Who does the American people want, President Pepsi or President Sprint? A young man in the crowd with blue paint smeared on his face in fanatic jubilation waves a sign smeared with 'I Believe in Pepsi. "Pepsi, Change, Yeah!" A grandmother in a red shirt wiggles her hips shouting, "Yeah Sprite. Experienced Change! Traditional Change! Yeah Sprite."
Someone, jaded no doubt, perhaps a college graduate who studies philosophy and is now working an office job with morons for co-workers, dragged here by with his Pepsi-loving Sprite-looking ditz of a girlfriend, mutters to himself, "Who cares, they are both sodas." ...
The music stops.
The crowd suddenly grows indignant. People slowly turn to stare at him with angry eyes. The candidates on stage turn towards him, shaking their heads, pissed. His girlfriend glares him down, tired of the same stupid argument. "Yes, they are sodas, Tyrone. What about it? I like soda." The crowd shouts in melodious synchrony, "We all like soda." Cameras and studio-lights turn to him.
No one makes a sound.
The young man looks around himself. He was just at a network coordinated and televised debate between two democratic candidates. Some CNN producer telling Obama to repeat his lines from the top, this time with a little more bass in his voice. The kid, nestled away in the shadows cast by the lights and illusions onstage, seated amongst Obama supporters standing and shouting and clapping, thought he was safe to laugh off the matter alone. Suddenly, however, he found himself in the spot-light, enraged audience members staring at him with murderous eyes. He could tell a riot was going to break out,
and he was going to be the burned city at the end of the night.
Even his girlfriend stared at him, ready to punch him in the nose. The candidates were making calls to hit man, studio security were pushing their way towards him, intent on causing some injuries. What the hell is going on, our jaded young man thought to himself. This must be a dream.
A hand jerks him backwards. He turns expecting Mike Tyson aiming to knock his head off. Instead, our gyrating grandmother scratches him in the eyes. " Keep that philosophical shit to yourself, sonny. I'm here to see the show of my life. And I aint got time to waste." The crowd begins to shake, slowly tensing their bodies in a zombie's freeze. Their pupils vanish. "We all like soda. We all like soda. We all like soda."
They begin to slowly creep towards our jaded young man. "Zombies! You're all zombies!" He backs away, his psyche permanently scarred. A small chase ensues, and he's backed into a corner. The candidates, the moderators, the producers, the babies, all of them creep towards him.
As the cameras pans away from him, cranes above him to reveal the room creeping towards, the voice of Rod Sterling narrates the following:
"Tyrone Stanley. Age 24. Was under the impression that he was at a debate. A debate between two individuals vying for command of the highest post in the world. America in the last stretch of its four-year period. A democracy practicing its freedom of thought and choice. But where Stanley actually is there are no candidates. There is no America. There is no freedom, no choice, no debates. On the stage tonight is a performance. A fictional showcase for the workers of the USA. A ritual with no meaning. The laws of the land are simple: the rich get richer, the poor get poorer. Capitalism is as simple as that. Whether Kennedy is in office or McCain is, whether Clinton or Reagan, Carter or Johnson, America looks to promote the growth of the accumulated capital of its accumulated capitalists through takeovers, mergers, or acquisitions of the resources of its allies and enemies, partners and competitors, by any means necessary. The people do not choose, their choices are given to them by ideological state appartuses i.e. affirmative and ideological education, public relations i.e. advertising i.e. propaganda i.e. corporate media industries, and bought off politicians. Whether Obama or Clinton, the zombies will still be in power. There is no bickering or debate about this, Tyrone Stanley,
here, in the twilight zone."
Illusions.
Obama vs McCain. There are differences, of course. Right? Right? War, uh, health care, uh... fixing Washington, right? Fixing America? The World?
