All I want for Christmas is truth!

Slow news week, but that doesn't mean Social Media still isn't full of easily debunkable memes.  Remember folks:  Just because it's written in white text overlain a relevant picture and shared by your well-meaning relative, doesn't mean it's true.  And with that, let's get going!  What meme are we debunking today?

OK, so before we do anything that can be called research, let's do some analysis: Just look at this image and see what sticks out.  First, what is this a picture of?  I see a glass table with what might be a laptop on it, a TV display like you'd find in any electronic store, a person wearing a jacket looking at the camera (or perhaps slightly to the side).  4 of the 6 TVs are showing the same image.  Also, there's some text in the lower right of the screen ("AFP"), where we might expect to see a channel designation.  So maybe it's...... one huge screen showing 6 screens on it.  The image itself seems to have a lot of water on it, or maybe the lens is cracked?  I really couldn't tell you.

Everything else in the image is black.  There's no good sense of where this picture was taken.  In fact, you can't even see the person's legs beneath the table.  The top of the image cites a website, www.unbelievablefactsblog.com.  So, whatever research we will do should begin there.  However, my alarm bells are already ringing that this picture is a little weird, and certainly not particularly related to the text, except that the person in the picture looks Asian.

Now, to the text itself.  Not all shows are 45 minutes.  What about news?  Do they even have 24 hour news there?  I'm sure they do.  What about movies?  The 45 minute bit seems oddly specific...

I can't find a less glib way to say this:  Before even investigating things further - but just by analysis - things already seem shaky.

OK, to the investigation!  First stop, unbelievablefactsblog.com.  I don't know quite what I was expecting - I think I expected to see a mess of a website.  Long rambling blog posts espousing the virtue of the "unbelievable facts" without actually proving why we should, actually, believe them.  A blog thrown together by college students who are frustrated that the world doesn't live up to their standards, and who are unrealistic in their expectations.  Goodness is good.  But goodness can be slow.  Not because evil forces hold it back, but rather it is always easier to do nothing.  Apathy is a greater enemy to humanity than evil.

However, what I saw was so unhelpful I refreshed the page a few times just to make sure.  I accessed the site on 12/27/2015.  I'm certain in the future it will change.  But here is what I saw:

It was basically the same image - identical!  But just when I almost gave up, I saw a small bit of text lower down on the page that said "source."  So I clicked it.  If you click on it, you'll indeed see a news story.  From the BBC.  Showing the government did limit TV advertisements.  In 2011.

But we got something!  It is true!  But it was also from several years ago.  Can we follow up on this?

Eh, not really.  All my research attempts turned up nothing (I'm certain if I knew Chinese I could find more information, but alas, I do not).  So while this is a true fact, it's relevance to us is not yet obvious.  Why were advertisements limited?  Did it work?  Are those limits still in effect?  Without answering those questions, this fact is just trivia.

However, by reading that BBC article, we can see there were already detractors.  In brief, here were the points against:

• TV networks will become more reliant on the government for funding.
• Revenue from advertising, if put at the end of a show where it is more easily avoidable, is considerably less.  This makes the TV stations more dependent on government funds, since advertising is the financial backbone of almost every media outlet.  This is a more obvious problem for news channels, whom viewers want to be as independent as possible.  Certainly being more dependent on the government is not desirable.
• Quote: "Radio and television are a mouthpiece of the party and the people - an important propaganda front in cultural thought," read the SARFT [State Administration of Radio, Film and Television] statement.
• A [SARFT] spokesman told Xinhua, the state-run news agency, that the aim was to make TV shows confirm to "public interests and aspiration."
• The advertisements are not likely going away.  Perhaps the products will be written into the script (Product placement).

These two points are important - they get to the core of why advertising, however frustrating it may be, is not bad.  Because right now we've been assuming TV advertisements are bad, and limiting them is good.  That's why this meme is being shared after all.  "Wouldn't it be great if our government did this, too."  But let's not jump on that bandwagon too fast.  What are the consequences?

Sponsors have a positive effect on media.  They significantly reduce the cost.  In return, the media outlet runs advertisements on their behalf.  The net effect is we, consumers, have to play much less than we otherwise would (and, in some cases, the product is given to us free!).  This makes it easy to gain listeners/viewers, and more viewers helps both the media and the sponsors.  There's little downside, outside of ads being annoying.

Sponsors also give viewers control over content they otherwise wouldn't have.  When Rush Linbaugh called Sandra Fluke a "slut" and a "prostitute," people contacted his sponsors, and asked (Well, demanded.  They probably weren't very polite about it) them to stop supporting his show.  And many of them did.  And this forced him to publicly apologize for his comments - a rare feat!  This would have been impossible without the pressure from sponsors.  Rush, of all people, is used to receiving hate, and he is fueled by it.  But to have that hate lead to reduction in dollars...  That stings a lot more.

Reducing TV networks ability to raise funds from multiple sources makes them more dependent on the Chinese government.  So guess who now gets a big say in what TV shows will get supported?  I'm not sure what Chinese word got translated as "propaganda" above - it may not be a fair translation - but certainly the Chinese government has cultural desires for its people, and now it has more power to act on those desires.  And the TV stations have less leverage to use against it.  They'll either conform to the demands or go out of business.

