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Bob Barney Propaganda in Film Part 2Hi, Bob Barney for The Plain Truth today, brought to you by theplaintruth.com, the place to go tofind out what’s happening. And a two-part series this time is about political propaganda in film.It’s happening right now.You just don’t probably know it. It happens all the time. But also, what we’re studying here is the World War II propaganda films.And we’re not really going to mention this time around. Maybe someday I’ll do a five-part week series and go through the German propaganda, the Italian, and there really was no Japanese propaganda. And you will see just how inferior their propaganda was.But at the same time, you see that today with Russia, or you see it with especially Kim Jong-un of North Korea, when they see these people crying and, you know, worshiping in this guy, that he’s some sex pot, when he’s this fat little fat weakling that he is. It’s just almost comical to watch Chinese, Korean, Russian propaganda about their leaders because it’s just so easily seen through.Well, the same thing happened in World War II.German propaganda was awful compared to what Americans could do. But as Frank Capra said, we said it yesterday, as Frank Capra said, you know, when the truth is on your side, it’s very easy to have a propaganda film that works. Because when people see the plain truth, well, guess what? You’re going to change their mind from being a pacifist to a warlike person to defend yourself.I grew up in the 1960s and 70s. I started college at the University of Connecticut in 1973. I took this course in the winter and spring of 1976 in Storrs, Connecticut.It was a big assembly hall with a big movie theater there. And it was probably 150 to 180 students in the class. And we watched these movies.And then the professor would talk before, maybe 10 minutes before the movie and about a half hour after the movie. And it was a once a week class, but you got full credit because the class lasted for four to five hours every week. It was a Wednesday that I used to be there in Storrs and go to that class.And I really enjoyed it. And so this time we’re going to pick up mainly on the Why We Fight series. Remember, this was a series that wasn’t really made for the American people.It was made for the American soldier who really, they joined because of Pearl Harbor. They were mad for what the Japanese did. But all of a sudden, half of them, more than half of them, in fact,found themselves going to Europe and Europe never attacked us.So there was still a little cautious in the Army, Navy, Air Force of the soldiers and Marines and the Navy sailors and the Army Air Force people. What are we doing in Germany if it was Japan that attacked us? And it was a little bit like that Afghanistan, Iraq type deal. But these movies did their job.They convinced these soldiers and other movies like Casablanca and Mrs. Miniver, we talked about yesterday, convinced the American public that we had to stop what was happening because it would soon be at our doorstep. I’m going to pick up here with the first Why We Fight series, the war of Ethiopia and Manchuria and about how they present. Remember yesterday they presented the good guys, the United States, Western Europe, France, England.They tried to put Russia into this because they were our ally by then, but that’s almost like a joke because Stalin was worse than Hitler. But anyway, let’s continue now. We’re talking about the evil black side of the world then, the evil Germans, Italians and Japanese.So by the way, if you notice here in all of the three examples they gave here, the leader is saying, stop thinking and follow me. And you see this today in politics in America, you’re going to see it especially in Central Europe and Italy and maybe Japan. But you see this all the time, even in America, where people look for a man or a woman to solve their problems.They don’t look inwards to themselves. They don’t look to God. If you’re going to solve your ownproblem, well, I suggest you go to God.You don’t go to Donald Trump or Joe Biden or Barack Obama or whoever’s going to be on the political front in the future. They do not have the answers. Now, you can have good leaders, you can have bad leaders.We see this in the Bible with the book of Kings and the Chronicles, where you had a good king, then you had two or three bad kings, and then a good king. And we see this in America. I’m not an FDR fan, but FDR was instrumental in putting America into the war that he understood America had to fight because we were the world’s superpower and we could not sit it out.Because if we did, and all of our allies of World War II were conquered by Hitler or Japan, guess what? Then they would have turned their guns on us. And what would happen then? We would have no allies to help us. And he understood that.I didn’t like his political domestic policies, brought us near socialist communism. He did a lot of illegal acts as president, including, by the way, funding a navy in an army that nobody even knew about in Congress, but that’s another story. But I consider him a good king with some bad flaws.He was followed