Unclear and Present Danger - Sneakers (feat. Mike Duncan)

Episode Date: May 14, 2022

On episode 15 of Unclear and Present Danger, Jamelle and John are joined by Mike Duncan (Revolutions podcast, “Hero of Two Worlds: The Marquis de Lafayette in the Age of Revolution”) to discuss the delightful 1992 thriller Sneakers. It’s a movie about a tech mogul who hopes to stage an information revolution and, not surprisingly, John, Jamelle and Mike discuss the internet, social revolutions, and the challenge of building something out of nothing.Our logo, as always, is courtesy of the great Rachel Eck, who you can find on Instagram.Contact us!Follow us on Twitter!John GanzJamelle BouieMike DuncanLinks from the episode!New York Times front-page for September 11, 1992Sneakers Computer Press Kit“Marxism and Politics” by Ralph Miliband

It's not about who's got the most bullets. It's about who controls the information. Anybody want to shut down the Federal Reserve? Hey, don't screw around with that thing. It's all about the information. So it's a codebreaker? No. It's the codebreaker. Battle stations. Do you have the item?

Can you guarantee my safety? Where is the item? Can you guarantee my safety? But you've got trouble. Here, maybe this might help. A old buddy of mine who was in Desert Storm sent it to me. First was on the other side. Now give me the box.

Maddie! I'm an excellent marksman, woman. I'm cross. Get the fire escape at the end of the North Corridor. Go directly north. Directly north of our third line. Five seconds. Hang out, fish.

Hang up. They've almost got us. THEIRMANILEEN SULLIV. Welcome to Episode 15 of Unclear and Present Danger, a podcast about the political and military thrillers of the 1990s and what they say about the politics of that decade. I'm Jamel Bowie. I'm a columnist for the New York Times Opinion section. My name is John Gans. I write for Gawker, and I'm working on a book about American politics in the early 1990s. Today we are talking about the 1992 thriller Sneakers, directed by Phil Aldenna. Robinson and starring Robert Redford, Dan Aykroyd, Ben Kingsley, Mary McDonnell, River Phoenix, Sidney Poitier, and David Stray Thurn. Here is a very quick plot synopsis when shadowy US

intelligence agents blackmail or formed computer hacker and his eccentric team of security experts into stealing a code-breaking black box from a Soviet-funded genius. That's a very long sentence. They uncover a bigger conspiracy. Now he and his sneakers must save themselves in the world economy by retrieving the box from their blackmailers. This movie, which you should watch before you listen to us talk about it, is available to rent or buy on iTunes and Amazon. Now, before we get started, we have a guest. Joining us is the great Mike Duncan, host of the Revolutions podcast, an author of a really

terrific biography of the Marquis de Lafayette, a hero of two worlds. Mike, welcome to the show. Thank you very much for having me. Welcome, Mike. Thanks, man. So, Mike, back last year when John and I announced that we were doing this podcast and we're talking about it, you reached out to me and you were like, if you guys watch sneakers, I would like to be on your sneakers episode. So. This is true. So here you are. on the Sneakers episode. And my question is, why Sneakers? Sneakers is just one of those movies.

Sneakers isn't the best movie that I've ever seen in my life. Like, I'm not going to get in some argument with people about it being the best movie that's ever made because it's not. But it is on the list of just my favorite movies that I can put on at any time and watch it. You know, I think I saw it for the first time, like my dad brought it home on video. So I was like 12, you know, I was probably 12 or 13 when it came home. So it's like coming off the new release rack when I saw it for the first time.

And I've just been watching this movie off and on for like 30 years now. And so I've probably, I've probably seen it 25, 30 times because it's just one of those movies that I can always have on in the background. If it ever came on on TV, it's just like, well, I guess I'm just watching this because that's what I'm going to do. So yeah, that's what it is. It's just, it's in my little sort of stable. of movies that I have a great deal of personal affection for. And so, yeah, man, this came out. And I did say, if you ever do sneakers, which is in the wheelhouse, you know,

that's definitely got a little, you know, post-Cold Warry stuff going on in the background. Please do think of me as someone who would like to come on and has been preparing for this podcast, literally his entire life. John, you're a big fan of this movie, too, right? Oh, yeah. I have a very similar story relationship with the movie. I mean, I rented, my sisters and I rented this and we were, when I was young, it must have just come out.

And I've seen this movie dozens of times. It's just a real blast. It's a, it's a really fine thriller. I think it's well written. It's funny. It's, you know, I was seeing it, it kind of got not so hot reviews when it came out, which I'm pretty surprised it, but I think it's aged pretty well, even a little, you know, it's a hacking movie in large degree

and I think, you know, the technology is age, but for some reason that kind of only adds to the charm of the film. And kind of watched it, you know, with new eyes this time to kind of get more of the social and

political content out of it and I noticed some interesting things that kind of flew under my radar before. But yeah, I mean, this is just a, this movie an enormous amount of fun. I love it. It has very nostalgic, cozy associations for me. I'm always happy to watch it again. And it never seems to get old. I think this is like when we

were talking about doing this podcast and the vibes of the movies we were talking about like sneakers was definitely like along with Hunt for Rattovers like one of the, you know, the ones that they were like most characteristic of the genre for me. Yeah. No. So I agree about the vibe this movie has. I'll say the first time I saw this movie was like two years ago. It's very recent for me as far as something I've seen. People have repeatedly said to me that you need to see sneakers. And it was only basically during the pandemic where at the beginning of the pandemic when I said, I'm going to go ahead and watch it.

I was, I loved it when I saw it. And I was also shocked preparing for this discussion at the bad to mediocre reviews. The reception, I'd say, was generally positive, but, you know, Ebert gave it two and a half stars, which is sort of fine for Ebert. Vincent can be at the times, really did not like it. And that's sort of the complaints for that it's formulaic, that the, you know, there's all these big stars, but they don't necessarily give like super memorable performances that there are a lot of cliches. But I don't know, from the perspective of 2022, I think that this, the performances in this movie are totally fine. I just watched the latest Marvel movie or whatever. The new Doctor Strange, which came out this past weekend, not to date the podcast, but that's what I saw.

