The inspiration for establishing the Patriot Nation community was Mark Crispin Miller’s performance in A Patriot Act, a compelling film that exposes the powerful movement within our government to undermine the Constitution.
A Patriot Act is a bold, funny and ultimately chilling film that uses news clips, historical documents and other factually verifiable sources to reveal the threats our Constitution is facing under the current administration. It examines the hidden motives behind their open contempt for fundamental civil rights, their blatant lies to garner support for a pre-emptive war, their relentless attacks on the environment, their unapologetic pandering to their wealthy “base” and their corporate sponsors.
The film chronicles the 2002 defeat, and 2004 reelection, of Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney to the U.S. House of Representatives; it also discusses issues surrounding alleged voter disenfranchisement and the use of voting machines in both the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections.
The film focuses heavily on McKinney, and claims that her 2002 loss in a Democratic primary to Denise Majette (who, like McKinney, is African-American) was part of an effort to disenfranchise minority voters. McKinney claims that Republican voters in her district tipped the primary election to Majette. This itself is legal, as Georgia law opens primaries to all voters irrespective of party. After losing, McKinney filed a lawsuit claiming that open primaries are a violation of the 14th Amendment, but a court dismissed the case.
The film also includes civil rights leader and U.S. Representative John Lewis with a powerful recounting of the march from Selma to Montgomery Alabama across the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Also Presidential Candidate Bernie Sanders appears in this documentary speaking about the desire of big money to keep voter turnout low.
2004 Historical Documentary, 2 hr 45 mins.
This documentary begins with an unusual detail that came from the 14th Amendment: Under constitutional law, corporations are seen as individuals. So, filmmaker Mark Achbar asks, what type of person would a corporation be? The evidence, according to such political activists as Noam Chomsky and filmmaker Michael Moore and company heads like carpet magnate Ray Anderson, points to a bad one, as the film aims to expose IBM’s Nazi ties and these large businesses’ exploitation of human rights.
A community-wide battle over free speech is ignited in the most unlikely of places: Utah’s sleepy Mormon country, which for the most part leans conservative in its politics. The brouhaha starts prior to the 2004 presidential election, when Utah Valley State College’s student body invites Michael Moore, the incendiary filmmaker behind “Bowling for Columbine,” to give a speech on campus. This is met by public outrage, death threats and even a bribery attempt to stop the visit from taking place.
This short-film collection is an engaging exploration of recent free speech battles (and yes, a few bad words do get spoken). The best known participants include documentary filmmaker Chris Hegedus (The War Room) and actor/director Mario Van Peebles (Baadasssss!), but all three films take a similar approach. Hegedus and Nick Doob (American High) are behind Fox vs. Franken, which looks at the suit filed against author Al Franken for using the phrase “fair and balanced” in the subtitle to his book, “Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right”.