Monday, October 31, 2016

America’s Raiders of the Lost Ark election

Have you noticed the similarity between this year's elections and a certain movie?

It finally occurred to me what’s going on in this nation. We’re not really having an election. We’re having a movie.

It’s a a movie of the thrill-a-minute, surprise-at-every-turn genre. A kind of Raiders of the Lost Ark, edge-of-your-chair piece of outrageous and totally improbable entertainment.

First a Stone Age Insult Comic insults his way to the top of the Republican ticket in a presidential race.

Meanwhile, the Wife of the Former Leader is challenged by Yoda (wrong movie, I know, but you get the idea) for the hearts and minds of the people. Yoda’s cause seems hopeless, but then suddenly it's not hopeless and he seems to be gaining on her until….

She shoots Yoda’s horse from under him. He falls, but then pledges fealty to her. Whereupon it’s discovered that her evil advisor, Lady Debbie of Thuglia, has been necromancing Yoda’s campaign.

But then  the Wife of the Former Leader and the Stone Age Insult Comic have three duels of words. He falters. He is injured. He is about to fall of his horse and onto a row of sharpened pikes.

But no, thanks to the previous machinations of Weiner the Lance, a gremlin from the past of the Wife of the Former Leader,  the Stone Age Insult Comic is saved from certain doom. He is wounded. But he’s struggling back to his feet. And next…

Well, we’ll have to see what happens next. Perhaps the Prehistoric Insult Comic will light a bomb and accidentally blow himself to kingdom come.

Perhaps, just as the fuse burns all the way down to the bomb, the Wife of the Former Leader will charge the Stone Age Insult Comic with a mace, but the bomb will blow up her horse and throw her into the air while he escapes uninjured.

My favorite scene from the original Raiders of the Lost Ark was when Indiana Jones, using only his bull whip, whipped weapon after weapon out of the hands of various approaching evil beings until finally he tires of this, yanks his pistol from his holster, and shoots the final sword-wielding evildoer dead in his tracks. Perhaps Hillary ought to arm herself with a bullwhip and a pistol.

Or perhaps…

Well, no matter how badly you want another bucket of popcorn, no matter how desperately you need to pee, stay glued to your chair. Because this movie isn’t over yet. And you don’t want to miss even a millisecond of the thrilling action to come.

P.S. I’ve been trying to figure out what I make of James Comey, the strewer of land mines that seem to indiscriminately blow up both sides. Is there any motivation, save his self-interest? I think not. Except that every time he makes a move, he shoots himself in the foot, furthering the impression that he's a total dimwit. So I’m just writing him off as a Keystone Cop character who wandered onto the wrong movie set.

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