Before and after the films, everyone’s invited to indulge in our Humanist
Vegetarian Tea House.
Wednesday, April 2 at 7:30 pm
The Carlyle Connection
Here is a
revealing documentary about the international world
of private equity banking. The Carlyle Group,
one of the largest investment banks in the world, is
based in Washington D.C. and has accumulated its
capital mainly by investments in the defense
industry. On their list of employees are
people like Lou Gerstner (former chairman of IBM),
George Bush Sr., James Baker III, John Major (former
British Prime Minister), and Fidel Ramos (former
Prime Minister of the Philipines). The Carlyle
Group invests in areas that are closely tied to
government policy:
aero space and defense, telecom, real estate, health
care, and the banking business. With $16
billion under management, they have the reputation
for being the best-connected company in the world.
Their list of private investors includes George
Soros, the Saudi Royal Family, and the Bin Laden
Family. How does the Carlyle Group operate?
Who are the people behind the Carlyle Group and how
much power does Carlyle have?
This documentary explores the fine line between the
conflict of interests and a new global way of doing
business as usual.
The Carlyle
Group bought Dunkin Donuts. In the picture
below, Dubbya is holding a cup of Dunkin Donuts
coffee.
Wednesday, April 9 at 7:30 pm
Behind
Every Terrorist There is a Bush
This
funny documentary is nevertheless one of the best
911 truth films. It does something that none of the
other 911 truth films do: it shows us that there’s a
large movement out there. It shows us that there’s a
rational, valid, and organised voice rightfully
questioning the “war on terror” and the event (9/11)
that sparked it. The stand-up comics and stage
artists in this film are both hilarious and
compellingly informative. The music by David Rovics
is fantastic and overall the film is just alive with
energy and inspiration. It manages to connect to
people through humour above all which is very
powerful and which would resonate with anyone.
Here This is a
documentary about Karl Rove, "the first
'co-president' of the United States." The film is a
Karl Rove primer. It tells the Karl Rove story from
the very beginning — from the time when he was in
high school. It chronicles his life during the Nixon
years, when he learned “dirty tricks” from some of
the masters of the craft and then quickly put them
to work as a young political operative in Texas
campaigns of the late 1980s and early 1990s. George
W. Bush could not have become President without Karl
Rove, the Wizard of Oz behind the curtain and the
man who has become known as “Bush’s Brain.” There
would be no War with Iraq without Karl Rove. There
would be no Patriot Act without Karl Rove. He was a
virtuoso when it came to dividing America to elect
his candidate. This film takes you on a guided tour
of Karl Rove’s undisputed masterpiece of political
artistry: the elections of George W. Bush. It shows
how he shaped, sculpted, and packaged a virtual
political novice, tranforming him into the President
of the United States in less than a decade. Through
interviews with close friends, former opponents,
campaign operatives, politicians, journalists, and
political pundits, this film tells how Karl Rove
pulled off an American political miracle: he tutored
an unpolished Texas oil man, a son of privilege who
never had shown much of a penchant for politics or
anything else, a man who had made one ill-advised
run for Congress and then hung it up for good. From
his masterful political skills to the secret
machinations he carefully orchestrated, Karl Rove
has been a new calibration in the idea of a
“political advisor.” This film makes an explosive
case that he was one of the most powerful
non-elected officials in American history.
Wednesday, April 23 at 7:30 pm
With God on our Side
Tracing the Christian Right
movement back to its postwar roots, this documentary
chronicles the emergence of conservative Christians
as a potent political force. At the same time,
it explores evangelical leaders' surprisingly rocky
relationships with American Presidents from Billy
Graham and Richard Nixon, to Jerry Falwell and
Ronald Reagan, to Pat Robertson and George H. W.
Bush.
The film
then focuses in on the evangelical journey of George
W. Bush, from "sinner, believer, to President."
Tracing Bush from his Midland midlife crisis to the
war in Iraq, the film opens a window onto how the
President's beliefs inform his decisions as
Commander-in Chief. Along the way, it reveals
surprising new information about Bush's "born-again"
experience, and about the pivotal but little-known
role he played in his father's 1988 presidential
campaign. Viewed through the lens of
evangelical conservatism, Bush's story emerges as a
parable of the complex ways religion and politics
mingle in American life.
The film
captures the spirit of the ever-growing Christian
Right and addresses the persistent questions the
movement raises:
How does a free society draw the line between church
and state while preserving a place for religious
conviction in public life?
How do media images of the Christian Right differ
from the reality?
And finally, when politicians and religious
activists join forces, who holds the reins?
This
documentary is the most thorough, clear-minded
analysis of failed U.S. policy put to film yet.
It rightfully lays the causes for Iraq's
degeneration into anarchy and guerilla war at the
feet of those charged with running our country.
None of
the revelations in this film are hysterical;
indeed, the sense of measured frustration from all
interviewees is intensified by narrator Campbell
Scott's soft delivery of a litany of outrageous
missteps. A range of insightful insiders,
analysts, soldiers, civilians, and journalists come
together under Charles Ferguson's direction
in a devastating portrait of expert advice brushed
aside because it's not in keeping with official
policies based on mindsets so far from reality as to
be laughable --
if the consequences weren't so deadly to the Iraqi
people and American soldiers and so debilitating to
the international standing of the U.S. One
misstep of note in the film is Paul Bremer's woeful
installation in Iraq as Administrator of the
Coalition Provisional Authority. Bremer, at
the behest of Cheney and Rumsfeld, issued several
sweeping proclamations (such as de-Ba'athification
of the government and the dissolution of the Iraqi
Army) that undercut and ignored the careful planning
and essential knowledge and analyses of those who,
despite being understaffed and ill-equipped, had
been setting the stage to integrate the Iraqi people
themselves, civilian or soldier, into the
reclamation of the country before its accelerating
devolution into insurgency and lawlessness could
take hold. The contrapuntal voices of informed
journalists and authors;
the matter-of-fact personal experiences of outraged
innocent Iraqis;
and the angry, sometimes broken words of members of
the military on the ground deepen the view of a
willfully mishandled situation that has deteriorated
into a morass where resentment and vengeance breed.
