Right Wing Nut House

Are you up at 6:00 AM Eastern time?

If so, you might want to tune in to the Pat Campbell Morning Show on WFLA 540 in Orlando, 6:00-9:00 AM Eastern where I’ll be discussing 24 with the host in the first hour.

You can also access the live stream of the broadcast here.

And nothing can we call our own but death
And that small model of the barren earth
Which serves as paste and cover to our bones.
For God’s sake, let us sit upon the ground
And tell sad stories of the death of kings.

King Richard II. Act iii. Sc. 2.

Are you ready to bury Jack, not to praise him?

I may be the last person who comments regularly on the show who has faced up to the fact that 24 has hopelessly jumped the shark. The plot has collapsed into a heap of unfinished threads, an endless exposition of plot lines to nowhere. Do you care one whit if Milo gets Nadia alone for 15 minutes? Is there no further use for Jack’s father in this set up - a very promising storyline that has dropped off the scope with nary a word on his fate? I’m even beginning to yawn at the by-play between Chloe and Morris - a sure sign of something having gone out of the show.

In fact, Chloe’s character has absolutely gone off the banal scale. To take this beautiful bitch of a woman and rob her of her snark, her scowls, her hooded looks of disapprobation when a co-worker made a mistake, is like taking away Betty Grable’s gams or Marilyn Monroe’s … smile. Chloe’s thoughtlessness and inappropriate behavior around her fellow CTU officemates - always saying the wrong thing at the wrong time to the wrong person - has disappeared. She is now simply a geek appendage to the show. Need someone to hack into CalTrans? Let Chloe do it. Need someone to download the updated schematics for the suitcase bomb? Piece of cake for supergeek Chloe.

But perhaps the clearest indication that the show is done for came from a speech that Little Ricky made to Jack thanking him for saving the United States. Since there has been plenty of speculation on the boards about Ricky Schroeder taking over for Kiefer Sutherland whenever the producers decide to kill off Jack Bauer, I ask you to imagine Jack Bauer saying this at any time in his life to anyone:

DOYLE: Jack, I know you’ve been through hell - not just today but the last couple of years - I just wanted to thank you for what you did today. ‘Cause it could have ended a helluva lot worse…and it would have if you weren’t here.

Gag me.

Jack’s fatalism regarding his rescuing Audrey from the evil clutches of the Chinese does not engender sympathy for Bauer or even elevate his character beyond the heroic nature he already enjoys. This willingness of Jack to die is simply seen as another plot device to manipulate our emotions and try and build suspense.

And what about the honking travesty of using an “algorithm” contained on a board in the guts of the suitcase nuke that would give the key to the entire technology of the Russian defense department? The Russians may be dumb but the idea of such a thing existing in the real world is so awesomely stupid as to beggar belief. And that’s the problem with the show. It’s no fun suspending belief for an hour if the writers are going to so insult your intelligence that they take you out of fantasyland and set you down in Never-Neverland with the full realization that a little common sense would tell you such a scenario couldn’t exist except in the script of a children’s show.

I will continue to watch and write about 24. But even if the writers knock my socks off for the remaining 5 shows, I can’t help but think that the production has gone about as far as it can go and has hit a wall. Ratings for the show are as strong as ever (#10 among the coveted 18-29 age group) but I would predict that if the last few episodes of the show are as slow and determinedly boring as this last one, that too, will change.

SUMMARY

Little Ricky informs Jack that the nukes will be handled by the military from now on. He also gets out the kneepads and genuflects at the altar of Bauer, thanking him in the most effusive and nauseating way possible for saving the country.

I’ve had the opportunity to hobnob with the kinds of special warriors who would more than likely make up the TAC Teams at an organization like CTU. And if one of them spouted off like that - even if it was fully deserved - the chances are the rest of the team would pants the guy and give him an underwear snuggy for good measure - or worse. Gushy is the last thing these practical and dangerous men are. What they do - putting their hides on the line in the absolutely most dangerous situations imaginable - is done with a minimum of fuss and with a tremendous pride in their own competence and professionalism.

After politely thanking Little Ricky for his kind words, Jack excuses himself to call Mr. Cheng. Ignoring Jack’s plea to talk to Audrey again, the Chinese security chief fills Jack in on how he can get old Needle Nose released; he must steal a “component from the trigger mechanism” - a “prototype algorithm” that is impervious to “modern encryption technology.” This little piece of technology will allow the Chinese to penetrate the entire Russian defense establishment.

I’m sure the damn component walks, talks, and wets itself as well.

To believe that any such “algorithm” could ever exist is to believe in Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and the good intentions of liberals all at the same time. Why not ask Jack to do something realistic like hand over launch codes for American nukes or something else that would threaten the United States? Do you care - even if it were remotely possible - that the Chinese would be able to steal Russian military secrets? Not I. In fact, given President Putin’s recent boorish, thuggish behavior, it may be that allowing the Chinese to get a leg up on the Russian military might not be such a bad idea.