by Harry Truman. I would consider him a bad king, a little man syndrome king who absolutely screwed up the Korean War. Douglas MacArthur should have been listened to.We would not have the Korea we have today. We would not even have a belligerent China today if it was not for Harry Truman. And that’s the truth.If Douglas MacArthur got his way, there would be one Korea. It would be South Korea in the North as well. And China would have been under Chiang Kai-shek after the revolution.And the communist China would be gone today. And China would be 10 times the powerhouse. Think of Taiwan, that little island, that is Chiang Kai-shek’s little Formosa that became such a rich Chinese country, even though we no longer recognize it as a country.But that would have been democracy in the mainland China. And it would have grown 10 times more than it is today. But it would have been our ally and not necessarily our rival.But let’s go on with some more here of Prelude to War. And then we’re going to go on to some other episodes of the Why We Fight series. Each system was alike in that the constitutional lawmaking bodies gave up their power.The Reichstag in Berlin, the House of Deputies in Rome, the Diet in Tokyo. And these elected representatives became collections of stooges, rubber stamp organizations. Applauding on cue the words of the leaders.And by the way, that is what this Congress reminds me of. I hate to say that right now. But they will not stand up to Donald Trump.They will not stand up to what they know is right. And it reminds me of what happened here in World War II. You cannot allow any person any president having so much power that it goes to their head and they become a megalomaniac, number one.But that is not stopped. That is not what America is about. We have three branches of government equal and not one superior over the other.Now, the next movie we’re going to get into on the Why We Fight series is. So in the film Battle of Britain, and we’re going to go to the very end in the summary of the whole thing in this movie, one hour movie, England fought for their lives. Winston Churchill became the prime minister after 15 years of warning England against anybody wanting to listen to him, the danger of Germany.And finally, his predictions came true. He was the man who saved Britain. But this is how the Battle of Britain ends.The Battle of Britain was won, but not by Hitler. They’re showing Winston Churchill here in the film. Hitler had lost the battle.He had lost 2,375 German planes and their crews. For the first time, it was the Germans who ate the bitter dirt of defeat. Gone was the legend of their invincibility.For a solid year, the Nazis struck Britain with all their might. They leveled thousands upon thousands of homes and damaged millions of others. They killed more than 40,000 men, women, and children, and seriously wounded 50,000 more.But not one single Nazi soldier set foot on British soil. But Hitler couldn’t stop. And in our next film, we will show how he had to turn to the east again.Why did the Nazis lose the Battle of Britain? First, because a regimented people met an equally determined free people, and the free people made them quit cold. We’ve been bombed, dive-bombed, high-level bombed, machine-gunned, been through two invasions here. The last lot we had, we had the house down about our ears.But we’re still sticking it, and we’re going to stick it. Second, because this was a new kind of war, and the RAF were the men who could fight it. These were the men who belonged to what Hitler called those weak, soft democracies.The British did more than save their country. They won for the world a year of precious time. It was not only for the people of Britain, but for the people of the world, that Winston Churchill spoke when he said, Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.There’ll always be an England. And just for your knowledge about this, many Americans, by the way, pilots, went to and fought with the RAF even though America was not in the war. I was actually friends, a salesman, Hal Tyler at B&L in Fort Lauderdale back in the 1980s.I knew him. He, during 1939, was an American pilot who went to England to fight with the IRF because he knew America belonged in that war. He had the foresight to know that.And I just wanted to put that in and mention Americans fought in that war too for England, but not for our government. But they understood what was going on. The last one we’re finally going to get to, by the way, is the last film of the series, number seven, and it’s called War Comes to America.And here to the soldiers, Frank Capra is explaining why America had to be in this war. And we’re going to play some good excerpts about that as well. War Comes to America From New GuineaOn the barren shores of the Aleutian In the tropic heat of the Pacific island In the sub-zero cold of the skies over Germany In Burma and Iceland, the Philippines and Iran, France, in China and Italy, fighting Fighting over an area extended to the sun-baked plains of the Middle West, the cotton fields of the South, the close packed streets of Manhattan, Chicago, the teeming factories of Detroit, Los Angeles, the endless stretching distances of the Southwest, men from the hills and from the plains, from the villages and from the cities, soda jerks, mechanics, college students, rich man, poor man, beggar man, thief, doctor, lawyer, merchant, chief, now veteran fighting men.Yet two years ago, many had never fired a gun or seen the ocean or been off the ground.Americans, fighting for their country while half a world away from it, fighting for their country and for more than their country, fighting for an idea, the idea bigger than the country. Without the idea, the country might have remained only a wilderness.Without the country, the idea might have remained only a dream. Over this ocean, 1607, Jamestown. 