From: glass@adcalc.fnal.gov (Michael Glass)
Subject: "The Panama Deception"
X-Posted-Also: alt.politics.bush,alt.politics.clinton,alt.fan.dan-quayle
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Reply-To: glass@adcalc.fnal.gov
Organization: Fermilab, Batavia, IL
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Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 03:04:50 GMT

     I have long felt that there is a certain blood-lust which underlies
much Republican policy.  I recently saw a really neat documentary movie
about the invasion of Panama which supports the point.

     The movie is called "The Panama Deception."  You get to see such
goodies as Pentagon flack Pete Williams declaring that "collateral damage"
was minimized, followed by aerial footage of burned-out Panamanian
neighborhoods.  Despite a small a small number of gross scenes--such as
a body which had been run over by a tank, and Panamanians exhuming bodies
from mass graves--the thrills and chills come from straight documentary
material.  What the U.S. did to Panama is _really_ scary.

     Much of the footage, by the way, was obtained via FOIA from the 
Pentagon, because reporters were largely excluded from covering the
invasion.

     Some main points of the film were:

     -- The U.S. did a lot of damage to civilian areas.  A number
        of people testified that the U.S. soldiers evacuated their
        neighborhoods and then went from house to house, torching
        each one.

     -- Many of these civilian evacuees have not been re-housed.
        There is a moving scene of aircraft hangers divided up into
        tiny cubicles, housing >1000 people.

     -- The death toll has been estimated by various institutions
        at from 2500 to >4000.

     -- The U.S. buried many of these dead in mass graves, which
        our government continues to deny the existance of.  At least
        a dozen have been found already, and the film shows footage
        of fields of body bags being dug up and opened.

     -- After the invasion, the U.S. rounded up thousands of people
        (many by the surprise knock on the door method) and gave them
        to the Endara government for imprisonment.  

     -- Noriega's drug-dealing had nothing to do with it.  (No surprise
        here.)  In fact, the GAO now estimates that the current gov't
        is running more drugs to the U.S. than Noriega ever did.

     -- The 1977 Panama Canal treaty might have had a lot to do with
        the invasion.  The Endara gov't has decided not to support an
        army, and the 1977 treaty requires that the canal be defended
        by Panama starting in the year 2000.  Citing this contradiction,
        the U.S. is considering re-negotiating the treaty.

     -- All the above is denied by the U.S. government.

     Geo. Bush makes a number of appearances in this movie, in both his
role as sugar daddy to Manuel Noriega and as the president who ordered
the invasion.  By the end of the movie, when you have seen all that was
done, the sight of his visage just doesn't feel the same anymore.

     It's a damn convincing movie.

     I am posting this to several Usenet political news groups because
I feel that the invasion of Panama is missing from the current U.S.
political debate.  The invasion of Panama isn't ancient history--those
people are *still* refugees, the government down there is *ours*, our
administration which is still in office has done *nothing* to account for
it.  

     In Chicago, my home town, "The Panama Deception" runs through
Sept. 10 at Chicago Filmmakers, 1229 W. Belmont, tel. 312-281-8788.

     Other venues:

     Santa Monica  playing at the "Monica Fourplex."
     Seattle       playing at at the Metro.
     Minneapolis   opens Sept. 10th at "Film in the City."
     San Francisco opens Sept. 12th at the Roxy.
     Berkley       opens Sept. 17th at UC somewhere.
     San Antonio   opens Sept. 18th at the Crossroads (part of film festival)
     Portland      opens Sept. 18th at Cinema 21.

     "The Panama Deception" is by the Empowerment Project, 1653 18th St.,
Suite 3, Santa Monica CA 90404.

     These are not likely to be long runs, so hustle buns!


-- Michael Glass                |  These opinions are my own, of course.
   glass@adcalc.fnal.gov
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