Robert McNamara Reads Creepy, Ironic Poetry (VIDEO)

One of the things that is likely to prevent former Defense Secretary Robert McNamara from receiving the same wall-to-wall coverage in death that Michael Jackson did is the fact that McNamara did not leave behind that many widely-watched music videos. That's a pity, because he might have broken new ground in the area of Vincent Price voice-over narration. The closest we come to such a thing is this deleted scene from Errol Morris' The Fog Of War, where McNamara recites Dylan Thomas' "The Hand That Signed The Paper":

The poem, in its entirety, goes like so:

The hand that signed the paper felled a city;
Five sovereign fingers taxed the breath,
Doubled the globe of dead and halved a country;
These five kings did a king to death.

The mighty hand leads to a sloping shoulder,
The finger joints are cramped with chalk;
A goose's quill has put an end to murder
That put an end to talk.

The hand that signed the treaty bred a fever,
And famine grew, and locusts came;
Great is the hand that holds dominion over
Man by a scribbled name.

The five kings count the dead but do not soften
The crusted wound nor pat the brow;
A hand rules pity as a hand rules heaven;
Hands have no tears to flow.

It's worth noting that "these" in the fourth line becomes "those," a case, perhaps, of McNamara unconsciously divesting himself of authorship. I faked my way through too many analytic discussions of poetry as an undergraduate to offer up any insight into whether or not there's significance in McNamara leaving out the second stanza. Any experts in the field are welcome to lend me their insight.

[Would you like to follow me on Twitter? Because why not? Also, please send tips to [e-mail] -- learn more about our media monitoring project here.]

Get HuffPost Politics On Facebook and Twitter!

Comments

[pjburns11]

Pat Oliphant best summed up McNamara's passing

http://thetruthburns.wordpress.com/2009/07/08/the-end-of-an-error/

[Avian801]

At this hour of Mr. McNamara's death I direct your attention to an elegy for President Kennedy:

Limousine, Midnight Blue in which the following lines occur:

"Before you tapped him / for Defense, McNamara ran Ford Motor Co., / and if we’re lucky, he’s got more bold new ideas.:"

...as well as these lines:

"Ask not what the tolling bell can do for you, / ask what it matters in eternity. / Consider the dying stars, / how they bring unfinished business to a perfect end."

For 8 sample poems, each with its own little video, see the site above http://www.jameyhecht.com//Site/HOME.html). Thank you.

[bmora]

That some cold stuff to say to man right before you whack him.

[Patrick Bussink]

i completely second that emotion, smchp: "fog of war" is a must see. what a brilliant film.

[Whitley2009]

I have always held him in contempt. What can you say about a man who fanatically held that his Ivy League business school management and scheduling techniques were the best tools for fighting a guerrilla war
in the jungle. He failed miserably at the cost of our kids lives and limbs.

[smchp]

The fog of war is a brilliant documentary of his time in the WH. Everyone should see it and learn from it.

[furey]

There will be some things that people will see.
There will be some things that people won't see.
And life goes on.

- Donald Rumsfeld

http://michaelfury.wordpress.com/2009/05/24/torture-and-911/

[smchp]

"We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat." –on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction

[LiarLiarIraqsOnFire]

"Six day, six weeks, I doubt six months..."

Donald Rumsfeld predicting the length of Bush's War For Empire

[furey]

As we know,
There are known knowns.
There are things we know we know.
We also know
There are known unknowns.
That is to say
We know there are some things
We do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns,
The ones we don't know
We don't know.

- Donald Rumsfeld

http://michaelfury.wordpress.com/2009/03/10/culture-of-deception/

[militantlibrarian]

Wallowing in guilt?

[ChristopherAtom]

Doubtful. He is almost giddy at the second line.