1620, Plymouth Rock.Here was America, the sea, the sky, the virgin continent. We came in search of freedom, facing unknown dangers rather than bend the knee or bow to tyranny. Out of the native oak and pine, we built a house, a church, a watchtower.We cleared a field and there grew up a colony of free citizens. We carved new states out of the green wilderness, Virginia, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Carolina. Then came the first test in the defense of that liberty.1775, Lexington. Our leaders spoke our deepest needs. Colonists are by the law of nature free-born, as indeed all men are.It is the right of the people to alter or abolish it and to institute new government. These are the times that try men’s souls. But as for me, give me liberty or give me death.In the midst of battle, it happened. The idea grew. The idea took form.Something new was expressed by men, a new and revolutionary doctrine, the greatest creative force in human relations. All men are created equal. All men are entitled to the blessings of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.That’s the goal we set for ourselves. Defeat meant hanging. Victory meant a world in whichAmericans ruled themselves.1777, Valley Forge. We fought and froze, suffered and died. For what? For the future freedom of all Americans.A few of us doubted and despaired. Most of us prayed and endured it all. 1781, Yorktown.Now we were a free, independent nation. The new idea had won its first test. Now to pass it on to future Americans.The Constitution, the sacred charter of we the people, the blood and sweat of we the people, the life, liberty, and happiness of we the people. The people were to rule, not some of the people, not the best people or the worst, not the rich people or the poor, but we the people, all the people. In this brotherhood, America was born.One nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. We began as 13 states along the Atlantic seaboard. We pushed across the Alleghenies, the Ohio River, the Mississippi, the last far range of the distant Rockies.We carried freedom with us. No aristocratic classes here, no kings, no nobles or princes, no state church, no courts, no parasites, no divine right of man to rule man. Here, humanity was making a clean, fresh start from scratch.Behind us, we left new states, chips off the old blocks welded together by freedom. A land of hope and opportunity that had arisen out of a skeptical world. A light was shining, freedom’s light, from every country.So I want to interrupt here. It’s really good. I wish everybody can find this, but then it’s going to go move into the great American character of the greatest thing about American soldiers is the American spirit and the American character.We’re going to finish up with one scene from this movie and then I’ll wrap up this whole show. The blood of Americans has been freely shed. Five times in our history have we withstood thechallenge of the idea that made our nation.The idea of equality for all men, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The idea that made us the people we are. Let’s take a look at ourselves before we went into this war.Well, first of all, we’re a working people on the land, at the work bench, at a desk, and we’re an inventive people. The lightning rod, cotton gin, the telegraph, the blessed anesthesia of ether, the rotary printing press, the telephone, electric welding, the incandescent lamp, submarine, steam turbine, the motor-driven airplane, the x-ray tube, the gyroscope compass, the sewing machine,television. All these and countless more bear witness to our inventiveness.And this inventiveness and enterprise, plus our hard-won democratic ideal of the greatest goodfor the greatest numbers, created for the average man the highest standard of living in the world.Thirty-two and a half million registered automobiles, two-thirds of all the automobiles there are in the entire world. We demand the highest standards in sanitation, purity of food, medical care.Our hospitals are models for the world to copy. We want the best for the average man, woman, or child, particularly child. We have reduced the hazard of being born.From then on, we protect, foster, and generally spoil the majority of our children. But it doesn’t seem to hurt them much. They go to school, all kinds of schools.To kindergarten, public schools, private schools, trade schools, high schools, to 25,000 high schools, and to college. In