And I, you know, the performances and sneakers are just like way better than anything you'd see in one of those big Hollywood blockbusters. and I think that there's something about, and this is the case for this entire genre of movie, it's precisely because they don't really make this kind of movie anymore. The budget on this was $23 million, so a pretty modest budget for given the stars, given everything. It did extremely well. It kind of grossed over $100 million on that budget. But this size movie, this sort of like relatively low scale, kind of high stakes but like the stakes aren't really the point kind of movie just doesn't get made anymore if it does it goes straight to streaming it's not really a theatrical release and

on that level I see nothing to sort of complain about it's sort of like this is great if this came out if a movie like this exact same plot um exact same you know everything the same obviously the actors wouldn't be the same but kind of same tenor of actors if that if this movie came out today, people would lose their goddamn minds. They would love this thing. Well, I think some of it, just the sense that I get looking back on it, is when it came out, because the cast of this movie is insane. Like, it is, it's a murderer's row of, of, of famous really high quality actors. And none of them, none of them give like their best performances, right? Like, nobody's going to be up for an Oscar for this movie. But every single, like, every single person

who is playing any kind of speaking role is such a high quality of actor that the floor on the floor on these performances is so high and they're clearly having a good time while they're doing it that if you walked into this and was like oh my god this is a movie

with Robert Redford and Sydney Poitier and James Earl Jones is going to show up you might maybe your expectations were elevated a little bit and you were like okay well it wasn't the high highs of something that maybe they could have done but you look back on it

and it's just it's so rock solid like the writing of it the delivery of it, the performances are also rock solid, that I think it ages far better than maybe, yeah, what people thought at the time, because I, too, was surprised, because I expected to be like, five stars, you know, this is the greatest movie that's ever been made, because that's what I thought when I was, you know, 12. No, it has aged, it has aged remarkably well, and I think that does have to do with just, like, the, I think it has to do with the script, like, the writing is clever and intelligent, and just that the actors are, as you say, they're kind of, you

giving, they're all great actors, but they're kind of giving journey men performances, but even then, you know, as Jamel was saying, it's, it's better than whatever. Yeah. And nobody's, nobody's phoning it in. No. Like, even if everybody's there just to get a paycheck, like, they're clearly, they're doing the work. And you can tell how much fun they're having, like the chemistry with everybody, with everybody else. There's no bad chemistry in the movie. Yeah. So before we move any further, we have to look at the near time. front page for the day this movie was released. It was released on September 11th, 1992. Not a not a fortuitous September 11th, obviously, but still, you know, kind of funny

all the same. John, do you want to do want to take this? Yeah, sure. Okay, so let's see what we've got. This is a very 90s, generically 90s, New York Times front page in a certain way. the big headline is about Israelis to close talks with Syria on steps to peace. Of course, we know that Israel and Syria never made peace. A lot of things that look like they were going to happen in Middle East peace in the 90s never really came to fruition. UN will add NATO troops to Bosnia force. The Yugoslav civil wars or the, I don't know if that's what you're supposed to call them anymore,

but are heating up at this period. the U.S. is starting to get involved and the United Nations is trying to put peacekeepers there, which didn't end up really preventing anything. Vowing a revival president sets out his economic plan. Bush is, this is the last stretch before the election of 1992. Bush is pretty much looking like he's sunk at this point and is sort of trying. The economy is not doing, the recession is ending with the economy is not doing well. And Bush is, kind of trying more tax cuts and things like that to get people

to vote for him. Contradiction in testimony as New York Pam Clears officer. There was a shooting in Washington Heights in upper Manhattan that caused some rioting in New York and this was

the beginning and this was obviously this was after the Rodney King riots in Los Angeles but There was similar but smaller riding after this incident in New York. And it was sort of the beginning of an era of police brutality, before Giuliani was the beginning of an era of police brutality in New York. And Ferraro and Fo's Clash Over Ethics is about the New York Senate campaign,

which is, you know, a little obscure at this point. And yeah, those are the big, that's the top of the fold. and yeah, it's not exactly too much stuff is completely relevant to what we're talking about here, but they can't see a very good sense of what, I don't know, an average New York Times headline when there wasn't a giant imminent crisis going on in the world look like in this era. These are the issues in foreign policy and domestic. Yeah, I mean, the only real thought I have is that the headline about Bush is just useful. and reminding people that he, you know, he lost, I mean, he pretty much lost because of the

economy. And I know that that's sort of, I'm not sure if that's conventional wisdom anymore, but it is what happened. And I think that the extent to which Bush's defeat in Clinton's victory has less to do with the, you know, I think the appearance of a third party candidate and more to do really with these like basic fundamentals is a little, a little under, underrated. Yeah, it's a complicated question. I mean, I think that those things are actually connected, as the case turned out to be. The appearance of the third party candidate was only possible because of the economic situation, I think. and the popularity of it.

And it was sort of, you know, I mean, this is what I'm not going to give too much away or monopolize the time, but sort of what I'm arguing in the book is that there was a bit of a low-key crisis at this point where both economically and ideologically, the country was really a mess. And I think that the economic situation and the emergence of the third party were sort of part of the same process, which is what you'll have to read about when I finally finish my book. I mean, I think we'll probably end up talking about it, too, very soon since we have falling down on the docket.

And I feel like we keep on teasing this, but falling down is sort of very much the movie that captures so much of this period of U.S. history. It is much less reactionary than you might think at first glance the movie. Yeah, that's true Okay, Mike, do you have any thoughts before we move on? No, we can move on from that. I'll wait to read John's book to find out if he thinks whether Bush or Clinton would have won had Perrault not gotten into it, like where that energy would have gotten into if Perrault had like bailed and not actually gotten into it.

Yeah, my opinion on that makes people very mad, I've found, so I'll leave it. Well, all right, we can, well, who do you? you think would have won? I am of the older, I sort of am of the older school that Perot did help Clinton a lot. And even though there was an economic crisis, Bush's incumbency would have gradually probably brought him over the line. and Perot

hurt Bush and shook up natural constituencies naturally more Republican constituencies and tore and the Republicans did a lot of work

to get them back in 1994 and a big story of Gingrich is sort of getting the Perot voters back through his

his sort of bomb-throwing populist form of conservatism so I know you're not supposed to say that anymore everybody says oh Clinton would like Clinton would have won without parole and they took they took voters equally from each other but I just don't quite buy that I got to tell you yeah I didn't I didn't know the

convention you can my head my head my head my head my head my head my head my head's been 150 years ago in the past I haven't like gone back and I just know it from my own like experiences and I just take it for granted that Bush would have won that absent per John, when your book comes out, I'll host an event with you, and we can argue about this. Okay, that sounds wonderful. I'm looking forward to it. Okay, sneakers. So, we're not going to go through the plot, you know, knots by notch.

