Well, what a surprise, Lone Survivor was the number one movie at the box office this weekend. It wasn’t even close, opening with $38.5 million. It was the second biggest January opening ever, and the box office victory exceeded industry expectations. Now, I am shocked that Hollywood wouldn’t see the success of this film coming. They expected $14 million at the box office.
I am shocked that a story about real people in our military who display unparalleled bravery, loyalty, honor, and sacrifice has been largely overlooked by the Hollywood crowd. I am shocked that an industry that feasts on America’s darkest, dirtiest temptations didn’t see this movie coming, didn’t see that audiences are starving for something decent.
This movie is not a success because it’s an action-packed thriller with lots of gratuitous violence and nudity and sex like The Wolf of Wall Street or the next Spiderman. This is number one because despite the odds, some Navy SEALs never quit. Despite knowing what would happen to themselves if they let goat herders free, they chose not to become murderers.
This movie showed us exactly what the men and women in our military really are made of, and it is everything that we hope and dream them to be and quite honestly hope and dream we can be, brave, loyal, honorable, selfless. We want to know that in our own lives we can do that, when our own personal safety or security is threatened, that we would handle it with dignity, honor, and courage.
Marcus and his teammates did just that. I don’t know if you saw the movie this weekend. If you haven’t, you need to, but one detail that you may have overlooked in this movie, when Lieutenant Mike Murphy leaves his cover and ventures out into the open ground to call in air support, he’s getting shot up so badly. He knows he is going to die. He ends the call with “thank you.” We know this happened because Marcus Luttrell heard it happen. It’s in the movie. Watch for it.
That is the kind of men and women that we have raised up through our military; however, I don’t think I’m alone to say I’m a little concerned that the backbone and the system that has generated some of the best and the bravest human beings the planet has ever known in wartime is being torn apart. The very values that build strong character are being systematically dismantled at home and abroad, at home in our own homes but also in our military schools.
The values that brought us no soldier left behind is being replaced by the Benghazi model, which is leave them behind and shut up about it. The heritage of Christianity in the military is under attack. They took Christian ethics out, one of the first things this president did. It’s becoming increasingly more difficult now for soldiers to pray in public and share their faith with others.
Bibles are being banned from Walter Reed Medical Center. Excuse me, what? And some soldiers are being taught that they shouldn’t join Christian groups like the AFA, American Families Association, because they’re a hate group.
I want to make it very clear, I’m not suggesting that you have to be a Christian to be in the military, but what you do have to have is a moral set of standards, and for most people, those moral lines come from God. God gives us moral lines, natural rights, and natural laws that everyone can agree on. When your erase God or nature’s God and nature’s law, and you take them out of the picture, you erase our moral standards, and a society with no moral compass will not last.
Now, I want you to combine what you know about the dissolving of our ethical and moral structures with this new piece of information that came out this weekend. Google has increasingly positioned itself as a key contractor for the U.S. military. So now Google, do no evil, is now part of the industrial complex, working closely with the NSA now for at least six years that we know of, and now they are expanding their ties to the U.S. defense as they have purchased at least eight robotics companies that we know of with the sole purpose of supplying the U.S. military with these things.
Okay, robots that are humanoid, humanoid robots, that’s good. Did anybody see, did you guys see the Star Wars where Emperor Palpatine was like yes, just as I have foreseen? Oh, there they are. Look, the humanoid robots. A giant technology company ingratiating itself and engraining itself into the U.S. military, maybe it’s just me, but I don’t think that probably ends very well.
Have we seen the movies? Do you remember Terminator? There’s another one. See, he comes back, says where is John Connor? Yeah, I don’t believe in time travel, wish I did, but nobody’s going to come in from the future and say where is John Connor’s mother? If you’re John Connor’s mother, please teach him what the future is. It’s not good.
Eisenhower, I think this is the last speech that any president gave us that actually really truly told the truth. Here is a general who then became president, and in the 1950s, he warned us. He’s the man who came out and coined the phrase that you’re about to hear.
VIDEOPresident Eisenhower: In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes.
We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals so that security and liberty may prosper together.
Glenn Oh, sorry, I lost him, something about alert. I’m all about using robots and machines and drones when we can. I’m more than happy to watch a drone get blown out of the sky over one of our pilots. I’m more than happy to see a robot blown up trying to defuse a bomb rather than one of our troops, but does anybody think we should be looking for the line?
The technology isn’t quite there yet, but it will be. We will have self driven tanks, self driven Jeeps, and full-sized humanoid robot soldiers sweeping cities all around the globe and rooting out “the enemy.” That doesn’t sound good. Let’s just start here on the least insane of the scenarios. Can we really expect robots to make split-second life-and-death decisions?
Oh, and then there’s this part, the information aspect of Google. They can track nearly 2 billion people worldwide. They’re tracking you. One billion people use Google search engines, maps, YouTube. Half a billion use Gmail. Their potential for intelligence gathering is limitless and should be breathtaking. They recognize that. The military recognizes that. When will America recognize that?
When Google went down a few months ago, 40% of the world’s Internet traffic was halted, 40% all around the globe because of one company. Where were the calls that that company is out of control and too big? I remember the calls for the Bell system to be broken apart. They weren’t mapping our brains and our DNA.
I don’t know about you, but I love the robot thing. I love the diffusing bombs. I love the drones, kind of. But I like the fact that we’re taking troops out of harm’s way, but down the road seems a little frightening. It’s far more insidious than an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie. There was another movie this weekend that is resembling reality. It’s called Her. It’s a romantic comedy about a guy who falls in love with a girl, except the girl isn’t really a girl. It’s a computer program. It’s a computer with a female voice, basically like dating Siri on your iPhone, except she’s everywhere. Watch.
Yeah, except Theodore is a little spooky. He’s dating a chick that isn’t there. There is also a trilogy of books out. I started reading right after Christmas Divergent. I went to read Insurgent after, and now I’m on the third one. I don’t know, it’s Detergent or whatever. But it’s written by a 26-year-old girl. It’s brilliant. But I’m about halfway through now on book number three. Wait until you get to book number three. Hello, Google genome project.
Technology is advancing at a rapid pace, and yet, morality and ethics are afterthoughts. We’re excited about discovery and advancement, you know? We’re in fact so excited that we don’t even take the time to discuss or debate the moral dilemmas and implications of new technology. Sure, we’re still in control of technology now, but does there come a time when we’re not? Who will be the one that says turn it off? When do things go wrong?
I don’t see anyone at Google or in the government or anyone at the forefront of technology boom that is contemplating the ethics and morality issues. Now that is a truly scary thought that doesn’t come in a movie.
We wanted to get a couple of people on today that are experts:
