Discussing the nature of the US Empire and how it got to where it is today with most US residents is always a challenge. Recommending books explaining it is equally so. This is especially true when one considers that most people who live in the United States have little or no concept of what an empire is and, when explained to them, are reluctant to believe that their nation is such a thing. I have often thought that someone should make a film that might accomplish this educational goal. After all, film is simultaneously informative and entertaining, especially when it is well made. That is the case with radical documentarian Scott Noble’s (Rise Like Lions, Psywar, Lifting the Veil) latest effort, The Power Principle.

Made in three parts, with each one totaling about an hour and fifteen minutes, The Power Principle is a history of the United States and the building of its empire. The emphasis is on the last seventy years of that history. It includes original footage from film and television news broadcasts, lectures and commentary from champions of the empire and its critics, and a pastiche of other images culled from cultural, technical and propaganda efforts representative of the time and subject covered. The result is a remarkably detailed, clearheaded, and engrossing study of how the United States power elites created the mess we find ourselves in. Furthermore, this film makes it clear that in the eyes of the elites, everyday citizens are little more than pawns to be manipulated in the elites’ drive to control the world.

There is a lot of history to be covered when discussing a topic as broad as the growth of the US Empire. Even a film four hours long can only begin to explore that history. To his credit, Noble does a great job picking important moments of US history to describe and analyze. By doing so, those historical moments bring forth more than the moments themselves; they exhume their motivations and effects, thereby a historical timeline that provides the viewer with a clear sense of how history is shaped by humans and how humans shape history. Noble’s highlighting of particular documents and individuals furthers that understanding.

Key to the hypothesis presented in The Power Principle is the relationship between the US war industry, Wall Street, the US military and the government in Washington. The interlocking relationships between corporations like Lockheed and presidential appointees like Warren Christopher point to the connections between war and Wall Street in a very personal way. So do more personal relationships such as the marriage of Dwight Eisenhower’s personal secretary to an executive of the United Fruit Company. Other graphic reminders of how few families and corporations run the United States are also discussed: Kermit Roosevelt’s role in overthrowing the popular Mohammed Mossadegh of Iran; the friendly relations between US bankers like Prescott Bush and the German Nazi regime; the hiring of certain Nazis after World War Two by the United States; the reinstallation of fascists into government in Italy after the war to prevent the rise of the communists; and so on.

The middle segment of the film is titled Propaganda. It is an interesting and unnerving look at how everyday people are manipulated by the powers that be. One of the key statements in this section is one from Senator Andenberg, a Republican from Michigan whose career prior to politics was in journalism. It was his resolution of June 1948 that is considered the foundation of NATO. Andenberg always understood that NATO’s purpose was to maintain and expand the growing US empire. He also understood that the people of the United States were reluctant to become the world’s policeman, especially so soon after the carnage of World War Two. With this in mind, he told colleagues that the only way to convince US citizens to expand their military and become an imperial nation was “to scare the hell out of” them. That has been the essence of Washington’s line to its own citizens ever since.

The third segment provides a discussion of the US Empire in the post-Soviet age. Key to this discussion are two things: nothing changed as far as the military-industrial complex was concerned and the agreement between the two political parties over empire is stronger than ever before. In other words, there is no difference in the way US foreign policy is conducted no matter which major party’s candidate wins the White House. Additionally, the presence of the US military in civilian life has never been greater. A brief interview with left editor and thinker Michael Albert concludes the film. He presents the possibility of a different world where the Empire is dissolved and the military-industrial complex is transformed into building things that benefit mankind. Unfortunately, the overriding conclusion of The Power Principle is that such a scenario is both necessary if we are to survive as a speices and unlikely unless the current system is removed.

If I were a high school or postsecondary teacher hoping to get my students to consider US history in a different light, I would show this film. Not only does it rearrange the common understanding of Washington’s role in the world, it also forces the viewer to reconsider how their understanding of that role is manipulated and misused. Certain to provoke reactions both positive and negative, Scott Noble’s most recent film is meant to disturb the general complacency of the body politic. Help spread the word.

