Last week, we advised Don to check out the third hour of RadioNation with Laura Flanders Saturday. Don felt that after a week of news and work, the last thing he wanted/needed to do was listen to six hours (three hours on Saturday, three on Sunday) of news. The third hour of RadioNation with Laura Flanders is reserved for conversations with authors, filmmakers, critics, poets, singers, songwriters . . .
Our advice to Don was to listen to the third hour and see if Laura Flanders didn't hook him.
He wrote back after listening Saturday and Laura Flanders did not hook him . . . due to the fact that Flanders is on vacation. Our apologies to Don for that. But he did enjoy the conversation guest host Ned Sublette had with Kevin Phillips about the dangerous strands in the Republic Party. Phillips was on to discuss his new book American Theocracy. Don noted that he enjoyed Phillips' points about the dangers, coming dangers because it will get worse, from the radical religious zealots in the Republican Party.
"The Left Behind series, like he said, really does speak to fears about the book of Revelations and attempt to provide a distorted fantasy take on a literal reading of the book," Don wrote.
"After that, the second point that really scored with me was when Mr. Phillips spoke of how we've never been in the Middle East for any reason other than it's geo-strategic reasons, never in history, but Bush can't speak about that because he can't say we're at war for oil. The zealots really believe we're at war to start Armaggedon and that thought thrills them. It was interesting to hear him speak of how coded words could appear just religious to most audiences but to the zealots, true believers, they signify something that sails over the heads of the rest us."
Phillips also spoke of how the desire for 'end of times' allowed the zealots to ignore issues such as global warming because why bother to work towards saving the planet when the 'end of times' is nigh?
The growth of these fringe reglions has been tremendous but it bears noting that this can result from "millenium fever" and that a similar fever swept the nation at the turn of the 20th century.
However, the fever was tempered by a newly emerging progressive mood in the nation. California's Heaven's Gate UFO cult, Switzerland and Canada's The Order of the Solar Temple were the acts by those who felt the end was coming and wanted to hasten their own demise to be 'reborn' and could have tipped people off to the fact that we were about to go over the deep end -- big time. What often follows millenium fever is a reform period (such as the reforms of the eleventh century) and we can all hope that's on the horizon.
It should also be noted that end of the world fantasies were not being marketed just by the non-secular media. The entertainment industry chose to close out the 90s with a bevy of disaster flicks -- the likes of which hadn't been seen since the 1970s. In the disaster flicks, the end was usually averted (Armaggedon) or it turned out that the world was still inhabitable (Deep Impact). But for every Contact that took on the extreme positions of the zealots (and the joy with which they longed for an end of the world), many more films marketed fears.
The 1970s wave of disaster films ran out of speed when they'd exhausted every angle (burning building, earthquake, potential plane crash) and were left trying to scare audiences with the threats of bees and Empire of the Ants. The most successful of the 90s disaster films wasn't really a disaster film unless extended, nonstop foreplay is your thing. Titanic played more like a love story than a disaster film. Repeat audiences knew going in that they'd be munching on their second barrel of popcorn before the ship began to sink.
A question currently being pondered is whether the actors involved in true disaster films harmed themselves? Could some "little boy who cried wolf" factor be in play when audiences reject Bruce Willis, repeatedly, in heroic roles? If Lucky Number Slevin, debuting this Friday, returns Willis to Sixth Sense status, don't be surprised if this theory takes hold.
However, box office stumbles could just be a case of the audience growing tired of Willis or Nicholas Cage or . . .
The unknown factor in all of this are the events of 9/11 which, due to a visual media, may have impacted the nation much more than a disaster at the last turn of the century (the 1906 Great Earthquake).
We think millenium fever, always at a high pitch when a century rolls over, combined with successfully marketed disaster products (secular and nonsecular) and were enhanced by the events on 9/11. From a demographic point of view, we'd also argue that many of the churches preaching end of times will see a drop in attendance as more of the baby boomlet leaves the nest and begins their own lives.
Most fevers work up a sweat and then break. Our diagnosis: Unless a new strain of cultural Scarlet Fever is in play, we think the nation's characteristic short attention span works against the American Taliban.
Don, we appreciate you giving RadioNation with Laura Flanders a chance and we hope you'll listen again when Laura Flanders comes back from vacation.
Here's the scheduled lineup for Sunday's RadioNation with Laura Flanders (Sublette continues as guest host Sunday):
The birth and death of political movements -- and takes on the immigration debate. Author and political analyst EARL OFARI HUTCHINSON on why clamping down on illegal immigrants won't end discrimination against African-Americans. Then, as Africa captures its most wanted war criminal, why W. keeps sheltering the West's worst terrorist, with ANN LOUISE BARDACH, one of the nation's best-known journalists on the Cuba-Miami-Washington nexus, and attorney JOSE PERTIERRA, who is representing the Venezuelan government in its case to extradite Luis Posada Carriles. Finally, what’s happened to the American labor movement, with ROBERT FITCH, author of Solidarity for Sale: How Corruption Destroyed the Labor Movement and Undermined America's Promise.
And since Don enjoyed Kevin Phillips as a guest, we'd also recommend he check out Democracy Now!'s "Fmr. GOP Strategist Kevin Phillips on American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21st Century" which aired on March 21st and can listened to, watched or read (transcripts) online by clicking on the link. In addition, he might be interested in listening to KPFA today (or checking out the archives after the show airs:
As Ruth noted:
this Sunday (Sunday at 9:00 a.m. Pacific time, 11:00 a.m. Central, and noon Eastern time) on KPFA:
In our first hour...
A wholesome group of Christians serving God through policy, or a dangerously shortsighted, ideologically extreme administration selling empire wrapped in the Bible? Former Republican strategist Kevin Phillips joins us to discuss his new book, "American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21st Century."
In our second hour...
The story of Vietnam War resistance WITHIN the military is largely untold. David Zeiger has made the first film to tell about it; "Sir! No, Sir!" is now screening around the country, including a run this coming week in the Bay Area. Zeiger joins us, along with two Vietnam veterans/resisters profiled in his film.Listen to past shows, get contact and reference info for guests, see announcements of upcoming programs, and more at: SundaySalon.org.