Anyway, Jack agrees and gets to talk to Audrey again. The poor dear looks like a little lost girl who can’t find her way home after wandering around the forest for a few hours. Jack assures her that he will rescue her from the clutches of the evil Asians.

Back at the White House, Tom catches President Palmer gazing off into space, looking for all the world as if he’s about to have a relapse. But the writers wouldn’t do that to us now, would they?

Palmer insists he must stay on the job or the Veep will try and take over again. (Palmer obviously has no more faith in the writers than we do.) Tom reluctantly spills the beans on what he’s got on Daniels - the damning tape recording of him plotting to commit perjury. The President’s interest is definitely piqued by this info - it may come in handy later.

Suddenly Karen bursts in with the news of Fayed’s death and the recovery of the nukes. This bit of good news cheers the President and he suggests that they leave the underground bunker and return to the oval office. He asks Tom to schedule a press conference to tell the American people.

Back at CTU, Bill is congratulating the gang on doing such a bang up job - despite the fact that their top secret, multi-gazillion dollar computer system was easily hacked and one of their top geeks refused to die an honorable death and instead enabled the terrorists to set off a nuke on American soil by building a trigger for the bomb.

Outside of that, everything went swimmingly.

Chloe’s phone buzzes during Bill’s encomium. It’s Jack, of course, calling to ask Chloe if she would be up to committing a little treason. Chloe says fine except she has to hack Morris’ computer to get the info Jack needs. Easily penetrating her former husband’s system, Chloe downloads the schematics for the suitcase nukes to Jack’s phone.

Is there anything Chloe wouldn’t do for Jack? I mean, in a purely non-biblical way?

Meanwhile, back in the oval office, Wayne greets the Vice President like a Mongoose about to take down a rattler. After thanking the Veep for his idea to nuke a lot of innocent people (which led to Wayne’s fake nuke gambit) he shows his appreciation by asking for Daniels’ resignation within the week. The stunned Vice President refuses - until Wayne lets on that he knows all about his planned perjury. The air is visibly let out of the Veep upon hearing that and he slinks away to write his resignation letter.

Back at CTU, Morris finds out that someone had hacked into his computer thanks to his precaution of adding an invisible log to prevent just such an occurrence. Before he calls security (as if those dolts would have been any help at all) Chloe spills the beans about her little escapade with Jack. Still feeling guilty about not sacrificing his life so that 12,000+ of his fellow citizens could live (silly Morris!) he tells Chloe in no uncertain terms that she must tell Bill about her little project to rescue Audrey from the Chinese or he will. Reluctantly, Chloe makes the trip to Bill’s office.

Jack shows up at the site where the military is getting the nukes ready for transport. He talks his way past the guards with ease:

JACK: You don’t need to see my identification.

GUARD: We don’t need to see his identification.

JACK: I’m not the kind of man who would steal anything from the nukes.

GUARD: He’s not the kind of man who would steal anything from the nukes.

JACK: I can go about my business.

GUARD: He can go about his business.

JACK: Move along…Move along…

GUARD: Move along! Move along!

Unfortunately, Bill is aware of what Jack is trying to do thanks to Chloe and sics Little Ricky on Jack. After a brief, tense standoff between Jack and Doyle, a Marine recovers from Jack’s mind control and cold cocks him upside the head with a rifle butt.

Within a couple of minutes, Jack is awake pleading with Bill to let him use the circuit board as a bargaining chip in his quest to free Audrey. When Bill refuses, Jack asks him to get the President on the line.

Palmer obligingly takes the call and listens to Jack’s pleadings. No way, says Wayne. The Russkies would be mad at us (as if they aren’t anyway) and besides, it wouldn’t work, the Chinese would still get the algorithm.

Not so fast, says Jack. I will guarantee the Chinese won’t get their hands on it. How, asks the President? I’ll kill myself first.

Jack giving up his life for his own country is a given. But Jack willing to die to protect Russian military secrets? Yes, he would be preventing the possibility of a war with the Russians. But that’s only if the Russians found out how the Chinese got a hold of the technology in the first place. I just hope the next thing Jack is willing to die for isn’t something stupid like foreign civilians or UN diplomats. Especially the latter. We could actually do with a few less of those fellows.

The clincher comes when Jack calls in all his chits with the Palmer family. “You owe me,” he tells Wayne. And that one phrase resonates with Wayne who has seen Jack sacrifice himself for the Palmer’s for 5 years. He gives the go ahead for the operation to rescue Audrey.

Jack asks little Ricky to tag along as his point man on the TAC team, making Little Ricky’s day judging by the look on his face. They get in the official CTU black SUV and start for the rendezvous with Cheng.

