Message From Beyond

Another look at the Republican convention

Comments (0) By Joshuah Bearman Thursday, Sep 9 2004

...continued from page 1

"Where are we?" I whispered to Stephen.

I don’t know. . .," he said, his eyes filled with wonder.

Next to me, the reporter from the Pittsburgh Post Gazette turned into my grandma Dotty. She wore her Hashomer Hatzair uniform and cravat. Behind her was the moshav in New Jersey. It was 1929. "The shomrim love the president. Herzl and Marx love the president!"

Grandma? Is that you? I miss you. But — why do you have your arm around Paul Wolfowitz? Grandpa hated Wolfowitz. When did Wolfowitz join the Movement?

"The Movement joined him," she said. "I have your favorite Jell-O here for you, Joshy. Orange flavor. Join us."

The wind howled. It pulled me upside down, and I held on to the press box with one hand. My grip loosened, from four fingers, down to three, then two — until, just at the brink of surrender, came that "calling from beyond the stars" at the close of the speech, which was just the catalyst for the wormhole to snap shut, collapsing the multiple realities over the Garden into a single, immutable reality — the one where the actual message from beyond the stars* last week came from the kind of scientific research that Bush doesn’t believe in. The one where Bush waged a one-man war on almost every worthwhile policy of the past half-century. The one where Bush can quote a letter from a fellow at a conservative think tank and pretend that it was written by one of the soldiers he sent to Iraq. The one true reality, in short, where everything the man says is plain old Texas bullshit.

It was with great relief that I fell back into the chair I’d stolen from the Arizona Republic. With clarity of thought restored, I could again see the convention for the cheap con that it was. And the transparency seemed all the more apparent having visited the void with the Republican spirit guide. As Luke said, putting his glasses back on: "Man, that was like that one acid trip where all is revealed as dust." Back in the solid world, I realized yet again that if you don’t fall for the GOP’s presto-chango act, its stage show is empty. Without the magic, there’s nothing.

"That’s it?" Stephen said.

"Guess so," I said, gathering my computer and chargers and notes from the floor. The balloons were falling, but the room was emptying already.

"Let’s go home."

*Days ago SETI discovered a special signal, perhaps aliens, which if true would be awesome. Read about it here. This is from Joshuah Bearman’s blog.