Bruce Willis Will Save Us From the Debt Limit!

The Great Evil

By CHARLES M. BLOW

Published: July 22, 2011

The current political environment and the debt-crisis debate remind me of the 1997 science-fiction film “The Fifth Element.”

You’re fucking kidding me. No, you absolutely have to be shitting me.

Stick with me. It’s complicated.

It’s a Bruce Willis movie; it’s really not.

In the film, the Great Evil, a giant ball of fire, hurtles toward Earth, intent on destroying it. This thing shows up every so often. It’s annoying.

Annoying? Yeah, that’s how I’d describe murder and destruction barreling across the galaxy straight…hey wait a minute, am I actually going along with this bullshti premise? Damn it.

Anyway, a group of gentle aliens have a weapon that can stop it.

Whew! That’s a relief!

Thoroughly believably Supreme Being. I mean damn.

It has been used before, and it’s really simple: It uses four stones that represent the four classical elements but a fifth element, the Supreme Being, must activate them.

And after all, what’s more apropos than neo-alchemical pseudoscience from the 9th highest grossing film of 1997?

The gentle aliens promise to return to Earth with their weapon the next time the Great Evil threatens. Sounds good. But on their way back, another group of aliens — simple-minded, warriors called Mangalores

Yes, because the name of the fictional alien race of simpletons is important to whatever the fucking point of all this nonsense might be.

who work for an evil, wealthy industrialist

Technically they’re mercenaries, but I agree that it’s not the point: capitalism is destructive. Nevermind the centuries of evidence to the contrary.

 — shoot down their ship.

I just hate industrialists! They all really just want to shoot down gentle aliens and blow up the world! It’s not like this is a work of fiction or anything.

Not Gary Oldman's best effort.

(The industrialist is a vile, twisted character.

They always are. This is a product of Hollywood, after all.

He sees destruction as a jobs program,

Since this is absolutely guaranteed to come back around to a political message, which party is known more for advocating destructive jobs programs? (Hint: think “Cash for Clunkers”)

and, as it turns out, he doesn’t even like the Mangalores. He says as much: “I don’t like warriors. Too

narrow-minded, no subtlety. And worse, they fight for hopeless causes.”

And which party is known more for disliking and distrusting the military as narrow-minded, blunt, and barbarous? (Hint: think John Kerry)

He’s just using them. And what does he give them for risking their lives? A box of guns.)

I just hate guns! Wait, is all this still in a single parenthetical?

All seems lost. But wait!

Is this supposed to build suspense? This is redefining a new low for the Op-Ed pages.

The stones were not onboard the destroyed ship but were in the care of an opera diva.

And why wouldn't you want to
trust the fate of the world to  singer?

Really, it was the only logical next point for the plot. Anyways, who’s the diva in this allegory?

And the military finds the hand of the fifth element, which scientists use to regenerate a Supreme Being humanoid.

This is seriously an Opinion column in the New York Times. It’s not a film review or in the Style section. This is the apex of serious political commentary. I’ll wait while you ponder on that for a moment.

It’s a girl!

Shock of shocks! A girl?!? I like my women in the kitchen, not doin' any fancy world-savin'!

After “birth,” she jumps off a ledge and lands in the flying taxi of an ex-special forces guy whom the government conscripts to get the stones from the diva.

I’m guessing that at some point, Charles Blow is going to advocate for Hilary Clinton (she is, after all, the Great Ovarian Hope) jump off the roof of the White House and hope a taxi is down there somewhere.

Well yeah, but first Bruce Willis has to
do some requisite ass-kicking.

The cabby retrieves the stones, readies the weapon, kisses the girl and she releases the Divine Light.

Thanks for the spoiler alert, asshole.

This stops the Great Evil just minutes before it destroys the world.

Which party is known for embracing the existence of good and evil exists only on a relative scale?

Whew! So much drama. And it didn’t have to be.

France of the alien world.

Yeah. Those “gentle aliens” probably should have been well-funded enough to fend an attack by two mere fighter spacecraft. Also, maybe they should have been less gentle.

I see two parallels.