Morris meanwhile is confused. He actually didn’t think Bill would allow it. Chloe explains that the President trusted Jack unlike Morris who didn’t trust her and help her in her plan to commit treason. Morris immediately understands that Chloe will not forgive and forget easily. “You’re going to hold this over my head for a long time, aren’t you?” he asks. But for how long? “I’ll get back to you,” is Chloe’s lukewarm response.

Are you telling me that’s the best the writers could do? Please give your ideas for a proper Chloe response in the comments.

With all tracking devices and explosive charges in place, the SUV speeds off into the night and toward whatever fate is in store for Jack and Little Ricky.

Back at the White House, a morose Daniels is contemplating life after the Veepship when his trusted aide and good time girl Lisa enters the room. After being told he is being forced out, Lisa can barely contain her excitement at the thought of spending more time with old Noah. Her flushed skin and heaving chest make it apparent that if nothing else, Noah Daniels sure hasn’t lost his touch with the fairer sex. They both hurry off to the Presidential press conference.

Wayne starts off the conference in fine fashion, mouthing platitudes about healing and so forth. It’s only when he starts to take questions that we see that something is terribly wrong. The President appears ill. And when he topples over like a giant sycamore going down, we’re sure something is wrong. Daniels, watching in the back, carefully folds his letter of resignation and carefully stuffs it into his jacket pocket. Fate has just handed him a second chance (as have the writers who apparently are desperately searching for something interesting to happen).

The news regarding the health of the President is grim. Dr. Arthur tells us he has suffered a cerebral hemorrhage. Unless the writers want to endow Jack with supernatural healing powers, it is doubtful whether we will see President Palmer during the last six hours of the show. I will not miss him as I always believed him to be something of a weak sister. But he was at least honorable and honest - the best you can say about any politician these days.

Daniels gets no argument when he invokes the 25th Amendment this time. He instructs Karen to make the necessary arrangements with the military. And Lisa, already on the job, brings up the Bauer operation to save Audrey and its apparent transfer of Russian technology to the Chinese.

Everyone in government seems to know a lot about this one, tiny bit of a circuit board, including the Vice President who orders the operation cancelled. Karen has to call Bill and tell him this, a job that she obviously found distasteful.

And Tom Lennox? Given his possession of evidence that could ruin Daniels, how long do you think he has to live? I’m sure the next major character to emerge will be the “Mr. Fixit” that all politicians have for emergencies like this - men who will do anything in service to their political masters. Even David Palmer had one of these men so don’t be surprised if the guy who handles the Veep’s dirty work is introduced shortly.

Bill Buchanan is no fool. He knows Jack and how he will react. He instructs his staff to get roadblocks up so they can stop the SUV and sends another TAC team just to take Jack into custody. He then calls Little Ricky who tries unsuccessfully to make the conversation about cancelling the op as casual as possible. Silly Ricky. Jack sees right through it. With a sudden move, Jack has his gun drawn and is pointing it at Little Ricky’s head:

JACK: Don’t you move.

DOYLE: (innocently) Jack, what’s the problem?

JACK: Earlier today, I shot my own partner, a friend of mine, because he tried to stop me from doing what I had to do. Don’t think in a second I won’t do that to you.

After kicking Little Ricky out of the SUV, Jack begins to drive away. “You can’t go against the White House,” Doyle calls after him. But Jack isn’t listening. Besides, when did going against the White House ever stop our Jack in the past?

BODY COUNT

The Grim Reaper not only had the night off, but is contemplating turning in his own letter of resignation.

JACK: 23

SHOW: 403

At least Matt Stoller says I do.

I just paid my taxes, and I have to say, I always take pride when I do so. I don’t like having less money to spend, of course, and the complexity of the process is really upsetting. But I am proud to pay for democracy, and I feel when I do send money to the DC Treasurer and the US Treasury that that is what I am doing. The right-wing likes to pretend as if taxes are a burden instead of the price of democracy. And I suppose, if you hate democracy, as the right-wing does, then taxes are the price for paying for something you really don’t want. Personally, I find banking fees, high cable and internet charges, health care costs, and credit card hidden charges much more abrasive than taxes, because with those I’m just being ripped off to pay for someone’s summer home.

Patriotism is about recognizing that we are all connected in a fundamental moral and physical sense, that the war in Iraq is our war, that poverty in New Orleans is our poverty, that public funding to cure cancer comes from each of us and not just the scientists who have made it theirs. The tax burden we face is a very small price to pay for the privilege of taking responsibility for our own freedom and our own society. And the hatred of taxes on the right comes from a hatred for this responsibility. It’s childish and immoral and unAmerican.

First of all, does anyone else get the creeps reading Mr. Stoller’s paean to our IRS overlords? I’m very happy he appreciates living in a democracy. So do I. But the taxes he so happily and proudly parts with are collected by perhaps the most undemocratic, oppressive, out of control, nightmare of a bureaucracy our republic has ever known.