As for product placement, this is a bigger problem than it may seem.  I can't tell if this is sincere or just excellent satire, but this is a great explanation of one of the bigger problems of product placement.  Your favorite TV character always orders Diet Coke?  Like James Bond?  These product placements are easier to see, though they can still get in your head.  But advertorials (advertisements hidden as editorials) appear in newspapers and on news sites.  We don't expect them there, and many of them are quite well hidden.  Is it sneaky?  Sure!  But we didn't like those banner ads.  So the media outlet complied.  And the advertisement evolved.  And now, instead of being sold products in a way we recognize as being sold a product (Thus we can be on our guard, while also watching the content), we're being sold products in less overt ways, in ways specifically designed to trick us.  This is hugely problematic for resisting their efforts to get us to pay money for things we don't need until they tell us we need them.

So advertisements are annoying.  But they also give us control over our media in a way simply complaining does not (Hate clicks are still clicks).  So they're good.  And annoying.  My view is they are good as long as we know what they are.  When we can't tell ads from the rest of the world, we're in trouble.

But what about a world without ads?  What if money wasn't a limit, and people could do what they wanted without needing to please corporations?  Well, the worst case scenario is Donald Trump, who has repeatedly insisted his best political strength is his financial independence:  "I am self-funding my campaign and therefore I will not be controlled by the donors, special interests and lobbyists who have corrupted our politics and politicians for far too long."

This is a similar position taken by Bernie Sanders, on the Democratic side, who has also disavowed special interests and lobbyists, for basically the same reason.  The two candidates, though, could hardly be more different - but they are instructive here.

A world without ads (Donors and special interests are the sponsors of the political world) can either be supremely egalitarian (as Sanders promises), or it can be incredibly self-serving (Trump can say whatever he wants, and when people are angry, they're just "complaining," and he can ignore them (And in fact use them to galvanize those who support him)).  Ads are, essentially, the a check-and-balance that keep us in sane, familiar territory.  It may not be great, and it may in fact have limits we despise (Broad blandness is preferred over boldness that may fail or offend), but it also prevents us from collapsing into demagogue free fall.  Any other presidential candidate would have been financially cut off and fallen into oblivion for saying what Trump has said.  But Trump (and Sanders) are immune to such limits.  It will be interesting to see how things play out for them.  The main difference is Trump can lose all his individual donors and still run a robust (or at least loud) campaign.  Sanders' success depends on keeping his base energized, from whom he gets a lot of individual contributions.

I've gone way off topic.  Let's wrap things up quickly.

So:  The meme is accurate (though I still couldn't find any information about the 45 minutes.  Are shorter/longer shows subject to different rules?  From what I found, it seems as though all commercials are shown at the end of shows, but I'm inferring that, I didn't explicitly read that anywhere, so I can't be certain.)

But:  The fact is 4 years old.  The meme also ignores objections raised at the time.  I'd like to see some follow up.  What is the current state of TV advertising in China?

Advertisements are annoying, but they serve several important purposes.  They keep the cost of media down, and they are a check-and-balance against those with a large platform saying outrageous things.  While I certainly was incorrect about this meme being inaccurate, I hope I've got you thinking about advertisements in a more nuanced way.  Simply removing them from is not an inherent good.  Our media costs money.  If not ads, how will the content get funded?  We have choices, but we need to consider them thoroughly...

Bernie Sanders vs The DNC

A few days ago, news broke that the Bernie Sanders campaign had been suspended by the Democratic National Committee (The DNC, which is basically the official Democratic Party.  Democratic Candidates represent the DNC's platform, or at least will default to it when they have no other pressing interest).  The Sanders campaign has since be reinstated, but not before the fight got pretty ugly, and even in it's resolution, shots were fired.  If the Republican party is desperately trying to figure out how to prevent Trump from becoming their nominee, the DNC seems set on trying to ensure Clinton does become their nominee.

I'm not going to rehash the story (But if you want good primers, try here and here), but in reading about it I noticed a startling trend.  While behind the scenes there may be animosity between the candidates, usually they try to play nice publicly.  In the second debate (I believe - I wasn't able to find an actual source, but I know this happened in an early debate), John Kasich said that Trump had hit a chord with the American people.  At the start of the third debate, he opened with: "My great concern is we are on the verge of perhaps picking someone who cannot do this job."  This wasn't because Kasich's opinion on Trump changed.  He just initially tried to play nice with him (because Bush and Walker, who had attacked him head on, got destroyed in the polls), but when that didn't work, he decided to pile on.  What they say aloud isn't necessarily reflective of their real feelings - it's all a calculation.

So it was shocking to me that, in describing how the issue got resolved, both the Sanders campaign and the DNC took some pretty low pot shots at each other:

From the Sanders campaign in a statement: 

"The Democratic National Committee on Friday capitulated and agreed to reinstate Sen. Bernie Sanders' campaign's access to a critically-important voter database,"

From DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz on CNN:"Thankfully, after refusing to give us the information we were asking for for nearly two days, last night, we did reach an agreement with the campaign.  They finally gave us the information that we had been asking for so that we could begin to assess the depth of the breach where their staff looked inappropriately at unauthorized material that was the proprietary information of the Clinton campaign."

