The Good Shepherd movie

Yesterday I watched this movie for the second time, having a little more understanding these days of the people and events it portrays. Wikipedia introduces an article about it with a short paragraph:

“The Good Shepherd is a 2006 spy film directed by Robert De Niro and starring Matt Damon and Angelina Jolie, with an extensive supporting cast.

Although it is a fictional film loosely based on real events, it is advertised as telling the untold story of the birth of counter-intelligence in the Central Intelligence Agency. The film’s main character, Edward Wilson (portrayed by Matt Damon), is loosely based on James Jesus Angleton and Richard M. Bissell. William Hurt’s character, Phillip Allen, is largely based on Allen Dulles, while General Bill Sullivan, played by Robert De Niro, is loosely based on Major General William Joseph Donovan.”

——————–

Here are some taglines from IMDb movie publicity:

“Edward Wilson believed in America, and he would sacrifice everything he loved to protect it.

The true story of the birth of the CIA through the eyes of a man who never existed.

The untold story of the most powerful covert agency in the world.

All our dirty secrets start here.

Who is the good shepherd? The one who looks after his family or the one who looks after his country?”

The timeline of the movie is from Edward Wilson’s college days and recruitment to be a United States counterintelligence agent in the 1930’s, up to the early 1960’s and the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba – failed due to a leak somewhere in the intelligence community, according to the movie plot. In real life, the truth was somewhat more murky. From Wikipedia:

“A Crime So Immense, an article by James K. Galbraith, states that a previously redacted version of the Taylor Report on the Bay of Pigs Invasion shows the Russians did know the date of the planned invasion:

One of the great travesties of the Cold War surfaced on April 29, 2000 when the Washington Post reported the declassification in full of General Maxwell Taylor’s June, 1961 special report on the Bay of Pigs invasion. Partial versions of this document have been available for decades. But only now did its darkest secret spill.

Here is what Taylor reported to Kennedy. The Russians knew the date of the invasion (Therefore, Castro also knew.) The CIA, headed by Allen Dulles, knew that the Russians knew (Therefore, they knew the invasion would fail). The leak did not come from the invasion force; it had happened before the Cuban exiles were themselves briefed on the date. Kennedy was not informed. Nor, of course, were the exiles. And knowing all this, Dulles ordered the operation forward.”

If you don’t know what and why the Bay of Pigs invasion was, take yourself a little history lesson; look it up. Be prepared to have lots of questions unanswered, of course.  Here’s a link to the Wikipedia article about it, with references and links to others: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bay_of_Pigs_Invasion

Now, why am I including all this in my blog? Because “Observing / Listening / Meditating” about national and world events are high on my priority list of personal activities and interests these days.

I was a young adult when the Bay of Pigs invasion was attempted and failed. I read and heard all the stories the national media published, both newsprint and television. I didn’t believe the American people were being told the truth about it, and we weren’t.

But why should we have been?

The current US administration wants to nitpick, second guess, dissect and destroy the information-gathering work of our intelligence agencies. I can think of a reason or two, and they have nothing to do with preserving our way of life…

All in all, this is a good movie. Informative and thought-provoking, one I can recommend to anyone interested in US politics and current events. Here’s a link to one of the movie trailers: The Good Shepherd movie trailer.

Advantages of being invisible

Recently I attended a large political workshop in Columbia, held in the ballroom of a downtown convention hotel. Every county in the state was represented, some with several men and women there to be informed and trained in the latest conservative strategy and high-tech software.

During the lunch break I wandered around the room, observing the other attendees, listening in on several conversations, noting familiar faces and newcomers. Before joining the buffet line, I approached one of the seminar speakers to express my appreciation of his presentation.

Introducing myself, I was taken aback when he said, “Oh, everyone in this room knows who you are.” My automatic response was, “Oh, I doubt that…” but he just nodded and insisted, “Yes, they do.”

I was flattered by that comment; who wouldn’t be. Looking at his face, I knew that I knew what I knew, that he was a fellow believer. I asked him outright if he was a Christian and he said yes, then reminded me how we had originally met some years ago, over the telephone.

Thinking more about it since then, I have come to realize several things.

One, our conversations all those years ago had stuck with him. At the time I was assisting several political candidates in their run for office, offering database help, practical advice, a listening ear. He was one of my sources for information.

