Dear Neoconservatives who have infiltrated my government:

I would like to applaud you on the ingenuity of the fiction you are creating. The fiction in which you imagine a scenario, convince others that your scenario is a reality, elude direct questions about the reality of the scenario, stand back while the scenario unfolds disastrously, (unfolds, that is, just as your critics predicted) and then (and this is the beautiful part) defend your scenario as progressing just as you would have liked. Most importantly, I appreciate how you can stick to 3 or 4 words that you repeat over and over again, no matter what the question. This is ingenious because you keep on evading questions in this fashion until the media has moved onto something else. Your attitude is that those people who persist and badger you are just the “elite liberal minority,” and no one has the time (or the interest) in listening to them anyway.



You are very successful at creating a smokescreen that blinds people to the grim reality of the world you are creating. You are testament to the darkest secrets of black magic: create an illusion that seeps far into people’s imaginations, and you can effectively alter their minds. Seduced by images of “freedom,” people tune out their emotional reaction to our troops and the thousands of civilians who are dying in Iraq. Seduced by Power which you flaunt like a “freedom tower,” people laugh and mock protesters who would dare to critique you. Seduced by your wealth and the corporations which back you (all in the name of The American Dream), people actually believe that their Social Security is in jeopardy and that the Stock Market is a reliable source of income!



I see through your ugly magic. I see you bankrupting the government in order to purge it of Roosevelt’s ghost; I see you creating havoc in the Middle East in order to destroy the infrastructure and power base of oil rich countries, and, while the people cry “jihad” or “Armageddon” you steal their oil and resources; I see you creating chaos so that you can remake order to conform to your vision; I see you using democracy and faith as your smokescreen (it creates a beautiful, fragile, and easily manipulatable illusion); and I see people all over the country believing in you as if you were a demigod. I see that they would prop you up as a dictator and build statues of you in their halls of justice. I see that they would follow you even as they follow a path that will lead to the demise of this entire country.



You’re hilarious! I remember when you thought the Communists where taking over the country and you set loose a dramatic witch hunt to purge universities, Hollywood, and working class communities of “the Red Threat!” Ha Ha! All of that was just another smokescreen because all that time you were planning your own infiltration. The Manchurian Candidate indeed. And you set loose your assassins against anyone with the power to move the people to see America as a true democracy. But I won't resort to conspiracy theories. It's just not necessary because things are weird enough already. Like making up Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq, knowing that the American People and their media minds would never hold you accountable. You can do anything and get away with it! It's amazing.



Beautiful plasma images! They’ll last until the trees start falling in Yellowstone and the Alaskan Arctic becomes a smokestack. They’ll last until the last of the hard working families can’t pay a mortgage in spite of working 4 jobs. They’ll last until the homeless overflow out of the shelters and the poor-driven-mad take their bats and smash your limousines. How many will you put in jail? Will you build jails big enough to contain 49% of the voting populace?



I’m not worried. Fanaticism ebbs, and it flows, through every century. Right now your bizarro reality is flowing. But I do know this: you’re on the wrong side of history.



Sincerely,

Citizen Kay

Inauguration Day, 2005