I just wanted to start what, you know, what are everyone's thoughts on the movie as a piece of kind of post-Cold War media? Like, this movie is funny because it's much, I mean, it's very much a heist movie. it's very comedic it's not sort of there's not that much intriguing it's very light on its feet but i do think there are things here uh here and there that are interesting to unpack and think about first among them uh being that robert redford's character is kind of like a new left radical type yeah exactly i was going to bring that up yeah that that's like the okay the first scene in the movie which you know um shows him and his friend cosmo as on a college campus in the 60s and they're doing some early version of computer hacking

and screwing with all these, you know, establishment institutions. And yeah, he's a new left radical. He's sort of implied to be kind of like on the SDS weather underground kind of politics and, you know, has this very, you know, anti-system politics. He goes out for pizza. His friend gets arrested and he kind of disappears. he becomes one of the you know this classic trope of the weatherman who you know kind of wasn't hiding for for 30 years or 20 years uh and then kind of like recreated a new life for themselves um a role that i think robert has played in other movies um and i guess he's got the look for it so he that was interesting um political context to the movie that goes back into the past

a little bit and you know this is another I know we probably say this too much but just like another side of the boomer experience here which is that you know this guy was a new left radical

he kind of wasn't exactly disillusioned but now he's in business for himself you know he became he became an entrepreneur and using he's kind of like not exactly the same as the Silicon Valley story, but I mean, this takes place in San Francisco area, Bay Area, but it's kind of the same story about the, about the Silicon Valley

people, which is like they were anti-system and hippies and new left people, and they channeled that anti-bureaucratic and creative energy into this new business endeavor. So he's kind of like, kind of like a Silicon Valley entrepreneur, not a terribly successful one, but he's a guy who does like hacking and security work. So that's kind of an interesting piece of cultural and political history that's like in the background in the movie. Where did you guys think about that?

Well, in terms of like its position as a Cold War movie and a post-Cold War movie, I think it might have been the first post-Cold War movie I ever saw that was dealing with these kind of like because there's a little bit of spy stuff that goes on with Greg, you know, the ex-spy where he's like, you know, this is very amazing times for people. Yeah, the ex-KGB guy.

And it's, you know, everything that all the movies and all the movies that you guys have talked about on the show so far, they were sort of like in production before the Cold War actually ended. So even though everybody, like all of it is like, these guys are very tired, they're going through the motions. Like there's not really any ideological conflict anymore. This is the first movie that I can remember coming across

like in my own just like life. where they're openly acknowledging, like, this is post-Cold War. Like, the Russia and the United States are now officially friends. Like, I can, you know, we can talk to each other out in the open. We don't have to lie to each other anymore. They're sort of going through what it means, you know, going through all these books of like the former agents that they tried to turn. But like, some of that just, it doesn't even matter anymore. And he's just like, was it this guy?

Was it this guy? Yeah, we tried to turn him in 83. But none of that matters because kind of the Cold War is over, even though we still spy on each other. Right. And so it still goes on. So this is like because it came out in 92 and obviously got in there at a certain point where, you know, I would have seen the hunt for a road October right before this, let's say, which is another movie I've seen about a bajillion times. And that's still very much a Cold War movie. And this is this is not that anymore.

We are decisively moving into this post-Cold War world. Right. Yeah. I think that that's exactly right. And I think it deals with some of the ambiguities and confusions of that, obviously, what you were mentioning. But I think it also deals with what this generation is trying to make sense of the world and trying to, like, you know, do good help. And how does that work in the modern information economy? I think the movie is actually weirdly prescient about certain things, even though, like, it's definitely a movie about the past.

in multiple ways in the boat that it's about the 60s in a way or the fallout of the 60s or what people did after the 60s. But it's also kind of like the movie is about the future in the sense that, you know, information, the exchange of information, manipulation of information is, you know, the movie makes a big deal that this is like the future, most important thing that will control the world in the coming age.

And, you know, I thought it was interesting that when I watched this movie a long time ago, I always assumed, you know, basically Robert Redford's character was still, even though he was kind of like cynical and doing this for business, he was kind of still, you know, the real idealistic guy, like a little bit of like Rick and Casablanca sort of figure where he still kind of has, holds a torch. for his idealistic side. And Cosmo, his friend, who he turns out, he thought died in prison. It turns out he's still alive and he turns out to be the main villain and antagonist in the movie was, you know, like this Silicon Valley millionaire now would be a billionaire

who had created this empire. It is like, you know, sort of a teal or a musk or a Gates or a Steve Jobs kind of figure where he's, he's, you know, extremely powerful and rich now, but he kind of still has the eccentricities of the era that he, you know, he came, you know, he came into his own in. But, you know, I always thought that this guy, that Cosmo played by Ben Kingsley had some, like, selfish motive, but he actually wants to use this. So the movie centers around this box, which can decrypt

anything. They discover that this mathematician has created this electronic thing that can decrypt anything. And he wants to use it to destroy, like to kind of do this like fight club-esque destruction like destruction of property.

He's still more radical than his friend who in the end, well we can talk about that later. So I thought it was interesting. I always, I misinterpreted the movie. I was like, oh this guy is like selfish. He wants this box to, I mean, I guess maybe it's possibility he's lying, but he has some kind of like evil communist almost plan. No, we need to talk about Cosmo's revolutionary program at some point in this. Yeah, he's like, I'm going to use this and we're going to destroy, like, we're going to get, we're going to do property.

We're going to destroy property. And the thing is, I was just going to say just, and then I'll like is, you know, he, he. he when he's lying he's I don't think he's lying about the idea like what he plans on doing with it because he gives the cynical answer I'm just I need this box to protect like my mob my mob business that I'm running in and Robert Redford's like I don't believe it and he's like yeah it's good to see it's good to see you again man because you get this all right all right well I was going to say we should talk about Cosmo's revolutionary program because it is okay it does amount to sort of he wants to he wants to wipe out I guess private property He wants to end kind of the, you know, I guess by eroding all private limits and information. He hopes to sort of, you know, erode all limits on property for the sake of what? I'm not entirely sure. But then this also gets to what's interesting about the fact that these two are former new left radicals. It kind of speaks a little bit to the critique of the new left.