From Jeff Weaver, Bernie Sanders' campaign manager in a statement: 

“We are extremely pleased that the DNC has reversed its outrageous decision to take Sen. Sanders’ data. The information we provided tonight is essentially the same information we already sent them by email on Thursday,” Jeff Weaver, Sanders’ campaign manager, said in a statement.

These are not friendly statements.  And these were the statements made after things were resolved.  Usually, when an issue is resolved, statements try to be at least a little positive, to show no hard feelings.  The Sanders campaign says the DNC 'capitulated,' Schultz takes the opportunity to point out that the Sanders campaign held out for two days, and Weaver fires back that whatever information the DNC finally got was very similar to the information that had been sent to them earlier.  It doesn't even matter who is right: This is not just a national party enforcing rules among its candidates.  There is real animosity here!

The Sanders' campaign have consistently accused the DNC of favoring Clinton.  (So has Martin O'Malley.)  Eric Fehrnstrom, formerly of the Romney campaign, said "The possibility that she could lose New Hampshire has everyone in a panic. Not only are they denying Bernie Sanders access to voter information, but they’ve limited the number of debates and the ones they are holding are tucked away on nights when nobody is watching."  The first democratic debate was on a Tuesday, the second one was on a Saturday, and the third one will also be on a Saturday (tonight).  The five Republican debates have all been in the middle of the week.  The disparity of amount is probably linked to the number of candidates (14 GOP, 3 Dem), but the timing of the debates is note-worthy.

You might think the Dems might want to have their fewer debates be better highlighted.  Or maybe you think the Dems want to tuck their debates away just so as to not distract from the chaos of the Republican race.  There are lots of non-nefarious reasons for limiting the number of debates.  However, it is hard to doubt that fewer debates benefit Clinton substantially.  Debates give candidates exposure to the public - Clinton is a former Senator, Secretary of State, and First Lady.  Further, the Republicans drop her name all the time in their debates - and rarely Sanders' and never O'Malley.  More exposure.  Debates also give candidates a chance to say something that gives them a big bump in the polls, or something that brings them down.  The higher you are, the less of a bump you can get, and the more room you have to fall.  Front runners do not benefit from debates.

Bernie Sanders' campaign from the beginning has been an underdog campaign - not just in numbers but in style.  He constantly shows how he's against the media and the establishment.  While Sanders supporters tend to say they want more mainstream coverage, I'm not really sure how that would help - suddenly a core part of his message is nullified.  It's hard to be on all the talk shows and claim there's a media blackout against you.

Meanwhile, the DNC seems to be getting less subtle about tilting things towards Clinton.  I disagree that this whole scandal is concocted, or that it was dropped purposely to be politically damaging (The worst time for the Sanders' campaign for this story to break would have been early next week, when people are getting ready for Christmas and people are watching the news less.  But with a debate a few days away when the story initially broke, it was in the DNC's interest to get this resolved as soon as possible.  Can you imagine the field day Sanders and O'Malley could have during the debate if this hadn't been resolved?  Clinton would've been forced to play the part of the establishment candidate, which she's always tried to avoid, or else take an otherwise untenable position.).  However, it seems more likely than ever that - if the DNC is not actively rooting for Clinton - they at least have adversarial feelings against Sanders.  This feeds Sanders' narrative, and may drive his supporters to be even more motivated.

What's most interesting to me is that the DNC is playing chess while the Sanders campaign is playing dodgeball.  The two games have really nothing in common, and strategies in one just do not apply to the other.  Whenever the DNC tries to undermine Sanders, he can make it work in his favor.  But when Sanders tries things his way ("The American people are sick and tired of hearing about your damn emails!"), the DNC can exploit it to their advantage (Clinton tried to use that moment to say the whole scandal was foolish and should be dropped, and Sanders needed to back pedal and say: “You get 12 seconds to say these things.  There’s an investigation going on right now. I did not say, ‘End the investigation.’ That’s silly. . . . Let the investigation proceed unimpeded.”

Even in this latest controversy, both sides have admitted that the Sanders campaign alerted the DNC to the breach: "Josh Uretsky, a Sanders campaign staffer who was fired Wednesday after viewing Clinton campaign data, told ABC News he was trying to investigate the data issue to see what information was vulnerable on their end so he could adequately report it to the software company. He said his team did not export any data and that he intentionally left a record of what he was doing in the system and did not try to hide his actions."

An interesting note - usually if a campaign/company fires someone for an error, they'll try to blame the campaign/company.  It's rare to have them say, essentially, "This is what we were doing.  The campaign/company is blameless here."

We'll see what happens moving forward, but I think we can doubtlessly say that there is serious friction within the Democratic race, not just between the candidates, but between the party and one of the candidates.  It's not every day that when a political party agrees to reinstate voter data access, it's referred to as "capitulation."

(I will update this post after the first Democratic debate if I feel new light has been shed on this story)

Edit: Nothing significant to update.