the last war, 20 percent of all the men in the armed forces had been to high school or college. In this war, 63 percent.We’re a great two-weeks vacation people. We hunt and we fish, up north, down south, back east, out west. When the season opens, we hunt and fish, and we’re a sports-loving people.Music, we couldn’t be without it. Over 12,000 newspapers of all shades of opinion, books on every conceivable subject, and more than 6,000 different magazines, not counting the comics.Churches, we have every denomination on earth.60 million of us regularly attend, and no one dares tell us which one to go to. Let our freedoms be endangered, and we’ll pay and suffer and fight to the last man. That is the America, that is the way of living for which we fight today.Why? Is that fight necessary? Did we want war? Europe was far away. And as for Asia, well, that was really out of this world, where everything looked like it was torn from the national geographic. Yet, in this remote spot in Asia, in 1931, while most of you were playing ball in the sand logs, this war started.Without warning, Japan invaded Manchuria. The state made a most vigorous protest. The American government does not intend to recognize any situation, treaty, or agreement which may be brought about by means of aggression.But we, the people, hadn’t much time to think about Manchuria. We were wrestling with the worst depression in our history. Some of us were out of jobs.Some of us stood in breadlines. Some of us suffered homemade aggression. Some of us were choked with dust.Some of us had no place to go. Two years later, in 1933, while most of you were graduating fromhigh school, we read that a funny little man called Hitler had come into power in Germany.Bombed and killed, the American Institute of Public Opinion, known as the Gallup Poll, asked a representative cross-section of American people, if another war develops in Europe, should America take part again? No.Ninety-five percent. We, the people, had spoken. Nineteen out of twenty of us said, include us out.To further insulate ourselves, we added a cash-and-carry amendment to the Intelligentsia Act. Not only wouldn’t we sell munitions… Well, just to interject here, and by 1941, ninety-five percent of the people were willing to go to war with Japan, and about seventy-five percent with Germany and Europe. That’s how fast the American mind, popular mind, changes.A lot of it based on movies they were watching in Hollywood that they didn’t realize were propaganda films. A lot of it were also seeing the news, because now you had a lot quicker, better news on film, where they could see the destruction of the Chinese people, children being burned alive, children being bombed in London during the Battle of Britain, and dying, and women also dying in these attacks on civilians. All of this stuff started to work on the American people, where they believed, rightfully so in my opinion, that something had to be done, and America was the nation that could do it.It’s still the nation that could do it today, if we had the right leadership. The truth of the matter is, I know what’s going to happen to America. It bothers me, and it pains me, because I am a patriot,but I know what’s going to happen to this country.But the truth is, God is patient, and God is willing to allow us to continue as long as we put God first in our lives. And if we did so, we would see America come back to where it could be. We don’t need a politician.We don’t need any man or woman to lead us. We need God to lead us. We need, as a nation, to put our hope into God.And I’m afraid that’s not going to happen. But I can tell you right now, the plain truth is, if it did happen, we would conquer Iran, end them from having nuclear war. We would get oil and gasoline prices back down to 1988 levels, when it was 79 cents a gallon for gas.We could do all of that. God would do that for us. We could lower inflation.We could solve some of the world’s problems. We could lead by example, like we did under Ronald Reagan, when the world did look up to us. There was a time when the third world, Africa and Asia and South America, absolutely looked up to us.And that is not happening today. We are supposed to be a city on the hill, and we’re not. We are not the light of the world that Ronald Reagan talked about, that our forefathers envisioned, and that our history proved we were.I hate to say it, but I hope it could come back again. But I hate to say it. I don’t think it will.This is Bob Barney for The Plain Truth today, talking about propaganda films, what it means for us. Pay attention to what you’re fed. Pay attention to what you watch.Pay attention to the movies, the TV shows, and always understand, everything is planned of how you’re going to watch it. Everything is thought through. Don’t think things are spontaneous, because they’re not.There’s always a purpose. Some of the purposes are good propaganda, and some of the purposes are evil propaganda. Get to know the difference.Wake up. Smell the roses and see what’s going on for the battle of your mind. This is Bob Barney for The Plain Truth today.Thank you for listening. Until tomorrow. Bye-bye.