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It's official: the nation's policy wonks are obsessed with Captain America: The First Avenger. Sure, to some it's just a comic book movie that grossed $65.8 million over the weekend. But to policy wonks, the tale of Steve Rogers and the top secret research project that transformed him into Captain America is the perfect springboard for talking about the debt ceiling impasse, financing foreign wars, or 1940s segregation in the military. Behold: the wonkification of Captain America:
Captain America tackles the debt impasse Jim Moret at The Huffington Post has decided that Captain America is the only one who can save us from economic calamity. "His ideology is simple. It is not influenced by politics nor an allegiance based on lines on a map. He is driven by the principles of right over wrong," he writes. "Even when he is given superhuman strength, the Captain's main weapon is not a gun, but a shield, as he consistently sees his duty as one of protection. I wish we had such a champion in America right now, when we clearly need one." Good thought, Jim.
Captain America explains financing a foreign war While theater audiences were thinking about how boss the special effects of Captain America's Nazi-fighting battles scenes were, Think Progress blogger Matt Yglesias had his mind on the various incentives governments provide citizens to sacrifice during a war effort. "You see in the film that in order to fight and win a war, you need to be able to finance a war. And this is a multi-dimensional process. On the one hand you have patriotic exhortations to lend money to the government at sub-market rates. On the other hand, even as fighting men volunteer to risk their lives, scientists Howard Stark and Abraham Erskine are doing their own wartime service rather than focusing their energies on finding erectile dysfunction treatments."