CSI: American Carnage (Friday, July 26, 2019)
IN THE CYBER – The Diapered Anomaly, sitting in the midst of a field of mud, crushes and eats hoards of bugs crawling up from beneath the earth. Little Timmy, pup reporter, and the small strike force look on, mesmerized by the grotesque scene. Phrases billow through the air: That’s not what he said! Yes it is! No it isn’t! You are Fake News™! Did your aides lie, sir? You are a liar! Timmy says, There must be some major disruption in the material world. The Professor, cleaning his pipe, says, Oh, yes, Timmy. I believe the special counsel must have appeared in public. The Anomaly howls and bangs his shoe. Bugs scatter. Steele Dossier! Treason! Harassment! Crooked! Timmy says, Those bugs keep coming, despite their awful fate. Clouds continue to darken the sky. To the north, a field of phragmites wilts and dies from lack of water in an expanse of mud. The temperature rises. The Anomaly flails at the bugs that are now emerging and marching behind signs – CNN, NBC, NPR, NYT, WaPo, ABC, CBS. Mohammed says, It’s the press! The press is surrounding the Anomaly! The Professor says, Indeed. Though the press is crippled and weakened and often misguided, it offers perhaps the one opportunity to overcome this nightmare. Sarah, Timmy’s friend from the resistance potluck, says, We must offer our support. Boris, genial triple agent, says, You mean subscribe? Sarah says, Yes, of course. But what I mean to say is the press is hobbled and weakened here in The Cyber. It cripples itself by pursuing its own entertainment and self-aggrandizement, becoming irrelevant to its true role as actor in this global nightmare. Here we have an instance of the press pathetically seeking to rein in the most egregious actions of the autocrat. Will it remain focused for more than an hour? Remember the autocrat depends on controlling all perception. He repeats and repeats until what he repeats becomes so and we see only what he wants us to see. Already, you can see this functioning. We are looking at the collective actions of a free press, but we see giant cockroaches being squashed and eaten by the autocrat’s infant cyber-doppelganger. Yet, by simple questioning of the autocrat, the press begins to emerge. We can now see that multiple news organizations are questioning the autocrat’s insistence that he and he alone can know and describe the landscape. Boris says, But that ees not enough, Sarahchik! Sarah says, No, you are right. The autocrat could never emerge and grow if the press were not in its weakened state. That tells us something. Mohammed, Timmy’s friend, says, I am not eating any bugs! Sarah says, Yet we must consume information. They look on as the Anomaly devours bugs and fills the air with growling howls of WITCH HUNT! – Friday, July 26, 2019