Casablanca: After 80 Years
Rick (Humphrey Bogart, L) and Sam (Dooley Wilson), in “Casablanca.”
Commentary
There is something fitting about the movie “Casablanca” having its 80th birthday while the world teeters on war over Ukraine and Taiwan—and the Iranians work overtime to get a nuclear weapon that can be delivered by missile.
We may be in the most dangerous pre-war environment since the Cuban missile crisis of 1962, when the United States and the Soviet Union came periously close to a military collision.
In this period of tension, it is fitting that we are celebrating one of the greatest films ever made.
“Casablanca” was the great movie from World War II. More than that, it was a truly historic movie in a way that its creators were probably surprised by.
I have seen “Casablanca” more than 20 times. Whenever I am in a place with a piano player, I ask if they can play “As Time Goes By,” the iconic song which haunts the film. The lyrics always get to me. Just read them and see if they don’t get to you too:
You must remember this,
A kiss is just a kiss.
A sigh is just a sigh.
The fundamental things apply,
As time goes by.
And when two lovers woo,
They still say “I love you.”
On that you can rely.
No matter what the future brings,
As time goes by.
Moonlight and love songs,
Never out of date.
Hearts full of passion,
Jealousy and hate.
Woman needs man,
and man must have his mate.
That no one can deny.
It’s still the same old story,
A fight for love and glory,
A case of do or die.
The world will always welcome lovers,
As time goes by.
As you read these words and remember they were sung about all people –
but with the backdrop of a world war—you can begin to sense the timelessness and personal scale of the movie.
“Casablanca” works because it is both big and small. In the background is the evil of the Nazi machine and the reality of a worldwide war that will determine whether civilization or barbarism is the future. In the foreground is the story of two lovers who desperately want to live out their lives together but find historic reality of the world they are in makes it impossible.
The movie is helped of course by Ingrid Bergman’s breathtaking beauty and extraordinary focus on Humphrey Bogart so that her love seems to come through the screen. Bogart is totally believable as a former romantic (a gunrunner to the Ethiopians against the fascist Italian invasion and a fighter for the pro-western Republic during the Spanish Civil War) who has become bitter because in Paris he found true love and then lost it when Bergman disappeared without explanation.
As the story unfolds, it becomes clear that Bergman loves Bogart but her husband, who she thought had been killed in a German concentration camp, had survived although severely hurt. She had gone to his side and was now trapped between her love for Bogart and her duty to help the resistance leader in a world war against Nazi tyranny.
A great deal of the power of “Casablanca” comes from the juxtaposition of two lovers against the backdrop of a world war. The reality of that world war is driven home by the fact that the movie was released just weeks after the allied invasion of Northern Africa (known as Operation Torch).
The supporting actors are all amazing. Only three members of the cast are American. Virtually all the rest were refugees from Nazi occupied Europe.
So, in the stirring scene in which “La Marseillaise” is sung to drown out a group of Nazis singing “Die Wacht am Rhein,” the cast members have authentic tears running down their checks, because they were all real refugees who were deeply emotional about being forced out of their homelands by real Nazis.
Appreciation for “Casablanca” and its place as an extraordinary movie, perhaps one of the greatest of all American films, has grown over time. It won numerous awards upon release and was almost universally considered an instant classic. If you have seen the film, you will recognize how worthy it is of these accolades.
If you have never seen “Casablanca” now is the time to get out the popcorn, pull up the movie, and settle in for an extraordinary experience.
Entertainment aside, it’s important to watch because our generation may find itself tested as our grandparents were. “Casablanca” is a good reminder that freedom and patriotism won in the past—and freedom and patriotism can win now.
From Gingrich360.com
Categories
S&W 44 Russian (44 Special)
This year at SHOT Show 2022 I had the chance to check out the NEW Mk5 Micro Fight Chassis by Spiritus Systems. Based on lots of use and feedback, they have updated the design in both materials and pattern.