Yeah. So his friend is sort of the reformed and reconstructed one. who is now a nice reformist liberal who knows how to work within the system. And he's still, even though and Cosmo, even though he's become this fantastically rich, you know, kind of Bond villain's figure,

is still kind of holding the torch for the old, you know, the old really revolutionary, ideals of the 60s he gives a wonderful I mean one of the best parts of the movie and I think like kind of like weirdly deep is the part where he gives his monologue to Robert Redford about like his worldview and it's just like again it's it's highly prescient about certain things it says I can't remember all of it but basically he says and I have I have a piece of it here because so they created a floppy disc for this

movie which they sent out with the press kit and you can find this floppy disk still on Archive.com which it launches with a DOSC emulator which I love and there's part of Cosmo's speech in it and he says there's a war out there

a world war and it's not about who's got the most bullets about who controls the information what we see and what we hear how we work what we think it's all about the information and basically he just he says everything is about perception and creating perceptions, markets are based on this. And then, you know, like, now we have all this never-ending conversation

about disinformation and misinformation and, you know, the epistemological crisis basically that they make the internet goes through. And it's all there in Ben Kingsley's monologue to Robert Redford. And, like, you know, the movie is very light and not, you know, not pretentious and, you know, it's worldview. I was like remarkably intelligent reflection on the world to come in that moment. And the way it finally gets dealt with is, well, Robert Redford manages to steal the box back. And he gives it to the government. He gives it to the government. He gives it to Jamesville

Jones, who's the NSA chief and kind of reprising his role as CIA director from Hunter October in a certain way, but with conditions, right? So he says, we know you're going to use this domestic spying because they want this to decrypt you know but like we're going to we're going to as good as good liberals we're going to make sure that you you're doing some good too so like the deal it offers is like basically that you know like yeah we know the government does this thing but we are going to use the box to make them give money to the united negro college fund and to all these other things that happen in the end so it's like the movie is very much suggests that you know like you know, reformists, you can start, you can leave the 60s behind, you can start your own

business, and you can still, you know, we can still stand up to the government and still reform and do nice things. We don't have to be radicals anymore. In a way, it's like very much the hope of the 90s there and 90s neoliberalism there. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And I think, you know, like you say, this, this movie is very, very prescient. about what the post-cold war world is going to look like. If that sort of defined everybody's worldview up to the 90s and then the 90s where this sort of like scramble to not to sort of figure out what's going to go on, if anybody,

anybody who hadn't seen this movie who's like a millennial, like a post-millennial or anybody, are going to look at this and be like, oh, yeah, this movie basically nailed what life is like now, which is it's all about the information. It's all about controlling information, controlling perception of reality. But the thing is for, so for Cosmo, though, that controlling of the information is a means to his ultimate end, which is this, this kind of, you know, extremely revolutionary program. And like you say, it, you know, it prefigures what, you know, fight club is going to be sort of try to get to in the end, which is he, he started out as a true

believer, clearly, you know, like Robert, like back in the day and when Robert Redford says, man, this wasn't, you know, this wasn't a journey that we were going on. It was a prank. It was a way to meet girls, which I've never been entirely clear how sitting in a room with just one other dude was a great way to meet girls by punching numbers into it in 1969. I think there were probably better ways to meet girls in 1969 than being a phone hacker. But Robert Redford, I'm assuming always did quite well for himself. But so all of this sort of it's about the information and controlling the information is to get to what they talk about in in the room in Cosmo's office, which I think is really like the heart of Cosmo's character.

where he's saying like what what can I do with this can can you crash currency markets can you crash money markets can you crash small countries right I can bring the whole system down I can destroy all records of ownership there will be no more rich people and no more poor people just like we always talked about because money is the root of all evil right and he actually does he gives this really nice little bit where he's like you know we do throw money at problems it's not that it's not that as a country or as a culture we don't you know we talk about how many things are underfunded and that's a reason why they're failing. But there's lots of things that we do throw money at and nothing seems to get done about it. So he's just like, he basically

has this like money is the root of all evil concept. And if he gets control of the box, then he can go forward and he can crash the entire system. And, you know, as I was watching it this, as I was watching it this time, I'm like, now that I've done like all of this sort of like, we've done like 19th century revolutions for me in doing the revolutions podcast. Like this is a very like, Blanky kind of mentality, right? Like Cosmo is a Blanquist and the idea here, and if you're not into this, you know, listeners of the show, you know, there's this spectrum of like revolutionary principles and practice where some people are really focused on what the end state of the revolution is going to look like and they're really focused on building utopias and like what is the ideal society going to look like. And then sort of on the other end of the spectrum, you have people like this guy, August Blanky, and, you know, Bakunin to a certain degree who's an anarchist. like, we just need to crash the system. And it's the system that's holding everybody back. And it's

the system that is preventing, you know, generosity and fellow feeling and communal living. And if we can just destroy the state, destroy the bourgeois economy, then there will be this sort of spontaneous flourishing of human goodness and happiness and communalism. And clearly like, you know, the script itself, this is a nice little caper flick. And so they're not going to go deeply into what he's thinking, Cosmo never gets to what happens after he does this because he's really, really fixated the way that Blonkey was and the way that some revolutionaries can be. If we can just destroy the system in its entirety, then everything will be fixed. And that's clearly what he's aiming for here. Like, when you listen to what he's talking about, you know, he's he has

humongous ambitions. He's a bit deranged. He's obviously gone a little bit crazy. But he is, he's the idealist here and Robert Redford Robert Redford has wound up in this kind of like he's we see Robert Redford you know give money to a homeless guy and so he's still compassionate but he's still a bit cynical he's like what are you talking about like that's you know that's not what we were supposed to do and and Ben Kingsley is like no but I thought I thought that's what we were going to do we're going to

save the world we're going to fix the world so it really is go ahead yeah I mean like to a certain extent like Robert Redford's character is sort of a son of a bitch in a certain way because he left his friend I mean if you read the movie from a radical perspective he left his friend in the lurch

he his friend went to jail he didn't right and then he his friend still stayed true to his principles he did not and he's like kind of the cynical like I think it actually kind of adds a little depth to his character which is that he's sort of like

this this cynical you know, he kind of betrayed his friend in a certain way. I mean, I think there's an aspect to which his, you know, Cosmo feels betrayed by, you know. Well, just to be clear, though, man, the very first scene, Cosmo duplicitously sends Robert Redford off to get the pizza, right? It's not, Redford's not, Redford doesn't just bail on him. Like, he's like, I fooled you with the little trick. And then he, that's why he wound up eating shit for him. That's true.