Tens of thousands of citizens have fallen under the wheels of the IRS juggernaut only to have their lives ruined, their assets seized, their freedom threatened - all because either the citizen made an honest mistake or, more likely, the IRS itself erred and refused to acknowledge it.

When liberals like Stoller make noises of satisfaction like an infant who has just soiled their diaper just because they obeyed the law one wonders what lefties like our Matt do when they come to a complete stop at a stop sign. The celebrations must go on far into the night.

As far as Mr. Stoller’s laughable “analysis” of right wing attitudes toward taxes and taxation, Paul at Powerline performs the necessary lobotomy:

According to Stoller, “the right-wing likes to pretend as if taxes are a burden instead of the price of democracy.” But while some taxation is the price of democracy (or virtually any other form of government) excessive taxation is, by definition, an undue burden. Excessive taxation is also harmful to our society, unless one believes that there’s no level of taxation that would throw our economy into a downward spiral and/or take too much control of spending decisions out of the hands of citizens.

Stoller then takes his faulty construct one step further, stating “if you hate democracy, as the right-wing does, then taxes are the price for paying for something you really don’t want.” The intellectual dishonesty of this statement is apparent. Conservatives argue for all sorts of things when it comes to taxes: lower marginal tax rates, lower capital gains taxes (or none), a flat tax, the replacement of the federal income tax with a national sales tax, etc. But I know of no conservative who argues for no taxation. Nor can Stoller show any relationship between current levels of taxation and democracy. We’d be no less democratic if our representatives voted to cut our tax rates in half or institute a flat tax. Thus, it’s hardly anti-democratic for conservatives to advocate such measures or to regret, especially on “tax day,” that they have not been adopted.

And herein lies a major difference between left and right regarding the nature of government; the left believes government is a living entity to be nurtured, pampered, even praised. The right believes, as the Founders did, that government is a utility that needs to be managed. (Would that it could be run as well as the phone company.)

Of course, it is hubristic to believe that anyone can manage a beast that consumes $3 trillion a year. Neither can the monster be reasoned with. The United States government in this, the 21st century, overseeing as it does the largest industrial democracy in the world, is the closest thing to a force of nature ever created by man. It can be managed in only the grossest sense - as a piano tuner might attempt to do his job wearing boxing gloves. He can pound the upper register of the instrument and cut spending, always leaving some needy people who fall through the cracks. Or, he can pound the lower register of the piano and increase spending, thus assuring that some who don’t deserve federal largess receive the benefit anyway.

A simplistic allegory to be sure, but I hope instructive. What escapes those of us on the right and on the left is the fact that fine tuning the instrument of government is an impossibility. There are 300 million of us in this country and each of us, in some way large and small, depends on the beast for something. Good roads for safety and convenience. Policeman to protect us. Firemen to save us. Soldiers to fight for us. And legions and legions of bureaucrats to keep the paperwork from overwhelming all of us.

Necessary? Mostly. Hard to argue (although The Cato Institute tries gamely) that the country doesn’t need an Environmental Protection Agency or an OSHA. But when lefties like Stoller wax poetic about government, it is an unseemly demonstration of attachment to what for all intents and purposes is an entity that should be viewed as if not an enemy then certainly an opponent of individual liberty. Keeping that fact uppermost in one’s mind does not make one “unamerican” or “unpatriotic.”

Paying taxes, obeying the law, contributing to society should be as utilitarian a function as using the toilet. Why it has elicited such gushiness from Stoller can only mean that he must spend a lot of time in the bathroom.

An attack at Virginia Tech University has killed at least 32 students including the gunman who apparently took his own life.

Rather than deal with the details at this point, I’d simply urge you to visit Hot Air, Michelle’s site, or PJ Media. Allah will have the latest video (as well as updates from various sources) and Michelle, if she follows form, will have MSM-blog react. PJ Media will also round up blog and press reaction.

I first heard about this story after I awoke from a nap around noon central time. The shock I felt upon hearing the number of dead (22 at the time) has been matched only 2 or three times in my life. The death of John Lennon and 9/11 are the only other times I can recall where my mind was unable to grasp the enormity of what had happened. At times like that, you tend to focus on the strangest things. I tried to recall what the school colors of VTU were and what their mascot looked like - anything but deal with the reality that now 32 sets of parents are going to receive the worst call of their lives telling them that their flesh and blood has been senselessly and brutally gunned down while living and learning in a protected enclave that is supposed to keep the outside world at bay.

Even at this early stage where details are sketchy and rumors are rampant, it appears that the gunman engaged in two separate shootings about 2 hours apart. Experts on CNN have speculated that if the murderer was after a specific target and missed them at the dorm, he would have known the target’s schedule and showed up later where he knew he/she would be in class. At the moment, it has been confirmed that the doors to the classroom building were chained shut - a clear indication that the shooter was out to make a name for himself and was determined to make as many of his classmates feel his pain as he had rounds for his guns.