That’s all? I see about fifty.

First, there is no reason that we should be in this pickle.

I’m going to cheat and read ahead to know that he’s talking about the debt ceiling. The debt ceiling legislation was enacted precisely so that we would have to confront this “pickle.” Left unchecked, the United States public debt is slated to pass 100% of GDP very soon. That’s a dangerous benchmark for ratings agencies. This didn’t happen because we’ve been taxing citizens too lightly since the seventies. It happened because George W.  Bush spent too much, and Barack Obama decided to differentiate himself by spending far, far more. That giant ball of pure evil barreling towards us? It’s not some abstract idea that we might not increase the debt ceiling or the prospect of default. It is a failure of leadership that leads to a future of American dependency.

 The debt ceiling has been raised numerous times with a simple vote.

And it could be raised this time with a simple vote; it just wouldn’t pass. And as we all know from Harry Reid’s summary dismissal of Cut, Cap and Balance legislation, the inability of legislation to pass makes it crazy, dangerous, and worthy of derision.

But Grover Norquist’s Tea Party pledglings shot that down.

It still amazes me that libeals are trying to make Grover Norquist the villain. (In this case, he’s literally being fit as the villain from the Fifth Element (a subpar performance by Gary Oldman), a particularly interesting choice, as the villain is both comically inept and displays a myriad of liberal affectations, including irrational, impotent rage and anxiety. He also looks like a weird emo kid, which just reminds me that the next generation of liberals isn‘t far away.

And now they can’t agree to a “grand bargain” because of their Faustian pact with big money.

Considering the source and magnitude of Obama’s 2012 fundraising, it would take a colossal ignorance or supreme naivity to argue that conservatives are beholden to “big money.”

We shouldn’t have to wait till the last minute to see the light and prevent cataclysm.

This is what Charles Blow thinks of you.

Second, and more broadly, is the degree to which some people, like the Mangalores,

They weren’t people; they were aliens that looked like pigs.

allow themselves to be used by those who don’t have their best interest at heart.

We have said the same about liberal Jews, supporting a party that despises Israel.

We have said the same about liberal blacks, supporting a party that created the modern ghetto and cultivated a culture of dependency in the black community with a myriad of ill-conceived and ill-executed social programs.

We have said the same about liberal youths, supporting a party that is responsible for skyrocketing unemployment among the young.

We have said the same about liberal women, who have seen women’s advocacy groups promote liberal policies that are bad for women and their children.

We have said all along that everyone’s best interests are served when freedom is expanded. And we have been vilified for it. Yet today more than ever, the fundamental power of liberty is on display. And Americans want it.

A report released Friday by the Pew Research Center found that the Republican Party has made tremendous gains in party affiliation among whites since President Obama took office.

In other words, Obama’s popularity (and the popularity of the Democratic Party) is plummeting because people are stupid, boorish, and have an irrational affinity for firearms.

This would be understandable if the largest gains were among the wealthy, but they weren’t. They were among the poor, the young and less educated — many of the same people who would be adversely affected by G.O.P. policies. (Blacks held relatively steady, and Hispanics fell.)

They understand what you, with all your haughty arrogance and dripping elitism, do not. Class warfare is a vehicle for cowards. It is masturbatory in that it serves no productive purpose aside from self-gratification. Liberal policies are not capable of growing the economy, only of hindering it. These welcome converts understand that the policies of conservatives that steer us away from government dependency are the most powerful tools for goodness and prosperity that the world has ever known. The giant ball of evil? That is the government leviathan. The divine light? It is freedom.

I guess if people with the money can convince you that destruction is a jobs program, anything is possible.

Of course, this is why Americans agreed, against their better judgment, to the failed Stimulus program. Deep down, we know that government can’t solve our problems. Indeed, it creates more problems. The solution is now, as it was 235 years ago, liberty. It is our birthright, and our divine light. It protects us from these regular incursions of government hyperactivity. The elements have aligned against this evil. We are simply waiting for someone, a Fifth Element, to stand in the center, and activate its latent power.

Turns out I got on board with this movie analogy more than I thought I would…