It's probably Welles' cuckoo clock line... Miles
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I wondered this myself. But Wells' line comes from a cynical criminal mind that doesn't care a twit for bourgeois morality---which could be interpreted as either the militarized fascist or militarized communist societies of post-WWII. There is an obvious anti-Americanism theme going on all through the movie, as if to say we British know how to do these things, old boy. That betrays a UK or at least Euro-centered conservatism that permeates much of the western mind set during the period, right on through to de Gaulle and 1968 collapse.
Other things. I went back and went through a few clips of the Third Man and then a few of The Odd Man Out. The psychological aspects of cinema noir are pretty heavy handed. The modern man in the immediate post-war was trapped the world of the sociopath, somekind of deformed world alienated from its true roots in enlightened and civilized past or something like that.
That maybe a theme in conservatism in the sense of a return to some imagined previous traditional value scheme in the UK and EU, but not here. A return here, meant a return to the rugged, self reliant individual (white, male, etc of the western), redone as the master managerial hero with the neckie and bull horn as if from the commanding heights---neocon icon of neoliberal realities post 1980s.
The other reason I can think of James putting it in the conservative list is the obvious emerging cold war themes, Iron Curtain stuff, where the Soviet sector gives free reign to the criminal, while the English and American zones are much more prudent and well mannered as imperial occupation armies---or something along those lines.
Anyway, I agree with the idea of adding all the Speilberg and Lucas productions as somekind of parable on a utopian suburbia's of the future. This seems especially appropriate when these are constrasted to their dark cousins of Alien, Terminator, Total Recall, Matrix, or one of the new wave cinema noir re-take, Dark City:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOHn2uzriBg
(Except the ending. It should have cut at ome point just after our hero breaks down the brick wall with the faded poster of Shell Beach.)
CG