Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Kiefer Sutherland Presents Mouseland



You know Kiefer Sutherland as the star of hit television show 24, or the son of actor Donald Sutherland. He is also grandson of the founder of the New Democratic Party Tommy Douglas. The NDP is Canada's labor party.

Kiefer presents with the help of his grandfather's words and Mouseland Players, a valuable political lesson.

RENEGADE EYE

29 comments:

ddjango said...

Y'know, Kiefer's dad is a pretty cool guy. Kiefer, on the other hand, is either the best actor in the world, or a total psychopath. Jack Bauer scares the shit outta me - and Fox should die b/c of him.

Frank Partisan said...

ddjango: I'm sure this video, will give you a better impression of Kiefer. Remember he is an actor.

Graeme said...

This is great.

Anonymous said...

excellent little film. really liked the "MORON" from "MORE VISION." good comment on the nature of bourgeois political parties, isn't it? by the way, before the ndp, there was the ccf, the cooperative commonwealth federation (farmer-labour socialist) which formed a provincial government in saskatchewan back in 1944. oh, and for an incredibly creepy, chilling performance, check out kiefer's dad donald in bertolucci's 1900.

les

Larry Gambone said...

We inserted Mouseland in our neighborhood association blog around the time of the municipal elections. It really is a good educational tool. I was also fortunate enough to see Tommy Douglas speak in 1963 during the federal election campaign of that era. There is no one like him today. (He was also elected "All Time Greatest Canadian" in 2007)

Nevin said...

I can not understand for the life of me, why would anyone with very liberal/progressive opinions take part in a racist and sadistic TV program like "24"? But hey, money rules, I guess...

I utterly enjoyed Mouseland... it reminded me of Alex Jones latest movie the Obama Conspiracy...

Nevin said...

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7886780711843120756

Correction: Not Conspiracy... "Deception"

Frank Partisan said...

Anonymous: I'm a socialist with a hole in my pocket. I'd put 1900 on my top ten movies.

Nevin: Professional actors don't take jobs based on agreeing with the project. 24 is only a TV show. Some seasons were really good.

Larry G: It is a good learning tool.

Graeme: It is great.

Memet Çagatay said...

Hello Ren,

Thank you for introducing to us this revealing little movie that touches upon one aspect of the deception of elections in capitalist democracy. I don’t want to sound like a grumpy skeptical but on the other side, contemporary delusion about elections doesn’t reside on the obvious absurdity of mice that vote for cats, but on the belief that mice can make a difference by voting for fellow mice, rats, vermin, etc. I’m not simply proposing to absent ourselves from electoral process, but, the proper way for directly engaging politics is creation of the circumstances that might force the immanent political figures of existing socio-economic order to take particular decisions or might overthrow them altogether.

Anonymous said...

LOL! No comment.

ddjango said...

Ren:

I know he's an actor, but by playing Bauer, he's furthering a destructive, evil ethic.

Tokyo Rose was an actor, too, as is Nobama.

The ignorant public is more impressed by actors than by people of intelligence and integrity.

SecondComingOfBast said...

Ddjango-

Do you think actors should only always portray good, peaceful, mellow characters that would never harm a fly and would never entertain a harmful, hateful, or destructive thought? That would get pretty old.

By the way, have you even watched the show? Every time Bauer does something like that, he gets in some kind of trouble for it, even though there is usually a potential for massive loss of civilian lives.

He doesn't always come out smelling like a rose. He's had to go into hiding, and this season started with him facing prosecution for his "crimes" and appearing before a Senate committee to answer charges.

The show is asking the question, when is it okay to cross that line? No matter what you believe the answer is, it is a legitimate question to ask. It's not all black and white. That's the message of 24 pertaining to torture of terrorists. And that's what they are too. They are always people who have been caught red-handed doing something that is horrible, or attempting to do so. They are far removed from the term "suspect". Their guilt is beyond all doubt, the only question is, what do they know and how can they be stopped from killing usually tens of thousands of people, at least.

People that don't watch the show seem to assume that it's some gung-ho, super-patriot, "by God we're Americans and we have a right to do whatever the hell we want" kind of thing, and that's just not the way it is.

Bauer represents the kind of person who has to live the "reality" of the kind of situation where you have to make some times split second decisions. It's easy to pontificate from on high about it, but ask yourself, what would you do in that situation.

ddjango said...

PG:

pffft & oh, snap!

Peace

Frank Partisan said...

Mehmet Çagatay: In the US we have nothing resembling, a mass working class party. The Democratic and republican parties, are bourgeoise parties, representing two sides of one class. In America a mass labor party, would be our Russia 1917.

ddjango: I don't have a strong opinion of that show.

I think Mouseland, cancels out whatever doubts you have about him.

With Obama in power now, don't rule out Jack Bauer becoming more liberal.

