“America is beyond power; it acts as in a dream, as a face of God. Wherever America is, there is freedom, and wherever America is not, madness rules with chains, darkness strangles millions. Beneath her patient bombers, paradise is possible.” — John Updike

I was having an argument with a friend of mine about America’s political goals. He claimed the U.S. was allowing Venezuelans in so that they could send them back to Venezuela as agents of American imperium and take over all that tasty South American oil. I was skeptical. I pointed out that the U.S. actually deals out of altruism a great deal of the time. An example of this is the 1970s return of the Panama Canal by America to the Panamanians.

The Panamanians certainly didn’t have the military force to seize the canal away. It was just good-heartedness, even in the teeth of the Cold War, that stirred America’s heart.

Those who claim that America is just a cold machine, a rapacious empire bent on world domination don’t understand the internal dynamics of its development. America is developing Houston, and Sarasota, and Orange County — the South Sun Belt, especially. It is flexing its economic muscles at home. It isn’t trying to “Coca-Colonize” France, or plant settlers in Central America. Its white population isn’t even growing anymore.

No, America sees things through an idealistic lens. It wants to be good. It celebrates its actions during World War 2 because they seem to be the actions of an anti-evil power rising up to do battle. Americans today regret some of what the CIA and other American agents did to topple or subvert third-party governments in the fight against Communism. There is a heart to America, and it is on display with every pro-feminist, pro-equality stance.

Now, having said all that, don’t think for a moment that I am backing America’s goodness. On the contrary, I want to see more of America’s badness.

When “Angels take flight,” America becomes preachy, sour, stubborn — boring. The Puritan mindset is a poisonous one to a good time. How you gonna crack open a wine cooler and seduce a hottie at a house party when the religious goodie-goodies are pursing their lips over your shoulder?

In a larger context, America sets the ethical tone for the world. I’d like to see that tone darker and more nuanced. A little more hateful, emotional, spiteful, arrogant, evil, cold-hearted. Strong, in a word.

an auteur’s vision

Loaded with meaning and sinking under the waves, Titanic is an American movie by a Canadian-American director, James Cameron.

I identify with Cameron because in many ways I feel myself to be an honorary American. I have less in common with the politeness of common Canadian society (“thank you driver!” — common exit phrase to the bus operator on public transit in Canada) and with the repressed sexuality of the common Canadian, loaded down with hang-ups of all kinds.

Cameron’s film reflects his fondness for water. In this case, watery graves. It is a very moralistic picture, because it concludes with an afterlife scene as the heroine turns young again and meets her chaste male lover who has been waiting in limbo decades for her.

The power of Titanic is similar to that of another Cameron franchise, the Avatar films. Avatar features a mean America doing its damnest to mine unobtainium. Goofy name for a mineral, but there you have it. The local alien natives are portrayed as cleverly intelligent, virtuously decent and devoid of a greedy bone in their body. Whereas the real Indians sold Manhattan for a few trinkets, these Indians — blue-skinned and gregarious — would never stoop so low.

Both Avatar and Titanic are built on an exploration of the American Dream, which is a sanitized version of American ethics. The Dream is a self-focused journey to material prosperity without hurting so much as a fly; it cavorts on the movie screen in the average American’s mind as he struggles to go paycheck-to-paycheck, again, without hurting a fly.

The ethics of the American Dream are much-disputed, but there is one undisputable fact: Uncle Sam wants to tax you when you get rich. James Cameron is in a high-tax-bracket and inevitably resents it. Like Bruce Willis, who complained about burning big piles of money when it went to Washington (before senility claimed him), Cameron must be itchy-fingered about the financial situation he finds himself in. Greed is an unethical emotion, but it features in everything from The Terminator to Aliens 2 to Avatar. The greed to excel oneself and reach for the stars marks everything Cameron touches. Take that, alien antagonist!