Oswald in the doorway: the blog of the Oswald Innocence Campaign, by Ralph Cinque

The U.S. 9/11 wars have been so dastardly and evil, that every American should be outraged, ashamed, and torn up inside over the number of human beings their government has killed since 9/11. It's like we went on a global killing spree. And it ranks high on the list of historic atrocities, particularly because the lethality of modern weapons is so much greater than ever before. 

The lethality of modern weapons is so great that war should be considered unthinkabe- in the way that nuclear war is considered unthinkable because of its lethality. The whole idea of crossing the ocean to start a war should be stricken from the human mind and consciousness- in every single person. 

But, the reality of what the U.S. government has done since 9/11 is not only ignored by government and media- it is systematically whitewashed. They all act as though the U.S. still has moral authority and moral superiority. They all act as if we, the United States, are a peaceful nation, when we are, in fact, the most violent and murderous nation on Earth. 

And this ignoring of reality by the U.S. establishment includes Hollywood. It hasn't made any anti-war movies in the 21st century. They have only made pro-war movies, glorifying the 9/11 wars, including the Iraq War. My Stretch of Texas Ground stands alone as the first and only anti-war movie of the 21st century.   

I think the film is doing very well at the film festivals. That's because there are so many films made today that every film festival gets thousands of entries, even the smaller ones. And keep in mind that there are a great many film festivals for which My Stretch of Texas Ground was NOT eligible because of its premiere status. Many festivals, and particularly the larger ones, require a premiere. They want all the films they screen to be premieres, which means never having been played at a theater and not available online. So that excluded us from Sundance, Toronto, and many other festivals, including South by Southwest here in Austin, and the Austin Film Festival. That's why I am very pleased that we made it into Austin IndieFEST, since they don't have a premiere requirement. 

But, as well as we have done at the film festivals, I strongly suspect that some festivals rejected the film outright because of its frank, unsullied truth-telling about the wars. They feared being marked and branded as supporting the film's message and its denunciation of the U.S., government for its terrorist wars.  So, to every film festival that has accepted us, I say thank you for being brave.