Conservatives at the Movies

August 7, 2011
Posted by Jay Livingston

In the recent conflict over the debt ceiling, the GOP impressed the country with its willingness to tank the economy – and in the process hurt a lot of people – in order to get their way. Their Senate leader likened their strategy to the threats used by hostage takers.

This is consistent with George Haidt’s research on conservative and liberal morality. Liberals, he says, base their morality mostly on two dimensions: Harm/Care and Fairness/Reciprocity. They ask, “Will people get hurt?” and “Is it fair?”

Conservatives add the dimensions of Purity, Authority, and Loyalty. As an illustration, consider the choice of motivational films. House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), was trying to motivate the Tea Party types to join with the rest of the party. So he played a clip from, “The Town.” In that clip, Ben Affleck, who robs things like banks and baseball stadiums – he also shoots people – says to his friend, “I need your help. I can’t tell you what it is. You can never ask me about it later. And we’re gonna hurt some people.” (Complainers about “the liberal press” please note: The Washington Post, which first reported the story, decided to leave out that last line.)

The friend’s only question is whose car to use.

According to the Post,

Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.), one of the most outspoken critics of leadership among the 87 freshmen, stood up to speak, according to GOP aides.
“I’m ready to drive the car,” West replied.

The point McCarthy was making with this clip is that loyalty to the group outweighs the harm to others.

Perhaps “The Town” was not the wisest choice. When word got out, Sen Schumer filled in some of the rest of the plot.

In the scene they chose to inspire their House freshmen, one of the crooks gives a pep talk to the other, right before they both put on hockey masks, bludgeon two men with sticks, and shoot a man in the leg!

(Schumer omitted the fact that later in the film, the Affleck character kills someone by shooting off the guy’s penis. What a role model for the GOP.)

In a post nearly four years ago (here), I referred to this morality based on Authority and Loyalty as “Mafia morality,” and I noted its apparent appeal to conservatives. As if to confirm this, the recent Rupert Murdoch Newscorp flap revived the nice detail (from a 2005 Forbes article) that the head of one of its marketing divisions, Paul Carlucci, “once rallied his sales force by showing a film clip from The Untouchables in which Al Capone (played by Robert DeNiro) beats a man to death with a baseball bat.” Capone is emphasizing loyalty, much like the motivational clip Rep. McCarthy used, though the DeNiro/Capone level of cruelty and violence is such that I’m not going to embed it here.

Carlucci left little doubt as to how his ideal motivational strategy fit in the liberal-conservative spectrum.

Mr. Carlucci said that if there were employees uncomfortable with the company’s philosophy — “bed-wetting liberals in particular was the description he used” Mr. Emmel testified — then he could arrange to have those employees “outplaced from the company.” (from The Gothamist)

On a different issue, regulation of banks, the Republicans could have used John Ford’s classic Western, “Stagecoach.” One of the people in the stagecoach is a banker, Henry Gatewood, who has just embezzled $50,000 from his bank. (I don’t know how much the Affleck character netted in his bank robbery – probably less than $50K in 2010 dollars, certainly less in 1880 dollars. As someone said, the best way to rob a bank is to own one.). Gatewood offers his views on financial regulation.

The film is set in 1880, but this has a contemporary ring, just as it did in 1939 when bankers, whose unregulated banks had failed disastrously a few years earlier, were resisting FDR’s proposals on banking regulation.

The audio isn’t too clear, so here’s a transcript.

I don’t know what the government is coming to. Instead of protecting businessmen, it pokes its nose into business! Why, they’re even talking now about having bank examiners. As if we bankers don’t know how to run our own banks! Why, at home I have a letter from a popinjay official saying they were going to inspect my books. I have a slogan that should be blazoned on every newspaper in this country: America for the Americans! The government must not interfere with business! Reduce taxes! Our national debt is something shocking. Over one billion dollars a year! What this country needs is a businessman for president!