Peasantville ☀
Just back from taking in a showing of Capitalism: A Love Story. Mrs. Naum and I enjoyed the flick (though I think she was more angered and saddened than entertained) and the half-filled audience bursted into applause at film’s end.
I expected more Michael Moore with camera in the face, confronting TPTB directly on their hypocrisy and injustice. However, did approve of the ending which puts the onus back on the viewer, tagging you to take part in the fight for justice.
Moore’s movie proffers a stark realization of how much of America has been ghettoized and hollowed out into the equivalent of third world country in wake of the Age of Reagan. Those are images that popular media (and frankly, most of us) would rather sweep out of focus.
While Moore notes the deregulation, tax cuts and total capitulation to Wall Street interests that gained full steam under Reagan’s watch and began to dismantle American middle class moorings, he could have reinforced how before 1980, the U.S. was the largest exporter of finished goods, largest importer of raw materials and the world’s largest creditor nation. 28 years later, at the conclusions of George W. Bush’s two terms, America was transformed into the world’s largest importer of finished goods, largest exporter of raw materials and leading debtor nation. These are marks of a third world nation.
Enclaves of entrepreneurial enterprises in our smartest cities bustle with creative spirit and intellectual energy is transformed into marvels of goods and services. But too much of our collective acumen is diverted into generation of gambling scheme algorithms or middleman marking and surcharges. Finance, insurance, and real estate interests have trumped manufacturing and science pursuits.
Included in the film is some footage of Franklin Roosevelt’s “Second Bill of Rights” speech from January 1944. It is pointed out that while Roosevelt died the next year before World War II concluded, and thus was not able to politically achieve what he deemed truly necessary for the “pursuit of happiness”, the conquered countries the U.S. helped rebuild included all of those economic provisions in their newly chartered constitutions.
