Olbermann, politics, 9/11, and The Twilight Zone

I've been hearing some right-wing propaganda on the radio masquerading as public service announcements-- even being dishonestly presented as such by symapthetic station owners. Raw Story has the video of one of these election-year horror shows, which warns viewers that criticizing GOP tactics is tantamount to murdering fellow Americans.

Although the last few elections have seen this tactic used-- most prominently by the likes of Dick Cheney and Condi Rice warning us that not attacking Iraq would result in nuclear holocaust for North America (which would be delightfully comic if it hadn't actually gotten us into a war).

But Keith Olbermann is on the case again, as perhaps the only even semi-prominent media news voice arguing for reason and sensibility in the 'war on terror.' He uses an analogy that at first seems absurd, but when you think about it, is there a better comparison to what we're seeing in politics these days than the eerie surrealism of The Twilight Zone?

And long ago, a series called "The Twilight Zone" broadcast a riveting episode entitled "The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street."

In brief: a meteor sparks rumors of an invasion by extra-terrestrials disguised as humans. The electricity goes out. A neighbor pleads for calm. Suddenly his car -- and only his car -- starts. Someone suggests he must be the alien. Then another man's lights go on. As charges and suspicion and panic overtake the street, guns are inevitably produced. An "alien" is shot -- but he turns out to be just another neighbor, returning from going for help. The camera pulls back to a near-by hill, where two extra-terrestrials are seen manipulating a small device that can jam electricity. The veteran tells his novice that there's no need to actually attack, that you just turn off a few of the human machines and then, "they pick the most dangerous enemy they can find, and it's themselves."

And then, in perhaps his finest piece of writing, Rod Serling sums it up with words of remarkable prescience, given where we find ourselves tonight: "The tools of conquest do not necessarily come with bombs and explosions and fallout. There are weapons that are simply thoughts, attitudes, prejudices, to be found only in the minds of men.