End The Iraq War -- [My First Video]
About the Filmmaker | Reprint Policy
This is an experiment in multimedia. If the above video player doesn't work, you can access this video at the YouTube site.
While I am admittedly a slave to the written word, I have (twice) in the past suggested scripts for campaign commercials. The first of these was more fun to come up with, and had more vivid imagery in my opinion; but the second one may have proved to be more effectual as a campaign strategy, if it had actually been used.
Now, as I fully admit in both of these articles, I have no training in either the advertising world or the political consultancy world... so, therefore, I am free to honestly speak my mind. It's kind of refreshing, actually.
But I have now been goaded into "putting up or shutting up" -- and so I present to you this video as a multimedia "opinion" piece. Maybe it could be used as a campaign video, I don't know. But it sure was fun to put together. Maybe I should make more of these... again, I don't know. You tell me.
A lot of (actually, that should read: "the lion's share of") the credit for this effort belongs to Huffington Post commenter "CotyJarret," who did all the actual audio, video, and editing work. He's also the guy that goaded me into doing this project in the first place.
You may remember him from last year, when he wrote the only guest column I have ever run, about "The Rules," which also (incidentally) explains his desire to remain anonymous.
He recently convinced me that it would be a good idea to throw together short "issues" videos like this one, so we collaborated on the project. We kicked the ideas back and forth, but (as I said) he's the one who did most of the work, so he should also receive most of the credit.
All that having been said (hey, I did admit that I was addicted to the written word), I think the video clip speaks for itself.
Enjoy it, and let me know what you think.
Cross-posted at The Huffington Post
-- Chris Weigant
VERY good video...
I don't have the talent for that I wish I did, but if I did, I would surely point out the possible results of NOT spending 10 billion every month in IRAQ...
Maybe a US 9/11 every month...
Maybe a UK Airline terror attack every month...
Maybe a Spanish Rail Line attack every month...
Maybe a UK Subway Attack every month...
While it surely would be nice to be able to take all the money we spend on wars and defense and put it into our children or our health care programs, the realities of this world we live in preclude such idealistic tendencies..
It's the nature of the beast....
Michale.....
By the bi, I did read THE RULES and found it very interesting..
Especially the part (Rule Eight, I think) about not trying to redefine reality.
I believe I commented on that quite a bit during the 2006 Elections. How the Democrats were trying to re-define reality to make the populace believe that terrorism wasn't really a threat...
Great Minds think alike, I guess. :D No offense to CotyJarret... :D
Michale.....
10$ BILLION ,It was right to the point, if this don't make you think and open your eye's to reality, you need to reside in Iraq. I like the video and it should wake up some people. GREAT JOB !!!
Steve.....
Aw c'mon, it's only Ten Billion a month. That probably wouldn't cover the interest on credit card debt in this country (I guesses).
We're already in for 1 Trillion. At only 10 Billion/month we won't hit 2 trillion for another 5 years. which implies:
10000 dead Americans (directly, 912 is around the corner I'm sure which may claim another million or so)
200000 dead Iraqis
Less than two million wounded
A Decade of record profits for Halliburton, Exxon, Blackwater, KBR, Boeing, General Motors, Bechtel, Rudy Giulliani, The Bush Family, the Bin Laden family, the Rush Limbaugh family (OK, I just threw that in).
How do you spell bargain in Farsi?
I really think it's all about setting our sights on Iran, which will probably weigh in about 25 billion/month. Think of the bargain THAT will be.
Again, I have to point out...
Ya'all are so concerned about the cost of doing this...
But yet ya'all completely ignore the possible cost of NOT doing it...
It's easy to talk in the abstract... But when it's your life on the line or your family's lives on the line.....
Do you want to gamble???
Michale.....
> Michale wrote:
> Again, I have to point out…
> Ya'all are so concerned about the cost of doing
> this…
>
> But yet ya'all completely ignore the possible cost
> of NOT doing it…
>
It's a TREMENDOUS amount of cash down a black hole with the only benefit in that it is making enemies ... not a benefit in my eye.
> It's easy to talk in the abstract… But when it's
> your life on the line or your family's lives on
> the line…..
>
The 10 billion/month is CONCRETE, the notion that not spending it will be scary is ABSTRACT.
My families lives ARE on the line at this very minute in Iraq. And for what, to secure a parking lot in the green zone in case Cheney visits?
> Do you want to gamble???
>
No. Bring the troops home where they're much less likely to die in a terrorist attack. Bring the troops home where they're much better equipped to make a stand should terrorists foolishly try to invade. Bring the troops home. Bring my family home.
CWC
>It's a TREMENDOUS amount of cash
>down a black hole with the only
>benefit in that it is making enemies …
>not a benefit in my eye.
That's because you look at it with a partisan eye. You are not objective with regards to the events in question. Nor do you have a complete picture as to what is going on and why.
We know very little of the GOOD that is being done over there
>Bring my family home.
And what of the Iraqis?? Do we just say, "to hell with them, we're going to get our people safe and your people can just kill each other en masse."
It looks like the military are not the only ones to forget the lessons of Vietnam..
We broke it, it's our responsibility to fix it..
Michale.....
>The 10 billion/month is CONCRETE,
>the notion that not spending it
>will be scary is ABSTRACT.
That is exactly my point..
It's EASY to ignore the consequences, because they are abstract..
What will you say if the abstract becomes the reality???
What will you say is we see another 9/11 every other week??
"Oh my bust..."???
People who are pushing for a unilateral pullout really need to think about all the possible consequences of what that could mean.. And I just don't mean a Killing Fields for the Iraqis. I mean for us here in the US...
Michale.....
Michale wrote:
CDub wrote:
>>It's a TREMENDOUS amount of cash
>>down a black hole with the only
>>benefit in that it is making enemies …
>>not a benefit in my eye.
>That's because you look at it with a partisan eye.
>
Well I've had my say, and I don't have any need to argue, but I have to laugh at that 'partisan eye' comment.
I am not now, nor will I ever be a partisan (unless I get struck by lightning or my lobotomy fund reaches maturity). The only time I ever have to choose one party over the other is in the primaries where I'm not allowed to pick across party lines (which sucks).
My apologies, I didn't mean to make it sound like "partisan" was a dirty word.. :D
Consider yourself lucky regarding the Primaries... I am not even ALLOWED to vote in the Primaries... :D
Michale.....
Michale -
A while back, my state had one election where anyone could vote in any party primary. Then both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party sued the state, so they got rid of the law.
During that time, I read a newspaper article about hundreds of people spontaneously registering as a non-existent party: the "Rock and Roll Party." I thought that sounded pretty good to me, so I went and registered myself as such.
Unfortunately, with the laws back to the old way, I will have to register as a Democrat in order to vote in the Democratic primary next year. Sigh.
-CW
Hello Chris,
When I read this post, I followed your link "first of these" and it presented two scenarios so I jumped to the conclusion that I'd also seen the result of following your link "second one".
Later, on a fluke, I followed the second and WOW. I wish I were paying attention when you first posted that. I could have provided much of the footage using my handy dandy 3d animation swiss army toolkit.
The Cheesy 50's Space hero and the cheesier 50's special effect spaceship ... I love it.
If you think this could be revived for 08, let me know. I'd enjoy cranking out some supporting work. If you have access to images and supplemental footage, I can do post-production and original music to boot.
Really enjoyed that ... good stuff!