So we're supposed to think that Cosmo's. as a villain because of that tricky behavior which you know who knows maybe that should tell us that maybe he won't keep by his you know he just wants the box for himself for whatever megalomaniacal purposes he has

but yeah he got but when he sees the cops come he just leaves I mean I guess what are you supposed to say would go to jail but like he didn't drop the dime on his friend or anything he just disappear so yeah I don't know there's something slightly not coward

but but avoidant about Robert Redford's character in the movie and you know I think that that's like one criticism of the people who left the new left and kind of re-entered mainstream society started businesses became entrepreneur so on and so forth you know and then they tried their best to say no you know through various ethical business practices or social causes or giving money to you know NGOs and so forth contend like no like we never really abandoned our principles

we found more practical ways of getting them done do we believe that I don't know but it was the 90s it was the 90s man what's funny just what's a little interesting

about that about that trajectory for certain new left radicals is that the the maintain our principles part still includes a hostility to the state, right? This is sort of how you get some, you know, some center-left buy-in, right, on the neoliberal project because it's the idea is that you can achieve some of the goals of your, you know, radical past, of your principles of creating more economic opportunity, of social change, by getting the government out of the picture somewhat and sort of like harnessing people into the

market, which is actually the thing that can liberate people from, you know, whatever hierarchies or, or what have you. Right. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And like the, like, so basically, I mean, there's one really great line in the movie where, you know, Martin says to cause, you haven't gone crazy on me, have you? And Coswell replies, who else is going to change the world, Marty Greenpeace?

And, you know, like, which was a very popular cause at the time. But yeah, basically, that's his criticism of the whole, you know, world view of the type of liberal or post-new-left guy that Robert Redford turned out to be. You know, I think at the end of the movie, they use the box to give money to a bunch of different charities and NGOs. Let me think. I think there's a list of it somewhere. Yeah, well, the Republican Party is bankrupted. Yeah, they banked. Well, there was plenty of money in our bank account last week, you know, and then they just put other people aren't going begging.

Right. They, they, right, exactly. The Republican part, this is the kind of utopian thing at the end of the movie. Yeah, we bankrupt the United Party. We'll bankrupt the Republican Party and we'll give the money to worthy causes, which is basically where they, oh, yeah, Amnese International Greenpeace, actual Greenpeace in the United Nico College Fund. I don't know if it's a bank that they still use the box. They have the box because he took the processor out or, you know, they did. So he still has it.

But the, yeah, because they give all these conditions the NSA, which I guess they're not, they're not in a condition to make good on because they've disabled this decryption machine. The whole theme of this description machine is kind of fascinating in itself because it's like, we have the thing you know everyone's like well there's no signifier there's no ideal there's no whatever you want to call it that makes the world make sense anymore and this movie kind of posits it literally as a box you know like like this is the post cold war machine which will like can can decode can literally decode we have the decoder box of the whole you know that can make that is the new center of power for this world

So, and I think that's an interesting fantasy in itself. It's like, you know, we live in a very chaotic world where there's no central sources of information anymore, no, you know, consensus about even reality. So the idea that there is like a literal box that could do all this work, you know, like a mathematician decoded, you know, decoded everything, I think is an interesting and hope that the movie has, but obviously one that I think is. a little bit. Yeah, again, it goes the same thing with the politics of the movie. It's just like,

look, we have a box, and with this box, we can move money from the Republicans to Amnesty International and all the good things. And that's all that we need to happen. So it's like this very modest, reformist, yeah, the movie, I guess, is about modest reformist.

Because with this box, with this box, they could launch a nuclear war if they wanted to. They could literally, do, yeah, they could literally do anything they wanted and what they're doing is like some fundraising events. Right, right. So I do see that. Yeah.

I mean, there's a scene in the movie when they first figure out what it is and they're kind of like kind of realized the horrible power of it because they're like breaking into the, they realize it allows them to break into the air traffic control systems and the power grid. It's a wonderful scene. I mean, a lot of this, the movie like builds a lot of attention and, uh, suspense and the way it uses the score and everything. Yeah, and I think that, oh, there is also online dating in this movie. Absolutely, there is.

Yeah. So, yeah, I think it's interesting the movie kind of is like, yeah, there's this, first of all, we have this tremendous power. Second of all, we should just use it to create like a very nice, peaceful redistribution of resources from the Republicans to various NGOs. not necessarily the most imaginative politics in the world. But I guess it's kind of the limit of the way people thought about politics in the 90s. It was, you know, we're going to support all these different humanitarian endeavors and we'll work it all out.

Right. There was no, I mean, at least in terms of mainstream liberalism, there was no sense that there was an alternative, right? sort of the Cold War is over, democracy is one, capitalism has won, or at least, you know, whatever sort of, you know, modestly regulated capitalism is one. And so future social gains are going to just occur within that broad context. And so our happy liberals who are our protagonists, they envision, you know, satisfying their principles for doing the right thing. As, as you say, John, you know, giving, giving some cash here and there to a few worthy causes. I wanted to say as well

that there's something I mean, the movie doesn't really deal very much with the internet, although there is that reference to online dating in which Mary McDonald somehow gets matched with Stephen Tobolowski, God bless him. Everybody in this movie is so good.

Yeah, they were very well cast. Passport. Yeah. But in this funny way, I mean, in this funny way, the internet is that box, right? Sort of like this thing that enables the unprecedented dissemination of information, the ability to sort of transform social relations within a society, et cetera, et cetera.

But at the end of the day, what is the internet kind of used for? It's used for very sophisticated advertising algorithms. That's sort of like what did it. exists to do. That's what it is. Yeah. All they took, they have all that information and all they do is use us to sell us like steak knives and like cars. And socks. It's crazy. Right. Well, I mean, that's the, maybe the best of it. I mean, speaking of which, this is sort of a Palantir, I mean, the whole idea of Peter Thiel's Evil Company Palantir, like that comes from Lord of the Rigs is like this, what, stone that you could look into and see what else is going on in the world. Right. Saruman has a,

It has a globe. Yeah. An orb. It's an orb, which he contemplates. So, yeah. So he, like, that fantasy, I think, of a all-powerful information clearing-house is such a boring work. But all, you know, some way of seeing through all of the information and having it all makes sense is definitely something that, a fantasy that still, you know, captures these. sort of tech oligarchs as, as, like, a possibility, yeah.