In a perfect world, gun control laws would have kept the weapons out of the shooter’s hands. Also in a perfect world, one of his potential victims would have been armed and cut short his quest for glory. Despite the fact we don’t live in a perfect world and there’s no sign of one emerging any time soon, we can count on the idiots in Congress and the media to start the political posturing, dying to make speeches and write columns telling us about how wrong the opposition is and how this shooting proves this or that about America, or Americans with guns, or violence in America, or how our schools are screwed up, or even blame the victims for not dodging the bullet that killed them.

What this shooting proves is that there are many who will use horrible tragedy to make political hay. And once - just once - I’d like to see those people taken down as severely as the disturbed young man whose random rampage of sick violence snuffed out many a promising life and brought unspeakable tragedy into so many American homes this day.

In keeping with their party motto “The only good government is the biggest damn government we can shove down people’s throats,” the Democrats are seriously contemplating saddling future Presidents with a “Department of Peace and Nonviolence.”

I’m not sure whether to laugh at the stupidity, weep at the shameless pandering, or tear my hair out thinking about what our enemies might make of such an idiotic idea.

When one considers that the third cabinet level executive department created by the very first Congress meeting in 1789 was the War Department, the possibilities for ironic juxtaposition are staggering. But leaving aside the latent historical analogies, other questions might be raised about the efficacy of creating an executive department that the executive not only hasn’t asked for but would almost certainly conflict with the operations of other executive level departments.

What in the name of all that is good and holy would a President do with such a department? It sounds wonderful - peace, love, sit-ins, smoking joints the size of a Cuban Habano, while playing slap and tickle with the hippie chick sitting next to you in the dark. But as a practical matter, don’t we already have such a department? What do all those people going to work every day at Foggy Bottom do for a living? Isn’t it their job already to promote peace and find non violent ways to resolve crisis?

Ooops! My bad. For the Dems, the first rule of good government is “Why have one Department when you can have two doing exactly the same thing at twice the cost?” (HT: Contact)

Actually, I like Jim Hoft’s idea of making Mother Sheehan the very first Secretary for Peace and Nonviolence. She’d have New Orleans unoccupied in a jiffy not to mention freeing Palestine from the Zionist oppressors before you can say “Holocaust anyone?”

And while we’re at it, might I suggest a few other executive level departments the Dems might want to contemplate adding:

DEPARTMENT OF THINGS THAT WERE FORMERLY CONSIDERED SEXUAL PERVERSIONS.

The problem is that in these rather libertine days, there is nothing that can truly be considered “sexually perverted” - except perhaps those of us unimaginative and downright old fashioned enough to be monogamous heterosexuals who like screwing in the missionary position once and a while (with many variations, naturally) and who like our porn straight up and bloodless.

A shrinking minority to be sure…

DEPARTMENT OF APOLOGIES

Not to be confused with the “Department of Groveling,” I have a feeling this Department will receive a lot of prominence if the Democrats make it to the White House in ‘08. Not only will liberals be running around the planet genuflecting to the thugs, the tyrants, and the ne’er do wells who we have offended the last 8 years by standing up to their perfidious designs on the civilized world, but just think of all the opportunities for apologies here at home! My God, they’d be lined up at the Secretary’s door, agitating for “reparations” and all sorts of goodies, including making every white male in the United States participate in a “Day of Reconciliation, Contrition, and Feces Flinging” so that all groups oppressed by white males can get their rocks off.

DEPARTMENT OF GROVELING

See above, except this cabinet department would be exclusively devoted to foreign affairs. One good thing is that this particular department would come relatively cheap. Knee pads and a generous supply of chapstick to deal with all the ass kissing of the likes of Ahmadinejad, Assad, Kim, and your odd African potentate or two would be all that’s necessary to make the department a stunning success.

Good to see the Dems already have a head start in forming this department what with the Speaker already planting her lips quite firmly on the thug Assad’s derriere and now getting ready to smooch Ahmadinejad’s radical rear.

Maybe she’s angling for the job…

DEPARTMENT OF HOLLYWOOD ADVISORS

What better way to reward the Dems friends in Tinseltown than with their very own cabinet level department where rather than pretending to be taken seriously, they actually would be listened to by people at the highest levels of government.

I wonder if Angelina Jolie would be willing to serve?

DEPARTMENT OF FREE SPEECH

Al Sharpton for Secretary!

Actually, you and I both know speech would be “free” as long as we didn’t offend - knowingly or unknowingly - the list of 1247 groups, sub groups, races, religions, ethnicities, mentally challenged, weight challenged, sex challenged, those who are afraid of challenges, and sundry other oppressed, put upon, minorities who together make up about 90% of the country.

