1 00:00:00,00 --> 01:02:27,000 1 00:00:36,910 --> 00:00:40,140 Every day we turn on the TV and there's more bad news-- 2 00:00:40,140 --> 00:00:41,760 another environmental catastrophe 3 00:00:41,760 --> 00:00:46,400 somewhere or more starving refugees or innocent victims 4 00:00:46,400 --> 00:00:48,310 in war zones. 5 00:00:48,310 --> 00:00:50,720 And most of us are busy trying to make ends meet 6 00:00:50,720 --> 00:00:53,020 in our own lives, and we see these images 7 00:00:53,020 --> 00:00:56,030 and feel helpless to do anything about it. 8 00:00:56,030 --> 00:00:59,110 I think the deep shame we feel about that is paralyzing, 9 00:00:59,110 --> 00:01:02,490 and certainly one of the reasons that we turn away. 10 00:01:02,490 --> 00:01:04,300 The object of this documentary is 11 00:01:04,300 --> 00:01:06,130 to look at the flaws in our systems 12 00:01:06,130 --> 00:01:07,970 that allow these things to happen 13 00:01:07,970 --> 00:01:11,400 and the mechanisms that actually work against us, 14 00:01:11,400 --> 00:01:13,860 and to show you a very simple but powerful 15 00:01:13,860 --> 00:01:17,370 way that we can actually change the world we live in. 16 00:01:17,370 --> 00:01:19,340 The material for this film is taken 17 00:01:19,340 --> 00:01:21,460 from facts available to the public 18 00:01:21,460 --> 00:01:25,260 and from interviews with some of today's leading thinkers. 19 00:01:25,260 --> 00:01:28,730 However, we do live in a world full of conspiracy theories. 20 00:01:28,730 --> 00:01:31,610 And all I ask is that you keep an open mind, 21 00:01:31,610 --> 00:01:32,660 but question everything. 22 00:01:39,600 --> 00:01:41,630 Because people have got to know whether or not 23 00:01:41,630 --> 00:01:43,250 their president's a crook. 24 00:01:43,250 --> 00:01:44,480 Well, I'm not a crook. 25 00:01:44,480 --> 00:01:48,780 I did not have sexual relations with that woman. 26 00:01:48,780 --> 00:01:51,190 Indeed I did have a relationship with Ms. Lewinsky. 27 00:01:51,190 --> 00:01:53,440 I think that gay marriage should be allowed. 28 00:01:53,440 --> 00:01:56,100 I do not believe that gay marriages should be legal. 29 00:01:56,100 --> 00:01:58,780 I am honored to be here with Barack Obama. 30 00:01:58,780 --> 00:02:01,250 So shame on you, Barack Obama. 31 00:02:01,250 --> 00:02:05,080 Iran, Cuba, Venezuela-- these countries 32 00:02:05,080 --> 00:02:08,470 are tiny compared to the Soviet Union. 33 00:02:08,470 --> 00:02:11,090 They don't pose a serious threat to us. 34 00:02:11,090 --> 00:02:12,300 Iran is a great threat. 35 00:02:12,300 --> 00:02:14,760 We can end illegal immigration. 36 00:02:14,760 --> 00:02:17,170 We're never ever going to be able to totally 37 00:02:17,170 --> 00:02:18,230 control immigration. 38 00:02:18,230 --> 00:02:19,980 You have said in the past that it was, 39 00:02:19,980 --> 00:02:21,610 quote, pretty well confirmed. 40 00:02:21,610 --> 00:02:22,820 -No, I never said that. -OK. 41 00:02:22,820 --> 00:02:23,520 I never said that. 42 00:02:23,520 --> 00:02:24,670 REPORTER (ON TV): I think that is-- 43 00:02:24,670 --> 00:02:26,250 Absolutely not. What I said was-- 44 00:02:26,250 --> 00:02:27,810 Uh, it's been pretty well confirmed. 45 00:02:27,810 --> 00:02:29,230 There are no knowns. 46 00:02:29,230 --> 00:02:32,220 There are things we know that we know. 47 00:02:32,220 --> 00:02:33,900 There are known unknowns. 48 00:02:33,900 --> 00:02:38,770 That is to say there are things that we now know we don't know. 49 00:02:38,770 --> 00:02:41,090 But there are also unknown unknowns. 50 00:02:41,090 --> 00:02:44,890 There are things we do know we don't know. 51 00:02:44,890 --> 00:02:47,090 One of the most important beliefs that people have 52 00:02:47,090 --> 00:02:49,660 about politicians is that politicians do 53 00:02:49,660 --> 00:02:51,940 whatever polls tell them to do. 54 00:02:51,940 --> 00:02:55,570 We hear a lot of complaint about the lack of strong leadership-- 55 00:02:55,570 --> 00:02:58,330 that politicians find out what the public wants and then 56 00:02:58,330 --> 00:03:02,020 they pander to it, or at least they say they'll pander to it. 57 00:03:02,020 --> 00:03:05,560 Now, what this idea of the poll-driven politician creates 58 00:03:05,560 --> 00:03:07,540 is the impression that the political system 59 00:03:07,540 --> 00:03:09,780 may have all kinds of problems. 60 00:03:09,780 --> 00:03:13,050 But on the whole, it's responsive and accountable 61 00:03:13,050 --> 00:03:15,070 to the public. 62 00:03:15,070 --> 00:03:17,790 So, how do we explain this contradiction between the myth 63 00:03:17,790 --> 00:03:20,660 that politicians reflect the public and the reality 64 00:03:20,660 --> 00:03:22,690 that, on most economic issues, they 65 00:03:22,690 --> 00:03:24,960 actually ignore public opinion? 66 00:03:24,960 --> 00:03:26,620 Media influence on public opinion 67 00:03:26,620 --> 00:03:29,170 has been studied from many years now. 68 00:03:29,170 --> 00:03:31,810 We know, for example, that the media often play what's called 69 00:03:31,810 --> 00:03:33,700 an "agenda-setting role." 70 00:03:33,700 --> 00:03:35,820 Public concern about issues tends 71 00:03:35,820 --> 00:03:38,000 to follow media coverage of those issues 72 00:03:38,000 --> 00:03:40,460 rather than any changes in the real world. 73 00:03:40,460 --> 00:03:42,840 The media create the impression that the American public 74 00:03:42,840 --> 00:03:44,320 has a real choice. 75 00:03:44,320 --> 00:03:45,760 You can choose Bush or you can choose 76 00:03:45,760 --> 00:03:48,140 Gore-- the implication being that they're 77 00:03:48,140 --> 00:03:49,960 both very different. 78 00:03:49,960 --> 00:03:52,980 But on substantive budgetary or economic issues, 79 00:03:52,980 --> 00:03:56,320 the differences between them are really on the margins. 80 00:03:56,320 --> 00:03:58,340 But is leading Democrats and Republicans 81 00:03:58,340 --> 00:04:00,780 support a privatized health care system. 82 00:04:00,780 --> 00:04:03,540 They support corporate-backed global trade agreements, 83 00:04:03,540 --> 00:04:06,270 they support maintaining a Cold War defense budget, 84 00:04:06,270 --> 00:04:10,100 and they generally favor the interests of big business. 85 00:04:10,100 --> 00:04:12,080 But the media give the impression 86 00:04:12,080 --> 00:04:15,110 that Democrats and Republicans represent a broad range 87 00:04:15,110 --> 00:04:19,380 of opinion by focusing on civil liberty, non-monetary issues, 88 00:04:19,380 --> 00:04:23,110 like gay rights or abortion, where Democrats and Republicans 89 00:04:23,110 --> 00:04:24,550 really do differ. 90 00:04:24,550 --> 00:04:28,530 And this masks the degree of elite consensus. 91 00:04:28,530 --> 00:04:30,690 There's a couple of completely logical reasons 92 00:04:30,690 --> 00:04:33,860 why our politicians are so similar. 93 00:04:33,860 --> 00:04:36,810 The end game for politicians is to get elected. 94 00:04:36,810 --> 00:04:39,710 The people who vote are, for the most part, quite moderate 95 00:04:39,710 --> 00:04:41,320 in their views. 96 00:04:41,320 --> 00:04:45,260 Both parties try to occupy that middle, moderate ground. 97 00:04:45,260 --> 00:04:47,940 They are simply responding to that majority in order 98 00:04:47,940 --> 00:04:49,500 to get elected. 99 00:04:49,500 --> 00:04:52,180 The second reason our politicians are so similar 100 00:04:52,180 --> 00:04:54,260 is much more sinister. 101 00:04:54,260 --> 00:04:58,590 They answer increasingly to the same master. 102 00:04:58,590 --> 00:04:59,690 Thank you so much for your time. 103 00:04:59,690 --> 00:05:04,260 We're looking easily at the first billion-dollar 104 00:05:04,260 --> 00:05:05,960 presidential election. 105 00:05:05,960 --> 00:05:08,940 It's much bigger money than we've ever seen 106 00:05:08,940 --> 00:05:10,920 in a presidential election. 107 00:05:10,920 --> 00:05:15,570 We define a candidate as being serious or not 108 00:05:15,570 --> 00:05:20,500 by how much money they can raise, not by what 109 00:05:20,500 --> 00:05:24,330 ideas they have, what their record in public service 110 00:05:24,330 --> 00:05:26,100 might have been. 111 00:05:26,100 --> 00:05:27,770 It's all about money. 112 00:05:27,770 --> 00:05:30,200 We really don't have an election anymore. 113 00:05:30,200 --> 00:05:32,420 We have an auction. 114 00:05:32,420 --> 00:05:34,270 And what's for sale? 115 00:05:34,270 --> 00:05:37,320 I mean, these are interesting questions to ask. 116 00:05:37,320 --> 00:05:42,140 Every incoming president rewards big donors 117 00:05:42,140 --> 00:05:46,390 with ambassadorships and other honorary appointments 118 00:05:46,390 --> 00:05:47,160 like that. 119 00:05:47,160 --> 00:05:50,360 There are all kinds of policy issues. 120 00:05:50,360 --> 00:05:52,970 Is a big donor rewarded with a place 121 00:05:52,970 --> 00:05:56,660 on a federal advisory panel that might have something 122 00:05:56,660 --> 00:05:59,140 to do with, say, approving new drugs 123 00:05:59,140 --> 00:06:01,410 or environmental regulations? 124 00:06:01,410 --> 00:06:04,860 All of these questions about what's for sale-- you know? 125 00:06:04,860 --> 00:06:06,380 Is government for sale? 126 00:06:06,380 --> 00:06:08,110 Is the White House for sale? 127 00:06:08,110 --> 00:06:11,450 I think a lot of Americans suspect that it is. 128 00:06:11,450 --> 00:06:14,710 The money flows in for a reason, and the reason 129 00:06:14,710 --> 00:06:16,430 is not good government. 130 00:06:16,430 --> 00:06:19,760 It is completely unrealistic to expect democracy 131 00:06:19,760 --> 00:06:22,970 to deliver representatives who serve the people's interests 132 00:06:22,970 --> 00:06:25,350 when so much money is involved. 133 00:06:25,350 --> 00:06:27,710 Having so much money in politics gives all 134 00:06:27,710 --> 00:06:30,640 the power to those with money. 135 00:06:30,640 --> 00:06:32,840 Yes, we are all still allowed to vote. 136 00:06:32,840 --> 00:06:35,120 But how free is our choice? 137 00:06:35,120 --> 00:06:37,370 The media in the hands of big business 138 00:06:37,370 --> 00:06:39,680 will only present us with politicians that 139 00:06:39,680 --> 00:06:41,460 will serve their interests. 140 00:06:41,460 --> 00:06:45,170 It would be completely illogical for them to do otherwise. 141 00:06:45,170 --> 00:06:47,280 It would also be illogical to expect 142 00:06:47,280 --> 00:06:51,430 politicians to change a system that puts them in power. 143 00:06:51,430 --> 00:06:54,440 But it certainly begs the question-- just what 144 00:06:54,440 --> 00:06:57,870 kind of democracy do we have? 145 00:06:57,870 --> 00:06:59,860 Do you want to live in a democratic society, 146 00:06:59,860 --> 00:07:03,150 or do you want to live in the society we have-- 147 00:07:03,150 --> 00:07:05,250 which, remember, is not a democratic society, 148 00:07:05,250 --> 00:07:07,530 and is not intended to be. 149 00:07:07,530 --> 00:07:11,250 If you take a course in political theory here, 150 00:07:11,250 --> 00:07:13,210 I'm sure they'll teach you that the United 151 00:07:13,210 --> 00:07:15,290 States is not a democracy. 152 00:07:15,290 --> 00:07:17,450 It's what's called, in the technical literature, 153 00:07:17,450 --> 00:07:18,830 a polyarchy. 154 00:07:18,830 --> 00:07:23,410 A polyarchy is a system in which power resides 155 00:07:23,410 --> 00:07:25,230 in the hands of those who Madison 156 00:07:25,230 --> 00:07:27,270 called the "wealth of the nation," 157 00:07:27,270 --> 00:07:29,750 the responsible class of men. 158 00:07:29,750 --> 00:07:32,280 And the rest of the population is fragmented. 159 00:07:32,280 --> 00:07:35,100 But that's the way the country was founded. 160 00:07:35,100 --> 00:07:37,910 TONY BENN: Throughout the history of the world, 161 00:07:37,910 --> 00:07:40,690 the rich and powerful have dominated it. 162 00:07:40,690 --> 00:07:44,120 And very few people have had any control 163 00:07:44,120 --> 00:07:44,960 of their own governments. 164 00:07:47,530 --> 00:07:50,610 But most real power in the world is still exercised 165 00:07:50,610 --> 00:07:53,700 by those we do not elect. 166 00:07:53,700 --> 00:07:56,840 We are still far from governing ourselves. 167 00:07:56,840 --> 00:08:00,300 The basis of democracy is the belief 168 00:08:00,300 --> 00:08:04,380 that we were all born equal, and that that equality must 169 00:08:04,380 --> 00:08:06,510 be accepted by those in power. 170 00:08:06,510 --> 00:08:09,240 But in the attempts to win those rights, 171 00:08:09,240 --> 00:08:11,820 many people have been imprisoned and tortured 172 00:08:11,820 --> 00:08:18,950 by those who have power and were determined to retain it. 173 00:08:18,950 --> 00:08:22,260 No one in power really wants democracy, 174 00:08:22,260 --> 00:08:24,680 because democracy would challenge their power 175 00:08:24,680 --> 00:08:27,090 structures and their authority. 176 00:08:27,090 --> 00:08:30,170 So anyone who comes out with a democratic idea 177 00:08:30,170 --> 00:08:33,540 is dismissed as unrepresentative or a troublemaker 178 00:08:33,540 --> 00:08:35,460 or an extremists or something. 