Baudrillard - Angela and Matthieu

In The Precession of the Simulacra Baudrillard argues that the reality no longer exists. He explains that the relation between representations and reality has been fundamentally altered, producing a state in which signs and symbols no longer related to reality but rather interact to create the Simulacra. All referentials have been liquidated. It is hyperreal -more real than reality. Generated from models of the real without a reality, like a map without a territory. The simulacrum is characterized by folding and meshing of the binaries of true and false, real and imaginary. Representations within the simulacra are never exchanged for the real, they are exchanged for themselves ( eg. Atomic bombs, capital). Because representations within the simulacra no longer relate to reality laws of logic no longer hold.
“Deterrence machines” (eg. Disneyland, Watergate) reinforce the simulacrum by providing an “imaginary” instance, which suggests that everything else is real. Baurillard uses Marx’s analysis of commodity to explain the emergnece deterrence. Capital was the first deterrent because the use-value of commodity has become irrelevant.
The simulacrum results from successive mutations in the relation between representation and reality. In the first phase signs reflect reality, in the second phase signs mask reality, in the third phase they mask the absence of reality and finally in the simulacra signs no have no relation to reality.

Questions:
Baurillard says that we now live in the era of “Murder by simulation”. The 2006 movie “Death of a President” in a fictional documentary about the assignation of George W. Bush constructed from archival (real?) footage. How does this simulated death function in the simulacrum? Is it a deterrence machine? Does it reinforce the simulacrum or does it subvert it? How does it relate to Baurillard discussion of past assignation attempts of political figures?

( I know we have not cover Debord, but I would like to ask this anyways…)
Baurillard analysis chronologically follows Guy Debord’s works on the Society of the Spectacle. Baurillard says we no longer live in the spectacle and that the simulacrum is decidedly different. How do these two paradigms differ? Is the Society of the Spectale a precursor to the simulacrum?