Feel free to add to this list in the comments. One thing for sure; if the Democrats get their way, Presidents in the future are going to have to hire out the Ballroom at the downtown Sheraton just to hold cabinet meetings.

UPDATE

Dymphna has an overview of the bill’s particulars. It’s worse than I thought. Not only would this cabinet Secretary be able to stick their nose into military planning, State Department negotiations, and our UN policy, but also domestic violence as well as counter terror initiatives and FBI investigations:

For those looking for a distillation, imagine a governmental agency responsible for advising on non-confrontational foreign policy options, establishing and enforcing new gun control measures, designing school curriculum, establishing and enforcing new legislation governing “hate crimes” and violence against animals, and my favorite, establishing a “Peace Academy,” a four-year institution of higher learning modeled on our service academies. (Wait, doesn’t the Ivy League already have like six of those?)

If this isn’t the silliest, stupidest, most asinine idea ever presented to the Congress of the United States, I don’t know what is.

Yesterday, my brother really stepped in it by penning perhaps the most lopsidedly unpopular post in the history of blogdom. Technorati lists 78 blog posts and counting this morning on Terry’s article, all of them - both left and right - highly opposed. Some conservatives are approaching apoplexy. For a pretty reasoned takedown of what Terry wrote, you can’t do better than J-Pods at The Corner. And my friend Tom Lifson at The American Thinker also offers a rational rebuttal to Terry’s words.

J-Pod and Tom are in a distinct minority. Out of the thousands of comments at Terry’s site, there may be 50 that attempt to respond in a reasonable manner. The rest should be studied by some college kid majoring in Deviant Psychology. What possesses 5,000 people to use exactly the same joke - the play on words with our last name from Moran to “Moron” - and actually delude themselves into thinking they are being both original and funny? It is beyond my understanding. The slackjawed yawpers, the drooling moutbreathers, the half wits, dim wits, pea wits, and twits - all seem to think that someone perusing the comments will come across the 3,217 use of that play on words, slap their palm to their forehead and say “AH! NOW I GET IT!” and then laugh like a banshee.

Pathetic.

Perhaps down the road, when some of the sting from the poisoned barbs let loose by the more than 6,000 commenters at his site goes away, I’ll have something suitably snarky and ironic to say to Terry. Perhaps I’ll bake him a congratulatory cake or something.

But today I feel compelled to rise from my sickbed and stand with him. Not in defense of what he wrote but in solidarity with his right to say it. For you see, in all the words written against him, no one has said the simple truth that you can say something with which every one else on the planet disagrees. But as long as you don’t employ hate speech or bigoted language to get your point across, you should be reasonably safe in saying it.

Calls for Terry’s resignation are laughable - and risible. Have we really gotten to a point in our national life where if your write or say something people disagree with that you can be canned for it? That’s outrageous. And extraordinarily dangerous. It is an open invitation for organized pressure groups to lower the bar even further so that intolerance of opposing viewpoints would mushroom into open warfare and the scalp hunt would be on. Civil discourse - already frayed around the edges and stretched to the breaking point - would become impossible. Pundits, talk show hosts, public figures from a wide swath of society would all be on pins and needles, not daring to utter anything colorful or controversial for fear that some special pleader group could twist what was said and turn it into a media controversy that would cost them their jobs. The dead hand of conformity would descend on our national conversation, making it about as interesting as watching jello harden.

No, I won’t defend what Terry said. But when all hands are raised against him, I think it important that he know that his family will stand with him. And I will say this; whatever his reasoning in writing that post, it came from someone with a good and true heart. And I would grant him more intellectual honesty in his little finger than is present in the many thousands of his critics combined. This has come through in his reporting time and time again and has earned him the respect of his colleagues and the admiration of many, many Americans - including this one.

There are a thousand important topics in this country that beg for discussion, debate, and consensus - real issues that would improve our security, advance the cause of liberty, promote the economy, and guarantee that the words contained in the Declaration of Independence and US Constitution actually mean something.

The Duke rape case logs in around 975.

I place as much importance on this case as I do the disappearance of a pretty white girl in Mexico or perhaps the latest horror story about a pleasure cruise from hell. A story of local prosecutorial misconduct in a college town just doesn’t deserve the kind of “all in” news coverage on cable nets and the internet that this story received. In fact, if one were to look at the case honestly by stepping back, taking a deep breath, and thinking about it for 10 seconds, one would have to admit to themselves that it is just plain loony that this story got as much play as it did in the first place.

In fact, I would say that this story says a helluva lot more about what’s wrong with the news business, blogs, and people in general than it says about any overarching issues relating to the justice system, treatment of rape victims (real or otherwise), feminism, the objectification of women in a sports dominated culture, privilege and the law, and all the other sickeningly portentous “issues” that were supposedly raised by this case.

