The Most Important Movie of the Year

If I told you that “Generation Zero” is the best movie about deficit spending and national debt that you will ever see, would you think I was making a joke? As in, how much competition can there be in such a category? OK, there’s not much competition in the “fiscal film” category. But “Generation Zero” would win, because it’s a brilliant movie; in reality, it’s a work of art that happens to be about red-ink spending. “Generation Zero” is going to do for the tea party movement--and the larger cause of controlling government spending--what Al Gore’s 2006 movie, “An Inconvenient Truth,” did for the global warming debate. There are some differences, however. As we now know, “Truth” was based on a deep fallacy, the idea that “global warming” is happening, even as the earth indeed is cooling. By contrast, “Zero” deals with one of the great struggles of our time; the trillions being spent and overspent are real. Down this wastrel road lies the chaotic fate of a banana republic--or maybe today’s Greece or Zimbabwe. And of course, whereas “Truth” won an Oscar and helped propel Gore to a Nobel Peace Prize, “Zero” is unlikely to win a single prize from left-leaning Hollywood or from even lefter-leaning international organizations such as the Nobel Institute. But, unlike “Truth,” which caused no real change in American politics, “Zero” is certain to have a huge political impact here at home...read more