New hopes and old fears

The final Star Wars post before I turn my attention back to real politics.  In this episode, I ignore almost everything I've heard about what the movie WILL be, and just talk about what I'd like to see - and not see.

YES:

• What happens to Lando?
• What happens in the months immediately after the Battle of Endor?
• A new Jedi academy
• How difficult is it to go from fighting the government to becoming the government?
• Basically, I want influences from Game of Thrones.  A more serious look at how things work.  But IN SPACE.

NO:

• Superweapons.  We've already had two Death Stars.  I'd love for the Sith to be sneaky and more like assassins than evil space jocks whose last two superweapons have served as a stand in for their balls (And what does that make the Executor??).  It would also be great to know the Sith have learned that giant weapons are not as invincible as they appear.
• Family relations between the Dark and the Light side.  Yawn.
• Years of what should have been a relatively well documented civil war being lost from the collective memory.  I don't want to spend a lot of time hearing the new characters learn history.
• As little of Tatooine as possible.  That planet has an uncanny knack for being an important plot point.  I'd like to see other planets.

I also recently read an interview where J.J. Abrams said one of the main things that got him into the project was someone asking him "Who has Luke Skywalker become?"  I think that's an awesome hook.  Even at the end of Return of the Jedi he was very removed from the rest of the characters.  He didn't take part in the big celebration.  What was he thinking?  Did he become disillusioned?

Did he find a new purpose?  What did the Alliance expect from him?  Did those things align?  How does he feel, 20 (or is it 30?) years later, about what happened.  What if he's like Vader is at the start of A New Hope?  An old sorcerer mocked by politicians who ask why "his sad devotion to that ancient religion has helped him conjure up a solvent government, or given him clairvoyance enough to find the Imperials who are in hiding."  But Luke can't respond as Vader did, with a gratuitous show of his powers.  He just has to think, "Some people are dicks.  As a Jedi, though, I must control my feelings."  Or maybe he did force choke someone.  Just once.  What then?

I do not, under any circumstances, want Luke to be the main character, or even fulfilling the role of a mentor like Obi-Wan did.  But I would really like to learn - after you save the universe and your family's name and help bring balance to the Force.......  What does someone whose accomplished all that do with the rest of their life?

But honestly, My demands are superficial at this point.  3 days and counting.  I'm excited.  I'll always have a preferred way things were done.  But what is in the movie is what will be in the movie.  And part of the fun of being a fan is discussing and debating and disagreeing with the material.  Everything else I aside, I just want to laugh, to cry, and to be completely blown away.

Predicting the "New Order Trilogy"

Looking toward the new trilogy, I'll be making two posts about it.  This one will be about the political and security issues that stem from the end of Episode VI, which I think should guide the new film's plot.  The next post will be, as a movie-goer, what I want (and don't want) to see in the new movie.

The Second Death Star is destroyed.  The Emperor is dead.  Vader not only is dead, but has repented for his sins.  The Rebellion has scored a major victory.  And yet, as we saw at the end of Episode IV, destroying their battle station does not defeat the Empire.  Even though this time they also lost their leaders, there's little reason to believe the Empire, as a government, has been overthrown.

At the end of Episode VI, We see a variety of celebrations (Relevant part: 0:40-1:30).  However, the three planets showcased were Bespin (Which is the planet Cloud City is in), Naboo and Coruscant.  While Bespin was taken over by the Empire during the Rebellion trilogy, and has more cause for celebration than the others, we know nothing of Naboo's involvement in the struggle, and Coruscant is not the political hub it once was (The senate has been dissolved since before the Battle of Yavin, and the Emperor was residing in the second Death Star, which is on the other side of the galaxy).  I also recall a version of the finale in which Tatooine was celebrating, which is odd, because it's not like Tatooine benefited particularly from the time of the Republic.  Still, except for Bespin, it's hard to see any of the celebrations as particularly relevant.  Further, and in this case especially Bespin, they may be better conceived of as ecstatic riots that are later crushed by the remaining imperial forces.  They're not much different from those that in the June Rebellion, as depicted in Les Miserables.

Episode IV ends with a celebration on Yavin 4.  Episode V begins with the Rebels on a frozen, miserable planet.  That's because, soon after the destruction of the Death Star, the Empire came back to Yavin IV and routed the Rebels.  There's no reason to believe Episode VII shouldn't begin the same way.  When the second Death Star was destroyed, there were several Star Destroyers that were still fighting fit (I found three by name, and while I'm tempted to, I'm not going to spend all night researching this), and they fled.  That's a terrifying force to have lurking about completely unaccounted for.  Those imperials did not surrender.

After the battle of Endor, the Rebels have the enormous task of needing to deliver on their promise of restoring the Republic.  It doesn't matter if they're "right."  They now need to show they can deliver good governance while also protecting their realm from attack.  But they will have weak points, as governments always do.  And they still have a war to fight.  The remnants of the Empire will continue to hammer them, and every even minor victory will produce great unrest.  Some will yearn for the Empire, which at least kept the core planets safe.  The core planets are also the more populated planets, and are important to keep happy.  Some may remember the dysfunction of the old Republic (Like Naboo, which during the entire Republic Trilogy was consistently let down by the Senate) and resist a new Republic.  And Force Forbid one of those Star Destroyers falls into the hands of an anarchist.