Yes, Mr. Nifong should go to jail. As should the accuser whose lies have made it more difficult for victims of rape to seek and receive justice. But Nifong is just a local pol who saw an opportunity for a high profile case to swing an election his way. If you don’t think this doesn’t happen all over America then you aren’t reading your local papers very often. Certainly there are few prosecutors who go to the extraordinary lengths that Mr. Nifong did in manufacturing a case. But he by no means is alone in seeking to use the justice system to advance a political career.

As for the rest of the story, we have college boys behaving badly - drinking and partying while paying $800 to an outcall service to have strippers come and perform. The fact that they were athletes on the not-so-famous Duke Lacross team shouldn’t have mattered. They could just have easily belonged to the astronomy club. And even if their behavior has now been shown not to have crossed the line of legality, does anyone really want to defend them as they leeringly cheered these women on, grasping, groping, even grabbing the strippers who from what I’ve read, had some moments of genuine fear for their safety? I’ve been to one or two parties like that and I can assure you that such displays do not do the male animal credit.

And before we start bemoaning the fate of the accused whose lives have now been “ruined,” let’s wait for the six figure offers to tell their story on film, in books, and on television. How far behind can a Barbara Walters Special be or appearances on Larry King Live? And does anyone want to take a stab at what the final settlement offer will be from the state, county, city, and individual officials - all of whom will be sued for a variety of reasons and where such an open and shut case will make these boys (who admittedly went through a year of hell) rich beyond avarice.

God help them if they’re brave enough to go on O’Reilly.

Bad prosecutor, bad boys, a lying rape victim - it just doesn’t add up to a story of national import. Ah! But beyond the story itself is the fact that the case presented an absolute golden opportunity for every Tom, Dick, and Mary of a special pleader to shove their face in front of a TV camera and scream for 15 minutes about issues with only the most tangential relevance to the case at hand.

Mind boggling to say the least. First up and most vociferous were the racialists who never miss an opportunity to obscure the facts in order to advance their hackneyed agenda. Here, as with the second most vocal outriders who latched on to the case for their own selfish ends - the feminists - the facts of the case didn’t matter as much as the power of the symbols involved; a black woman whose veracity was questioned by the “white power structure” and whose ordeal was being made worse by misogynistic white males. The racialists and the feminists should be given credit for total consistency. Even when evidenced emerged clearing the young men, they stuck to their guns and said the guilt or innocence of the boys didn’t matter, that the real issues were the ones they raised in the first place.

Beyond the race and gender harpies, there were the class warriors who pointed to the “privileged” nature of Duke as a private institution and, along with the “College Sports Culture Breeds Animals” advocates, joined hands in skewering Duke athletics in general as well as the entire college administration who reacted with such extraordinary weakness and groveling that a retrospective look at their performance should get the lot of them fired.

Of course, none of this would have been possible without the relentless eye of the media; setting up shop in Durham for the duration, devoting hours and hours of coverage to timelines, leaks from defense lawyers, leaks from the prosecutor, and the contentious panel discussions about all the issues raised above and then some - a cacophony of noise, rumor, gossip, and speculation that made this story into the sickening display of media overkill that it eventually became.

The media navel gazing has already begun. Everything I’ve said above and more will be dutifully noted in columns and solemnly discussed on the media shows over the weekend. There will be angst-ridden pleas from media critics to stop the madness, that ‘we’re better than this - or at least we should be.” There will be editorials summing up for us what it all means and we’ll be hearing phrases like “rush to judgement” and “feeding frenzy” and “the media is to blame for this entire episode.” (Well, perhaps not that last one, but it fits, doesn’t it?)

Blogs like this one will waste a thousand or so words wondering why other blogs wasted so many words on a non story and others will take me to task for criticizing those who wasted the words in the first place.

And in the end, it will all be meaningless drivel. Take a good look, people. This is America at the beginning of the 21st century. A culture coarsened by a media - concentrated in fewer and fewer hands now - whose relentless drive for profit has created conditions where news isn’t what is happening everyday that impacts people’s lives but rather events or “stories” that can be told like a soap opera with good guys, bad guys, plot twists, and a commercial every 7 minutes. This is what we, the people, have wrought largely as a result of our complacency in the face aggressive corporate takeovers of one media outlet after another.

Fox News Group not only has TV stations but also newspapers around the world and a huge movie studio (not to mention radio stations, magazines, and internet portals). The same goes for every other international conglomerate who owns huge chunks of the media world. Perhaps a half dozen companies control almost all of the media content we are exposed to from sun up to sun down. And in a corporate culture that places a premium on how many eyeballs are glued to a particular station rather than the accuracy or viability of the news being reported, it becomes paramount for news to entertain first, then inform.

I can guarantee that within a month, the media will find the next story that they can serialize like a daytime drama. They will have learned nothing from the Duke rape case despite their caterwauling about lowered standards and the nature of the news biz.