179 00:08:35,460 --> 00:08:40,330 And in this way, the full throw of a public debate 180 00:08:40,330 --> 00:08:42,790 about alternatives is being extinguished. 181 00:08:48,440 --> 00:08:50,730 Big business is about making money. 182 00:08:50,730 --> 00:08:53,250 That's what big business does well. 183 00:08:53,250 --> 00:08:55,670 Governments, however, have to balance the needs 184 00:08:55,670 --> 00:08:58,960 of the whole society, including big business, 185 00:08:58,960 --> 00:09:02,450 based on ethics and social and moral responsibility. 186 00:09:02,450 --> 00:09:04,180 But if our corporations have become 187 00:09:04,180 --> 00:09:06,390 more powerful than our governments, 188 00:09:06,390 --> 00:09:08,680 then we have to understand the effect that is 189 00:09:08,680 --> 00:09:11,980 going to have on our systems. 190 00:09:11,980 --> 00:09:15,030 HOWARD INN: Corporations are artificial creations. 191 00:09:15,030 --> 00:09:17,770 You might say they are monsters trying 192 00:09:17,770 --> 00:09:22,870 to devour as much profit as possible, at anyone's expense. 193 00:09:25,760 --> 00:09:29,670 The 14th Amendment was passed at the end of the Civil War 194 00:09:29,670 --> 00:09:32,810 to give equal rights to black people. 195 00:09:32,810 --> 00:09:35,550 And what happens is the corporations come into court, 196 00:09:35,550 --> 00:09:37,860 and corporation lawyers are very clever. 197 00:09:37,860 --> 00:09:41,750 And they say, oh, you can't deprive a person 198 00:09:41,750 --> 00:09:43,470 of life, liberty, or property. 199 00:09:43,470 --> 00:09:44,810 We are a person. 200 00:09:44,810 --> 00:09:46,430 A corporation is a person. 201 00:09:46,430 --> 00:09:50,380 These are a special kind of persons, which are designed, 202 00:09:50,380 --> 00:09:54,490 by law, to be concerned only for their stockholders, 203 00:09:54,490 --> 00:09:55,880 and not say what are sometimes called 204 00:09:55,880 --> 00:09:58,910 their stakeholders, like the community or the workforce 205 00:09:58,910 --> 00:09:59,610 or whatever. 206 00:09:59,610 --> 00:10:01,170 I believe the mistake that a lot of people 207 00:10:01,170 --> 00:10:03,380 make when they think about corporations is they 208 00:10:03,380 --> 00:10:05,340 think corporations are like us. 209 00:10:05,340 --> 00:10:06,050 They have feelings. 210 00:10:06,050 --> 00:10:07,840 They have politics. 211 00:10:07,840 --> 00:10:09,340 They have belief systems. 212 00:10:09,340 --> 00:10:12,840 They really only have one thing-- the bottom line. 213 00:10:12,840 --> 00:10:15,540 NARRATOR: All publicly traded corporations 214 00:10:15,540 --> 00:10:18,980 have been structured through a series of legal decisions 215 00:10:18,980 --> 00:10:22,810 to have a very disturbing characteristic. 216 00:10:22,810 --> 00:10:27,170 They are required, by law, to place the financial interests 217 00:10:27,170 --> 00:10:32,570 of their owners above everything else, even the public good. 218 00:10:32,570 --> 00:10:33,780 That's not a law of nature. 219 00:10:33,780 --> 00:10:35,480 That's a very specific decision-- 220 00:10:35,480 --> 00:10:37,780 in fact, a judicial decision. 221 00:10:37,780 --> 00:10:40,760 So they're concerned only for the short-term profit 222 00:10:40,760 --> 00:10:45,310 of their stockholders, who are very highly concentrated. 223 00:10:45,310 --> 00:10:49,390 So the pressure's on the corporation to deliver results 224 00:10:49,390 --> 00:10:52,920 now, and to externalize any costs 225 00:10:52,920 --> 00:10:55,180 that this unwary or uncaring public 226 00:10:55,180 --> 00:10:59,260 will allow it to externalize. 227 00:10:59,260 --> 00:11:03,320 Towards the end of 1989, a great box of documents 228 00:11:03,320 --> 00:11:06,000 arrived at my office without any indication 229 00:11:06,000 --> 00:11:07,780 where they came from. 230 00:11:07,780 --> 00:11:12,300 And I opened them and found in it a complete set of Monsanto 231 00:11:12,300 --> 00:11:14,540 files-- particularly a set of files 232 00:11:14,540 --> 00:11:18,440 dealing with toxicological testing of cows 233 00:11:18,440 --> 00:11:19,750 who had been given rBGH. 234 00:11:19,750 --> 00:11:22,220 REPORTER (ON RECORDING): BST, trade name Posilac, 235 00:11:22,220 --> 00:11:25,080 is being used in more than a quarter of the dairy herds 236 00:11:25,080 --> 00:11:27,420 in the United States, according to Monsanto. 237 00:11:27,420 --> 00:11:29,480 The milk is being drunk by a large portion 238 00:11:29,480 --> 00:11:31,990 of the American population since the Food and Drug 239 00:11:31,990 --> 00:11:35,140 Administration declared it safe for both cows and humans 240 00:11:35,140 --> 00:11:35,840 four years ago. 241 00:11:35,840 --> 00:11:38,000 And at that time, Monsanto was saying 242 00:11:38,000 --> 00:11:40,790 there's no evidence whatsoever of any adverse effects. 243 00:11:40,790 --> 00:11:42,340 We don't use antibiotics. 244 00:11:42,340 --> 00:11:44,790 And this clearly showed that they 245 00:11:44,790 --> 00:11:47,260 had lied through their teeth. 246 00:11:47,260 --> 00:11:49,960 The files described areas of chronic inflammation 247 00:11:49,960 --> 00:11:52,030 in the heart, lung, kidneys, spleen, 248 00:11:52,030 --> 00:11:56,160 also reproductive effects, also a whole series 249 00:11:56,160 --> 00:11:57,850 of other problems. 250 00:11:57,850 --> 00:12:00,610 There's a cost to the cows. 251 00:12:00,610 --> 00:12:04,030 The cows get sicker when they're injected with rBGH. 252 00:12:04,030 --> 00:12:07,290 They're injected with antibiotics. 253 00:12:07,290 --> 00:12:10,280 We know that people are consuming 254 00:12:10,280 --> 00:12:12,020 antibiotics through their food. 255 00:12:12,020 --> 00:12:13,560 And we know that that's contributing 256 00:12:13,560 --> 00:12:16,790 to antibiotic-resistant bacteria and diseases. 257 00:12:16,790 --> 00:12:18,650 And we know we're at a crisis when somebody can 258 00:12:18,650 --> 00:12:21,140 go into a hospital and get a staph infection 259 00:12:21,140 --> 00:12:23,600 and it can't be cured and they die. 260 00:12:23,600 --> 00:12:24,760 That's a crisis. 261 00:12:24,760 --> 00:12:26,520 Again and again, we have the problem 262 00:12:26,520 --> 00:12:28,940 that whether you obey the law or not 263 00:12:28,940 --> 00:12:31,400 is a matter of whether it's cost-effective. 264 00:12:31,400 --> 00:12:35,550 If the chance of getting caught and the penalty are less 265 00:12:35,550 --> 00:12:39,350 than a cost to comply, people think of it as being 266 00:12:39,350 --> 00:12:41,610 just a business decision. 267 00:12:41,610 --> 00:12:45,020 Every living system of earth is in decline. 268 00:12:45,020 --> 00:12:49,630 Every life support system of earth is in decline. 269 00:12:49,630 --> 00:12:52,530 And these together constitute the biosphere-- 270 00:12:52,530 --> 00:12:55,620 the biosphere that supports and nurtures all of life. 271 00:12:55,620 --> 00:12:57,760 And not just our life, but perhaps 272 00:12:57,760 --> 00:12:59,890 30 million other species. 273 00:12:59,890 --> 00:13:03,770 The typical company of the 20th century-- extractive, 274 00:13:03,770 --> 00:13:08,210 wasteful, abusive, linear in all of its processes, 275 00:13:08,210 --> 00:13:11,360 taking from the earth, making, wasting. 276 00:13:11,360 --> 00:13:15,010 We're leaving that terrible legacy. 277 00:13:15,010 --> 00:13:16,900 Corporations have gone global. 278 00:13:16,900 --> 00:13:19,350 Regardless of whether the corporation can be trusted 279 00:13:19,350 --> 00:13:23,470 or cannot be trusted, governments today do not have 280 00:13:23,470 --> 00:13:26,360 over the corporations the power that 281 00:13:26,360 --> 00:13:31,070 they had and the leverage that they had 50 or 60 years ago. 282 00:13:31,070 --> 00:13:32,140 And that's a major change. 283 00:13:32,140 --> 00:13:35,740 So governments have become powerless compared 284 00:13:35,740 --> 00:13:38,100 to what they were before. 285 00:13:38,100 --> 00:13:41,870 Capitalism today commands the towering heights 286 00:13:41,870 --> 00:13:44,860 and has displaced politics and politicians 287 00:13:44,860 --> 00:13:46,910 as the new high priests. 288 00:13:46,910 --> 00:13:50,810 Corporations, by law, must increase their bottom line. 289 00:13:50,810 --> 00:13:53,180 In order to expand, they have to sell more products. 290 00:13:53,180 --> 00:13:56,980 To sell more products, they must consume more resources. 291 00:13:56,980 --> 00:14:00,340 Even going back 50 years, we could see the effect that this 292 00:14:00,340 --> 00:14:02,750 was having on our environment. 293 00:14:02,750 --> 00:14:05,930 Today, the effects of pollution and industrialization 294 00:14:05,930 --> 00:14:10,060 have multiplied 10-fold, and the damage is terrifying. 295 00:14:10,060 --> 00:14:12,340 And yet, these same corporations still want 296 00:14:12,340 --> 00:14:14,860 to drill for oil in the Arctic. 297 00:14:14,860 --> 00:14:17,110 And that's not just morally blind. 298 00:14:17,110 --> 00:14:18,610 That's morally bankrupt. 299 00:14:18,610 --> 00:14:21,780 Also corporate expansion into other countries 300 00:14:21,780 --> 00:14:23,800 to get those resources is the cause 301 00:14:23,800 --> 00:14:28,060 of so much war and conflict, as you will see in this film. 302 00:14:28,060 --> 00:14:31,380 We need our corporations to bring us the technologies-- 303 00:14:31,380 --> 00:14:34,070 many of which already exist-- that can help 304 00:14:34,070 --> 00:14:36,270 us address the issues we face. 305 00:14:36,270 --> 00:14:40,320 And yet the system encourages a thirst for short-term profit. 306 00:14:50,220 --> 00:14:53,070 I know many of us have heard stories about powerful groups 307 00:14:53,070 --> 00:14:55,490 of businessmen who pull the strings of governments 308 00:14:55,490 --> 00:14:57,880 from behind closed doors. 309 00:14:57,880 --> 00:15:01,040 And so many rumors have sprung up around organizations, 310 00:15:01,040 --> 00:15:02,850 like the Bilderbergs and the Council 311 00:15:02,850 --> 00:15:05,680 on Foreign Relations, that it's really difficult 312 00:15:05,680 --> 00:15:07,190 to know what to believe. 313 00:15:07,190 --> 00:15:11,320 However, it is an interesting fact-- the Federal Reserve 314 00:15:11,320 --> 00:15:13,910 Bank of the United States is not actually 315 00:15:13,910 --> 00:15:15,510 owned by the government. 316 00:15:15,510 --> 00:15:18,940 It is owned by a private banking cartel. 317 00:15:18,940 --> 00:15:22,900 Now, whoever these men are that can loan money to governments 318 00:15:22,900 --> 00:15:26,400 have to be some of the most influential men in the world. 319 00:15:26,400 --> 00:15:28,450 And yet, we don't know who they are. 320 00:15:28,450 --> 00:15:31,570 Not all conspiracy theories are just theories, 321 00:15:31,570 --> 00:15:33,570 and the research for this film pulled up 322 00:15:33,570 --> 00:15:34,680 some interesting quotes. 323 00:16:16,170 --> 00:16:20,300 NARRATOR: Gold is valuable because it is relatively rare. 324 00:16:20,300 --> 00:16:23,780 Like gold, the value of money is determined by how 325 00:16:23,780 --> 00:16:26,640 much money is in circulation. 326 00:16:26,640 --> 00:16:30,040 One would think the power to regulate the money supply that 327 00:16:30,040 --> 00:16:34,290 controls our economy and affects our lives in every way 328 00:16:34,290 --> 00:16:37,050 would be in the hands of the government of the people. 329 00:16:37,050 --> 00:16:40,080 But surprisingly, it is not. 330 00:16:40,080 --> 00:16:42,550 The power to control the money supply 331 00:16:42,550 --> 00:16:45,710 is in the hands of the Federal Reserve Bank. 332 00:16:45,710 --> 00:16:48,990 It is important to note the Federal Reserve is 333 00:16:48,990 --> 00:16:51,480 not a government organization. 334 00:16:51,480 --> 00:16:54,030 It is a private banking cartel. 335 00:16:54,030 --> 00:16:58,180 The Federal Reserve System is a banking cartel. 336 00:16:58,180 --> 00:17:00,730 It's no different than a banana cartel or an oil 337 00:17:00,730 --> 00:17:02,600 cartel or the sugar cartel. 338 00:17:02,600 --> 00:17:04,900 It just happens to be a banking cartel. 339 00:17:04,900 --> 00:17:06,270 Congress, in essence, has seated 340 00:17:06,270 --> 00:17:09,090 total control of the value of our money to a secret 341 00:17:09,090 --> 00:17:10,930 to a central bank. 342 00:17:10,930 --> 00:17:13,720 It's a group of very large and powerful 343 00:17:13,720 --> 00:17:15,170 private banking interests. 344 00:17:15,170 --> 00:17:17,600 Congress knows nothing of the conversations, 345 00:17:17,600 --> 00:17:19,790 the plans, and the action taken in concert 346 00:17:19,790 --> 00:17:20,990 with other central banks. 347 00:17:20,990 --> 00:17:23,510 The government has given it a monopoly, 348 00:17:23,510 --> 00:17:28,000 a virtual monopoly, to create the nation's money supply. 349 00:17:28,000 --> 00:17:30,930 But all these actions directed by the Federal Reserve 350 00:17:30,930 --> 00:17:34,440 alter the purchasing power of our money. 351 00:17:34,440 --> 00:17:37,790 This has significant consequences on our economy 352 00:17:37,790 --> 00:17:39,740 and our political stability. 