Dinesh D'Souza's laughable embarrassment (review of his new movie)

[gollygee]

http://www.salon.com/2014/07/22/dinesh_dsouzas_laughable_embarrassment_a_review_of_america_imagine_the_world_without_her

If you’re reading a review of Dinesh D’Souza’s “America: Imagine the World Without Her,” the film isn’t for you. “America” isn’t a film to be considered; it is not even a persuasion piece. The argumentation, such as it is, is far too thin and weary to even properly earn the label of propaganda, and the entire project drips with a vaguely self-aware déjà vu. The audience “America” is intended for has seen all of its tricks before, in so many Bill O’Reilly “history” books and weekend Civil War reenactments, where good ol’ boys swinging Stars ‘n’ Bars roleplay a win Dixie couldn’t quite pull out in real life. It’s a movie designed to confirm the things a person already believes, with a little Rand Paul stumping thrown in for good measure – an all-time low of infotainment associations even for a dude named “Rand.”

(snip)

The lies D’Souza must disabuse us of, in order: First, that the genocide of Native Americans happened in relation to the conquest of their land; second, that African slave labor was exploited to build the American economy; third, that Mexican territories were conquered to form the U.S. Southwest; fourth, that U.S. wars abroad have involved imperial motives; fifth, that capitalism is bad. He goes to the trouble of listing these myths in text on what appears to be a massive parchment-esqe Powerpoint slide, and the structure of the film is a methodical treatment of each in turn.

The argumentation itself is bad, laughably bad. Native Americans were bad treaty-keepers who were already killing each other, the brutes, a claim D’Souza curiously follows up with the assertion that they all died of disease anyway – just naturally, just like that, out of nowhere. As for African slaves, D’Souza is content to point out that some whites were indentured servants and some blacks owned slaves themselves; in the wacky world of Dinesh, racism has no legacy, only a distant past. Were Mexican territories conquered? Yeah, D’Souza submits, but then he gets a Mexican-American to say that’s cool with him, and Ted Cruz shambles briefly on to bemoan the status of Texans under Mexican rule, which I guess coalesces into a weird unspoken just war theory. Watching “America” in an empty theater in Dallas (literally empty, only my husband and I on a Friday night) I couldn’t help but recall Ted’s stint as Texas solicitor general, a job he’d honored by trying to secure schools’ right to force the pledge of allegiance on kids, and wonder if I would’ve preferred Santa Anna instead.

As for U.S. wars abroad, D’Souza supposes the torture of a Vietnam POW in the Hanoi Hilton made the whole thing even, and glosses over Iraq and Afghanistan in a couple of slick asides: we gave them democracy! His discussion of American capitalism is even stranger and more schizophrenic, dashing between clips of Michael Moore and Occupy and alighting briefly upon a black woman who used to be on welfare but then got off it because her friends told her it was ungodly. She then muses that she didn’t even know there were churches while she was on welfare. Just didn’t even know the Christian religion had institutional meeting places, no idea what all those buildings with crosses on top were, and D’Souza nods gravely along: this is what welfare does, the viewer intimates.

[Gothmog]

1. This idiot has no talent

I have been surprised that conservatives think that this idiot is smart. This movie just confirms that he is a hack

[ck4829]

2. I think even he knows how bad he sucks

He also knows that as long as he says "Liberals... EVIL!", there will be a segment of the population that will smile, nod, and then buy whatever he is selling.