Narrated by Julian Bond / Media Education Foundation – 2004-07-22 10:11:10

http://www.mef.tv/index.php?module=pagesetter&func=viewpub&tid=2&pid=1

“Hijacking Catastrophe stands to become an explosive and empowering information weapon in this decisive year in US history.” — Naomi Klein

Hijacking Catastrophe: 9/11, Fear & the Selling of American Empire examines how a radical fringe of the Republican Party used the trauma of the 9/11 terror attacks to advance a pre-existing agenda to radically transform American foreign policy while rolling back civil liberties and social programs at home.

The documentary places the Bush Administration’s false justifications for war in Iraq within the larger context of a two-decade struggle by neoconservatives to dramatically increase military spending in the wake of the Cold War, and to expand American power globally by means of military force.

At the same time, the documentary argues that the Bush Administration has sold this radical and controversial plan for aggressive American military intervention by deliberately manipulating intelligence, political imagery, and the fears of the American people after 9/11.

Narrated by Julian Bond, Hijacking Catastrophe features interviews with more than 20 prominent political observers, including Pentagon whistleblower Lt. Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski, who witnessed first-hand how the Bush Administration set up a sophisticated propaganda operation to link the anxieties generated by 9/11 to a pre-existing foreign policy agenda that included a preemptive war on Iraq.

Joining Kwiatkowski in a wide-ranging, accessible, and ultimately empowering analysis are former Chief UN Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter, former Pentagon analyst Daniel Ellsberg, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Jody Williams, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Norman Mailer, MIT professor Noam Chomsky, Code Pink founder Medea Benjamin, defense policy analyst William Hartung, author Chalmers Johnson, Army Special Forces Master Sergeant Stan Goff (Ret.).

At its core, the film places the deceptions of the Bush Administration within the larger frame of questions seldom posed in the mainstream:
• What, exactly, is the agenda that drove the administration’s pre-war deceptions?
• How is 9/11 being used to sell this agenda?
• And what are the stakes for America, Americans, and the world if this agenda succeeds in being fully implemented during a second Bush term?

More Praise for Hijacking Catastrophe

“Hijacking Catastrophe is a great movie –.a solid hour of hardcore factual reporting. Has the narrative tension of a good detective story, tracing the documentary evidence straight back to the neoconservative suspects in this case of the WarParty vs. the American People.” — Justin Raimondo, Editorial Director, Antiwar.com

“Gripping … Sober yet ultimately uplifting.” — San Francisco Chronicle

“Hijacking Catastrophe goes beyond simple Bush-bashing to paint a horrifying portrait of organized US imperialist expansion and public deception stretching back to the early Reagan era.” — Daily Variety

“As sober and scarifying as a pilfered confidential file.” — San Francisco Bay Guardian

“.a more-serious-than Moore indictment of US policy in Iraq.” — Leah Garchik, San Francisco Chronicle

“The Media Education Foundation has been carrying out vitally important work on major issues of the day, in a highly meritorious effort to raise public awareness and understanding, work that is particularly crucial in advance of the coming election, which may well cast a long shadow over the country’s future.” — Noam Chomsky

“This is the best, most complete explanation of the motives, the underlying ideology, behind the Bush administration’s headlong thrust into war with Iraq on the heels of 9/11 I have seen. It answers the question so many citizens are asking with increasing frequency, ‘We know it’s about oil – but is that all?'” — Wilson “Woody” Powell, Executive Director of Veterans for Peace

“Hijacking Catastrophe will be a vital tool in the campaign to rescue American democracy from its internal enemies. It will enrage and empower as it enlightens and explains.” Robert McChesney | — Author, Rich Media, Poor Democracy

“Hijacking Catastrophe is a film every citizen who cares about democracy should see.” — Michael Leonard | President, National Society of Newspaper Columnists

“A solid piece of work — important, righteous, and worth seeing.” — San Francisco Weekly