353 00:17:39,740 --> 00:17:43,860 Wages never keep up with profits on Wall Street and the banks, 354 00:17:43,860 --> 00:17:46,750 thus sowing the seeds of class and discontent. 355 00:17:46,750 --> 00:17:49,350 NARRATOR: It is bewildering to think that we allow 356 00:17:49,350 --> 00:17:53,490 an unelected and unregulated group of private bankers 357 00:17:53,490 --> 00:17:57,910 to wield such incredible influence over our society. 358 00:17:57,910 --> 00:18:01,200 The truth is that most of us will live from paycheck 359 00:18:01,200 --> 00:18:04,600 to paycheck in a continued state of struggle, 360 00:18:04,600 --> 00:18:08,080 unable to question a system of finance that keeps 361 00:18:08,080 --> 00:18:10,760 us on a constant treadmill. 362 00:18:10,760 --> 00:18:13,190 And while most of us struggle to stay ahead, 363 00:18:13,190 --> 00:18:15,940 billions of dollars in profits flow 364 00:18:15,940 --> 00:18:20,560 into the hands of private bankers at our expense. 365 00:18:20,560 --> 00:18:23,620 For this is how the system works. 366 00:18:23,620 --> 00:18:26,080 Whenever the government needs money, 367 00:18:26,080 --> 00:18:29,190 it requests it from the Federal Reserve. 368 00:18:29,190 --> 00:18:32,030 But the Fed doesn't just give the money to the government. 369 00:18:32,030 --> 00:18:35,170 It loans the money at interest. 370 00:18:35,170 --> 00:18:37,020 Every dollar the government loans 371 00:18:37,020 --> 00:18:39,020 from the Federal Reserve Bank has 372 00:18:39,020 --> 00:18:41,540 to be paid back with interest. 373 00:18:41,540 --> 00:18:43,560 This keeps the government, and, as such, 374 00:18:43,560 --> 00:18:47,620 the people, in a continual state of debt. 375 00:18:47,620 --> 00:18:51,660 All of our income taxes are paid back to the Federal Reserve 376 00:18:51,660 --> 00:18:53,410 to pay off the debt that the government 377 00:18:53,410 --> 00:18:58,110 incurs when it borrows money from the Federal Reserve Bank. 378 00:18:58,110 --> 00:19:00,710 This is all a matter of public record, 379 00:19:00,710 --> 00:19:04,260 and easily verifiable should you care to look. 380 00:19:04,260 --> 00:19:06,140 The Founding Fathers of America were 381 00:19:06,140 --> 00:19:08,830 well aware of the perils of central banks, 382 00:19:08,830 --> 00:19:11,110 and sought to prevent them. 383 00:19:11,110 --> 00:19:14,940 Several central banks were set up but then removed. 384 00:19:14,940 --> 00:19:18,390 But the ruthless and powerful bankers-- the Rockefellers, 385 00:19:18,390 --> 00:19:21,560 the Morgans, the Walburgs, the Rothschilds-- 386 00:19:21,560 --> 00:19:23,660 were determined to set up a central banking 387 00:19:23,660 --> 00:19:27,010 system in America at any cost. 388 00:19:27,010 --> 00:19:31,520 In the early 1920s, JP Morgan, one of the most influential 389 00:19:31,520 --> 00:19:35,070 bankers of his day, caused massive panic in the markets 390 00:19:35,070 --> 00:19:38,530 by spreading rumors that many private banks 391 00:19:38,530 --> 00:19:39,950 were about to go bankrupt. 392 00:19:39,950 --> 00:19:42,670 This caused widespread panic. 393 00:19:42,670 --> 00:19:46,090 Everyone started withdrawing their deposits en masse, 394 00:19:46,090 --> 00:19:49,090 and the banks had to call in all of their loans 395 00:19:49,090 --> 00:19:50,450 to try and survive. 396 00:19:50,450 --> 00:19:52,680 The hysteria destroyed the markets, 397 00:19:52,680 --> 00:19:56,750 and the banking elites, having caused the panic, 398 00:19:56,750 --> 00:19:59,420 used it to influence politicians and the public 399 00:19:59,420 --> 00:20:04,620 that a central bank would bring stability to the system. 400 00:20:04,620 --> 00:20:08,780 At a secret meeting in 1910 at the estate of JP 401 00:20:08,780 --> 00:20:11,590 Morgan on Jekyll Island, the bankers 402 00:20:11,590 --> 00:20:14,130 wrote the Federal Reserve Act. 403 00:20:14,130 --> 00:20:16,810 They then gave their considerable financial and 404 00:20:16,810 --> 00:20:20,580 political support to Woodrow Wilson on the condition 405 00:20:20,580 --> 00:20:23,610 he would support the bill if elected. 406 00:20:23,610 --> 00:20:27,730 In 1913, Woodrow Wilson signed the bill into law. 407 00:20:27,730 --> 00:20:29,150 He later wrote, in regret. 408 00:20:57,150 --> 00:20:59,860 The bankers made immediate moves to increase 409 00:20:59,860 --> 00:21:02,780 and consolidate their power. 410 00:21:02,780 --> 00:21:07,430 From 1921 to 1929, the banks drastically 411 00:21:07,430 --> 00:21:11,420 increased the money supply, making millions of loans. 412 00:21:11,420 --> 00:21:16,760 Then, in October, 1929, having quietly exited the markets, 413 00:21:16,760 --> 00:21:19,740 they started calling in those loans en masse. 414 00:21:19,740 --> 00:21:24,500 The hysteria that followed led to the Great Depression. 415 00:21:24,500 --> 00:21:26,580 The conspiring bankers bought out 416 00:21:26,580 --> 00:21:28,960 rival banks and massive corporations 417 00:21:28,960 --> 00:21:30,590 for pennies on the dollar. 418 00:21:30,590 --> 00:21:34,280 Their position of power and influence had become absolute. 419 00:21:40,350 --> 00:21:43,690 We get almost all of our information from the media. 420 00:21:43,690 --> 00:21:46,960 If we base our opinions on bad or biased information, 421 00:21:46,960 --> 00:21:49,510 then everything we believe is suspect. 422 00:21:49,510 --> 00:21:53,290 Political debate today is kept within very narrow boundaries 423 00:21:53,290 --> 00:21:57,420 so the media can present both sides of these narrow positions 424 00:21:57,420 --> 00:21:59,760 and give the impression we have a free press. 425 00:21:59,760 --> 00:22:03,160 However, to talk about a left or right wing press 426 00:22:03,160 --> 00:22:05,390 is to miss a very important point. 427 00:22:05,390 --> 00:22:08,020 Whatever message big business wants carried 428 00:22:08,020 --> 00:22:10,590 with whatever slant, the media will 429 00:22:10,590 --> 00:22:14,430 carry that story unfailingly. 430 00:22:14,430 --> 00:22:17,070 NOAM CHOMSKY: Well, the title is actually borrowed from a book 431 00:22:17,070 --> 00:22:22,390 by Walter Lippmann written back around 1921 in which he 432 00:22:22,390 --> 00:22:25,340 described what he called "the manufacture of consent" 433 00:22:25,340 --> 00:22:29,710 as "a revolution" in the "practice of democracy." 434 00:22:29,710 --> 00:22:33,310 What it amounts to is a technique of control. 435 00:22:33,310 --> 00:22:38,050 And he said this was useful and necessary because "the common 436 00:22:38,050 --> 00:22:40,450 interests"-- the general concerns of all people-- 437 00:22:40,450 --> 00:22:42,350 "elude the public. 438 00:22:42,350 --> 00:22:44,460 The public just isn't up to dealing with them. 439 00:22:44,460 --> 00:22:46,360 And they have to be the domain of what he 440 00:22:46,360 --> 00:22:50,120 called "a specialized class." 441 00:22:50,120 --> 00:22:53,160 Notice that that's the opposite of the standard view 442 00:22:53,160 --> 00:22:55,410 about democracy. 443 00:22:55,410 --> 00:22:56,900 There's a version of this expressed 444 00:22:56,900 --> 00:23:01,680 by the highly respected moralist and theologian Reinhold 445 00:23:01,680 --> 00:23:04,950 Niebuhr, who was very influential 446 00:23:04,950 --> 00:23:07,340 on contemporary policymakers. 447 00:23:07,340 --> 00:23:12,330 His view was that rationality belongs to the cool observer. 448 00:23:12,330 --> 00:23:15,700 But because of the stupidity of the average man, 449 00:23:15,700 --> 00:23:18,920 he follows not reason, but faith. 450 00:23:18,920 --> 00:23:25,380 And this naive faith requires necessary illusion. 451 00:23:25,380 --> 00:23:29,070 The point is that in a military state or a feudal state, 452 00:23:29,070 --> 00:23:32,100 or what you would nowadays call a totalitarian state, 453 00:23:32,100 --> 00:23:35,760 it doesn't much matter what people think because you've 454 00:23:35,760 --> 00:23:38,170 got a bludgeon over their head and you 455 00:23:38,170 --> 00:23:40,530 can control what they do. 456 00:23:40,530 --> 00:23:43,220 But when the state loses the bludgeon, when you can't 457 00:23:43,220 --> 00:23:46,740 control by force, and when the voice of the people 458 00:23:46,740 --> 00:23:49,950 can be heard, you have this problem. 459 00:23:49,950 --> 00:23:52,890 It may make people so curious and so arrogant 460 00:23:52,890 --> 00:23:54,280 that they don't have the humility 461 00:23:54,280 --> 00:23:56,210 to submit to a civil rule. 462 00:23:56,210 --> 00:24:00,890 And therefore, you have to control what people think. 463 00:24:00,890 --> 00:24:04,930 NARRATOR: 100 years ago, Sigmund Freud, famous for giving us 464 00:24:04,930 --> 00:24:07,470 the science of psychological analysis, 465 00:24:07,470 --> 00:24:11,350 suggested that's the ideal of individual freedom, 466 00:24:11,350 --> 00:24:15,620 central to the idea of democracy, was impossible. 467 00:24:15,620 --> 00:24:19,020 He said our hidden desires were too dangerous. 468 00:24:19,020 --> 00:24:21,920 Human beings could never be allowed to fully express 469 00:24:21,920 --> 00:24:25,210 themselves, that we must always be controlled and would, 470 00:24:25,210 --> 00:24:28,260 thus, always be discontent. 471 00:24:28,260 --> 00:24:33,120 Sigmund Freud's American nephew was Edward Bernays. 472 00:24:33,120 --> 00:24:36,370 Beryans is almost completely unknown today, 473 00:24:36,370 --> 00:24:39,330 but his influence on society is possibly 474 00:24:39,330 --> 00:24:41,790 much greater than Freud. 475 00:24:41,790 --> 00:24:45,670 Bernays took the new science developed by his famous uncle 476 00:24:45,670 --> 00:24:48,830 and used it to manipulate the masses. 477 00:24:48,830 --> 00:24:51,980 Bernays is the man who invented the profession 478 00:24:51,980 --> 00:24:56,280 the term "public relations." 479 00:24:56,280 --> 00:24:58,780 He worked for most of the major corporations, 480 00:24:58,780 --> 00:25:03,170 and advised politicians on how to win favor with the public. 481 00:25:03,170 --> 00:25:06,510 Like Freud, Bernays was convinced that humans were 482 00:25:06,510 --> 00:25:09,040 driven by irrational forces. 483 00:25:09,040 --> 00:25:11,710 But by stimulating our inner desires 484 00:25:11,710 --> 00:25:14,820 and then sating them with consumer products, 485 00:25:14,820 --> 00:25:18,710 he created a new way to manage the irrational behavior 486 00:25:18,710 --> 00:25:20,490 of the masses. 487 00:25:20,490 --> 00:25:24,120 What Eddie got from Freud was indeed this idea 488 00:25:24,120 --> 00:25:28,680 that there is a lot more going on in human decision-making-- 489 00:25:28,680 --> 00:25:31,230 now only among individuals, but even more importantly 490 00:25:31,230 --> 00:25:35,180 among groups-- than this idea that information 491 00:25:35,180 --> 00:25:37,560 drives behavior. 492 00:25:37,560 --> 00:25:41,400 And so Eddie began to formulate this idea that you had too 493 00:25:41,400 --> 00:25:42,890 look at things that would play to people's 494 00:25:42,890 --> 00:25:45,120 irrational emotions. 495 00:25:45,120 --> 00:25:47,520 And, you see, that moved Eddie immediately 496 00:25:47,520 --> 00:25:50,780 into a different category from other people in his field 497 00:25:50,780 --> 00:25:54,160 and most government officials and managers of the day who 498 00:25:54,160 --> 00:25:55,870 thought, if you just hit people with all 499 00:25:55,870 --> 00:25:58,660 of this factual information, they would look at that 500 00:25:58,660 --> 00:26:00,320 and say, oh, of course. 501 00:26:00,320 --> 00:26:02,190 There's a psychology of dress. 502 00:26:02,190 --> 00:26:03,560 Have you ever thought about it? 503 00:26:03,560 --> 00:26:07,310 How it can express your character? 504 00:26:07,310 --> 00:26:10,090 You all have interesting characters, but some of them 505 00:26:10,090 --> 00:26:11,550 are all hidden. 506 00:26:11,550 --> 00:26:14,700 I wonder why you all want to dress always the same, 507 00:26:14,700 --> 00:26:17,530 with the same hats and the same coats. 508 00:26:17,530 --> 00:26:20,160 I'm sure all of you are interesting and have 509 00:26:20,160 --> 00:26:22,130 wonderful things about you. 510 00:26:22,130 --> 00:26:25,140 But looking at you in the street, 511 00:26:25,140 --> 00:26:27,990 you all look so much the same. 512 00:26:27,990 --> 00:26:29,490 And that's why I'm talking to you 513 00:26:29,490 --> 00:26:31,930 about the psychology of dress. 514 00:26:31,930 --> 00:26:35,890 Try and express yourselves better in your dress. 515 00:26:35,890 --> 00:26:38,740 He had a home in the corner suite 516 00:26:38,740 --> 00:26:40,380 of the Sherry Netherland Hotel. 517 00:26:40,380 --> 00:26:43,490 And here's this wonderful suite with all these windows looking 518 00:26:43,490 --> 00:26:45,630 out on the Central Park and across at the Plaza 519 00:26:45,630 --> 00:26:47,390 and on the square. 520 00:26:47,390 --> 00:26:51,650 And he would use this place to hold a soiree. 