But then we have the problem of amnesty.  After the American Civil War, there was a huge controversy about how to deal with the Southerners who had rebelled.  The Lincoln had no desire to rule the South with an iron fist, but many Union politicians refused to let the rebels get off without significant punishment.  So would the new Republic have to deal with imperial officers.  Some may be ideologically aligned with the Empire, but some may be career bureaucrats with families to feed.  If you work in payroll, the style of government has little impact on your job.  There are a lot of government jobs that aren't ideological.  Hyperspace routes still need to be patrolled, smugglers still need to be prosecuted.  How can you tell an innocent imperial from a guilty one?

And there's the problem created by the power vacuum left by the emperor.  Along with the Galactic Civil War, there could be a huge power struggle in the Empire, which only further complicates the issue (Now there are four leaders claiming to represent the Empire, each with it's own followers and military.  Defeating one only strengthens and emboldens the others.)

AND then there's the ever-present threat of the Sith.  With only one living Jedi, it will be difficult to prevent the Sith from rising again.  And the Sith would present an entirely different kind of problem for the new Republic!

Anyway, with all these competing interests, I think it's inevitable the new Republic will fail, or at least stumble significantly.  This is not going to be an easy task.  Ruling over peace is almost harder than prevailing in war.  With the Star Destroyers (and other Imperial starships who weren't at the Battle of Endor at all) lurking about, stability will be an impossible promise for the Republic to deliver on.  There will be enormous pressure from both sides regarding the amnesty issue (What do you do, say, with the individual - or more likely, the company - that developed the Superlaser?).  Whatever the solution, one side will be deeply unhappy.  Political idealists may try to find a third way to govern that is neither Republican nor Imperial.  Anarchists will take the opportunity to destabilize as a way of showing the government (Republic and Imperial) are worthless.  Smaller conflicts will break out, since the Rebel Alliance doesn't have the reach of the Empire to enforce order.    There will be imperial apologists who'll insist things were better under the Empire, or at least safer.

The Galaxy is doomed to be in chaos for decades, if not centuries.


Special thanks to Robert Cantelmo, who helped me come up with the analogy of the celebrations/riots to the June Rebellion, which is much clearer (and, frankly, more accurate) than my original analogy to Arabs celebrating 9/11.

Analyzing the "Republic Trilogy"

Earlier this week we looked at the original trilogy in depth, examining its themes and real world inspirations.  Now we shall do the same for the prequels.  This post will be *much* longer than the previous one, because the prequels are much more complicated movies.  They aren't better, but it's easier to analyze a simple, positive and uplifting message than a cautionary tale.

The main theme in the Republic Trilogy is corruption.  Promises are made and broken, or they are twisted against their original meaning.  Let's look at each episode.

Episode I is mostly about innocence.  Everyone thinks one-dimensionally, with the exception of Qui-Gon Jinn and Darth Sidious.

• The Trade Federation Viceroy, as the movie proceeds, begin to regret their bargain with Sidious.
• Queen Amidala believes if she goes to the Senate, the rightness of her side will be enough win their support.
• Qui-Gonn is caught off guard when Watto is immune to Jedi mind tricks.
• Padme is shocked that Watto has slaves.
• Anakin is described as knowing "nothing of greed," and when he accepts that he must leave his mother behind, he promises to return and free her, too.
• When Darth Maul attacks Qui-Gon, it is unexpected because "the Sith have been extinct for a millennium".
• During the battle of Naboo, the Flagship is destroyed by Anakin basically by accident.
• Qui-Gon makes Obi-Wan promise to train Anakin, even after explicit instruction from the Council not to.

If the whole of Episode I seems a lot like the main characters bumbling around and making stupid choices, that's the point.  This is what peace can do - it causes complacency and leaves us vulnerable to treachery.  People take security for granted, and work to secure their own hand.  In a small way, the arrival at Coruscation is an important Game of Thrones moment, where Padme's naivete is laid bare.

(The "..." are not bits of the dialogue being skipped.  Instead, they indicate brief pauses in the dialogue.)

PALPATINE : ...the Republic is not what it once was. The Senate is full of
greedy, squabbling delegates who are only looking out for themselves and
their home sytems. There is no interest in the common good...no civility,
only politics...its disgusting. I must be frank, Your Majesty, there is
little chance the Senate will act on the invasion.
AMIDALA : Chancellor Valorum seems to think there is hope.
PALPATINE : If I may say so, Your Majesty, the Chancellor has little real
power...he is mired down by baseless accusations of corruption. A
manufactured scandal surrounds him. The bureaucrats are in charge now.

While certainly not nearly as well done as in Game of Thrones, the political situation in the Senate prevents "the right" from prevailing.  This is why slavery persists in the galaxy.  The movie ends with a celebration over the liberation of Naboo but, in my absolutely favorite Star Wars fun fact, the music that plays is a version of the Emperor's Theme, a foreshadowing of what is to come.  The board is set.  Importantly, Qui-Gon, the only character on our side who seemed to be able to think multiple moves ahead, is gone.