Secondly, it’s hard to be a right-wing, radical, pro-life, Christian political activist and remain anonymous.

Now, I didn’t attempt to be anonymous for many years. Tim and I believed that we were called to be missionaries to the world of politics. I did what I believed in my gut was the right thing to do, the thing the Lord wanted me to do, at the time and place and in the method he wanted, and let him worry about the outcome. I didn’t always know what the outcome was and that took some getting used to…

One outcome I knew pretty well, however, was being the target of flak. Name-calling, like “Nazi” and “Hitler.” Gossip. Rumors. Unfair criticism and outright lies. That also took some getting used to.

In the several years since Tim died, however, I’ve kept a low-key profile, not involved in much of anything publicly or politically. Becoming more or less invisible politically has been a pleasant form of retirement.

Watching, listening and discerning the gathering war clouds in heavenly places, I’ve been letting the younger generation deal with the main issues of the day. But over these months I’ve discovered how some members of the younger generation deal with issues. They socialize. They complain and they discuss, but they don’t fight.

And I’ve come to realize that even if they did, they wouldn’t use the essential weapons of this warfare, intercession, God’s word and gifts of the Holy Spirit. It’s as if they don’t recognize the kind of war that’s breaking out around them, much less know how to fight it.

Well, I’ve come to a conclusion. The use of those weapons doesn’t require a public face or a public arena. In this situation, invisibility has its advantages.

Bruce Springsteen Live in NYC with the E Street Band

Composed by Bruce Springsteen (original album Born to Run released 1 Jan 1975)

I’m sure many of my friends will be taken by surprise by this blog entry – the Boss wasn’t one of my favorites growing up, but like Bob Dylan he and his music are timeless. As one of a small group of teens growing up in the 50’s and 60’s I can tell you, this could well have been our theme song. Economies change, politics change, but some things don’t… in case you can’t understand all the words, here they are.

In the day we sweat it out in the streets of a runaway American dream
At night we ride through mansions of glory in suicide machines
Sprung from cages out on highway 9,
Chrome wheeled, fuel injected and steppin’ out over the line
Baby this town rips the bones from your back
It’s a death trap, it’s a suicide rap
We gotta get out while we’re young
`cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run

Wendy let me in I wanna be your friend
I want to guard your dreams and visions
Just wrap your legs round these velvet rims
And strap your hands across my engines
Together we could break this trap
We’ll run till we drop, baby we’ll never go back
Will you walk with me out on the wire
`cause baby Im just a scared and lonely rider
But I gotta find out how it feels
I want to know if love is wild, girl I want to know if love is real

Beyond the palace hemi-powered drones scream down the boulevard
The girls comb their hair in rearview mirrors
And the boys try to look so hard
The amusement park rises bold and stark
Kids are huddled on the beach in a mist
I wanna die with you Wendy on the streets tonight
In an everlasting kiss

The highways jammed with broken heroes on a last chance power drive
Everybody’s out on the run tonight but there’s no place left to hide
Together Wendy we’ll live with the sadness
I’ll love you with all the madness in my soul
Someday girl I don’t know when we’re gonna get to that place
Where we really want to go and we’ll walk in the sun
But till then tramps like us baby we were born to run

What is it about vampires

Henry Fitzroy. Mick St. John. Edward Cullen. Modern-day vampires, hits at the box-office or on the small screen. One by one I have purchased the DVD’s and books, watched and read, and discovered a new twist on my time-tested favorite detective shows. I sort of like these vampires.

Now, Edward Cullen isn’t a detective, he’s one of two main ‘teen-age’ characters in “Twilight,” a lengthy sci-fi / romance serial derived from four best-selling novels. The second movie of that series is due out this fall and I’m sure it will be just as big a hit as the first.

The “Blood Ties” Canadian television series is about a detective, although Henry isn’t the private eye at the beginning, that role was a non-vampire human being named Vicky Nelson, former police detective, present private investigator. It also features a male police detective, Vicky’s former partner, now rival to Henry for her affections.

This series lasted two seasons and could still have been at the top of the TV ratings, had not some network executives had a brain freeze and pulled it. There’s an ongoing project by their thousands of loyal fans to bring it back. I wish them success, I’d like that myself.

