The ecstacy and the agony

With apologies to Irving Stone. But not to Charleton Heston, because he's a dick.
Though it's not a recent film, I only just watched Michael Moore's Capitalism: A Love Story. If you haven't seen it, I suggest you do; it's a sharp and insightful piece, and it reminded me of the beginnings of the financial crisis and how perfectly executed was the complete sellout of the American people by our government, leading up to the bailout in the waning days of Chimpy's administration. In light of what's happening now with the Occupy movement, this film is more relevant than ever.

Still, there's one section--on the uprising of the people that led to Obama's victory--that stirred memories of one of the happiest nights of my life, as well as brought up a bitter reflux of betrayal. Moore chronicled the almost complete buyout of Congress and the administration by Goldman-Sachs execs (Paulsen, Geithner), senators who got loans from Countrywide (Dodd) before they crashed and burned, the fear-mongering that forced the passing of the TARP bailout -- but a lot of those people stayed in Obama's cabinet. Obama, whose top campaign contributor was Goldman Sachs, ended up being their bitch -- the very thing we elected him NOT to do. I watched the joy on people's faces as they watched Obama's rise, and I remembered the many many many times Obama has furthered the Bush-Cheney administration's many corrupt aims.

As I said, Moore didn't spend too much time on Obama; at the time Moore was making the movie (2007-2008, released in 2009), Obama was just starting to gain traction as a man for change, a man who was http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.giffor the people -- in short, a http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifsocialist. I was glad Moore didn't spend much time making Obama into the savior of the people, or he would've had to make a whole other movie just to eat his words.

Watch this movie sometime; it'll remind you of just how corrupt most of Washington is and how it got that way.

P.S.--the movie also brings up the subject of companies purchasing life insurance policies on their employees and how they profit when those employees die. Check to see if your employer is on this list. Gotta tell you that I breathed a sigh of relief that my current employer isn't on the list.