521 00:26:51,650 --> 00:26:53,190 The mayor would come. 522 00:26:53,190 --> 00:26:54,840 All the media leaders would come-- 523 00:26:54,840 --> 00:26:56,870 the political leaders, the business leaders, 524 00:26:56,870 --> 00:26:58,080 the people in the arts. 525 00:26:58,080 --> 00:27:00,030 I mean, it was a who's who. 526 00:27:00,030 --> 00:27:03,870 People wanted to know Eddie Bernays, because, you know, he 527 00:27:03,870 --> 00:27:08,270 himself became sort of a famous man, sort of a magician who 528 00:27:08,270 --> 00:27:10,200 could make these things happen. 529 00:27:10,200 --> 00:27:15,020 Eddie Bernays saw the way to sell product 530 00:27:15,020 --> 00:27:18,340 was not to sell it to your intellect-- that you ought 531 00:27:18,340 --> 00:27:23,200 to buy an automobile-- but that you will feel better about it 532 00:27:23,200 --> 00:27:24,970 if you have this automobile. 533 00:27:24,970 --> 00:27:28,120 I think he originated that idea-- that they weren't just 534 00:27:28,120 --> 00:27:30,370 purchasing something, but they were 535 00:27:30,370 --> 00:27:34,050 engaging themselves emotionally or personally 536 00:27:34,050 --> 00:27:35,860 in the product or service. 537 00:27:35,860 --> 00:27:40,720 So it's not you think you need a new piece of clothing, 538 00:27:40,720 --> 00:27:43,520 but you'll feel better with the piece of clothing. 539 00:27:43,520 --> 00:27:46,220 That was his contribution in a very real sense. 540 00:27:46,220 --> 00:27:47,770 We see it all over the place today, 541 00:27:47,770 --> 00:27:51,110 but I think he originated the idea of the emotional connect 542 00:27:51,110 --> 00:27:53,370 to a product or service. 543 00:27:53,370 --> 00:27:57,470 Democracy to my father was a wonderful concept. 544 00:27:57,470 --> 00:27:59,680 But I don't think he felt that of those 545 00:27:59,680 --> 00:28:04,640 publics out there had reliable judgment. 546 00:28:04,640 --> 00:28:09,860 And that they very easily might vote for the wrong man 547 00:28:09,860 --> 00:28:12,530 or want the wrong thing, so that they 548 00:28:12,530 --> 00:28:14,950 had to be guided from above. 549 00:28:14,950 --> 00:28:20,270 You appeal to their desires and their unrecognized longings-- 550 00:28:20,270 --> 00:28:23,360 that sort of thing. 551 00:28:23,360 --> 00:28:29,500 You can tap into their deepest desires or their deepest fears 552 00:28:29,500 --> 00:28:32,910 and use that to your own purposes. 553 00:28:32,910 --> 00:28:34,750 NARRATOR: Many influential thinkers 554 00:28:34,750 --> 00:28:38,230 came to believe that the public were incapable of making 555 00:28:38,230 --> 00:28:41,280 rational decisions, and that, as such, 556 00:28:41,280 --> 00:28:44,480 democracy could never work. 557 00:28:44,480 --> 00:28:48,110 Walter Lippmann, one of the most influential political writers 558 00:28:48,110 --> 00:28:52,330 at that time, argued that if people were, in reality, 559 00:28:52,330 --> 00:28:56,250 motivated by irrational forces, then what was needed 560 00:28:56,250 --> 00:28:59,480 was control by the elites to manage what he 561 00:28:59,480 --> 00:29:02,190 called "the bewildered herd." 562 00:29:02,190 --> 00:29:04,290 And this could be accomplished by using 563 00:29:04,290 --> 00:29:07,490 psychological techniques to control the unconscious 564 00:29:07,490 --> 00:29:10,960 desires of the masses. 565 00:29:10,960 --> 00:29:13,570 And so here you have Walter Lippmann, probably 566 00:29:13,570 --> 00:29:17,390 the most influential political thinker in the United States, 567 00:29:17,390 --> 00:29:20,370 who is essentially saying that the basic mechanism 568 00:29:20,370 --> 00:29:25,290 of the mass mind is unreason, is irrationality, is anomality. 569 00:29:25,290 --> 00:29:29,320 He believes that the mob in the street-- which is how he sees 570 00:29:29,320 --> 00:29:32,610 ordinary people-- are people who are driven not by their minds, 571 00:29:32,610 --> 00:29:34,500 but by their spinal cords. 572 00:29:34,500 --> 00:29:39,200 The notion of animal drives, unconscious instinctual 573 00:29:39,200 --> 00:29:42,710 drives lurking beneath the surface of civilization. 574 00:29:42,710 --> 00:29:46,570 And so they started looking towards psychological science 575 00:29:46,570 --> 00:29:50,870 as a way of understanding the mechanisms by which 576 00:29:50,870 --> 00:29:54,430 the popular mind works, specifically 577 00:29:54,430 --> 00:29:58,570 with the goal of figuring out how to understand 578 00:29:58,570 --> 00:30:03,730 how to apply those mechanisms to strategies for social control. 579 00:30:03,730 --> 00:30:06,890 Democracy at its heart was about changing 580 00:30:06,890 --> 00:30:10,980 the relations of power that had governed the world for so long. 581 00:30:10,980 --> 00:30:13,020 And Bernays' concept of democracy 582 00:30:13,020 --> 00:30:15,830 was one of maintaining the relations of power, 583 00:30:15,830 --> 00:30:18,320 even if it meant that one needed to sort 584 00:30:18,320 --> 00:30:21,670 of stimulate the psychological lives of the public. 585 00:30:21,670 --> 00:30:26,050 So democracy is reduced from something which assumes 586 00:30:26,050 --> 00:30:29,450 an active citizenry to the idea of the public 587 00:30:29,450 --> 00:30:31,890 as passive consumers-- 588 00:30:31,890 --> 00:30:34,360 Ohh. 589 00:30:34,360 --> 00:30:38,000 ---driven primarily by instinctual or unconscious 590 00:30:38,000 --> 00:30:40,440 desires, and that, if you can, in fact, 591 00:30:40,440 --> 00:30:42,740 trigger those needs and desires, you can 592 00:30:42,740 --> 00:30:44,880 get what you want from them. 593 00:30:44,880 --> 00:30:46,890 NARRATOR: The corporations understood 594 00:30:46,890 --> 00:30:49,220 that to change our consumer culture 595 00:30:49,220 --> 00:30:52,710 from needs-based to desire-based purchasing, 596 00:30:52,710 --> 00:30:56,860 people must be trained to want new things even before the old 597 00:30:56,860 --> 00:30:58,300 had been consumed. 598 00:30:58,300 --> 00:31:01,540 Bernays really is the guy within the United States, 599 00:31:01,540 --> 00:31:05,830 more than anybody else, who sort of brings to the table 600 00:31:05,830 --> 00:31:09,210 psychological theory as something that 601 00:31:09,210 --> 00:31:13,990 is an essential part of how-- from the corporate side-- 602 00:31:13,990 --> 00:31:17,800 of how we are going to appeal to the masses. 603 00:31:17,800 --> 00:31:20,900 He showed the corporations how they could make people want 604 00:31:20,900 --> 00:31:23,770 things they did not mean by linking products 605 00:31:23,770 --> 00:31:27,460 to their unconscious desires, and the mass media 606 00:31:27,460 --> 00:31:30,560 would be the key. 607 00:31:30,560 --> 00:31:32,820 The media and marketing men spend billions 608 00:31:32,820 --> 00:31:34,220 of dollars in research. 609 00:31:34,220 --> 00:31:36,470 They have developed an entire science 610 00:31:36,470 --> 00:31:39,870 based on the very best psychology that knows exactly 611 00:31:39,870 --> 00:31:42,570 which one of our buttons to press to make us swallow 612 00:31:42,570 --> 00:31:45,550 an idea or buy a product. 613 00:31:45,550 --> 00:31:48,080 And they are not just selling us laundry detergent. 614 00:31:48,080 --> 00:31:52,340 They sell us everything from plastic gadgets to warfare. 615 00:31:52,340 --> 00:31:54,690 If we are to make decisions about the future 616 00:31:54,690 --> 00:31:57,340 of our society, the single most important thing 617 00:31:57,340 --> 00:31:59,220 we need it's the truth. 618 00:32:06,870 --> 00:32:09,760 So I would like us to imagine a nightmare scenario-- 619 00:32:09,760 --> 00:32:14,180 a powerful group of businessmen with access to the White House, 620 00:32:14,180 --> 00:32:18,350 who control the media and who make obscene amounts of money 621 00:32:18,350 --> 00:32:20,390 whenever there is war. 622 00:32:20,390 --> 00:32:22,200 In the councils of government, we 623 00:32:22,200 --> 00:32:24,680 must guard against the acquisition 624 00:32:24,680 --> 00:32:28,360 of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, 625 00:32:28,360 --> 00:32:30,740 by the military industrial complex. 626 00:32:30,740 --> 00:32:33,290 President Eisenhower's concern about 627 00:32:33,290 --> 00:32:36,450 the military industrial complex-- his words have, 628 00:32:36,450 --> 00:32:38,360 unfortunately, come true. 629 00:32:38,360 --> 00:32:40,320 He was worried that priorities are 630 00:32:40,320 --> 00:32:44,130 set by what benefits corporations as opposed to what 631 00:32:44,130 --> 00:32:45,460 benefits the country. 632 00:32:45,460 --> 00:32:47,920 MAN: Lockheed Martin and McDonnell Douglas 633 00:32:47,920 --> 00:32:50,980 and Boeing-- throughout America, there are factories, 634 00:32:50,980 --> 00:32:54,490 there are corporations that are involved on a daily basis. 635 00:32:54,490 --> 00:32:57,310 We have a snapshot in time after September 11 636 00:32:57,310 --> 00:33:00,710 where at least 71 companies that we were able to identify 637 00:33:00,710 --> 00:33:05,660 are starting to get contracts to go in Afghanistan and Iraq. 638 00:33:05,660 --> 00:33:09,380 All of the top 10 companies had former US officials 639 00:33:09,380 --> 00:33:12,200 who had worked in the Pentagon or other parts of the US 640 00:33:12,200 --> 00:33:13,760 Government on the boards of directors. 641 00:33:18,150 --> 00:33:21,560 The Carlyle Group plays in industries 642 00:33:21,560 --> 00:33:25,360 and in an area that are heavily influenced by politics. 643 00:33:25,360 --> 00:33:28,410 My understanding is they are now the 11th or 12th largest 644 00:33:28,410 --> 00:33:30,930 defense contractor-- a multi-billion dollar 645 00:33:30,930 --> 00:33:36,620 annual enterprise with an almost obscenely high profit margin. 646 00:33:36,620 --> 00:33:38,770 They hire defense experts like Frank 647 00:33:38,770 --> 00:33:40,610 Carlucci are Frank Finelli. 648 00:33:40,610 --> 00:33:42,970 They hire politicians like George 649 00:33:42,970 --> 00:33:45,120 Bush Senior or James Baker III. 650 00:33:45,120 --> 00:33:47,390 And the iron triangle is, in some ways, 651 00:33:47,390 --> 00:33:49,420 a uniquely American phenomenon. 652 00:33:49,420 --> 00:33:54,680 It's the confluence of the military, big business, 653 00:33:54,680 --> 00:33:56,110 and politics. 654 00:33:56,110 --> 00:33:59,330 I will name, as the next Secretary of Defense, 655 00:33:59,330 --> 00:34:01,020 the best-qualified man in America 656 00:34:01,020 --> 00:34:03,960 to carry on Cap's work, Frank Carlucci. 657 00:34:03,960 --> 00:34:05,640 When Frank Carlucci came on board, 658 00:34:05,640 --> 00:34:08,240 he was coming straight from the Pentagon 659 00:34:08,240 --> 00:34:09,520 as Secretary of Defense. 660 00:34:09,520 --> 00:34:12,790 A year, two years later, the Gulf War hit. 661 00:34:12,790 --> 00:34:14,820 And everybody knows that wartime is 662 00:34:14,820 --> 00:34:16,480 boom time for the defense industry, 663 00:34:16,480 --> 00:34:18,380 and Carlyle made a ton of money. 664 00:34:18,380 --> 00:34:19,660 They did very, very well. 665 00:34:19,660 --> 00:34:20,720 They really cleaned up. 666 00:34:20,720 --> 00:34:22,620 After that, Carlyle said, hey. 667 00:34:22,620 --> 00:34:25,740 You know, having these politicians on board 668 00:34:25,740 --> 00:34:26,710 is pretty great. 669 00:34:26,710 --> 00:34:29,010 I mean, they know things that nobody else knows. 670 00:34:29,010 --> 00:34:34,340 They are able to predict trends in global markets, predict 671 00:34:34,340 --> 00:34:40,240 trends in political shifts, and, in some ways-- and this 672 00:34:40,240 --> 00:34:42,400 is sort of most insidious part. 673 00:34:42,400 --> 00:34:44,200 And if you want to be cynical about the Carlyle Group, 674 00:34:44,200 --> 00:34:46,400 you have to be concerned about their ability 675 00:34:46,400 --> 00:34:50,730 to influence these trends and actually affect change 676 00:34:50,730 --> 00:34:53,260 in government policy which would positively 677 00:34:53,260 --> 00:34:54,970 affect their investments. 678 00:34:54,970 --> 00:34:58,990 If you have an organization that 679 00:34:58,990 --> 00:35:02,040 is able to operate behind the scenes 680 00:35:02,040 --> 00:35:07,970 without real accountability, and that same organization has 681 00:35:07,970 --> 00:35:12,970 the ability to ruin political careers for people who are 682 00:35:12,970 --> 00:35:16,510 a little bit too inquisitive or a little bit too honest, 683 00:35:16,510 --> 00:35:22,170 or to shape public thinking, then we 684 00:35:22,170 --> 00:35:28,450 have the means for a kind of control globally 685 00:35:28,450 --> 00:35:32,780 that is probably unprecedented. 686 00:35:32,780 --> 00:35:34,380 So we have this problem here. 687 00:35:34,380 --> 00:35:37,540 This is a mysterious, immensely powerful company 688 00:35:37,540 --> 00:35:40,290 with virtually no scrutiny. 689 00:35:40,290 --> 00:35:42,120 ROBERT BYRD: On this February day, 690 00:35:42,120 --> 00:35:46,050 as this nation stands at the brink of battle, 691 00:35:46,050 --> 00:35:50,150 every American, on some level, must be contemplating 692 00:35:50,150 --> 00:35:52,560 the horrors of war. 693 00:35:52,560 --> 00:35:58,690 And yet, this chamber is, for the most part, 694 00:35:58,690 --> 00:36:00,780 dreadfully SILENT. 