Crazy talk

For proper ambiance, play this video while reading…

If you’ve been paying attention, you might have noticed that there’s a police state coming online under Obama’s watch. Whistle blowers jailed, militarization of the police, prosecution of journalists, on and on. Meanwhile, there’s the rabid Republicans who *seem* totally gonzo, off the reservation. Ron Paul talks a good revolution but his troops are supposedly standing down and attempting to slither onto the levers of power gradually, following the Ralph Reed Christian Coalition model. So on the one hand you got bad cops acting like parodies of themselves – ignorant, misogynistic, racist, greedy – driving you towards the compassionate, rational ethnic good cops who aren’t denying climate change or evolution. Or maybe the scheming socialists are driving you toward moral patriots who don’t murder the unborn… Whatevah.

We’ve been desensitized by the ubiquity of formulaic Hollywood movies – ready to suspend our disbelief at the first flicker. This is a big budget production, a grand good cop / bad cop routine. We the people in protective custody, safe from terrorists and other dangerous characters, locked up tight in our home theaters, whispering to each other over Facebook.

Good or bad, cops swill the same coffee and scarf the same doughnuts. Nothing wrong with cops mind you, as long as you’re not living in a police state. The elections are a massive mind game, there clearly isn’t a choice at all. We are supposed to reject the bad cops and legitimize the good cops with our votes in November, then we’ll get more of the old iron boot on our neck routine.

There’s just one party and the platform is control.

Terry Gilliam’s “Brazil”