I think, I think, too, like, as somebody who did grow up, like, as the internet grew up, right? And I was sort of, I was along for the ride as with each successive step, is that all through the 90s, the internet really was treated as this liberatory technology, that it was, that it was, and this is the theme of the movie, right? Too many secrets is the theme of the movie. And there's not going to be any secrets anymore. and this is sort of like the secret key

to how we're going to set everything free is that and I think that coming right out of the Cold War when everything was still like secretive and spies and espionage and you can't really you can't, you don't know who to trust that during the 90s you know it was going to be great we were going to have access to total information

everybody was going to have all the information that they needed there weren't going to be any more secrets there wasn't going to be any more places for corruption to hide and I think that for like 10 or 15 years that was really you know the digital front of the internet was a place of freedom and a place where where freedom was going to be truly discovered. And then we're now 15 or 20 years beyond that sort of really idealistic phase of the internet. So it's everybody, we're also cynical about the internet now. But when it came

along, it was very, there was a great deal of idealism that you can see in the way that they talk about it and think about it. Yeah. I mean, like, so I actually have some personal, this movie maybe inspired it, but I was actually, when I was young and it was the late 90s and early 2000s, I was really interested in, I was never talented at it, but I was interested in computer hacking and I read computer hacking magazines, I went to computer hacking conventions and meetings and so and so forth. And it was, you know, there was a political aspect to it, which was basically that it was very much like the ideology of sneakers in a certain way, which is, you know, the big governments and the big companies are holding back the, you know, actual utopian potential

of the internet. And it's up to this merry band of raiders who are sort of, you know, Robin Hood kind of figures to, you know, liberate the potential of free information. And we're fighting against, you know, the foam company and fight, which was the old ethos from the beginning, which seems so so quaint now of the phone company as the biggest evil like AT&T was the most evil thing

of the world and I realize now looking back at it I was like kind of into something that had already passed like this movie in the sense that it was like

a form of hacking that had already gone by like the internet was already too advanced the total the consciousness was based around fighting the phone company is an oppressive the government

I mean, this is still an issue, but the government agencies, the NSA's surveillance and information gathering was big. But yeah, it was a very new left ethos in the sense that, you know, big bureaucracies from the faceless corporations like AT&T and the government were basically the same thing. And, you know, it was our job to like, as merry pranksters to kind of like screw with the system, you know. and and it was outdated already then in a way and you know it's it's interesting to think about it but like now you know and there's a several movies from the year including hackers which comes out a little bit later which is even more explicit about it than than sneakers but yeah that that vision of politics and activism if you want to call it that was very attractive but it was like has kind of I mean, there's anonymous in groups like that, but kind of fail. Like, hacktivism as an idea, you know, it's not really, doesn't make a whole hell of a lot of sense in the world that we live in now. I mean, I'm not even sure it made sense at the time for the simple reason that what exactly

are the politics of it, right? There's no, you, you liberate information, you take down AT&T, you take down the man, but like, what are you actually organizing society for? right uh nothing there's there's there's nothing there's no vision there right that's just sort of i guess the idea is some sort of spontaneous as you said as you said mike referring um to the the 19th century revolutionaries you know there'll be this spontaneous uh uh goodwill of man that that comes forth people were organized themselves uh into something but that's you know i i'm personally skeptical that that kind of thing happens but even if you even if you think that's what's

going to happen. There still needs to be some sort of program for envisioning the aftermath of your informational victory. And there's just, there's nothing there. And this is what, you know, it happens with Cosmo in his vision for things, which is, I think, something that was being passed around in the 90s in that way. That is if we can just liberate all the information. Like if we have true free speech and true freedom of information, then of course all problems will just start to naturally dissolve themselves because there are structures that are blocking us from getting at the right information and doing things. And then all so all we want to focus on then is destroying what's holding us back. And when you do

that, as you said, Jamel, and just if you're listening to this and you happen to be a budding revolutionary, you should really think about what happens next. Right. And think about how things aren't going to change, think about how things are going to change. It's never enough to just completely crash the system. And what's interesting, and I'll say one more thing, though, is that I could very easily, as you were talking about, like, what you were doing with, like, it's kind of a hacktivist thing in the 90s, I could very see, very easily see this movie being remade today, where Cosmo and Robert and Martin are those people, like those early internet pioneer hackers, and now they've gone their separate ways. And Robert Redford realized that there wasn't anything in it. And Ben Kingsley was like, no, man, I'm still trying to do it, man. I'm Peter Thiel.

Like, I'm doing all of the things that we said we were going to do. Yeah. And who you work for again there, man? I mean, sort of in this, like, the funny thing about that is that if you were in this remake, right, for Cosmo, for the Cosmo, for Bing Kings's Cosmo, there's still this, I guess, potential that's something that's positive could come out of all of this. But if you're going to remake it, like, Peter Thiel is actually just like a villain. He's just like, he's like, yeah, I would, yeah, Peter Thiel's not the best example. But I mean, I kind of think that that's where this ends, right? Sort of that's like Peter Thiel's, you know, vision of this sort of like, you know, this, this ultra-libertarianism or

whatever it is. Yeah. I think it's actually pretty natural progression from where Cosmo is. yeah well i think basically i have a couple of things to say about that so part of the reasons why my experience in the computer hacking world was politically frustrating or a dead end or whatever was that um it was political and coherent it was like you had some like left liberal kind of new left sympathetic people some people kind of vaguely Marxist politics um and then you had a lot of libertarians right and these people you know like it was a mixture these two ideologies you know like kind of sort of saw eye eye some things but not other things they were both

you know their idea of what freedom of speech was and what free information was was very different um and yeah as you were saying jemel where does where does this kind of absolutist libertarian end up i mean like so teal began as a libertarian And his little philosophical crony, Curtis Jarvin, also known as Menchus Mulbug, was a libertarian. And they go from this kind of libertarianism and they go through the steps and then they end up, they end up with authoritarianism. They're like, well, the logical result of this way of thinking about liberty is that actually we should have total control. um and you know yeah so it's like there's no there's no actual i think it's free because there's like no it's too individualistic and not in a in a like it's too atomized right so it's like

everybody at their computer and it's very hard for those people to come around and like come to a single cause because they don't even have a single shared reality really like like everybody the reason why like workers revolts were a thing is like everybody's on the factory floor and they're piz that the foreman who's you know tormenting them and they know how much it sucks right they all have a shared reality right and and their solidarity is built on experiencing a shared reality among you know everybody on their computers they don't have that shared reality and like it the fun of it becomes about fucking with one another shared reality and trying to manipulate it and then you know Ultimately, like, it leads to a kind of tyranny of one where you're just like, look, I want to, like, I want to be totally egotistical and decide what is the world.