Episode II is where some of the earlier promises start to get corrupted and broken.  Naboo is safe, but Padme is being targeted by assassins.  The Jedi spring into action.  Obi-Wan follows the clues left by the assassins, and Anakin is tasked with protecting Padme.  Obi-Wan's search quickly hits a dead end, and he's consistently told that if the Jedi Records can't identify it, then it cannot be identified,  The Jedi are here proud and bureaucratic.  It's cooler to think of them as they were in the Rebellion, but I think the Jedi Order is to Exiled Jedi as Police Departments are to Rogue Agents.  The latter is cooler, but you need the former for a functioning society, even if it is just a lot of paperwork.  Obi-Wan eventually stumbles upon the clone army, and the Jedi allow circumstances to evolve that the army is recruited by the Republic (Instead of remaining aloof and trying to view things more objectively).  The Jedi, sworn to protect the Republic, plays a huge role in it's destruction.

Meanwhile, as Obi-Wan wrecks the Republic, Anakin is given a task he's entirely unable to handle.  He's too attached to Padme, and not trained enough to resist his urges.  He struggles throughout the movie with these feelings.  While the way it's portrayed on screen is frankly sometimes awful (Sand, guys.  Sand!), I think the story is still powerful.  Anakin is placed in a situation he cannot win.

When Anakin's visions of his mother begin to overwhelm him, Padme offers to follow him to Tatooine, so he can visit her and also still protect her.  This is in stark contrast to what Yoda tells Luke in Episode V, when he sees a vision of his friends in trouble.

LUKE: And sacrifice Han and Leia?
YODA: If you honor what they fight for ... yes!

Luke doesn't listen, but that's besides the point.  Anakin is being enabled to follow his emotions.  And while this deepens the bond between Anakin and Padme, it has terrible consequences for Anakin.

Anakin's quest to save his mother fails.  It's underplayed in the movies, but it's important to realize his mother is his only family, and that Anakin leaves Tatooine only when he promises to come back and rescue her.  For him, freeing all the slaves is a big reason he became a Jedi.  From the first movie:

ANAKIN: I had a dream I was a Jedi. I came back here and freed all the
slaves...have you come to free us?
QUI-GON: No, I'm afraid not...
ANAKIN: I think you have...why else would you be here?

And later, when Anakin is leaving Tatooine

ANAKIN: I.. will become a Jedi and I will come back and free you, Mom...I
promise.

Anakin wants to become powerful and save everyone.  But here he can't even save the one person he promised to rescue.  And while Shmi (his mother) gets peace seeing her son again, watching her die gives Anakin no comfort at all.  He retaliates by slaughtering the Tusken Raiders.  He confides this in Padme, and acknowledges it was wrong, but


ANAKIN: I killed them. I killed them all. They're dead, every single one of them. And not just the men, but the women and the children, too. They're like animals, and I slaughtered them like animals. I HATE THEM!

Obi-Wan then sends a distress call that he has found a huge Battle Droid factory, and that he's been captured.  Anakin wants to go help Obi-Wan but, when he forwards the message to the Jedi, they instruct him to protect Padme at all costs.  He relents.  Anakin oscillates between being headstrong and reckless and knowing his place.  He could be a powerful Jedi with the right training.

But Padme, with good intentions, enables him again.  She insists on going to help, and when Anakin says he's supposed to protect her, she says she's going to help him, and if he wants to protect her, then he should come with her.  So they go.

The Jedi, meanwhile, are stuck between sacrificing one Jedi and allowing the separatists to continue to build their army unopposed, or sending the Jedi out to rescue Obi-Wan.  Incredibly, they decide to attack.  This is actually one part of the prequels that baffles me.  It's a truly idiotic move that I can't possibly explain.  It corners the Republic into either authorizing the Republic to use the Clone army (The source of which is still unknown) *or* risk their "keepers of the peace" being exterminated.  Still, they do it.  The Jedi, who are supposed to protect peace, are twisted to enable war.

Episode III is the simplest to pick apart.  Everything comes crashing down.  Anakin, with Palpatine's encouragement, essentially murders Count Dooku (Which, according to Sith principles, means he is Palpatine's new apprentice).  While Yoda tries to get Anakin to accept death as a natural part of life, Palpatine exploits Anakin's fear of losing Padme like he lost his mother to lead him toward the Dark Side.  He uses Anakin's frustration at the Jedi Council to recruit him to spy on the Jedi.  When Mace Windu moves to kill Palpatine, Palpatine feigns weakness to force Anakin to act to save him.  He does, Mace is killed, and Anakin must accept Palpatine as his master (Because the Jedi will never accept him again).  All he asks for is the ability to save Padme.

Palpatine executes order 66, wiping out most of the Jedi.  Obi-Wan discovers Anakin has turned and confronts Padme, who denies it, and flees to him.  She finds he is alive, and when he tells her what he's done:

ANAKIN: I won't lose you the way I lost my mother! I've become more powerful than any Jedi has ever dreamed of and I've done it for you. To protect you. 
PADME: Come away with me. Help me raise our child. Leave everything else behind while we still can. 
ANAKIN: Don't you see, we don't have to run away anymore. I have brought peace to the Republic. I am more powerful than the Chancellor. I can overthrow him, and together you and I can rule the galaxy. Make things the way we want them to be. 
PADME: I don't believe what I'm hearing . . . Obi-Wan was right. You've changed. 
ANAKIN: I don't want to hear any more about Obi-Wan. The Jedi turned against me. Don't you turn against me. 