Ron Jacobs is the author of The Way the Wind Blew: a History of the Weather Underground and Short Order Frame Up. Jacobs’ essay on Big Bill Broonzy is featured in CounterPunch’s collection on music, art and sex, Serpents in the Garden. His collection of essays and other musings titled Tripping Through the American Night is now available and his new novel is The Co-Conspirator’s Tale. He is a contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion, published by AK Press. He can be reached at: ronj1955@gmail.com.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/06/08/american-empire-the-feature-film/

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Scott Noble is the director of several acclaimed and politically charged documentaries, including Psywar, Human Resources and Lifting the Veil. His documentary on Occupy Wall Street, Rise Like Lions, took the #1 spot on Films for Action’s Top Ten Occupy films. His latest, The Power Principle, takes on the American empire, with emphasis on the Cold War period. We sent him a few questions. Here are his responses.

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Your film “Rise Like Lions” charts the history of the Occupy Wall Street movement. What drew you to Occupy?

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Well, I should probably begin by stressing that my opinions are likely to be more “radical” than much of your readership. The Occupy movement is made up of a very diverse crowd, ranging from “liberals” and “libertarians” who desire to reform the system while keeping most of its institutions intact, to “radicals” who wish to completely transform the institutions themselves. I fall into the latter camp.

Ken Knabb, author of “The Joy of Revolution”, has called Occupy “the most significant radical breakthrough in America since the 1960s.” One can hope. The important thing is that people are beginning to come together, on an international level, in search of a new society. Whether in the future these various movements fall under the name “Occupy” is not of much significance. The fuse has been lit.

The response by “authorities” has been telling. Rebecca Solnit at Tom Dispatch described the Occupy evictions as “maximum sub-lethal force on sleepers in tents, mothers with children, unarmed pedestrians, young women already penned up, unresisting seated students, poets, professors, pregnant women, wheelchair-bound occupiers, and octogenarians. It has been a sustained campaign of police brutality from Wall Street to Washington State the likes of which we haven’t seen in 40 years.”

More –

http://soldiersforthecause.org/2012/05/23/the-power-principle-an-interview-with-filmmaker-scott-noble/

7 pm

CSUMB University Center, Seaside

RISE LIKE LIONS

(Scott Noble, 2011, 97 min)

Occupy Wall Street and the seeds of revolution in its own words.

A 5 minute film on Occupy Monterey will also be shown at this event.

Speakers: Panel with local Occupy-ers

Sponsors: California Faculty Association, Students for Quality Education

Just imagine what could become possible if an entire city had seen just one of the documentaries below. Just imagine what would be possible if everyone in the country was aware of how unhealthy the mainstream media was for our future and started turning to independent sources in droves.

Creating a better world really does start with an informed citizenry, and there’s lots of subject matter to cover. Our country has to come to terms with the true history of the United States. It has to learn about basic ecology. It needs to understand some basic truths about peak oil and the monetary system, the truth about capitalism and governments.

Our society needs a new story to belong to. The old story of empire and dominion over the earth has to be looked at in the full light of day – all of our ambient cultural stories and values that we take for granted and which remain invisible must become visible.

But most of all, we need to see the promise of the alternatives – we need to be able to imagine new exciting ways that people could live, better than anything that the old paradigm could ever dream of providing.

And all of this knowledge and introspection, dreaming, questioning, and discovery is essential for a cultural transformation that addresses root causes. This knowledge is vitally necessary. Taken together, this knowledge, which is documented throughout the 100 documentaries we’ve selected below, will lay the foundation on which the next paradigm will be built, post empire.

So take this library of films and use it. Host film screenings, share these films with friends, buy and give copies to your elected officials and school faculty. Get this information out in to your community and you will be laying the foundation for a local movement for mass societal, environmental and economic change.”