If you aren’t familiar with Spiritus Systems, they’re a manufacturer of tactical gear made here in the U.S. They make hard-use gear for today’s warfighters, law enforcement, as well as the tactically-minded consumer. They have been making their chest rigs for a number of years now and the design, while slowly changing, has stayed pretty much the same — until now!
For starters, the material used has changed. While the previous Micro Fight Chest Rig was made out of cordura, the new Mk5 is made out of a special laminate that gives it greater strength and durability, as well as the ability to be laser cut. This opens the door for more attachment points and more overall flexibility when it comes time to set it up.
The design has changed quite a bit, too. Rather than two open pockets on the Mk4, where you could either put magazine inserts, flaps or other accessories, the Mk5 is simply one pocket for inserts.
Based on feedback, the front pocket on the older design wasn’t used that much. So by doing away with it, they created a more streamlined chest rig and were able to cover the front with female velcro. This lets you attach the cummerbund on your plate carrier across the front of the Mk5, such as the LV-119.
But there is still tons of modularity. Even though the Mk5 only has one pouch for magazine inserts, thanks to the PALS compatible front, you can mount other pouches, magazine or otherwise, on the system. Or, you can use the new CCS Pouch. The CCS Pouch covers the front of the Mk5, similar to the old second pouch. But the CCS has two zippered compartments. This lets you keep all those smaller items secure, rather than using a velcro flap like on the older Mk4.
Overall this expansion of the Micro Fight Chest Rig line is one more option that lets you, the user, configure your gear however you see fit for the mission at hand. Expect to see the Mk5 Micro Fight Chassis and CCS Pouch in Q1 of 2022.
Price-wise, the Mk5 and CCS will be around the same price as the Mk4 Chassis. And like the previous Mk4, all of the components can be purchased individually. So you can use your harness, back-strap and inserts from your other chest rig and just upgrade the Chassis.
by Julie Kelly
When most Americans hear the term “Capitol Police,” they likely conjure visions of uniformed officers manning metal detectors at the numerous congressional buildings or helping tourists navigate the sprawling Capitol grounds: a D.C. version of a mall cop.
That imagery, however, is in stark contrast to reality as Democrats have weaponized yet another federal agency to target their political enemies on the Right.
After January 6, 2021, Capitol Police officials announced plans to expand beyond the legislatively authorized purview of the agency and open offices in Florida and California, as well as in other states. Congress overwhelmingly supported a bill last year to fork over $2.1 billion in new funding to the Capitol Police. Now flush with cash and immune from any serious public oversight, the agency is returning the favor by spying on dissidents of the Biden regime.
According to Politico, Capitol Police investigators are preparing secret dossiers on lawmakers, congressional staff, donors, and even constituents who visit their representatives in public or in private.
“After the Jan. 6 insurrection (sic), the Capitol Police’s intelligence unit quietly started scrutinizing the backgrounds of people who meet with lawmakers,” reporters Betsy Woodruff Swan and Daniel Lippman wrote. “Several Capitol Police intelligence analysts have already raised concerns about the practice to the department’s inspector general,” one source told Politico.
Investigators are asked to scour social media accounts and even examine “tax and real estate records to find out who owned the properties that lawmakers visited.” In one example, Capitol Police analyzed a fundraiser held in a private home for Senator Rick Scott (R-Fla.). Donors to House Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.), who was shot by a Bernie Sanders supporter in 2017, also are under Capitol police scrutiny.
Far from ensuring the safety of legislators and their staffs, the underlying political motive is obvious to anyone who’s been paying attention the past several years: the Capitol Police, acting as the Stasi of the Democratic Party, will collect dirt on Republicans under the pretense of national security then leak gossipy details to an always-compliant news media.
Journalists will then source the leaks to anonymous “intelligence officials” to legitimize any incriminating disclosures, which in turn will prompt Democrats to call for immediate investigations and criminal referrals—see the January 6 select committee for how this successful formula works.
