The Divine Plan
Donald R. McClarey
Cradle Catholic. Active in the pro-life movement since 1973. Father of three, one in Heaven, and happily married for 41 years. Small town lawyer and amateur historian. Former president of the board of directors of the local crisis pregnancy center for a decade.
Don’t forget the Iron Lady Margaret Thatcher!
This AM I listened to Joe Piscapo on AM talk radio interview Michael Reagan on his father. Michael told a story of going to the hospital immediately after Pres. Reagan was shot. First thing President Reagan said was “If you’re going to get shot, don’t wear a new suit.”
That’s the kind of wry humor I remember of men from that generation.
Way Off Topic: Another web site I haunt directed to a (I thought) fairly good, brief explanation of why the Allies beat the Nazis on a web site “Notes On Liberty” entitled, “The Myth Of The Nazi War Machine.” Of course, most of the credit goes to the American fighting man, American industry/logistics, and the M1 Garand rifle.
I wanted to go but could not. I’ll wait for the DVD.
I give credit to the people of Poland for their constant resistance to Communism as the biggest reason the Iron Curtain fell.
Not so fast. Today on the Catholic Thing blog there was an excellent article:
‘Vladimir Bukovsky, Baptism, and the Fall of the Berlin Wall’
By Alessandra Nucci
Here is my comment in response and applies to today’s ‘American Catholic’ article:
Excellent article reminding us that the tearing down of the Berlin wall was not so much a victory for the West but an opening for Communism to spread it’s theories far and wide in the EU, UN, Democrat Party, Catholic Church. Now our situation is worse than ever. Cultural Marxism is the face of Communism. We see it political correctness everywhere: feminism, transgenderism, Social Justice, open immigration, atheism, etc. Vladimir Bukovsky knew this. Do we?
I would say Michael that such an interpretation of the Fall of the Berlin Wall is a masterpiece of idiocy. The fall of the Communist states in Europe was an unmixed good, and had bupkis to do with the fact that academia and entertainment have leaned Left since the Sixties in the West.
The article you cite however is excellent and I highly recommend it:
https://www.thecatholicthing.org/2019/11/07/vladimir-bukovsky-baptism-and-the-fall-of-the-berlin-wall/
The West was already infected long before the wall fell– the difference is that by destroying the evil empire, the useful idiots stopped getting so much support.
Truth came out.
Yeah, they’re still flailing– but for heaven’s sake, SOVIETS ARE ACTUALLY BAD GUYS IN MOVIES.
Regularly!
Heck, as often as the Nazis!
I’ll take that as an improvement.
I went with a small inter-parish group to see the movie. For Cold Warrior Boomers like me, it was a reminder of clearer times and the wonderful rush of excitement as the Wall fell and the red flags dropped for the last time.
They downplayed Mrs. Thatcher and boosted Gorbachev in ways with which I’m “unsettled,” but the departure is not as wildly wishful as modern academia and journalism would paint it; some things were revealed about the last Soviet leader that I did not know. Hearing the Gipper again literally brought a small tear to my eye, and a good bit of Karol Wojtyla’s early history made an excellent counterpoint to Reagan’s boyhood. The premise that these two men were intentionally brought onto the world stage, in the way and at the time they were, is well-supported by the given historical narrative.
The style is “Graphic Novel” and, as admitted by the producer, it hopes to inform a generation who was not yet born at the time about what really happened. Strokes of luck in the people involved plus, no doubt, a small dose of Divine Intervention helped knit together a fairly cogent statement on who and how it all shook down, at least as much as you can when compressing the last decade of the most dangerous time in the world’s history into an hour and a half.
Like any piece of subjective media art, it has flaws and strengths, the latter winning by a good margin. As a lead in to deeper discussions, I would rate it highly.
Thanks for the review AK. Valuable insights.