Anakin's plan is short-sighted, but it isn't evil.  He wants to protect his family.  Everything else is disposable.  When Padme renounces him, he becomes angry again, and Force chokes her until Obi-Wan challenges him.  Anakin, like many short-sighted men, reacts violently against his wife when she wrongs him - even though she is right.

The Republic is replaced by an Empire, and the Sith take over.  The Jedi are vilified and security is vaulted above all other values.  Luke and Leia are born, but the Republic is no more, and Anakin is now in the service of the Emperor.  In short: Every glimmer of hope from Episode I has turned to shit.  In many cases, steps the characters took to secure the Republic in fact led to it's demise.

So what about real life correlations.  Unlike the Rebellion Trilogy, which was written specifically to protest the Vietnam War, the Republic Trilogy actually was not written as a direct criticism of any contemporary political events.  While the comparisons to the War on Terrorism are startlingly clear, Phantom Menace came out in 1999.  And while Attack of the Clones came out in 2002, most of the filming was completed in 2000, with reshoots in March 2001.  As for Revenge of the Sith:

 Before the movie was even released [to the public], people began making the connection between the War on Terror and Vader's declaration near the end of Revenge of the Sith, "You are either with me – or you are my enemy." Lucas, however, when asked if this was a reference to the War on Terror, said at the Cannes film festival, "When I wrote it, [the current war in] Iraq didn't exist. We were just funding Saddam Hussein, giving him weapons of mass destruction; we didn't think of him as an enemy at that point. We were going after Iran, using [Saddam] as our surrogate – just as we were doing in Vietnam. This really came out of the Vietnam era – and the parallels between what we did in Vietnam and what we're doing in Iraq now are unbelievable."

(Source)

For Lucas, this is the same kind of protest from the Vietnam era, just reassigned to modern day.  But I think the movies still manage to make specific criticisms of the early years of the War on Terror.

Episode I and II can be seen as an allegory between how we were September 10th, 2001 and how we were at end of that year.  There was peace.  We were careless.  We took security for granted.  Suddenly there was an attack and we responded in the usual ways, unaware of the deeper consequences.  Our army meant to protect peace proceeded to act more aggressively.  We tried to determine where the attacks came from, but were grossly misled, and what results turns a bad situation so, so much worse.

If Obi-Wan and the Jedi represents out military and intelligence agencies, Anakin represents our commitment to our core values.  The Patriot Act, the NSA, PRISM, Guantanamo were all actions taken to allay emotional feelings, but have since been shown to have had incredibly negative consequences.  If 9/11 and Al Qaeda are the Emperor (Slowly manipulating things, edging both sides towards conflict), then these agencies represent how we played into their hand, instead of staying true to ourselves.  Such is the downfall of Anakin, who allows a short-sighted desire to stop death to blind him to the long game of THE GALAXY.  Similarly, can we stop every attack?  No.  We can either accept that some risk has to exist, or we can sacrifice everything in a vain effort.  Of course, Padme still dies.  All for naught.

If The Rebellion Trilogy represents smallness overcoming bigness - an inspirational story meant to uplift us, the Republic Trilogy is a cautionary tale about corruption and naively seeking absolutes in a complicated world (galaxy?).  When we let our guard down, we risk everything.  Thinking from 2005 to 2015, the world does not feel safer, and the terrorists do not feel less dangerous.  Despite our best efforts, it feels we've only made things worse.

Analyzing the "Rebellion Trilogy"

This the first of a few posts I'll make in anticipating of The Force Awakens.  In this one, I'll discuss the overall themes of the original trilogy.

The original trilogy was about living on the fringe, fighting an evil that is completely overwhelming.  The first shot of A New Hope is a small ship fleeing a larger ship - a ship so large it eventually takes up half the screen (And the ship is called a Star Destroyer).  The Death Star: A space station the size of a moon with the ability to destroy a planet.  The entirety of Episode IV is about smallness overcoming bigness.  In every instance, smallness wins.  Where the Rebels are determined ("What good are stunt fighters going to do against *that*?", the Empire is arrogant ("Evacuate?  In our moment of triumph?")

Episode V is about every Rebel plan falling apart:  Hoth gets overrun; Han, Leia and Chewie get captured; Luke is drawn into a trap and loses his hand.  He also learns he is related to the man the Galaxy is meant to fear the most.  The Emperor rules, but Vader enforces.

Episode VI is about finally overcoming evil, defeating Jabba, destroying the Endor Bunker with the help of an overlooked native population, and destroying the second Death Star.  Most importantly, Luke ends the cycle of Jedi/Sith violence by refusing to kill Vader.  Smallness (and determined love) wins.

