A
FELONY URINATION
Richard
Bizarro, who got up out of his seat to take a whiz, has become
"the first person arrested under a new flight regulation adopted
for the Olympics," Fox News reports. Bizarrely, he faces "up
to 20 years in prison on charges of interfering with a flight
crew." On a Delta airlines flight from Los Angeles to Salt
Lake City, Mr. Bizarro got out of his seat 25 minutes before
landing, in violation of the 30-minute rule newly imposed
on Salt Lake City flights by the Federal Aviation Administration
as a precautionary measure during the Olympics. (The same
rule is permanently in effect for all travelers to the Imperial
City).
For
this he's facing 20 years? Ah, but urination without
authorization is just the beginning of his crimes: according
to one of the witches disguised as flight attendants, Bizarro
not only "ignored her orders" but also "stared at her for
about a minute before returning to his seat." The Fox News
story also ominously adds that Bizarro is "6-foot-2 and 220
pounds" another crime, along with unauthorized staring,
in the Bizarro World we're living in. Goodness gracious me,
I'll be surprised if he doesn't get life without possibility
of parole!
Oh,
but here's my favorite part:
"Because
of the incident, air marshals aboard the plane ordered all
passengers to put their hands on their heads for the rest
of the flight."
WELCOME
TO BIZARRO WORLD
If
this seems utterly inexplicable to you, then you don't understand
the central organizing (or is that disorganizing) principle
of Bizarro World. As the link above explains, this is:
"A
planet where alarm clocks dictate when to go to sleep, ugliness
is beautiful and the world's greatest hero is a chalk- faced
duplicate of Superman."
In
the normal world that is, the world prior to 9/11 airlines
competed for business, each one claiming to treat their customers
like royalty. In the Bizarro World we landed in after 9/11,
however, the airlines are competing to see which one is the
meanest, and, from what I can see, the competition
is positively cutthroat.
BOOK
HIM!
The
FBI claims that "the incident [what incident?] was
seen by two of three undercover air marshals on board
One
of the agents said he saw Bizarro give what appeared to be
a 'thumbs up' to another passenger as he returned to his seat,
prompting the marshals to take control of the cabin." Aha!
Unauthorized hand signals! Give that man another 20
years!
HIJACKERS
OR SKY MARSHALS? YOU DECIDE
Bizarro,
for his part, told
the Salt Lake Tribune that he thought the sky marshals
were hijackers. When three men, "old enough to be his grandchildren,"
started yelling and demanding that everyone put their hands
on their heads, "I believed I was witnessing a hijacking of
our airplane," he said. Bizarro, in spite of his name, just
doesn't get it: everything's changed, you dolt! Up
is down. Down is up. Ugly is beautiful, and vice-versa. Sky
marshals act like hijackers makes sense to me
.
"Bizarro,
a frequent traveler, said he had never heard the restriction
announced before," the Salt Lake Tribune reports, "and
no one stopped him when he stood up." But of course,
you ninny! When someone's committing a felony, the idea is
not to stop them but to let them go ahead.
The
Tribune continues: "When he exited the restroom, Bizarro
said he was confronted by a flight attendant, whose comments
he interpreted as rudeness." In a world where rudeness is
interpreted as a display of the most exquisite manners, an
old-fashioned guy like Richard Bizarro just doesn't stand
a chance. Federal prosecutors zealously pursuing this case
"say he intimidated the attendant with his stares and his
size." A contrite yet somewhat baffled Bizarro says "I now
know she was just doing her job," but still denies being able
to do anything about his height and weight. He is also at
a loss as to the mysterious hand signals, and the appearance,
demeanor, and actions of the sky marshals. According to him,
"The
three air marshals looked young enough to be his grandchildren
and may have had fake badges. One marshal was wearing a baseball
cap backward, he added. 'They did not give the appearance
they were law enforcement officers and I did not pay them
the proper respect,' Bizarro said."
THE
END OF NORMALITY
But
it all makes perfect sense: cops naturally look and act like
young punks if you're living in Bizarro World. Mr. Bizarro
describes his experience as "surreal" but, of course, the
surreal is the normal in our post-9/11 universe. What would
really be odd, at this point, is even the slightest hint of
normality. But try as one might, you won't find it in the
headlines. Here, for example, is a
story about the race to get dibs on the now famous phrase:
"Let's Roll!"