Pagan: You drive me nuts, when you talk about Sean Penn. This is not Penn thread. We've been through that. Trotsky wrote book reviews. he admired some conservative writers.

FJ: Ducky should see this. You having no comment.

SecondComingOfBast said...

Ren-

Where did I mention Penn in this thread? Two different people attacked Sutherland for his 24 role, so I had to say something. As far as the film goes, its accurate, and unfortunately it will always be that way as long as people continue to insist on putting their faith and hopes in political parties-any of them, right or left.

Daniel Hoffmann-Gill said...

Commenting to go 'no comment' still counts as a comment, no?

Unknown said...

Good find, Ren. All the stuff PT says about the 'turrists' could be applied to our politicians. Let's start torturing all those *ssholes, as they are more dangerous to America than any terrorist.

Frank Partisan said...

Pagan: You didn't mention Penn.

Daniel H-G: I think no comment means, he didn't want to admit he liked the video.

Brother Tim: My senator is a moderate Democrat (shudder).

For Daniel this would sound ridiculous, but in the US, a labor party is a big deal.

SecondComingOfBast said...

"All the stuff PT says about the 'turrists' could be applied to our politicians. Let's start torturing all those *ssholes, as they are more dangerous to America than any terrorist."

You won't get any argument out of me.

ddjango said...

y'know, normally i'd just walk away from this, thinking, "ok, i've had my say", but i won't let this one go:

sutherland can choose who he works for and what roles he plays - the fact that he chooses to play bauer, in my opinion, largely negates other "good" things he might do

24 is propaganda and not-so-subtle indoctrination of the worst kind - sutherland has no excuse - he reaps financial benefits from this inhuman crap

sorry to be trite, but "you're either part of the problem, etc . . .", in spite of the dialectic - mouseland is a snide apology for his bigger sins

bauer become more "liberal" - keerist, ren - ,what the hell does THAT mean?

John Peterson said...

A valuable lesson indeed!

SecondComingOfBast said...

This Mouseland video seems to have been made some time before he started 24. He seems appreciably younger here, so no, Mouseland is not a "snide apology" (as if he has anything to apologize for). Jack Bauer is presented as neither a liberal or conservative. The character never mentions a political affiliation or philosophy.

He just does his job, and in the course of it does pretty much what any other person would do that has a pulse, and by the way a heart, and for that matter a brain when it comes to saving potentially millions of innocent lives.

Let's see here-Oh, this terrorist has just been caught trying to release a biological weapon into a crowded shopping mall, and he knows where a nuclear bomb is hidden somewhere in LA that is due to explode in the next seven hours. But I better not touch his toenails with a pair of pliers, that just wouldn't be cricket.

Bullshit!

Frank Partisan said...

Ddjango: I don't watch TV, and only saw the show once.

I remember when "24" started it was highly respected. The idea of the whole season being a day divideded into several episodes, was groundbreaking.

I recently saw a French movie called Paris 36 in the US. It had a socialist theme, and was pro factory occupation in prewar Paris. Some of the money to make it came from conservative Clint Eastwood.

I don't think actors should take parts, they only agree with.

Pagan: It's ridiculous to justify torture, particularly with an absurd hypothetical. The best technique is organized casual conversation.

SecondComingOfBast said...

Ren-

Those "absurd hypotheticals" are exactly what the show is about, it's not your everyday, well, we've got a terror suspect here, let's see if we can find out who and what he knows about secret plans we think somebody might be planning somewhere.

The whole point of the show is asking, when is it justified in doing everything possible to save tens or hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions, of innocent lives.

As for your point about organized casual conversation, I just don't buy it. In fact, it doesn't make a lick of sense. Think about what you're saying. "Casual conversation"? Yeah, okay, that might be fine if you're trying to get somebody to divulge say, if he might know where Bin Laden is hiding, or if he knows of any terrorist attacks imminent or the presence of terror cells inside the US.

But I guarantee you if a scenario such as what typically happens on 24 were to really happen, everybody would be Jack Bauer, and very few would complain about it.

Finally, all these agreements and treaties the US signed, I will remind you, were not signed with my participation or with my agreement or consent, so while the government might feel obligated to abide by them, I certainly am under no obligation to agree with it or support it. We can get ourselves out from under such onerous treaties fairly easily, actually, all we have to do is come up with evidence that nobody else actually abides by it. That, I promise you, would not be hard to do, if we really dug into it.

I'm reasonably sure the Geneva Conventions were signed well before the Bataan Death March, the Hanoi Hilton, or Nicholas Berg.

Nevin said...

ddjango, I agree with you....

Moussa Bashir said...

great video. true for most lands. especially true for lebanon. lebanon is mouseland...

online payday loans said...

The United Food and Commercial Workers Union made this animated cartoon based on a live recording of Tommy's famous speech. The cartoon is introduced by Tommy's grandson, Kiefer Sutherland.

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