[Spooks]

We're the Big Bad Wolf Now

As a lead-in to the big news this final day of the year, let me offer an observation I had of the new Narnia movie. An altogether crappy effort, it did at least provide one canary in the cultural coalmine. It is a British production, and all the actors hail from the islands, except one. It is the voice of the head of the White Witch's security team, the ruthless wolf, who is portrayed as snarling evil personified (lupusified?). For the past half-century or so, this character would have been voiced by ...? A German, of course. Across the world, we all know that clipped Tuetonic accent is the sound of aggressive oppression. In Narnia? An American.

Yes folks, we're the scary, bad men now. Get used to it.

Thus the news today that Bush has vastly expanded CIA's spying program is unlikely to dispel our image as big baddies anytime soon:

The broad-based effort, known within the agency by the initials GST, is compartmentalized into dozens of highly classified individual programs, details of which are known mainly to those directly involved.

GST includes programs allowing the CIA to capture al Qaeda suspects with help from foreign intelligence services, to maintain secret prisons abroad, to use interrogation techniques that some lawyers say violate international treaties, and to maintain a fleet of aircraft to move detainees around the globe. Other compartments within GST give the CIA enhanced ability to mine international financial records and eavesdrop on suspects anywhere in the world.

Ve havv vays of makink you tawk...