Sputnik Mania - must see doc

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Friday October 26, 2007 · 6:28 AM PDT

2007/10/26 · 06:28

It is an era that democrats would probably prefer forgotten.

Sputnik Mania was shown at an NYC doc festival tonight, and I highly recommend it.

The period parallels what we have now, but an inversion - an interpositive.

It all started when a a tiny satillite flew over the country back in the '50's.
Initially, people were in awe of the Russian scientists when ... we came to our senses and realized

this tarnished our God given chest beating rights as the greatest;

and more interestingly

the event morphed into a tool for politicians hellbent on unseating Eisenhower. (in this scenario the Democrats were screaming that we were about to be bombarded with bombs from space and Ike was too slow on the trigger. All coming from the mouths of the likes of LBJ, Humphrey et al. All scaring America shitless.

Naturally, the press picked up on it - and started beating their drums of alarm at how dangerously far behind we were.

Imagine this - this time the Republican president, Eisenhower, tried to tamp down the fear and pass off the satellite as not a big deal.

In no time, were were in a heated arms race, with Russia and the U.S. setting off a hydrogen bomb every 3 days.

Eisenhower had seen enough war. He was appalled. He kept reminding the country that the bomb money could be spent on things like education and poverty.

What was most interesting about the evening was the discussion with the director and Eisenhower's grandaughter. She is the spitting image of
her grandfather and absolutely brilliant. She continually reminded the audience that we cannot allow America to become gulled into destructive paranoia.

I hope that there will be a dvd issued that includes this discussion.

Also, in the movie, you'll get to meet Nikita Kruschev's son, who tells a pretty funny black joke.

I can't help but wonder if the right wing learned all this war mongering shit from the '50's democrats.

The filmmaker is David Hoffman BTW.

Link here
http://www.sputnikmania.com/

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