695 00:36:00,780 --> 00:36:04,500 We have a Congress that failed, in every way, 696 00:36:04,500 --> 00:36:08,570 to ask the right questions, to hold the President to account. 697 00:36:08,570 --> 00:36:10,440 Our Congress failed us miserably. 698 00:36:10,440 --> 00:36:12,260 And that's because many in Congress 699 00:36:12,260 --> 00:36:14,120 are beholden to the military industrial complex. 700 00:36:14,120 --> 00:36:16,270 When we're speaking of the United States of America 701 00:36:16,270 --> 00:36:18,490 and the concept of democratic representation, 702 00:36:18,490 --> 00:36:20,500 I think one of the more important aspects 703 00:36:20,500 --> 00:36:23,760 is the concept of informed consent of the people. 704 00:36:23,760 --> 00:36:26,080 If you're going to go to war, you lay out the reasons 705 00:36:26,080 --> 00:36:29,170 for the war, the justifications for the war, 706 00:36:29,170 --> 00:36:33,130 and then you subject it to debate, dialogue, discussion 707 00:36:33,130 --> 00:36:35,180 amongst the elected representatives of the people, 708 00:36:35,180 --> 00:36:36,740 and, indeed, the people themselves. 709 00:36:36,740 --> 00:36:39,430 The defense budget is 3/4 of a trillion dollars. 710 00:36:39,430 --> 00:36:42,960 Profits went up last year well over 25%. 711 00:36:42,960 --> 00:36:45,700 I guarantee you when war becomes that profitable, 712 00:36:45,700 --> 00:36:47,140 you're going to see more of it. 713 00:36:47,140 --> 00:36:50,840 We have a process that has a seamlessness where 714 00:36:50,840 --> 00:36:54,390 the corporate interests that stand to benefit 715 00:36:54,390 --> 00:36:57,710 are so intertwined and interwoven 716 00:36:57,710 --> 00:37:00,780 with the political forces that the financial elites 717 00:37:00,780 --> 00:37:03,770 and the political elites have become the same people. 718 00:37:03,770 --> 00:37:05,620 The attack came without warning. 719 00:37:05,620 --> 00:37:07,680 And according to a US Government source, 720 00:37:07,680 --> 00:37:10,300 told CBS News that it has Middle East 721 00:37:10,300 --> 00:37:12,230 terrorism written all over it. 722 00:37:12,230 --> 00:37:14,240 REPORTER (ON TV): The attack in Oklahoma City appears 723 00:37:14,240 --> 00:37:15,940 to have a familiar mark. 724 00:37:15,940 --> 00:37:17,790 This was done with the attempt to inflict 725 00:37:17,790 --> 00:37:19,810 as many casualties as possible. 726 00:37:19,810 --> 00:37:21,610 And that is a Middle Eastern trait. 727 00:37:21,610 --> 00:37:23,880 REPORTER (ON TV): The fact that it was such a powerful bomb 728 00:37:23,880 --> 00:37:26,650 in Oklahoma City immediately drew investigators 729 00:37:26,650 --> 00:37:29,090 to consider deadly parallels that all 730 00:37:29,090 --> 00:37:30,560 have roots in the Middle East. 731 00:37:30,560 --> 00:37:34,740 ABC News has learned that the FBI has asked the US Military 732 00:37:34,740 --> 00:37:37,360 to provide up to 10 Arabic speakers 733 00:37:37,360 --> 00:37:39,030 to help in the investigation. 734 00:37:39,030 --> 00:37:42,920 The so-called independent media, in a liberal society 735 00:37:42,920 --> 00:37:45,410 like this, in effect, are so lazy 736 00:37:45,410 --> 00:37:47,550 and are controlled by interests that 737 00:37:47,550 --> 00:37:50,660 are commercial and political at the same time 738 00:37:50,660 --> 00:37:53,000 that there is no investigative reporting. 739 00:37:53,000 --> 00:37:57,250 It's just basically repeating the line of the government-- 740 00:37:57,250 --> 00:38:00,240 Only eight day ago, I concluded a broadcast on the World Trade 741 00:38:00,240 --> 00:38:03,490 Center bombing by telling you what senior US law enforcement 742 00:38:03,490 --> 00:38:07,530 officials were telling us-- that the threat of Muslim extremists 743 00:38:07,530 --> 00:38:09,430 operating within the United States 744 00:38:09,430 --> 00:38:11,970 is an ongoing danger, something we'll 745 00:38:11,970 --> 00:38:14,230 have to live with from now on. 746 00:38:14,230 --> 00:38:16,970 ---and repeating the lines of the people who have the most 747 00:38:16,970 --> 00:38:23,770 influence, for whom Islam is a useful foreign demon to turn 748 00:38:23,770 --> 00:38:27,120 attention away from the inequities and problems 749 00:38:27,120 --> 00:38:28,710 in our own society. 750 00:38:28,710 --> 00:38:34,400 So as a result, the human side of the Islamic 751 00:38:34,400 --> 00:38:39,010 and especially Arabic world, are rarely to be found. 752 00:38:39,010 --> 00:38:42,780 And the net result is this vacancy, on the one hand, 753 00:38:42,780 --> 00:38:49,200 and these easy, almost automatic images of terror and violence. 754 00:38:49,200 --> 00:38:50,810 The situation in the popular media 755 00:38:50,810 --> 00:38:55,520 is basically that Muslims are really two things-- one, 756 00:38:55,520 --> 00:38:58,380 they are villains of one sort, villains and fanatics. 757 00:38:58,380 --> 00:39:05,090 And B, many films end up with huge numbers of bodies, 758 00:39:05,090 --> 00:39:07,120 Muslim bodies, strewn all over the place-- the result 759 00:39:07,120 --> 00:39:11,410 of Arnold Schwarzenegger or Demi Moore-- Chuck Norris. 760 00:39:11,410 --> 00:39:13,250 Lots of films about guerrillas going in 761 00:39:13,250 --> 00:39:15,690 to kill Muslim terrorists. 762 00:39:15,690 --> 00:39:20,000 So the idea of Islam is something to be stamped out 763 00:39:20,000 --> 00:39:22,430 it's easy to attract attention, and certainly the media's 764 00:39:22,430 --> 00:39:24,700 attention, for some of the political reasons 765 00:39:24,700 --> 00:39:25,530 that are obvious. 766 00:39:25,530 --> 00:39:27,630 I mean, to discredit the Arabs, to make them seem like a threat 767 00:39:27,630 --> 00:39:33,330 to the West, to keep the idea around 768 00:39:33,330 --> 00:39:37,600 at the end of the Cold War that there are foreign devils. 769 00:39:37,600 --> 00:39:40,770 Otherwise, what are we doing with this gigantic military? 770 00:39:40,770 --> 00:39:43,790 The war with Iraq gives us a snapshot in time 771 00:39:43,790 --> 00:39:45,400 where we can see the effects of all 772 00:39:45,400 --> 00:39:49,140 of these powerful influences coming together. 773 00:39:49,140 --> 00:39:51,440 They have weapons of mass destruction. 774 00:39:51,440 --> 00:39:53,040 That is what this war was about. 775 00:39:53,040 --> 00:39:55,280 And Saddam Hussein possesses biological and chemical 776 00:39:55,280 --> 00:39:55,980 weapons. 777 00:39:55,980 --> 00:39:57,620 It's a fact that there are weapons there. 778 00:39:57,620 --> 00:39:58,720 You've heard the President say it 779 00:39:58,720 --> 00:40:00,070 repeatedly-- that he has chemical 780 00:40:00,070 --> 00:40:01,570 and biological weapons. 781 00:40:01,570 --> 00:40:03,480 REPORTER (ON TV): With the drumbeat for an attack on Iraq 782 00:40:03,480 --> 00:40:05,240 increasing, the Bush Administration 783 00:40:05,240 --> 00:40:07,850 may finally have the ammunition they've been looking for. 784 00:40:07,850 --> 00:40:08,770 September 11. 785 00:40:08,770 --> 00:40:09,930 September 11. 786 00:40:09,930 --> 00:40:11,020 September 11. 787 00:40:11,020 --> 00:40:12,040 September 11. 788 00:40:12,040 --> 00:40:13,120 September 11. 789 00:40:13,120 --> 00:40:14,170 Dangerous world. 790 00:40:14,170 --> 00:40:15,400 A grave new threat. 791 00:40:15,400 --> 00:40:17,460 There is no doubt that he is amassing 792 00:40:17,460 --> 00:40:20,890 them to use against our friends, against our allies. 793 00:40:20,890 --> 00:40:23,620 A Hollywood set designer was brought in 794 00:40:23,620 --> 00:40:29,100 to create a $200,000 backdrop for official war briefings. 795 00:40:29,100 --> 00:40:33,730 In USA Today and in the major network coverage and so forth, 796 00:40:33,730 --> 00:40:38,010 you have this very elaborate computer-generated graphic sort 797 00:40:38,010 --> 00:40:43,920 of coverage of the different US Air Force and Army planes 798 00:40:43,920 --> 00:40:48,330 and gun ships and helicopters, and a very snazzy weapons 799 00:40:48,330 --> 00:40:49,420 of all descriptions. 800 00:40:49,420 --> 00:40:50,950 MAN (ON TV): Well, it's quite amazing. 801 00:40:50,950 --> 00:40:53,940 I've fallen almost in love with the F-18 Super Hornet, 802 00:40:53,940 --> 00:40:56,220 because it's quite a versatile plane. 803 00:40:56,220 --> 00:40:59,310 It's not enough for us to be told to accept this war we're 804 00:40:59,310 --> 00:41:03,330 really encouraged to gain some kind of vicarious pleasure 805 00:41:03,330 --> 00:41:04,030 from it. 806 00:41:12,910 --> 00:41:16,300 The Pentagon, for many years now, since Vietnam, 807 00:41:16,300 --> 00:41:20,620 has worked extremely hard at shaping news and how 808 00:41:20,620 --> 00:41:21,950 the media reports that news. 809 00:41:21,950 --> 00:41:26,720 We train people to say certain things in a certain way. 810 00:41:26,720 --> 00:41:30,530 Well, a militia group linked to terror being backed by Iran 811 00:41:30,530 --> 00:41:33,450 and setting up camp on America's doorstep? 812 00:41:33,450 --> 00:41:34,850 NARRATOR: The propaganda campaign 813 00:41:34,850 --> 00:41:38,920 waged by the media was so successful that by 2003, 814 00:41:38,920 --> 00:41:42,050 opinion polls showed that vast majority of Americans 815 00:41:42,050 --> 00:41:45,390 believed Saddam Hussein was linked to 9/11. 816 00:41:45,390 --> 00:41:47,360 This claim was false. 817 00:41:47,360 --> 00:41:49,960 The majority believed he possessed stockpiles 818 00:41:49,960 --> 00:41:51,670 of weapons of mass destruction. 819 00:41:51,670 --> 00:41:54,220 This claim, too, was false. 820 00:41:54,220 --> 00:41:56,940 These claims allowed the corporate interests 821 00:41:56,940 --> 00:42:00,080 and the administration to frame the attack on Iraq 822 00:42:00,080 --> 00:42:03,630 as a justifiable act of self-defense. 823 00:42:03,630 --> 00:42:05,870 Lieutenant Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski 824 00:42:05,870 --> 00:42:07,200 worked at the Pentagon. 825 00:42:07,200 --> 00:42:10,250 She saw firsthand how the intelligence was distorted 826 00:42:10,250 --> 00:42:13,440 to win support for the attack. 827 00:42:13,440 --> 00:42:16,270 The information in there are drawn from fact-- you could 828 00:42:16,270 --> 00:42:18,600 find bits and pieces of fact throughout-- 829 00:42:18,600 --> 00:42:26,500 but framed, articulated, crafted to convince someone of what? 830 00:42:26,500 --> 00:42:28,160 Well, of things that weren't true. 831 00:42:28,160 --> 00:42:29,230 Things that weren't true. 832 00:42:29,230 --> 00:42:33,550 9/11, al-Qaeda related to Saddam Hussein, 833 00:42:33,550 --> 00:42:36,120 possibly some involvement there-- the very things 834 00:42:36,120 --> 00:42:39,750 that, a year later, President Bush himself 835 00:42:39,750 --> 00:42:41,990 denies and feigns his surprise. 836 00:42:41,990 --> 00:42:43,710 "I don't know why everybody thinks that." 837 00:42:43,710 --> 00:42:45,990 We've had no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved 838 00:42:45,990 --> 00:42:47,770 with the September the 11th. 839 00:42:47,770 --> 00:42:52,380 Well, I worked in a place where they concentrated on preparing 840 00:42:52,380 --> 00:42:54,650 this storyline and selling it. 841 00:42:54,650 --> 00:42:58,040 What they're trying to do is have 842 00:42:58,040 --> 00:43:03,230 an Iraq that is a friend to us, not an Iraq that is liberated. 843 00:43:03,230 --> 00:43:04,400 This is total bogus. 844 00:43:04,400 --> 00:43:07,420 We never intended to liberate the Iraqi people. 845 00:43:07,420 --> 00:43:10,060 We intended to liberate Iraq from Sadaam, 846 00:43:10,060 --> 00:43:13,430 and have a footprint, a military footprint, there. 847 00:43:13,430 --> 00:43:14,230 And we've done that now. 848 00:43:14,230 --> 00:43:14,960 We have Kuwait. 849 00:43:14,960 --> 00:43:17,840 We have Fifth Fleet in Bahrain, we have a nice base in Qatar, 850 00:43:17,840 --> 00:43:19,920 but it's a little too far south. 851 00:43:19,920 --> 00:43:20,720 And what do we have? 852 00:43:20,720 --> 00:43:23,180 We have four bases in Iraq-- beautiful bases. 853 00:43:23,180 --> 00:43:24,130 We can hit Syria. 854 00:43:24,130 --> 00:43:25,370 We can hit Iran. 855 00:43:25,370 --> 00:43:26,940 We can keep tabs on Afghanistan. 856 00:43:26,940 --> 00:43:29,920 There's all kinds of things we can do from those bases. 857 00:43:29,920 --> 00:43:32,520 The larger picture is being driven by the fact 858 00:43:32,520 --> 00:43:36,470 that we're about to hit peak oil worldwide, 859 00:43:36,470 --> 00:43:39,390 that there's this sort of emerging global competition 860 00:43:39,390 --> 00:43:40,990 between US and China. 861 00:43:40,990 --> 00:43:43,220 There's the ongoing economic rivalries 862 00:43:43,220 --> 00:43:44,260 between us and Europe. 863 00:43:44,260 --> 00:43:48,990 And so southwest Asia becomes geopolitically a linchpin. 864 00:43:48,990 --> 00:43:52,540 The idea that any of the motives that brought us in 865 00:43:52,540 --> 00:43:55,980 would have sufficed to get us in if there was no oil in Iran 866 00:43:55,980 --> 00:43:58,110 does not persuade me. 867 00:43:58,110 --> 00:43:59,650 The pretext-- that is, the excuse 868 00:43:59,650 --> 00:44:02,240 for going in-- in Afghanistan was about terrorism 869 00:44:02,240 --> 00:44:03,780 and Osama bin Ladin. 