In “Moonlight,” a TV series on CBS, the vampire Mick St. John was indeed the private detective. That one lasted only one season but it could certainly have survived and thrived in a second, or third. That one was more of a mystery show with a sci-fi flair and really appealed to me too.

Now HBO has started yet another vampire story line, “True Blood,” in its second season. The title refers to an artificial blood that vampires can drink instead of the real thing – it supposedly comes in handy bottles like cola drinks.

The creators of the show have gotten really smart in the marketing line – they’re planning to put out a for-real soft drink called Tru-Blood (blood oranges, not actual blood) later this year. I’m sure it will sell like crazy.

This series is set in Louisiana and is a bit too everything for me. I’ve started to watch some episodes but didn’t get all the way through some of them. Too much graphic violence, too much X-rated stuff. The characters are okay, but the story line isn’t anything like the others.

I’ve wondered what it is about vampires that attracts so many people to read and watch. The supernatural element, of course, like with the X-Men movies.

The supposed eternal nature of the vampire? It’s certainly magnetic. I believe that desire is built into the human soul, the desire for eternity. The romantic, misunderstood “hero” quality of the main characters in these story lines makes them quite attractive too, of course.

Whatever the attraction, for people who say this is all make-believe, all imaginary, I have some advice. Don’t laugh at those who believe.

Just hope and pray you don’t meet one of the truly bad supernatural beings that inhabit this planet. They’re not all as friendly as Henry, or Mick, or Edward.

Gone

"Achievement of the Grail" tapestry by Edward Burne-Jones, 1891-4

“America as I knew it growing up is gone, and I don’t think it’s coming back.” I wrote that back on May 22nd. It bears repeating.

Some people I know resemble a frog being boiled. You put a frog in a pot of cold water, gradually turn up the heat, and he’s cooked before he notices anything amiss. Some folks  gripe about things changing for the worse, but other than complaining they take no action about it. They certainly don’t seem to be praying about it.

A couple of months ago I stopped watching Good Morning America and began watching old television re-runs instead. For many years I had read my morning newspapers and eaten my breakfast to a backdrop of ABC’s morning news, but finally I just couldn’t take the drivel any more.

To be honest, I couldn’t take the Fox morning shows either – all that saccharine and sanctimony was nauseating. Even to me, a radical, right-wing, conservative Christian activist it was too hard to digest with my morning toast and coffee.

I also stopped watching the evening news shows on any channel. Too much slant, too little hard news.

Now, for many years I have used news programs as prayer guides and encouraged others to do the same. It’s still an excellent idea. Prayer is still needed, but now I read far more news from many sources online without having to listen to it.

And the news I seek these days isn’t usually included in the morning shows or evening shows. Earthquakes, floods, meteor strikes, famine, fires, oddities in the natural disaster realm. Political, military, socioeconomic and religious items from other nations, some of whom are certainly not our friends.

I see an interesting developing pattern, threads of many colors and dimensions running through news articles and opinion pieces.

Some years ago I worked in the Admissions office at Francis Marion University. Lunch hours were spent on a bench under a tree, reading a book or magazine while I ate a sandwich. Sometimes I used my spare time to pray for people and situations.

One such day I was praying when I suddenly saw in my mind’s eye a large tapestry being woven. Brilliant and muted colors of threads, some thick, some thin were being fitted together from every direction, gradually creating an image – Landscape? Cityscape? I don’t remember.

Because then the tapestry was turned so that I could see the back. Here there was no discernible design, just tangled threads of blues and greens, gold and silver – every color and every shade of color, but no pattern.

And I knew without a doubt that this tapestry represented the world and its relationships, people, places, times and events. The earth and the world, natural and supernatural. The vision faded after a while, but the memory of it has never faded; all these years later I can still see it clearly.

As I read reports from the four corners of the natural earth and reports from the pages of the scriptures, again I see that tapestry being woven.

What most of us see in current events is the snarled mass of threads, the back of the tapestry. We don’t see the final image, the intricate design being worked. But an intricate design is being worked.

America has been part of that design for well over 200 years, longer than most forms of government historically last. I suspect that God’s purpose for America’s creation wasn’t altogether what we’ve thought it was, and the next stage in its life-span may not be what we’d want it to be.

Whatever it has been and whatever it will be, praying over the news is still a very good idea.