And for me and others, it's not, there's no, it doesn't generate solidarity. It doesn't generate, um, a shared worldview. It generates like these atomized individuals who's, who, for whom total liberty and being completely. completely the master of their universe and the domain of the same thing, right? It's not like, oh, we're sharing in a project, so I need to give up some power and another person can have some power because, like, this is the way cooperation works. So it's like, there's something fundamentally defective, I think, about it, the whole social setup that's, like, not, like, going to lead to a revolution,

at least in the 19th century way that Mike is familiar with. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, what I would say, like following right up on that is if you were to sort of project Cosmo's revolutionary trajectory, right? And let's say he does get the box. And what he's saying here,

like with money is the root of all evil? What am I going to do with this box? I'm going to destroy all records of ownership. There's not going to be rich people. There's not going to be poor people. So clearly this is very left wing, right? He's not even necessarily coming. at it from like a, from a libertarian perspective, right? He doesn't. This is what he's saying

anyway. And but I do think just given the thin bits that we know about the character and the way that these things often go, as I've seen many, many times, you know, you see it with people, you know, like Lenin, for example, where you have this like, we're going to smash the state and we're going to set everybody free. And then you move into that world. And on day one of like the post-destructed world, you're like, oh, okay, well, things are really chaotic. And but I, and I don't want to lose what power and authority I have. And so I don't see caught, like, even though he has these sort of like idealistic principles that he's saying out loud, I think that on day one, after day zero, when he hits the button and crashes everything, is that guy, Cosmo going to be

willing to give up his own power, influence, authority, or is he going to keep that box for himself and be like, okay, well, now I've set everybody free, but somebody still needs to make all the decisions, and I can see him going on that trajectory that you were just describing, where it's like, oh, no, but I, but I'm going to be the benevolent, the quote unquote benevolent authoritarian dictator of this free society because you people can't actually, you know, it's clearly like you're not going to be able to do it. I don't see him retiring like Thanos to like hang up his black box and go be a farmer someplace. Like I don't think that that's what Cosmo would be willing to do. He's somebody who clearly wants to be in control of things, even after he set everybody free.

The other thing, in this, oh, the other thing is that we're all sort of taking at face value that hitting the button would actually reset society in some meaningful way. But I just, this conversation has reminded me of a past from a book John recommended to me, Marxism and Politics by Ed Miliband, father of Ralph. No, Ralph is, as I said. So Ralph Miliband, father of Ed. Yeah, that's a time loop, man. Oh God, just destroyed reality. Yeah, man. Sorry, by Ralph Miliban, father of Ed.

For whatever reason, I guess like Ralph just sounds like a, like a, I don't know, whatever. Like a little boy. Yeah. But there's this line in sort of the first part of the book where Miliban says, writes, tradition can never be completely paralyzing, but neither can it be rapidly over. overcome. The problem for victorious revolutions is to prevent tradition from corroding them and ultimately defeating them from within. The Topler regime is seldom easy and is often very difficult indeed. But it is nevertheless easier to do so and to proclaim a new social order

than to actually bring one into being. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I'd say that's spot on. Yeah, it's very easy to talk, to do a lot of talk. I mean, the other thing that comes to mind, and I'm going to get this I'm going to get this wrong somehow. But so there's a part in Dostoevsky's demon, like the whole teal thing where it begins in libertarianism and ends in authoritarianism is there's a part in, there's a character of Dostoevsky's demon who's a, like, the revolutionary theorist. And he's like, he somehow reasons himself from, uh, he's like, look, because I believe in

absolute freedom for everybody, um, this somehow, ends up he reasons himself into like a completely totalitarian system where he's like the only way to make this happen is from to have you know total control and to destroy the old world entirely and so and so forth which is you know like obviously um kind of uh people have taken that to be extremely um prescient about the course of of communism but um i don't know where i was going with that but i was just thinking about that like why does it keep happening that that people begin I mean there's this there's a famous libertarian to alt-right pipeline which is like people begin with libertarian ideas and end up as fascists I mean it has something to do with just the idea of the self and property that I think and the absolutism about the self and property that I think ends up in a kind of fascist way of thinking but it's kind of a puzzle to me um yeah so maybe a little bit of a sidetrack but But the movie made me think of it.

Seems like we're coming to an end here. So any last thoughts from anyone? The only thing I think that like when I was watching it now, and especially in light of like previous episodes of Unclear and present danger that I've listened to is just the character of mother and all of his sort of conspiracy theories that he is just popping off with left and right and his relationship with crease. And it's like, oh yeah, you were there. You know, and the, you know, the earthquake was caused by the, what are you saying?

The earthquake was caused by the CIA. And it's just like, so this movie came out just after JFK. And so we're starting to see, you know, these sort of like conspiracy theories and conspiracy theorist way of thinking. And just in what with mother sort of being this character who's obviously not like if you project, you know, mother for it, he's he's queuing on, right? He just believes in every, you know, conspiracy theory that ever passes his way. is like that too is very familiar and prescient. So it's just kind of everywhere you look in this movie, I feel like they wrote it in a way that really presaged everything

that was going to be coming today, which conspiracy theories. It's all about information. You know, we live in this world. So anyway, just mother. That's the only other thing I had written down here. Got to talk about mother and his conspiracy theories. I think I love this movie

I think it's just wonderful to watch It's pretty smart Just interesting things going on It's everything That we love on this podcast And maybe Maybe the best of these movies I maybe even say

