An Ugly American

Last week, Oliver Stone, on the Fourth of July, actually said of the United States at a film festival in the Czech Republic, "The world is in danger with our tyranny."

Stone also said, as The Wrap reported during a press conference at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, "It's a disgrace that Obama is more concerned with hunting down Snowden than reforming these George Bush-style eavesdropping techniques...To me, Snowden is a hero, because he revealed secrets that we should all know, that the United States has repeatedly violated the Fourth Amendment."

"He should be welcomed, and offered asylum," Stoned continued, "but he has no place to hide because every country is intimidated by the United States. This should not be. This is what's wrong with the world today, and it's very important that the world recognizes and gives asylum to Snowden. Everyone in the world is impacted by the United States' Big Brother attitude toward the world."

William Oliver Stone (born September 15, 1946) is an American film director, screenwriter, producer and veteran. Stone came to public prominence between the mid-1980s and the early 1990s for writing and directing a series of films about the Vietnam War, in which he had participated as an infantry soldier. Many of Stone's films focus on contemporary and controversial American political and cultural issues, such as JFK, Natural Born Killers, and Nixon.

Stone's films often combine different camera and film formats within a single scene as evidenced in JFK, Natural Born Killers, and Nixon.  British newspaper The Guardian has described Stone as "one of the few committed men of the left working in mainstream American cinema." Stone has received three Academy Awards for his work on the films Midnight Express, Platoon, and Born on the Fourth of July. He was presented with the Extraordinary Contribution to Filmmaking Award at the 2007 Austin Film Festival.

Oliver Stone is pretty much protected under the First Amendment (Freedom of Speech) but his attitude leaves one thinking how proud is he really to be an American by criticizing his own country while overseas on our day of independence?  How professional is this professional man?

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