Among the huddled masses, yearning to breathe free; taking Zarqawi PSY OPS to Clear Channel ain't easy, nor good for my perceived character

The whole psy ops thing last week distracted me from what I wanted to write about, the immigration rally in St. Paul a week ago. I randomly ran into Eliot Brown in an alley in St. Paul on Saturday and he said he'd happened to take a photo of me among the crowd. Thanks!

I have gotten a haircut since the photo. But anyway. I gotta go to Wisco now for a family dinner; my uncle Dan got engaged, which is nice. On Wednesday I took the PSY OPS case to my Republican boss' call-in radio show on KTLK. In a segment about 7 minutes long, I was somewhat surprised to receive a Sean Hannity-style 7 or 9 blathering ad hominem attacks from my employer that I had no opportunity to rebut. I have the recording and will probably post it up, but altogether it was disheartening yet somewhat amusing. I informed the ClearChannel audience that the military was doing psychological warfare on their brains, and there's evidence out there. This made her panic, and my age (22) and my status (graduated) from a college (Macalester) were the only available battering rams to attempt to discredit what I was saying and fill up time.

Upon hearing the recording, a wise friend pointed out to me she's right, what the hell have I got to back up my credibility? The same basic bag of tricks will be employed against people like me, and it requires a more agile response, simply because the truth, in and of itself, rarely works these days.

Yah, it was disheartening. But the clanging bells of the Basilica last night and today helped remind me what Hunter Thompson entered on his typewriter before he blew his brains out.

Counselor.

This seems to have been a reference to the Gospel of John (ch. 14), as a contributor to RawStory explained.

“And I will pray the Father, and he will give you another Counselor, to be with you for ever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him; you know him, for he dwells with you, and will be in you.”

As the RawStory guy said (and I posted last August):

Thompson surely would have felt drawn to the Gospel of John, the most lyrical and mystical of the four Gospels. It’s there that we find the pronouncement: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” It is a decree that has resonated with writers from Twain to Whitman to Fitzgerald to Miller—a revelation that words are transcendent, that a writer’s vocation is more than just a job. It should be a calling, wherein the “Spirit of truth” (Counselor) is followed unfailingly. No mean trick.

For following your Counselor often means discovering things that aren’t fit for polite company. It’s never pleasant to find evil growing among the peonies. Or in the hearts of your elected officials. Better to be “vaguely happy” than uncomfortable. Thompson, though, never fell for that devil’s lie. He knew that even though the truth often cuts like a razor, it also serves as a “Comforter” when the jackals begin circling. Because as Thompson recognized, the jackals don’t really give a damn whether you speak the truth or not. They are coming after us all one day. But facing the bastards down is a whole lot easier when you’ve got the truth by your side.

We are faced with annihilationist ideology, applied for partisan Republican political purposes. I find it plainly disturbing that my education on the Holocaust has been the key to unlocking the meaning of the Zarqawi figure. Those rare occasions when I have caught the current of history and made it halt for a moment, have been among the key times I really felt fully alive, intervening in the flow of events. The radio bit doesn't rise to that level, but it shows me how rocky and difficult the road ahead will be.

The top defenders of the Republican empire know their myths are shallow and evaporating daily. I know because I can hear the fear in their voice.

At that level, the truth makes a good Counselor.