Klaatu Obama Nikto

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America’s fight against al Qaeda and its terrorist affiliates is why we persevere in Afghanistan, where major development assistance from India has improved the lives of the Afghan people. We’re making progress in our mission to break the Taliban’s momentum and to train Afghan forces so they can take the lead for their security. And while I have made it clear that American forces will begin the transition to Afghan responsibility next summer, I’ve also made it clear that America’s commitment to the Afghan people will endure. The United States will not abandon the people of Afghanistan — or the region — to violent extremists who threaten us all.

~ Barack H. Obama (Nov. 8, 2010)

So, we’re there for the long haul. I suspected as much in 2008.

When I read these words, it all sounded vaguely familiar. I had heard this before. But where?

Then it came to me. It was a Saturday afternoon in the fall of 1951. I had just watched 8 cartoons, a serial, and a black & white B-western. That took care of morning. Then came what I had been waiting for, after a traditional Saturday lunch of popcorn and a Butterfinger: The Day the Earth Stood Still. That was the big payoff for my 25-cent ticket (plus 50 cents for two-way bus fare).

The movie had it all. There was a flying saucer that had this long plank that melted into the side of the ship. Now you see it; now you don’t. There was a skinny guy from outer space with a British accent who could open locked doors with his bare hands and do really advanced math. And there was a robot.

I had never seen a robot like that robot. Nobody had.

It was tall: NBA center tall. It had no eyes. It had no mouth. But it had a kind of metal eyelid that concealed an elongated pulsating beam of light. When the lid opened, we soon learned, it was best to get out of the vicinity. Zap: a beam of light shot out of the little beam, and everything it hit melted. It turned tanks into piles of molten metal. This was a no-nonsense robot.

It had a name: Gort. The name said it all. “Don’t mess with the robot.”

It didn’t move fast. But with that ray blaster, it did not need to move fast. Smart people got out of its way. Early.

The key scene was when the robot went after the heroine. She had been told by the skinny guy exactly what to tell the robot: “Klaatu barrada nikto.” We never did find out this meant. But when a 7-foot cyclops robot is walking toward you, and its ray-blaster metal lid has opened, you had better say it. You can run, but you can’t hide.

THE MESSAGE

The Day the Earth Stood Still was an instant success. It has since become a classic film. The plot was a grabber. The governments of the world are run by men whose proclivity for war is unstoppable — by anything on earth, anyway. So, a visitor from another planet arrives to warn earthlings to find a way to make peace. The world beyond the atmosphere will not tolerate aggressive people with atomic weapons at their disposal.

In 1951, in the midst of the Cold War and the Korean War, that message made a lot of sense to kids. A year later, the first hydrogen bomb was exploded. The movie made even more sense.

In the film, the government of the United States would not let the visitor speak to representatives of other governments. So, he made other arrangements. He would speak with scientists.

Back in 1951, the American public did not know that most scientists by then were on the payroll of some government, or soon would be. The military was a major source of the funding. It still is.

Klaatu was a peacenik. But he was a peacenik with advanced technology. The most advanced technology was the robot.

Gort didn’t say much, not having a mouth. But he saw a lot for a machine with no eyes. It knew what was happening all around it. And as soon as Klaatu was dead, it took action. The action was violence. “There is no limit to what he could do,” Klaatu had warned the single-mom heroine.

The main message of the movie was clear: we cannot trust governments to bring us peace. It was a peacenik movie. It may be the most popular peacenik movie in American history.

But there was a problem with the plot. The script only hinted at it. In Klaatu’s speech to the scientists, he briefly mentions the nature of the peaceful world beyond the atmosphere. The people of the planets have created a race of robots to keep order.

In the original short story, Farewell to the Master, the robot talked. Its name is Gnut. As the robot prepares to leave earth, alone, Klaatu having died, the protagonist speaks to the robot. He tells the robot what to say to the masters beyond the atmosphere. The reply is the key to the story. “You misunderstand. I am the master.”

The movie has governments at loggerheads, ready to fight. The world beyond the atmosphere offers peace. But it is a special kind of peace: a peace without liberty. The movie makes it look as though Klaatu is in charge. He isn’t. He is the representative of the robots. The robots are in charge. They have the ray-blasters.

The movie really was about gun control and its corollary: a one-state world government with a monopoly over weapons.

There was no limit to what it could do.

HAVE ROBOTS, WILL TRAVEL

Today, we are told that the United States is the world’s only superpower, which has become a single word. What is a superpower obligated to do? Exercise super power.

The government of the United States ever since 1898 has taken on the role of the head robot in charge. It has gone looking for conflicts to solve. In principle, the government will not tolerate conflicts beyond its borders. It puts up with such nonsense only because, at any time, there are two dozen to three dozen wars in progress.

The media cover only two or three at a time. The American public goes into guilt overload if it is told about any more. After all, when you have a monopoly on the robots, you have a lot of responsibility. But there are more conflicts than robots. With only a dozen aircraft carriers, and with so many wars inland, we have to limit our reach. We can handle only a couple of conflicts at a time. The “care and feeding of robots” is expensive. The movie never went into this. It did not offer a detailed discussion of TANSTAAFR. Robots break down. They need upgrades. Technology marches on. In order to get their upgrades, they must be sure that taxpayers pony up the money. The taxpayers always do.

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November 11, 2010

Gary North [send him mail] is the author of Mises on Money. Visit http://www.garynorth.com. He is also the author of a free 20-volume series, An Economic Commentary on the Bible.

Copyright © 2010 Gary North