Star Wars was created during the Vietnam War (Though it wasn't released until 1977.  The war finally ended in 1975).  Lucas opposed the war, and the movies reflect this.  Here's another article on that.  The Empire was America, and the Rebels were the Vietnamese rebels.  It came out of a frustration that America was no longer a defender of peace as it perhaps once was, but was out to support its own interests and crush those who opposed it.  America was doomed to lose, despite it's strength, against those who were "right".

Star Wars had such an impact on America that Ronald Reagan took to calling the Soviets "The Evil Empire," as a way to rally Americans.  The end of the Cold War was even approached differently.  Instead of a big America trying to fight a big Russia, the struggle became portrayed as a morally right but small America against an overwhelming Soviet force.  "Tear down this wall" works into this model.  The idea was to challenge them morally, and use internal unrest to an advantage.  Even ramping up the arms race was more about economically exhausting the Soviets than militarily outdoing them.  In the end, the Soviets collapsed without an American invasion.  Like Luke Skywalker, we had broken the cycle of superpower violence.

Stay tuned for my analysis of the prequels.  Spoiler:  I really, really, really like the prequels.

When Honest Reporting Gets Corrupt

Honest Reporting is a website dedicated to pointing out bias in the media against Israel.  Presumably, they are on a campaign for truth and accuracy.  However, it is quite clear from this article that they are not nearly as interested in defeating media bias as they are in getting clicks.  As such, this is one of the most substanceless articles I've seen in a while.

If you don't feel like clicking on the link above, here's a summary:  During a story about "Syria and the Middle East," CNN used a map of the Middle East that did not show Israel.  Instead, the area was designated "Palestina."  Here's the map in question:



So, as Jews who have endured decades of cries that Israel has no right to exist, this should rightly concern us.  What happened?  How could CNN let this happen?  Luckily, we have Honest Reporting here to help us out.  But almost immediately the article uses some language I think we should question.

• "CNN Erases Israel From the Map" (This is the headline)
• "Israel has been wiped from the map..."
• "Whether it was an oversight or something more sinister, CNN's illustration of the Middle East without Israel is completely unacceptable."

Honest Reporting uses the phrases "wiped/erases from the map."  This is a very charged phrase, and I don't think it should have been used by a website attempting to fix media bias (unless quoting someone else, of course).  It only inflames its readers.

The idea that if "it was an oversight or something more sinister" should not be brushed aside so casually.  If CNN's choice of map was an accidental oversight, that completely changes the nature of the error.  But, as it stands, either CNN is part of a conspiracy, or even its forgetfulness is somehow malicious.  CNN cannot come out clean.

Let's back up a bit.  Maybe I'm being too harsh.  After all, Honest Reporting is a website that seeks to "Defend Israel from Media Bias."  It makes money on clicks.  All well and good.  Publications that can attract many readers deserve to be profitable, right?

But Honest Reporting does not make a habit of posting times when news organizations do a good job (because that's not interesting, thus fewer clicks), and when it finds errors it admits might have been a mistake (such as here), it resorts to inflammatory language to ensure readers are outraged (and thus causing them to share the story, thus garnering Honest Reporting more clicks, and more money).  Honest Reporting's business model is based on making it's readers angry (Or, more generally, emotional).

Here, let me get my soap box for one of my favorite phrases:  NOT EVERYONE CARES ABOUT ISRAEL AS MUCH AS WE DO.  Not everyone even cares at all.  Not because they are anti-Israel - they just have other things to care about.  South Sudan seceded from Sudan during a civil war.  Did you know that?  What are your opinions on this?  You probably have none, because you don't have family there, or a trace your heritage there, or whatever.  That's totally fine.  That doesn't make you anti-South Sudan.  It just means it isn't important to you.  If you used a map of Africa that didn't show South Sudan, you aren't anti-South Sudan.  You just didn't notice it because you didn't care (Google Map of Africa.  South Sudan is not on every map shown).

Did Honest Reporting send an email to CNN alerting them of their error?  Or did Honest Reporting post a story on its website, insinuate CNN was part of something sinister, and share it with its followers before giving CNN a chance to react?  If Honest Reporting was truly against media bias, it would have contacted CNN privately and waited 12-24 hours for a response.  If there was none, run the story as is.  They then at least could have said "CNN has ignored our attempts to reach out to them." If CNN fixed it but gave no written response back, or a lackluster one, then write a story that it happened, that it got fixed, but you aren't sure what happened behind the scenes.  Or, if CNN said "Oh you're right, our bad, someone wasn't paying attention," Then don't publish a story, because that isn't media bias.  That's just incompetence.   But that isn't Honest Reporting's purpose.  They aren't here to get rid of media bias.  They're here to make you angry about it.  Because then you share their stories.  And then they get clicks.

It's also important to note that CNN has since fixed this error (By replacing the map with a picture of a bombed out building in Aleppo, which in truth doesn't actually address the error, itself), but the Honest Reporting article has not been rescinded.  There is a note above the article saying it was fixed, but the story itself is still entirely intact.  This is because, and I cannot stress this enough, Honest Reporting wants clicks more than it wants to end media bias.  Because getting clicks is how it gets paid.

(I have reached out both to CNN and Honest Reporting with questions for them and, if they respond, I will update this post accordingly.  As of 6/12/16, neither have responded.)