870 00:44:03,780 --> 00:44:06,000 In Iraq, it's about weapons of mass destruction 871 00:44:06,000 --> 00:44:07,380 and Saddam Hussein. 872 00:44:07,380 --> 00:44:09,260 But, in the end, neither one of those wars 873 00:44:09,260 --> 00:44:12,180 was really about those people or those regimes. 874 00:44:12,180 --> 00:44:14,060 It was about securing and solidifying 875 00:44:14,060 --> 00:44:16,670 American control over these incredibly 876 00:44:16,670 --> 00:44:18,210 important regions of the world. 877 00:44:18,210 --> 00:44:19,460 In this case, I was saying we've been 878 00:44:19,460 --> 00:44:23,400 lied into this as blatantly as we were lied into Vietnam. 879 00:44:23,400 --> 00:44:25,100 And I was saying that a year ago-- that 880 00:44:25,100 --> 00:44:29,590 is, in the fall of 2002-- at a time when we did not 881 00:44:29,590 --> 00:44:32,200 know how much they were hyping the evidence 882 00:44:32,200 --> 00:44:34,320 or exaggerating the evidence for WMDs, 883 00:44:34,320 --> 00:44:35,970 for weapons of mass destruction. 884 00:44:35,970 --> 00:44:41,170 To say that, in that world, that Saddam Hussein, after 10 years 885 00:44:41,170 --> 00:44:45,110 of sanctions in the Gulf War, was any threat at all 886 00:44:45,110 --> 00:44:46,710 was basically absurd. 887 00:44:46,710 --> 00:44:50,070 What you're saying is Democracy doesn't matter in America, 888 00:44:50,070 --> 00:44:52,020 that, this nation, the principles and values 889 00:44:52,020 --> 00:44:55,580 upon which we were built, simply is irrelevant-- 890 00:44:55,580 --> 00:44:57,220 that the president is a dictator who 891 00:44:57,220 --> 00:45:00,470 can do anything he or she wants to do, 892 00:45:00,470 --> 00:45:01,830 regardless of the will of the people. 893 00:45:01,830 --> 00:45:02,530 No. 894 00:45:02,530 --> 00:45:06,880 Informed consent of the people is a mandatory-- not optional, 895 00:45:06,880 --> 00:45:10,160 not mandatory-- requirement on how we are governed 896 00:45:10,160 --> 00:45:12,790 and how those whom we elect to higher office 897 00:45:12,790 --> 00:45:14,510 operate in our name. 898 00:45:14,510 --> 00:45:19,620 They not only want to repeal, revoke virtually all 899 00:45:19,620 --> 00:45:22,490 of the progressive reforms of the New Deal 900 00:45:22,490 --> 00:45:24,920 and ever since, and really bring us back 901 00:45:24,920 --> 00:45:29,380 into an essentially unregulated, non-unionized country that 902 00:45:29,380 --> 00:45:32,110 existed before the deal, I think they 903 00:45:32,110 --> 00:45:36,470 want openly to see the president given the power 904 00:45:36,470 --> 00:45:37,910 that he was delegated. 905 00:45:37,910 --> 00:45:43,040 And it's virtually an open, an undated blank check by Congress 906 00:45:43,040 --> 00:45:45,810 that simply yields to the president. 907 00:45:45,810 --> 00:45:48,730 They clearly are trying to repeal that aspect 908 00:45:48,730 --> 00:45:54,250 of our Constitution, which gives Congress that authority, which 909 00:45:54,250 --> 00:45:59,180 the Founders wrote in order-- as a result of debate-- 910 00:45:59,180 --> 00:46:02,990 in order to limit our going to war, 911 00:46:02,990 --> 00:46:04,730 to make it harder to go to war, to put 912 00:46:04,730 --> 00:46:08,770 that in the hands of hundreds of people instead of one man. 913 00:46:08,770 --> 00:46:12,170 They saw the alternative as the attribute of monarchy 914 00:46:12,170 --> 00:46:14,160 they most wanted to avoid. 915 00:46:14,160 --> 00:46:17,190 I don't think they take seriously any merits 916 00:46:17,190 --> 00:46:20,500 or advantages to a country of a Bill of Rights, 917 00:46:20,500 --> 00:46:23,770 unless it's the right to bear arms. 918 00:46:23,770 --> 00:46:26,620 But free speech, free assembly, I 919 00:46:26,620 --> 00:46:28,710 don't think they respect that at all. 920 00:46:28,710 --> 00:46:32,140 Freedom does not simply mean rallying 921 00:46:32,140 --> 00:46:33,830 oneself behind the flag, here. 922 00:46:33,830 --> 00:46:34,830 This is a great flag. 923 00:46:34,830 --> 00:46:39,300 But freedom means allowing the kind of dissent 924 00:46:39,300 --> 00:46:44,650 and vigorous debate and tolerance of onerous points 925 00:46:44,650 --> 00:46:48,530 of view that people regard as obnoxious and hateful because 926 00:46:48,530 --> 00:46:50,190 we understand that once you say, I don't want 927 00:46:50,190 --> 00:46:51,250 to hear that point of view. 928 00:46:51,250 --> 00:46:52,440 You can't say that. 929 00:46:52,440 --> 00:46:55,590 You begin to stifle all kinds of points of view. 930 00:46:55,590 --> 00:46:58,340 You begin to create a mindset. 931 00:46:58,340 --> 00:47:00,140 Freedom is a very delicate thing. 932 00:47:00,140 --> 00:47:04,300 It's a very delicate thing between limiting people's 933 00:47:04,300 --> 00:47:06,940 intellectual growth or not. 934 00:47:06,940 --> 00:47:10,300 And that's why we have to be vigorous and extremely proud. 935 00:47:10,300 --> 00:47:13,070 This flag means the Constitution of the United States. 936 00:47:13,070 --> 00:47:15,830 We as Americans should be very, very proud of that, 937 00:47:15,830 --> 00:47:17,070 and we should do everything that we 938 00:47:17,070 --> 00:47:23,030 can to fight those people who, for political reasons, 939 00:47:23,030 --> 00:47:25,550 are trying to limit basic freedom in America. 940 00:47:25,550 --> 00:47:28,790 It is this kind of ideology that has grown up 941 00:47:28,790 --> 00:47:32,930 in the wake of the Cold War, propounded quite openly 942 00:47:32,930 --> 00:47:35,490 by what we are calling neoconservatives in America 943 00:47:35,490 --> 00:47:39,810 that identifies the United States as a colossus athwart 944 00:47:39,810 --> 00:47:43,370 the world, a new Rome, beyond good and evil. 945 00:47:43,370 --> 00:47:44,990 We no longer need friends. 946 00:47:44,990 --> 00:47:48,210 We don't need international law. 947 00:47:48,210 --> 00:47:52,140 Like the old Roman phrase, "it doesn't 948 00:47:52,140 --> 00:47:55,730 matter whether they love us or not, so long as they fear us." 949 00:47:55,730 --> 00:47:57,680 Been a born New Yorker all my life. 950 00:47:57,680 --> 00:47:58,720 I've lived here all my life. 951 00:47:58,720 --> 00:48:02,300 So for me, it was a powerful personal event. 952 00:48:02,300 --> 00:48:04,980 What I remember, what I think it taught-- of course 953 00:48:04,980 --> 00:48:09,470 my first reaction was fear, anger, rage, vengeance. 954 00:48:09,470 --> 00:48:12,980 I think all of us, if we're human, had that reaction. 955 00:48:12,980 --> 00:48:16,630 The question for all of us is what we remember 956 00:48:16,630 --> 00:48:18,040 and what we do with the memories. 957 00:48:18,040 --> 00:48:18,940 What is the lesson? 958 00:48:18,940 --> 00:48:19,910 What does it tell? 959 00:48:19,910 --> 00:48:21,870 What does it teach? 960 00:48:21,870 --> 00:48:26,090 For the President, it teaches the lesson of the Axis of Evil. 961 00:48:26,090 --> 00:48:29,600 States like these and their terrorist allies 962 00:48:29,600 --> 00:48:31,970 constitute an Axis of Evil. 963 00:48:31,970 --> 00:48:33,380 It teaches a lesson that America 964 00:48:33,380 --> 00:48:35,400 has enemies, secret dangerous enemies 965 00:48:35,400 --> 00:48:36,300 who have to be taken out. 966 00:48:36,300 --> 00:48:39,350 Our enemy is a radical network of terrorists 967 00:48:39,350 --> 00:48:42,270 and every government that supports them. 968 00:48:42,270 --> 00:48:44,990 It teaches the lesson that we can never be weak. 969 00:48:44,990 --> 00:48:46,760 We have to flex our muscles at every turn. 970 00:48:46,760 --> 00:48:48,550 We will fight with the full force 971 00:48:48,550 --> 00:48:50,950 and might of the United States Military. 972 00:48:50,950 --> 00:48:52,600 That's one kind of lesson. 973 00:48:52,600 --> 00:48:55,150 It creates a politics of fear. 974 00:48:55,150 --> 00:48:58,850 The politics of fear that this administration has deployed 975 00:48:58,850 --> 00:49:00,600 in trying to respond to terrorism 976 00:49:00,600 --> 00:49:02,340 has itself, in some ways, been much more 977 00:49:02,340 --> 00:49:04,240 dangers than terrorism itself. 978 00:49:04,240 --> 00:49:05,890 And this administration has been, 979 00:49:05,890 --> 00:49:08,080 I think, responsible for inciting 980 00:49:08,080 --> 00:49:11,780 the very terror that it was the terrorists' 981 00:49:11,780 --> 00:49:13,970 purpose to incite in America. 982 00:49:13,970 --> 00:49:17,160 REPORTER (ON TV): They're calling it Code Orange Plus. 983 00:49:17,160 --> 00:49:19,770 The Fed's decision to raise the terror alert to high. 984 00:49:19,770 --> 00:49:21,890 REPORTER (ON TV): America on high alert, 985 00:49:21,890 --> 00:49:24,490 from biggest cities to smallest towns. 986 00:49:24,490 --> 00:49:26,240 Red, yellow, orange. We're afraid. 987 00:49:26,240 --> 00:49:27,940 Be afraid. What level of fear? 988 00:49:27,940 --> 00:49:31,790 The government can program that without any justification. 989 00:49:31,790 --> 00:49:32,520 You know? 990 00:49:32,520 --> 00:49:34,490 We have an intelligence report that terrorists 991 00:49:34,490 --> 00:49:35,730 are about to attack. Who? 992 00:49:35,730 --> 00:49:36,890 We don't know. Where? 993 00:49:36,890 --> 00:49:38,290 We don't know. What? 994 00:49:38,290 --> 00:49:39,160 We don't know. 995 00:49:39,160 --> 00:49:41,030 But you tell us, so now we're afraid. 996 00:49:41,030 --> 00:49:43,030 A Connecticut man wrapping his family's 997 00:49:43,030 --> 00:49:45,560 19th century farmhouse with plastic, 998 00:49:45,560 --> 00:49:46,750 sealing it in duct tape. 999 00:49:46,750 --> 00:49:48,950 States response to terrorism. 1000 00:49:48,950 --> 00:49:53,670 We're too great a nation to allow the evildoers 1001 00:49:53,670 --> 00:49:55,090 to affect our soul. 1002 00:49:55,090 --> 00:49:57,040 The decision was made within the administration 1003 00:49:57,040 --> 00:50:01,240 to take this event, to take the struggle against al-Qaeda, 1004 00:50:01,240 --> 00:50:05,590 and make it into a full-fledged struggle against good and evil. 1005 00:50:05,590 --> 00:50:10,700 Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists. 1006 00:50:10,700 --> 00:50:12,110 The important thing to remember here 1007 00:50:12,110 --> 00:50:14,700 is one didn't have to put it in these terms. 1008 00:50:14,700 --> 00:50:18,200 One didn't have to say, if you're not for us, on our side, 1009 00:50:18,200 --> 00:50:19,870 you're on the side of the terrorists. 1010 00:50:19,870 --> 00:50:21,730 That was not a necessary response. 1011 00:50:21,730 --> 00:50:23,410 That was a chosen response. 1012 00:50:23,410 --> 00:50:25,800 The more we're afraid, the more you ask us to give. 1013 00:50:25,800 --> 00:50:29,000 Patriot Act II, enhancements to the Patriot Act. 1014 00:50:29,000 --> 00:50:30,680 Now the budget's starting to be bankrupted, 1015 00:50:30,680 --> 00:50:34,000 billions flowing out of this country into a war on terror. 1016 00:50:34,000 --> 00:50:35,100 More defense expenditures. 1017 00:50:35,100 --> 00:50:36,840 And therefore, I've asked Congress 1018 00:50:36,840 --> 00:50:40,480 for a one-year increase of more than $48 million dollars 1019 00:50:40,480 --> 00:50:43,060 for national defense-- the largest increase 1020 00:50:43,060 --> 00:50:44,650 in a generation. 1021 00:50:44,650 --> 00:50:48,790 Perpetual war, the loss of civil liberties, 1022 00:50:48,790 --> 00:50:50,740 uh, the lack of trust in government 1023 00:50:50,740 --> 00:50:53,880 because they don't tell the truth-- these are 1024 00:50:53,880 --> 00:50:56,330 outrageous and unpleasant political developments, 1025 00:50:56,330 --> 00:51:00,480 but they don't necessarily spell the end of the United States. 1026 00:51:00,480 --> 00:51:02,290 Financial bankruptcy does. 1027 00:51:02,290 --> 00:51:05,660 Things that can't go on forever don't. 1028 00:51:05,660 --> 00:51:07,040 What we're talking about right now 1029 00:51:07,040 --> 00:51:10,640 is the rigged American economy can't go on forever, 1030 00:51:10,640 --> 00:51:12,830 and it's not rocket science to say say. 1031 00:51:12,830 --> 00:51:14,900 One war after another after another, 1032 00:51:14,900 --> 00:51:16,720 we become a warfare state. 1033 00:51:16,720 --> 00:51:20,750 That is, the system is set up to go to war. 1034 00:51:20,750 --> 00:51:21,950 We're going to find wars. 1035 00:51:21,950 --> 00:51:24,720 We've already had wars-- two major wars, 1036 00:51:24,720 --> 00:51:26,090 Iraq and Afghanistan. 1037 00:51:26,090 --> 00:51:31,400 I think the people most without fear on September 12 in America 1038 00:51:31,400 --> 00:51:33,450 were those working at Ground Zero. 1039 00:51:33,450 --> 00:51:35,330 They were in the greatest danger, actually. 