In fact, an official from the Obama Administration, the birthplace of Russiagate and other political espionage efforts, is heading up the new endeavor.
“Major changes in the Capitol Police intelligence unit started in fall of 2020, when the department brought on former Department of Homeland Security official Julie Farnam to help run its intelligence unit, which is housed in its Intelligence and Interagency Coordination Division,” Politico confirmed.
Who is Julie Farnam? In October 2014, Farnam was hired by the Obama Administration to serve as the acting chief of staff for the Homeland Security department’s field operations in Washington, D.C. The following year, Farnam was promoted to senior advisor on immigration issues. According to her LinkedIn profile, Farnam represented the Customs and Immigrations Services at “high-level meetings within the Agency, Department, other Federal agencies, and the White House.” She also “briefed senior officials on matters with national impact or controversy.”
One senior official with whom Farnam presumably worked at the White House would have been Lisa Monaco, Obama’s Homeland Security Advisor during his second term. Herself a key architect of Russiagate and an unabashed partisan, Monaco now serves as the deputy attorney general, responsible for the Justice Department’s sprawling and punitive investigation into January 6. Monaco’s prosecutors are handling at least 730 criminal cases related to the Capitol protest, with new arrests announced every week.
Monaco’s street cred as a political operative is stellar. Chief of staff to former FBI Director Robert Mueller, Monaco is moving at open throttle not just to round up trespassers who objected to Joe Biden’s election but to hand down criminal indictments against Trump loyalists such as Steve Bannon and investigate alleged “fake electoral slates” in seven states sent to the National Archives in December 2020
Farnam seems to be following in Monaco’s footsteps—or taking her marching orders—to whip up frenzy about the imaginary threat posed by Trump voters.
In an interview earlier this month with CBS News, Farnam revealed her agency prepared an “special event assessment” on January 3, 2021 that warned of potential violence during the Electoral College certification. “Supporters of the current president see January 6, 2021 as the last opportunity to overturn the results of the presidential election,” Farnam wrote. “This sense of desperation and disappointment may lead to more of an incentive to become violent. Unlike previous post-election protests . . . Congress itself is the target on the 6th.”
Erroneously claiming “protesters plan to be armed”—the only person who used a firearm inside the building that day, ironically, was a Capitol Police lieutenant who shot and killed Ashli Babbitt—Farnam’s report relied heavily on bogeyman terms such as “white supremacists” and “extremists.”
She questioned the issuance of January 6 permits for “Stop the Steal” rallies, which, according to Farnam, attract bad actors who “actively promote violence.” Farnam must have missed all the videographic and social media evidence of how leftist activists attacked Trump supporters and police after previous Stop the Steal events in Washington in November and December 2020.
Seven Republican congressmen sent a letter this week to both sergeants-at-arms, the Capitol Police chief, and the architect of the Capitol to demand answers, insisting the new spy initiative “constitutes a dramatic and troubling expansion of the USCP’s authority.”
Like all inquiries sent to Biden regime apparatchiks, the letter will go unanswered. Farnam, another Obama minion who learned from the best how to aim powerful government tools at political foes, will accelerate her unchecked surveillance operation to complement Monaco’s January 6 criminal investigation and House Democrats’ January 6 select committee—all intended to produce damaging headlines for Republicans during the 2022 midterm elections.
The rotten, unpunished legacy of Crossfire Hurricane continues.
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Julie Kelly is a political commentator and senior contributor to American Greatness. She is the author of January 6: How Democrats Used the Capitol Protest to Launch a War on Terror Against the Political Right and Disloyal Opposition: How the NeverTrump Right Tried―And Failed―To Take Down the President. Her past work can be found at The Federalist and National Review. She also has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, The Hill, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, and Genetic Literacy Project. She is the co-host of the “Happy Hour Podcast with Julie and Liz.” She is a graduate of Eastern Illinois University and lives in suburban Chicago with her husband and two daughters.
Photo “Capitol Police” by Elvert Barnes CC BY-SA 2.0.