The
9/11 hero, Todd
Beamer, has a foundation
set up in his name which is now battling for first dibs on
the phrase that is the modern version of "We have not yet
begun to fight!" over the trademark, that is. Associated
Press reports:
"The
foundation is competing against various companies and individuals
who want to sell everything from T-shirts to mud flaps emblazoned
with what has become a catch phrase for American courage.
"The
race could eventually lead to a legal battle over whether
someone can actually claim exclusive use over such a commonly
used expression."
THE
END OF LANGUAGE
It
used to be that language was the one thing we all had in common.
Not anymore. Now, anyone can trademark any combination of
words like claiming an internet address and forbid everyone
else from using them. Gee, I think I'll apply for exclusive
rights to "bill past due," "remit immediately," and all possible
variations thereof that should hold off my creditors for
awhile.
THE
END OF CAPITALISM
Several
others got in line ahead of the Beamer Foundation: Iman Abdallah,
of Newark, New Jersey, was first (hmmmmm
.), closely
followed by at least a dozen others, including Jack L. Williams,
of Grosse Pointe Park, Michigan, who got in ahead of the Beamer
people by two full days and is disdainful of threats from
the foundation's legal team: "I don't care what your name
is, it's first in, first swim," says Williams, a contractor.
"It's all about good old American capitalism."
Williams
is another one who just doesn't get it: the rules are now
inverted, and it's first in, but you don't even get wet. Just
ask Microsoft, which is being dragged
into court again for the high crime of being first on
the market with a useful product selling at a reasonable price.
And as for good old American capitalism: in a world where
airlines
get money from the government to torture their passengers,
there ain't no such thing anymore. In the twisted logic of
the post-9/11 Bizarro World, the idea is to drive passengers
away, and lose money but only a lucky few will
be allowed to go out of business. The rest will see their
misery and that of their customers prolonged by an
endless stream of government subsidies and other bail-out
measures.
DON'T
COUNT ON IT
The
AP piece cites Tom Holt, a Boston-based patent attorney, who
finds it hard to believe that trademarking "Let's roll!" is
going to survive a legal challenge:
"You
can't seek to appropriate for your own use words plucked out
of the dictionary. While the words `Let's roll' have taken
on a very profound significance, I don't think trademark protection
will be given to that phrase."
I
wouldn't be so sure about that. While certain people, such
as Mr. Bizarro, above, and perhaps Mr. Holt himself, seem
immune to the effects of the big post-9/11 change, in which
ordinary logic has been turned on its head, the Bizarro-ization
process seems well advanced to me.
METHINKS
I SEE THE WRONG COUNTRY
Indeed,
it seems to be spreading overseas, the latest manifestation
showing up in Britain, with Maggie Thatcher's latest "Advice
to a Superpower":
"Methinks
I see in my mind a noble and puissant nation rousing herself
like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible
locks."
With
these words from Milton's Areopagitica,
the Iron Lady starts out a very odd narrative, at the end
of which it seems clear that she has mistaken America for
Britain at the height of its imperial glory. For the Americans
have not had a good rest from the job of global policeman
since the end of the last world war: rather, it is John Bull
who has been soundly dozing, while the lost remnants of his
former Empire heartily
protest their abandonment.
TRADING
PLACES
Yet,
to Lady Thatcher, Milton's words "perfectly describe America
today." But then, again, she never seems to have grasped the
basic idea of the American Revolution, which split the English-speaking
world into separate nations. Now, "after the horror of Sept.
11," she avers, "America will never be the same again." Indeed,
if her description of the former colonies is true, then we
seem to have slipped into a time-warp, or an
alternate universe in which the American Revolution never
happened. The US, she writes,
"Has
proved to itself and to others that it is in truth (not just
in name) the only global superpower, indeed a power that enjoys
a level of superiority over its actual or potential rivals
unmatched by any other nation in modern times. Consequently,
the world outside America should never be the same either."