1040 00:51:35,330 --> 00:51:36,810 But because they were active, they 1041 00:51:36,810 --> 00:51:40,360 were engaged-- the firemen and the medical officials 1042 00:51:40,360 --> 00:51:43,980 and the cops who were working there first to find victims, 1043 00:51:43,980 --> 00:51:46,980 then to find remains and clear the site. 1044 00:51:46,980 --> 00:51:48,450 They had a civic task. 1045 00:51:48,450 --> 00:51:51,290 They were engaged, and they weren't afraid of anything. 1046 00:51:51,290 --> 00:51:54,310 American citizens after 9/11 said to the President, 1047 00:51:54,310 --> 00:51:55,440 what can we do? 1048 00:51:55,440 --> 00:51:59,830 What can we do to become engaged and take some responsibility? 1049 00:51:59,830 --> 00:52:03,220 President Bush unfortunately said, go shopping. 1050 00:52:03,220 --> 00:52:04,160 Go back to the mall. 1051 00:52:04,160 --> 00:52:05,410 Go back to your normal lives. 1052 00:52:05,410 --> 00:52:07,780 We'll take care of it. 1053 00:52:07,780 --> 00:52:11,600 Spectatorship is an invitation to fear. 1054 00:52:11,600 --> 00:52:14,930 Citizenship is how we fight the politics of fear. 1055 00:52:14,930 --> 00:52:17,380 The politics of citizenship, the politics of engagement, 1056 00:52:17,380 --> 00:52:20,080 taking responsibility is a much better way 1057 00:52:20,080 --> 00:52:24,890 to deal with terrorism than hunkering down being spectators 1058 00:52:24,890 --> 00:52:27,330 and allowing the government to rob us of our liberties, 1059 00:52:27,330 --> 00:52:29,710 to rob us of our multiculturalism 1060 00:52:29,710 --> 00:52:31,520 in the name of protecting us. 1061 00:52:31,520 --> 00:52:33,340 I think the history of the United States, 1062 00:52:33,340 --> 00:52:36,930 as a work in progress, and our attempt at democracy 1063 00:52:36,930 --> 00:52:40,040 here is a constant struggle between capitalism 1064 00:52:40,040 --> 00:52:40,750 and democracy. 1065 00:52:40,750 --> 00:52:43,760 And there have been ebbs and flows where democracy 1066 00:52:43,760 --> 00:52:44,800 looks like it's winning. 1067 00:52:44,800 --> 00:52:47,570 You reign in those powerful forces. 1068 00:52:47,570 --> 00:52:51,350 But the fundamental reality is that most of the Government's 1069 00:52:51,350 --> 00:52:53,360 decisions today are substantially 1070 00:52:53,360 --> 00:52:56,400 dictated by powerful corporate interests. 1071 00:52:56,400 --> 00:52:58,510 Clearly, capitalism is winning. 1072 00:52:58,510 --> 00:53:00,100 For anyone who doesn't yet know, 1073 00:53:00,100 --> 00:53:02,320 our corporations have been in the Middle East 1074 00:53:02,320 --> 00:53:04,360 trampling on their beliefs and customs 1075 00:53:04,360 --> 00:53:06,370 since they discovered oil. 1076 00:53:06,370 --> 00:53:08,110 Our corporations would tell us they 1077 00:53:08,110 --> 00:53:10,180 are just getting us the things we need, 1078 00:53:10,180 --> 00:53:11,800 and there is truth in that. 1079 00:53:11,800 --> 00:53:15,850 But we have to decide what price we are willing to pay. 1080 00:53:15,850 --> 00:53:19,870 We as individuals drive the demand for these resources. 1081 00:53:19,870 --> 00:53:21,730 As long as we are all aware of the fact 1082 00:53:21,730 --> 00:53:25,360 there is blood in this oil, and that is the decision 1083 00:53:25,360 --> 00:53:27,380 that we make, then so be it. 1084 00:53:33,230 --> 00:53:35,180 It's completely understandable that people 1085 00:53:35,180 --> 00:53:37,180 bury their heads in the sand. 1086 00:53:37,180 --> 00:53:38,790 And if we don't look too closely, 1087 00:53:38,790 --> 00:53:42,280 life doesn't seem too bad in many areas of the world. 1088 00:53:42,280 --> 00:53:44,050 But that is going to change. 1089 00:53:44,050 --> 00:53:45,650 And there are some logical outcomes 1090 00:53:45,650 --> 00:53:47,690 to the way this system works that will 1091 00:53:47,690 --> 00:53:49,640 affect every one of us. 1092 00:53:52,900 --> 00:53:57,100 I was invited to Washington DC to attend this meeting that 1093 00:53:57,100 --> 00:53:58,820 was being put together by the National 1094 00:53:58,820 --> 00:54:02,800 Security Agency called the Critical Thinking Consortium. 1095 00:54:02,800 --> 00:54:04,760 I remember standing there in this room 1096 00:54:04,760 --> 00:54:07,700 and looking over on one side of the room. 1097 00:54:07,700 --> 00:54:16,220 And we had CIA, NSA, DIA, FBI, Customs, Secret Service. 1098 00:54:16,220 --> 00:54:17,730 And then on the other side of the room, 1099 00:54:17,730 --> 00:54:23,780 we had Coca Cola, Mobil Oil, GTE, and Kodak. 1100 00:54:23,780 --> 00:54:25,260 And I remember thinking, I am, like, 1101 00:54:25,260 --> 00:54:28,270 in the epicenter of the intelligence 1102 00:54:28,270 --> 00:54:29,390 industry right now. 1103 00:54:29,390 --> 00:54:31,920 I mean, the line is not just blurring. 1104 00:54:31,920 --> 00:54:35,180 It's just not there anymore. 1105 00:54:35,180 --> 00:54:41,600 And to me, it spoke volumes as to how industry and government 1106 00:54:41,600 --> 00:54:45,110 were consulting with each other and working with each other. 1107 00:54:45,110 --> 00:54:48,180 An initial news report in the Army Times newspaper last month 1108 00:54:48,180 --> 00:54:51,030 noted, in addition to urgent emergency response, 1109 00:54:51,030 --> 00:54:54,960 the force, quote, "may be called upon to help with civil unrest 1110 00:54:54,960 --> 00:54:56,410 and crowd control." 1111 00:54:56,410 --> 00:54:59,260 Did this surprise you? -It did. 1112 00:54:59,260 --> 00:55:01,990 It surprised me also that NORTHCOM itself was involved 1113 00:55:01,990 --> 00:55:04,590 in intelligence sharing with local police 1114 00:55:04,590 --> 00:55:06,310 officers in Saint Paul. 1115 00:55:06,310 --> 00:55:08,390 I mean, what in the world is NORTHCOM 1116 00:55:08,390 --> 00:55:12,360 doing looking at what some of the protesters are involved in? 1117 00:55:12,360 --> 00:55:13,960 And you had infiltration up there, too. 1118 00:55:13,960 --> 00:55:16,040 But what we have going on in this country 1119 00:55:16,040 --> 00:55:18,290 is we have infiltration and spying that goes on 1120 00:55:18,290 --> 00:55:21,300 not only at the-- well, all the way from the campus police, 1121 00:55:21,300 --> 00:55:23,540 practically, aiming up to the Pentagon and the National 1122 00:55:23,540 --> 00:55:24,680 Security Agency. 1123 00:55:24,680 --> 00:55:26,510 We're becoming a police state, here. 1124 00:55:26,510 --> 00:55:29,310 Right now, as we talk, the Fourth 1125 00:55:29,310 --> 00:55:31,590 and Sixth Amendments to the Constitution 1126 00:55:31,590 --> 00:55:33,830 to the Bill of Rights are dead letters. 1127 00:55:33,830 --> 00:55:36,250 Both of these bills were written into the Constitution 1128 00:55:36,250 --> 00:55:38,870 by the Founding Fathers in order to protect 1129 00:55:38,870 --> 00:55:42,290 the people of America from the government of America. 1130 00:55:42,290 --> 00:55:45,090 Right now, the right to freedom of speech, 1131 00:55:45,090 --> 00:55:48,760 the right to free assembly, and the right to a fair trial 1132 00:55:48,760 --> 00:55:51,600 are no longer protected by law. 1133 00:55:51,600 --> 00:55:53,940 NARRATOR: The result of the Patriot Act, the Military 1134 00:55:53,940 --> 00:55:57,330 Tribunal Act, and many other bills written in the name 1135 00:55:57,330 --> 00:56:01,280 of Homeland Security is that almost any action, speech, 1136 00:56:01,280 --> 00:56:03,700 or protest against the Government 1137 00:56:03,700 --> 00:56:07,650 can be construed legally as terrorism. 1138 00:56:07,650 --> 00:56:10,910 Your home can be searched secretly, without a warrant. 1139 00:56:10,910 --> 00:56:13,950 You can could be arrested with no charges revealed to you. 1140 00:56:13,950 --> 00:56:16,050 You can be detained indefinitely, 1141 00:56:16,050 --> 00:56:20,840 and tortured without any protection under the law. 1142 00:56:20,840 --> 00:56:25,900 In 2005, Congress passed the Real ID Act. 1143 00:56:25,900 --> 00:56:30,730 Soon, we will be required to carry ID cards by law. 1144 00:56:30,730 --> 00:56:33,050 There are plans to equip these cards 1145 00:56:33,050 --> 00:56:35,740 with RFID tracking chips that will be 1146 00:56:35,740 --> 00:56:38,000 able to track your every move. 1147 00:56:38,000 --> 00:56:42,420 These tracking chips are already in all new passports. 1148 00:56:42,420 --> 00:56:44,420 Many believe this will eventually 1149 00:56:44,420 --> 00:56:48,420 lead to the implanted chip, which is already being used 1150 00:56:48,420 --> 00:56:50,590 in many places in our society. 1151 00:56:50,590 --> 00:56:53,240 We have a Florida family who are really 1152 00:56:53,240 --> 00:56:55,220 pioneers in a brave new world. 1153 00:56:55,220 --> 00:56:58,060 They have volunteered to be the first ever 1154 00:56:58,060 --> 00:57:01,100 to have microchip identification devices 1155 00:57:01,100 --> 00:57:02,900 implanted into their body. 1156 00:57:02,900 --> 00:57:05,600 After 9/11, I was really concerned 1157 00:57:05,600 --> 00:57:07,360 with the security of my family. 1158 00:57:07,360 --> 00:57:08,630 I wouldn't mind having something 1159 00:57:08,630 --> 00:57:12,330 planted permanently in my arm that would identify me. 1160 00:57:12,330 --> 00:57:15,410 NARRATOR: It is not difficult to see a future where we are all 1161 00:57:15,410 --> 00:57:17,960 locked in to a monitored control grid, where 1162 00:57:17,960 --> 00:57:21,060 every move and all transactions will be tracked, 1163 00:57:21,060 --> 00:57:22,910 monitored, and recorded. 1164 00:57:22,910 --> 00:57:24,900 And if anyone gets out of line, they 1165 00:57:24,900 --> 00:57:26,910 can just turn off their chip. 1166 00:57:26,910 --> 00:57:29,290 Could the sense of fear and isolation 1167 00:57:29,290 --> 00:57:33,160 prevalent in our society allow us to accept totalitarian 1168 00:57:33,160 --> 00:57:34,950 measures of this nature? 1169 00:57:34,950 --> 00:57:39,150 And if we become scared enough, might not even demand them? 1170 00:57:39,150 --> 00:57:41,520 Has our sense of fear and division 1171 00:57:41,520 --> 00:57:44,370 detached us from reality? 1172 00:57:44,370 --> 00:57:48,060 It is not too difficult to imagine that many of our fears 1173 00:57:48,060 --> 00:57:50,020 are manufactured for us. 1174 00:57:50,020 --> 00:57:52,690 History shows us that many in power 1175 00:57:52,690 --> 00:57:55,730 have used fear to manipulate societies. 1176 00:57:55,730 --> 00:57:59,230 And there are those who would benefit from a totalitarian 1177 00:57:59,230 --> 00:58:01,830 world government. 1178 00:58:01,830 --> 00:58:05,530 This is Aaron Russo, a formal politician. 1179 00:58:05,530 --> 00:58:09,310 Next to him is Nicholas Rockefeller, of the Rockefeller 1180 00:58:09,310 --> 00:58:11,140 banking family. 1181 00:58:11,140 --> 00:58:14,140 After a long friendship, Aaron Russo eventually 1182 00:58:14,140 --> 00:58:16,320 ended their relationship, appalled 1183 00:58:16,320 --> 00:58:19,580 at what he had learned of the Rockefellers and their plans. 1184 00:58:19,580 --> 00:58:21,450 AARON RUSSO (ON RECORDING): So he said to me one night-- 1185 00:58:21,450 --> 00:58:24,390 he said that there's going to be an event there. 1186 00:58:24,390 --> 00:58:25,560 And out of that event, you're going 1187 00:58:25,560 --> 00:58:29,050 to see we're going to go into Afghanistan so we can run 1188 00:58:29,050 --> 00:58:30,650 pipelines from the Caspian Sea. 1189 00:58:30,650 --> 00:58:33,020 We're going to go into Iraq to take the oil 1190 00:58:33,020 --> 00:58:35,190 and establish a base in the Middle East. 1191 00:58:35,190 --> 00:58:36,530 And we're going to go into Venezuela 1192 00:58:36,530 --> 00:58:39,040 and try and get rid of Chavez. 1193 00:58:39,040 --> 00:58:41,200 And the first two they've accomplished. 1194 00:58:41,200 --> 00:58:43,150 Chavez, they didn't accomplish. 1195 00:58:43,150 --> 00:58:45,790 And, uh, he said you're going to guys going into caves looking 1196 00:58:45,790 --> 00:58:49,490 for-- [LAUGH] looking for people that they're 1197 00:58:49,490 --> 00:58:51,260 never going to find. 1198 00:58:51,260 --> 00:58:52,760 He was laughing about the fact that you 1199 00:58:52,760 --> 00:58:55,070 have this war on terrorism. 1200 00:58:55,070 --> 00:58:55,930 There's no real enemy. 1201 00:58:55,930 --> 00:58:59,710 He's talking about how, by having this war on terror, 1202 00:58:59,710 --> 00:59:03,120 you can never win it. Because it's an eternal war. 1203 00:59:03,120 --> 00:59:06,000 And so you can always keep taking people's liberties away. 1204 00:59:06,000 --> 00:59:07,370 And I said, how are you going to convince 1205 00:59:07,370 --> 00:59:08,910 people that this war is real? 1206 00:59:08,910 --> 00:59:10,150 He said, but the media. 1207 00:59:10,150 --> 00:59:11,960 The media can convince everybody it's real. 1208 00:59:11,960 --> 00:59:14,950 I mean, it's just that you keep talking about things. 1209 00:59:14,950 --> 00:59:16,970 You keep saying it over and over and over again, 1210 00:59:16,970 --> 00:59:19,200 and eventually people believe it. 1211 00:59:19,200 --> 00:59:20,300 You know, you created the Federal 1212 00:59:20,300 --> 00:59:23,070 Reserve in 1913 through lies. 1213 00:59:23,070 --> 00:59:26,350 You create 9/11, which is another lie. 1214 00:59:26,350 --> 00:59:28,930 Through 9/11, then you're fighting a war on terror. 