I just watched the most excellent first episode of HBO's Chernobyl, "1:23:45" (written by Craig Mazin, who has nothing else in his résumé to suggest he's capable of the brilliance displayed in this movie, but hey...maybe he was only waiting for this moment to arise). Not only was it incredibly gripping, but it seemed obvious to me from the get-go that this was more than a story about a nuclear accident in mid-eighties Soviet Ukraine.
The episode opens with a character listening to a tape which says, in part,
"What is the cost of lies? It's not that we'll mistake them for the truth. The real danger is that if we hear enough lies, then we no longer recognize the truth at all. What can we do then? What else is left but to abandon even the hope of truth and content ourselves instead with stories? In these stories it doesn't matter who the heroes are. All we want to know is who is to blame."
Well...it's pretty hard not to think of Trump when you read those lines, isn't it? I mean, seriously...even if you like and / or support the motherfucker, you can't possibly deny that he's a lying liar, can you? (I was going to put up an irrefutable example, just for the sake of clarity, but I was so overwhelmed with the information I found...pages and pages of lies...that I couldn't pick one. Check https://www.politifact.com/personalities/donald-trump/statements/ byruling/false/?page=1 and pick one that works for you. Or pick a couple of dozen. Whatever.)
But it doesn't stop there.
As soon as the disaster occurs, the people in charge start clamping down on the truth, denying the reality of the situation, and putting out misinformation. It reminded me of how a parent will try to keep a hurtful truth from a child by telling him / her that everything is okay...but it lacks the benevolent motivation, of course. In this case, the truth is squelched and lies are propagated for one simple reason: everyone wants to avoid the blame.
The epitome of this comes when the city of Pripyat is not evacuated...because to do that would mean admitting the truth of how bad the disaster is. Instead, it's put out that it's a roof fire which is now under control. There's a chilling scene wherein we see kids in Pripyat heading into school, just another day, and then we see a bird fall out of the sky and die on the sidewalk in front of the school.
And there it is, isn't it? Republicans in Congress...and especially in the Senate...and especially Kentucky's own Mitch "Trump's Bitch" McConnell...are willing to let their metaphorical kids go to school in a town that is aflame with deadly radiation because they don't want to admit that the problem is beyond their control. Or maybe he / they even believe that the disaster is not beyond their capacity to contain. That's the best spin I can put on it for them. Which means that they're incredibly stupid sons of bitches who are completely out of touch with reality. But it could be worse than that, too.
Anyway...this looks like it is going to be a superb show. I think I'm going to need to extend my HBO subscription for a bit.
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