All
roads must lead to Rome; surely this is the hallmark of the
imperial style. At the sight of such an imposing hegemon,
the great and glorious Global Superpower, one is moved to
shout: "Hail Caesar!" Or, perhaps, "Rule
Britannia!" America, like Britannia, rules the waves,
and waives the rules! "There may be new challenges to "American
dominance," says Thatcher, but technology will somehow magically
give us the wisdom and the means to "ensure stability and
peace" on a world scale.
BIN
LADEN A BOLSHEVIK?
Again,
this sounds more like Britain at the apex of its imperial
glory, rather than the US, but then again, Lady Thatcher seems
to have fallen into yet another time-warp. According to her,
"the best parallel" of today's terrorist threat
"Is
with early Communism. Islamic extremism today, like Bolshevism
in the past, is an armed doctrine. It is an aggressive ideology
promoted by fanatical, well-armed devotees. And, like Communism,
it requires an all-embracing long-term strategy to defeat
it."
BRITAIN'S
FIFTH COLUMN
She
might have added: and, like Communism, it has thoroughly penetrated
nearly every aspect of society with a home-grown fifth column
acting under orders from abroad. Again, however, this describes
Britain, and not really the US: immigration from primarily
Muslim countries, such as Pakistan, has flooded that country
in recent years, to the point where Al Qaeda was operating
semi-openly, recruiting British citizens to fight for Osama
bin Laden. In Britain's own war on terrorism, a substantial
minority of foreign-born citizens can said to be sympathetic
to the other side. In spite of a campaign to impugn the patriotism
of our own Arab-Muslim minority much smaller, proportionately,
than in Britain a President with an Arab-American among
his personal bodyguards has, rightly and vigorously, defended
them against charges of disloyalty.
BIZARRO
LOGIC
With
perfect Bizarro-illogic, Lady Thatcher compares a medievalist
pre-Enlightenment religious doctrine with atheistic Marxism,
the apotheosis of Enlightenment rationalism, militant materialism,
and the worship of Progress and finds them identical. The
"liberation" of women, the abolition of the family, the end
of "patriarchy," the eradication of religion all these announced
goals of Marx and his heirs are anathema to the mullahs of
every Islamic sect. In spirit and style, the appeal of bin
Laden is more like the Christian Coalition our own brand
of fundamentalists than the ideology that inspired, say,
Kim Philby
and his
friends.
THE
IRON LADY TAKES CHARGE
What's
really odd about Thatcher's brand of "advice" is that she
offers it almost as if she were a retired US President, rather
than a former Prime Minister of Great Britain. Her commanding,
strangely fatherly tone is hard to fathom otherwise
as she details the three necessary phases of this "all-embracing
long-term strategy." The first phase, in Afghanistan, was
all well and good, but we must get on with it "in Africa,
Southeast Asia and elsewhere." Phase three means going after
"rogue states" namely, Syria, Iran (both "enemies of Western
values"), Libya, North Korea, Sudan, and especially Iraq.
In her aspect as Commander-in-chief, the Iron Lady lays out
her strategy:
"Again,
solving this problem will demand the best available intelligence.
It will require, as in Aghanistan, the mobilization of internal
resistance. It will probably also involve a massive use of
force."
American
force, that is. Looks like she has it all figured out. So
why wait for President Bush to make a decision, when Lady
Thatcher seems to have already done so? Indeed, given the
parameters she sets out, there isn't going to be much discussion
about it, either, because "How and when, not whether, to remove
[Saddam Hussein] are the only important questions." The Iron
Lady has spoken.
QUEEN
OF THE ANGLOSPHERE
She
ends her peroration exhorting America "to strengthen its resolve
against rogue regimes and upgrade its defenses," and declaring:
"The good news is that America has a president who can offer
the leadership necessary to do so." Yeah, but why don't we
just bypass him, and instead heed the voice of a woman whose
transatlantic advice is proffered in a tone so regal that
it has the ring of a royal command? Maggie I, uncrowned Queen
of the Anglosphere, says we "must" invade the Middle East
at once so, hop to it, Georgie boy! What're you waiting
for? Don't you know that, by the sheer force of the 9/11 explosion,
the American Revolution has been repealed and reversed?
There
is some dispute as to whether the British really did play
"The
World Turned Upside Down" during the surrender at the
Battle of Yorktown, as tradition would have it. But certainly,
in the view of Maggie Thatcher, September 11 turned it "right"
side up again.
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