1215 00:59:28,930 --> 00:59:30,160 And now all of a sudden, you're going 1216 00:59:30,160 --> 00:59:31,990 to Iraq, which was another lie. 1217 00:59:31,990 --> 00:59:33,930 And now they're going to do Iran. 1218 00:59:33,930 --> 00:59:34,630 You know? 1219 00:59:34,630 --> 00:59:36,930 And so it's one thing leading to another, leading to another, 1220 00:59:36,930 --> 00:59:38,140 leading to another. 1221 00:59:38,140 --> 00:59:39,890 Now, I would say, what are you doing this for? 1222 00:59:39,890 --> 00:59:41,280 What's the point of this thing? 1223 00:59:41,280 --> 00:59:43,290 You have all the money in the world you ever want. 1224 00:59:43,290 --> 00:59:44,610 You have all the power. 1225 00:59:44,610 --> 00:59:45,940 I said, you know, you're hurting people. 1226 00:59:45,940 --> 00:59:47,270 It's not a good thing. 1227 00:59:47,270 --> 00:59:50,230 And he would say, what do you care about the people for? 1228 00:59:50,230 --> 00:59:52,990 Take care of yourself and you take care of your family. 1229 00:59:52,990 --> 00:59:54,780 And then I said to him, what's the-- what 1230 00:59:54,780 --> 00:59:56,630 are the ultimate goals here? 1231 00:59:56,630 --> 00:59:59,320 He said, the ultimate goal is to get everybody 1232 00:59:59,320 --> 01:00:02,480 in this world chipped with a [INAUDIBLE] ID chip, 1233 01:00:02,480 --> 01:00:04,620 and have all money be on those chips 1234 01:00:04,620 --> 01:00:06,280 and everything on those chips. 1235 01:00:06,280 --> 01:00:08,520 And if anybody wants to protest what we do 1236 01:00:08,520 --> 01:00:11,210 or violate what we want, we just turn off their chip. 1237 01:00:30,530 --> 01:00:32,940 There are some very troubling possible futures 1238 01:00:32,940 --> 01:00:34,730 for our society. 1239 01:00:34,730 --> 01:00:37,730 Climate change will displace millions of people, 1240 01:00:37,730 --> 01:00:40,950 and we'll hit peak oil in 2015. 1241 01:00:40,950 --> 01:00:44,390 Thereafter, the price of oil will skyrocket. 1242 01:00:44,390 --> 01:00:46,420 So we'll see supply decrease, and we'll 1243 01:00:46,420 --> 01:00:50,740 see prices of basic foods and every basic commodity spiral 1244 01:00:50,740 --> 01:00:52,140 upwards. 1245 01:00:52,140 --> 01:00:55,610 Our current world population is just under 7 billion, 1246 01:00:55,610 --> 01:01:00,020 and that figure will double approximately every 35 years. 1247 01:01:00,020 --> 01:01:01,760 So take a look at where you live. 1248 01:01:01,760 --> 01:01:04,420 Try to imagine double the amount of people, 1249 01:01:04,420 --> 01:01:06,930 twice the demand for resources, and double 1250 01:01:06,930 --> 01:01:08,580 the amount of pollution. 1251 01:01:08,580 --> 01:01:11,890 Massive changes are coming, whether we like it or not. 1252 01:01:11,890 --> 01:01:13,450 I'm not a politician. 1253 01:01:13,450 --> 01:01:15,030 I'm not looking for your vote, so I 1254 01:01:15,030 --> 01:01:16,830 can give it to you straight. 1255 01:01:16,830 --> 01:01:19,040 This system cannot continue. 1256 01:01:19,040 --> 01:01:21,670 So who will make the decisions about who gets food to eat, 1257 01:01:21,670 --> 01:01:24,280 or who goes hungry, or who gets water to drink 1258 01:01:24,280 --> 01:01:26,130 and who goes without? 1259 01:01:26,130 --> 01:01:29,250 Because the idea of allowing mindless corporations 1260 01:01:29,250 --> 01:01:32,410 or wealthy elites to make decisions about population 1261 01:01:32,410 --> 01:01:34,260 control is terrifying. 1262 01:01:37,220 --> 01:01:40,870 NARRATOR: The great heroes of our times-- people like Gandhi 1263 01:01:40,870 --> 01:01:44,640 and Martin Luther King-- incredible though they were, 1264 01:01:44,640 --> 01:01:47,770 could not create change on their own. 1265 01:01:47,770 --> 01:01:50,170 Only the will of the people can do that. 1266 01:01:50,170 --> 01:01:52,480 And together, we can accomplish anything. 1267 01:02:01,400 --> 01:02:06,760 Interestingly, the way to win back democracy, end the wars, 1268 01:02:06,760 --> 01:02:10,850 and save our environment has just one cure. 1269 01:02:10,850 --> 01:02:11,690 And it's simple. 1270 01:02:20,520 --> 01:02:23,820 We live in a capitalist system. 1271 01:02:23,820 --> 01:02:27,720 Everything we do is based on the exchange of money. 1272 01:02:27,720 --> 01:02:30,190 The media and the advertising web 1273 01:02:30,190 --> 01:02:33,150 have turned us into obedient little consumers, 1274 01:02:33,150 --> 01:02:35,650 trying to buy ourselves to happiness 1275 01:02:35,650 --> 01:02:38,140 in a throw-away society. 1276 01:02:38,140 --> 01:02:41,100 This creates such a demand on our resources 1277 01:02:41,100 --> 01:02:45,100 that our corporations invade other countries to get more, 1278 01:02:45,100 --> 01:02:48,120 causing untold war and conflict. 1279 01:02:48,120 --> 01:02:51,600 Then, using the wealth and power that we give them, 1280 01:02:51,600 --> 01:02:56,810 corporations undermine democracy and justice. 1281 01:02:56,810 --> 01:03:00,950 However, the unlikely and ironic outcome of consumerism 1282 01:03:00,950 --> 01:03:06,360 is that it makes you, the consumer, all powerful. 1283 01:03:06,360 --> 01:03:10,560 The way we use money has more influence in our society 1284 01:03:10,560 --> 01:03:12,410 than anything else. 1285 01:03:12,410 --> 01:03:14,750 And the way we choose to spend our money 1286 01:03:14,750 --> 01:03:17,590 can change everything. 1287 01:03:17,590 --> 01:03:20,710 No company will continue a practice or product that you, 1288 01:03:20,710 --> 01:03:23,060 the consumer, will not buy. 1289 01:03:23,060 --> 01:03:25,400 It's vitally important that you understand this, 1290 01:03:25,400 --> 01:03:28,090 because this gives you ultimate power to change 1291 01:03:28,090 --> 01:03:29,950 the world you live in. 1292 01:03:29,950 --> 01:03:31,800 Companies are extremely sensitive 1293 01:03:31,800 --> 01:03:33,590 about you buying their products because if you 1294 01:03:33,590 --> 01:03:36,270 don't buy their stuff, they go out of business. 1295 01:03:36,270 --> 01:03:39,610 That's not something any company is willing to consider. 1296 01:03:39,610 --> 01:03:41,780 And by choosing to spend your money wisely, 1297 01:03:41,780 --> 01:03:44,410 you can promote those companies that do business 1298 01:03:44,410 --> 01:03:47,240 in a socially responsible way. 1299 01:03:47,240 --> 01:03:48,930 NARRATOR: Without saying a word, you 1300 01:03:48,930 --> 01:03:53,150 will have a sent a clear message that they simply can't ignore. 1301 01:03:53,150 --> 01:03:58,070 It will be heard, headed, and acted upon, guaranteed. 1302 01:03:58,070 --> 01:04:00,600 This is real power. 1303 01:04:00,600 --> 01:04:03,270 For example, if a company pollutes the environment 1304 01:04:03,270 --> 01:04:07,010 or uses bad business practices, if you don't buy their stuff, 1305 01:04:07,010 --> 01:04:08,370 they will change. 1306 01:04:08,370 --> 01:04:11,340 If you don't want food with chemicals or GMOs in it, 1307 01:04:11,340 --> 01:04:12,760 then don't buy it. 1308 01:04:12,760 --> 01:04:15,350 NARRATOR: Basic foods and cleaning products make 1309 01:04:15,350 --> 01:04:18,820 up 70% of our weekly purchases. 1310 01:04:18,820 --> 01:04:22,330 This drives the agricultural and chemical industries 1311 01:04:22,330 --> 01:04:25,540 that have a massive effect on our environment. 1312 01:04:25,540 --> 01:04:27,840 If we can start making the right choices 1313 01:04:27,840 --> 01:04:30,630 about these simple, everyday purchases, 1314 01:04:30,630 --> 01:04:32,950 we can save our environment. 1315 01:04:32,950 --> 01:04:35,680 We've got into the habit of buying junk fast foods 1316 01:04:35,680 --> 01:04:37,690 that have no actual food in them. 1317 01:04:37,690 --> 01:04:40,270 We by gallons of poisonous household cleaners 1318 01:04:40,270 --> 01:04:42,830 when one degradable soft soap will do. 1319 01:04:42,830 --> 01:04:45,840 We are poisoning our homes and wasting our hard-earned money 1320 01:04:45,840 --> 01:04:47,100 for no good reason. 1321 01:04:47,100 --> 01:04:47,800 Why? 1322 01:04:47,800 --> 01:04:50,740 Because the advertising industry tells us to. 1323 01:04:50,740 --> 01:04:53,880 They just want you to buy stuff. 1324 01:04:53,880 --> 01:04:56,200 The car is the single biggest strain 1325 01:04:56,200 --> 01:04:57,960 on the Earth's resources. 1326 01:04:57,960 --> 01:05:01,700 Just about every mineral, every chemical, and every metal 1327 01:05:01,700 --> 01:05:06,060 known to man goes into the manufacture of our cars. 1328 01:05:06,060 --> 01:05:08,330 The gasoline engine is inefficient 1329 01:05:08,330 --> 01:05:11,070 and poisons our environment. 1330 01:05:11,070 --> 01:05:15,650 The car, as it is today, cannot be sustained. 1331 01:05:15,650 --> 01:05:17,890 It is up to us to drive the demand 1332 01:05:17,890 --> 01:05:21,070 for clean, efficient vehicles. 1333 01:05:21,070 --> 01:05:24,260 Do not underestimate the power of that dollar bill 1334 01:05:24,260 --> 01:05:25,610 in your pocket. 1335 01:05:25,610 --> 01:05:29,070 The way you spend that dollar already affects economies 1336 01:05:29,070 --> 01:05:31,180 and lives around the world. 1337 01:05:31,180 --> 01:05:35,850 Spent wisely, it can fix every problem known to man. 1338 01:05:35,850 --> 01:05:38,470 The minute we start taking responsibility and spending 1339 01:05:38,470 --> 01:05:41,840 our money wisely, every politician, every corporation 1340 01:05:41,840 --> 01:05:43,730 and leader around the world is going 1341 01:05:43,730 --> 01:05:46,050 to know that we have woken up. 1342 01:05:46,050 --> 01:05:49,680 And that is the most important point in this film. 1343 01:05:49,680 --> 01:05:52,740 All of the abuse in our system happens because we 1344 01:05:52,740 --> 01:05:54,770 just roll over and take it. 1345 01:05:54,770 --> 01:05:56,290 But when we get involved and start 1346 01:05:56,290 --> 01:05:59,720 making the right decisions, everything changes. 1347 01:05:59,720 --> 01:06:02,060 Our consumer choices are the easiest 1348 01:06:02,060 --> 01:06:04,040 way for us to get involved in a very 1349 01:06:04,040 --> 01:06:06,300 meaningful and powerful way. 1350 01:06:06,300 --> 01:06:08,840 But the issue is our involvement-- 1351 01:06:08,840 --> 01:06:13,050 you and I taking responsibility, you and I demanding the truth, 1352 01:06:13,050 --> 01:06:17,770 learning the facts, and making our decisions accordingly. 1353 01:06:17,770 --> 01:06:19,430 NARRATOR: There are serious decisions 1354 01:06:19,430 --> 01:06:23,480 to be made about the future of our society. 1355 01:06:23,480 --> 01:06:26,840 Because there are so many of us and population levels 1356 01:06:26,840 --> 01:06:30,870 are rising all the time, we have to drastically reduce 1357 01:06:30,870 --> 01:06:34,240 our demand for every consumer product. 1358 01:06:34,240 --> 01:06:37,820 Breaking the habits of a lifetime won't be easy. 1359 01:06:37,820 --> 01:06:40,180 Retooling industry and maintaining 1360 01:06:40,180 --> 01:06:42,640 balance in our markets and economies 1361 01:06:42,640 --> 01:06:44,750 is a massive undertaking. 1362 01:06:44,750 --> 01:06:47,970 But we can address all of these questions. 1363 01:06:47,970 --> 01:06:50,670 You have the power to deny profits 1364 01:06:50,670 --> 01:06:54,180 to offending corporations, and support those 1365 01:06:54,180 --> 01:06:56,800 who maintain good practices. 1366 01:06:56,800 --> 01:07:00,480 You can express the concerns you hold dear 1367 01:07:00,480 --> 01:07:04,120 and herald a new beginning at every level of our society. 1368 01:07:06,660 --> 01:07:08,570 This is the 21st century. 1369 01:07:08,570 --> 01:07:12,030 If we use our resources wisely, there is no reason why anyone 1370 01:07:12,030 --> 01:07:14,150 shouldn't have what they need. 1371 01:07:14,150 --> 01:07:17,230 There's no reason whatsoever why people are still starving 1372 01:07:17,230 --> 01:07:19,000 to death on our planet. 1373 01:07:19,000 --> 01:07:20,850 And the common man or woman, whether they 1374 01:07:20,850 --> 01:07:23,770 are Israli or Palestinian, Protestant or Catholic, 1375 01:07:23,770 --> 01:07:27,170 or Iraqi or American-- the common man just 1376 01:07:27,170 --> 01:07:31,000 wants to live in peace and justice in a clean environment. 1377 01:07:31,000 --> 01:07:34,070 When we look around the world and we see that that is not 1378 01:07:34,070 --> 01:07:36,930 the case, we know that the will of the majority 1379 01:07:36,930 --> 01:07:38,860 is not being listened to. 1380 01:07:38,860 --> 01:07:42,800 That's the first sign that our system is broken. 1381 01:07:42,800 --> 01:07:46,030 Government won't make these changes for us. 1382 01:07:46,030 --> 01:07:49,130 Yet again, it is down to the common man. 1383 01:07:49,130 --> 01:07:52,230 Please don't just watch this movie and turn away. 1384 01:07:52,230 --> 01:07:54,550 We can fix this system. 1385 01:07:54,550 --> 01:07:55,850 Go to the website. 1386 01:07:55,850 --> 01:07:58,900 Take that first step towards an incredible future 1387 01:07:58,900 --> 01:08:00,930 for all of us. 1388 01:08:00,930 --> 01:08:02,670 Thank you for watching.