The Second Civil War is a satirical black comedy (Propaganda) film about anti-immigrant sentiment in the United States. It was made for the HBO cable television network and first shown on March 15, 1997.<br /><br />The film is set in a future United States in which immigration has rapidly increased, resulting in a fractured polyglot society. The mayor of Los Angeles speaks only in Spanish, Rhode Island is populated mostly by Chinese-Americans, and Alabama has a Sikh congressman. Politics have been openly reduced to a matter of catering to various ethnic groups for their votes, and media-fueled polarization has led to widespread anxiety, with viewership of cable news, including channel NewsNet, at all time highs.<br /><br />The film stars James Earl Jones, Elizabeth Peña, and Denis Leary as reporters for a CNN-like cable network, "News Net" (referred to in on-screen graphics as "NN"); Phil Hartman as the U.S. President; James Coburn as his chief political advisor; and William Schallert as the Secretary of Defense. Brian Keith portrayed a general in one of his final movie roles.