone he was supremely dangerous.

The CIA, though, disagreed. The CIA is charged, mind you, with finding out stuff -- not acting as the White House's marketing agency. They still over-estimated the danger posed by Sadaam and Iraq, but based on what they knew they insisted the situation was nowhere near as dire as the White House insisted it was. In response, the White House pretty much stopped listening to the CIA and started generating its own intelligence data from sources that confirmed its view of things.

When the dust finally settled and it turned out that Sadaam was a threat to his own people and no one else (like the vast majority of dictators currently in power around the world), the CIA took the blame. Because, y'know, they overestimated how dangerous he was.

How does this relate to the Joe Wilson case and our favorite piece of partisan hackery? Joe Wilson went to Niger to investigate claims that Sadaam was buying uranium there. The White House was using these claims to help prove that Iraq was dangerous. The CIA was skeptical, and had told the White House as much -- they sent someone to investigate further and determined that it was, in fact, a baseless story. They were right.

If that's what the writer calls a "covert operation" conducted against President Bush, perhaps the CIA was a bit too easy on him.