Is it better than Hunt for Rackover? Maybe not But it's very close Yeah I don't think it's better than I don't think it's a better movie Than Hunt for Red October but it is it's such a

enjoyable. Yeah, it's it's endlessly rewatchable. And like I was thinking about this too because the very, the final scene with James Earl Jones, you know, when they're cutting the deal and Dan Ayckrod's like, I want to Winnebago and,

you know, David Strathoran's like, I want peace on earth and goodwill towards men. And James Earl Jones is like, we're the United States government. We don't do that sort of thing. Like that, like the whole end of the movie,

like the end of the call sheet for that scene is just like, it's so glorious, you know, it's like, it's James Earl Jones, Robert Redford, Sydney Poitay, Mary MacDonald, David Strather, and Dan Aykroyd, River Phoenix, all just standing around in a room kind of like, yeah, like, it's just kind of like cutting jokes at the end of this like very funny but cool and very prescient movie. Like I, yeah, highly recommend. I hope everybody had already seen it by the time that we were talking about it, but man, what a good flick. Yeah. My only thought is, you know, at the beginning of our conversation, John, you said that you said that something we say a lot on this podcast is talking about kind of like boomer

overhang boomer you know trauma or whatever and I think there's actually I mean I think we should continue pulling at that as we talk about these movies because this movie in its connection and it's in its attempt to make a connection to the new left and sort of what it is prescient about makes me think that there's still more to discuss about the ways that the experience of the 60s and 70s and kind of like warp this generation of people in like profound ways the impact of which we

not only are still feeling but that is like taking new shapes as it as it as it you know as it evolves not for nothing right sort of the most of the national leadership of the United States its political leadership consists of people who came of age in the

60s and 70s yeah so that's my that's I can That's my last thought. The movie is good, too. But that's the thing that's sort of stuck in my mind right now, and I think we should continue to pull up that. Well, you could pull at that thread when you get to Under Siege, which Stephen Segal,

Karate jumping people on a boat. Great movie. They can't wait for it. That is our show. If you are not a subscriber, please subscribe. We're available on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, and Google Podcast. and wherever else podcasts are found. If you subscribe, please leave a rating and a review.

It really does help people find the show. You can reach out to both of us on Twitter. My, sorry. You can reach out to both of us on Twitter. I am at Jay Bowie. John, you are. I'm at Lionel underscore trolling. And Mike, you're also on Twitter.

What's your handle? I am. I'm at Mike Duncan. We also have a feedback email. It is unclear and present feedback at fastmail.com. For this week and feedback, we have an email from David from Nashville, Tennessee. It is titled Thoughts on the Borg, apropro our Star Trek 6 episode. Oh, yeah, let's do this.

I really enjoyed your last episode, not quite last at this point, and have in the last week or two caught up on the whole series and subscribe. Thank you, David. As an elder millennial, these movies went straight into my veins, and I just uncritically absorb their messages, so I'm thrilled to listen to your analysis and review them for myself as a grown-up. I'm really looking forward to your episode on Star Trek First Contact, because the Borg presents such an interesting lens on humanity.

I don't know if you all have watched the new Picard series, I have not, but it sort of flips the horror of the Borg on its head in recent episodes, whereas their presentation in the Next Generation and Star Trek First Contact emphasized the loss of individuality at the arguable height of the neoliberal era, the Borg Queen and Picard offers community in an everlasting cure to loneliness in an atomized society. Obviously, she's still a villain, but the degree to which the good guy characters struggle with her temptation speaks to the fact that the Borg are offering a solution into a real problem. That nuance was never explored in TNG. It was always, they're always in my head intruding on my privacy after Picard was

de-assimilated, never a nostalgia for a sense of belonging. Anyway, this is a half-baked thought, but maybe y'all can explore this in a deeper, more literate way on the show. I appreciate what you're doing. I think that's super interesting. I think that's super interesting, too. And I might actually watch Picard prior to our first contact episode

just to have that in my head, because I think it's an interesting perspective on the Borg. In an interesting way that the first contact or the next generation and its sort of vision of the Borg is, does reflect maybe some of the concerns of the period in which it emerged, kind of, you know, well, and the Borg,

yeah, and the Borg were introduced. I mean, I don't know what the exact, you know, air date of, it was in the second season when they were introduced. So we're talking like 1987, 1988, 1988, like at the absolute latest. So it was very much of that time where, like, the bad thing is, is the totalitarian, you know, unity of all things, and we don't have individual expression anymore. We are a we. And then that gets, that starts to get turned when DS9, you know,

starts exploring like, well, let's sit down and think about this. Like, how different is the Federation from the Borg in terms of it's like, we must assimilate all things at all time? And Quark is like, I don't know, man, like first they show up and the next thing you know, you like root beer and like the and that's what it is is this very like weirdly soft like you know kind of like you know they're not the borg the borg but there's something similar so okay now we're now we're at this point where we've been atomized and we're 30 years 40 years away from where t and g started and now we're like i don't know it might be kind of nice to just be with people again since we haven't been for so many you're like okay board collective sounds great you know

I don't know if that's true, but Well, I thought that's a really interesting email and an interesting thoughts with David, we are going to keep it in mind. Thank you for writing. And everyone, you should email us. Again, the email is unclear and present feedback at fastmail.com. Obviously, we read these things, and we'll read them on air too. So reach out, please.

Episodes come out every other Friday, so we will see you in two weeks with, as we've said, Under Siege, a great movie starring Stephen Segal. Here is a very quick plot synopsis of Under Siege. Disgruntled ex-CIA operative Stranix, his assistant Krill, and the group of terrorists, seized the battleship with nuclear blackmail in mind. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Yeah, yeah, that's all true.

They plan for every contingency, but ignore the ship's cook, former Navy SEAL Casey Ryback, an error that could prove fatal It did It did prove fatal Under Siege is available for rent on Amazon and iTunes You should check it out It's a great little 90-minute movie

A perfect weeknight film Thank you Mike for joining us Hey thanks very much for having me For John Gans I am Jamel Bowie And this is unclear and present danger We'll see you next time We were going to change the world, Marty.

Remember? Did you ever get around actually doing it? No, I guess not. Well, I think I can. Really? Yes. What's wrong with this country, Marty? Money, you taught me that.

Evil defense contractors had it, noble causes, did not. Politicians are bought and sold, like so much chattel our problems, multiply, pollution of crime, drugs, poverty, disease, hunger, despair. We throw gobs of money at them. Probably those get worse. Why is that? Because money's most powerful ability is to allow bad people to continue doing bad things at the expense of those who don't have it. I agree. Who'd you say you were working for?

Oh, that's just my day job. Listen, when I was in prison, I learned that everything in this world, including money, operates not on reality, but the perception real. Posit. People think a bank might be financially shaky. Consequence, people start to withdraw their money. Result, pretty soon it is financially shaky. Conclusion. You can make banks fail.

I've already done that. Maybe you've heard about a few. Think bigger. Stock market? Yes. Currency market? Yes. Commodities market. Yes. Small countries. I might even be able to crash the whole damn system Destroy all records of ownership Think of it, Marty

No more rich people No more poor people Everybody's the same Isn't that what we said we always want to