It makes one wonder why I or anyone else should even bother.

UPDATE

I’ve already had to delete a half dozen comments for vulgarity and insulting language. Let’s keep it clean, please.

Also, this is not my brother’s blog. If you wish to comment on his post, please go to his site. Any comment not germane to this post will be deleted.

UPDATE II

Just a random observation about human beings…

If 5,000 people use the appellation “Moron” as a play on words regarding the last name “Moran” to describe me or my brother, do they ALL think they’re being funny? Do they believe they are being original in their humor - even when 4,999 commenters prior to their comment registering used the exact same play on words?

Fascinating…

“Oh, George. I wish I had kissed the Sonuvabitch.”
(Patton reflecting on the consequences of striking a soldier suffering from PTSD.)

There is little doubt that Don Imus deserves to be fired. The problem is he has deserved it for going on 25 years. A major contributor to the toxicity of our culture, Imus has frolicked in the sewer of American entertainment, making a living being pointlessly hurtful and hateful to every ethnic and racial group in America. His targets in the past have included the Jews, Hispanics, Italians, Arabs, Catholics, evangelical Christians, and Muslims, to name a few. And he has gotten away with it because people recognize that he is doing it for purposes of “entertainment.”

Playing to stereotypes is a dangerous game and Imus (and his chief enabler and cheerleader, producer Bernard McGuirk), skirt the edge of outright hate speech constantly, settling for drawing broad analogies and using code words that allow their slack jawed fans to create their own punchlines. This gimmicky approach to practicing bigotry without actually crossing the line earned the radio host a huge following during the crucial morning drive time in most major markets and a sizable audience on television via MSNBC.

Now having finally crossed the Rubicon of racist caricature, it appears he is about ready to lose it all:

NBC News dropped Don Imus yesterday, canceling his talk show on its MSNBC cable news channel a week after he made a racially disparaging remark about the Rutgers University women’s basketball team.

The move came after several days of widening calls for Mr. Imus to lose his show both on MSNBC, which simulcasts the “Imus in the Morning” show, and CBS Radio, which originates the show.

CBS Radio, which is the main employer of Mr. Imus, said in a statement last night that it would stick by the two-week suspension of the show that it and NBC News announced earlier; the suspension begins Monday.

But CBS said it would, in the interim, “continue to speak with all concerned parties and monitor the situation closely.”

The demands that Mr. Imus’s show be canceled have grown in intensity every day since last Wednesday when he made the comments, in which he labeled the women “nappy-headed hos.”

The gutless wonders at CBS who have their finger in the wind seeing if the controversy will die down over the next two weeks are a perfect example of why Imus was allowed to get away with his hate shtick. The fact is, he is wildly popular and makes money for those who employ him. On that basis alone, he has been given a pass that politicians, athletes, actors, musicians, and other public figures never seem to get when it comes to inappropriate speech. And here is where the market forces that drive the entertainment industry actually work to bring the culture down to the level of the gutter. We are told that sex, violence, perversion, and the general coarseness of our popular culture is the result of our own choices, that if people wanted more elevating fare they would demand it.

This may be true to a large extent. But it is also true that even with a veritable cornucopia of choices available on television, the internet, the movie theater, and radio, along with satellite outlets such as DVD’s, CD’s, and gaming, the ever shrinking number of corporations who control all of this media fail to offer much in the way of alternatives. The odd family show on television or small number of G-rated movies released every year reveal the fact that our media gatekeepers simply don’t try very hard.

In a perfect world, edifying and uplifting fare would if not dominate all aspects of our culture, they would certainly compete equally for dollars and viewership. Not living in a perfect world instead gives us Howard Stern who at first, tried to “out-Imus” Imus until he settled into his own brand of sexually charged, off the wall rantings against gays and racial minorities. The fact that he is now on a pay service doesn’t minimize his impact on a specific segment of the population - 18 to 25 year old males. Stern’s objectification of the female body, his leering references to lesbianism, and his ignorant political diatribes are gobbled up by the most impressionable of audiences. His estimated 5 million listeners on Sirius radio pay for the privilege of listening to this weirdo - a sure sign either in the efficacy of capitalism or that civilization is coming to an end.

Beyond the hate and the prurience, there is a general coarseness to our culture that leaves those who consume its fruits at times feeling unclean. I enjoy movies with lots of explosions and death as much as anyone. But there are times that I come away feeling as if I had wallowed in a pool of blood, so ultra violent and utterly devoid of social value much of this fare offers. The Kill Bill films are a good example. Hugely entertaining because they tell an interesting story populated with interesting characters, the gore and casual attitude toward spilling blood nevertheless made it much the guilty pleasure.

To be a critic and a lover of popular culture is not so much a dichotomy as it is a realistic response to the world in which we live. But the Imus’s of this world are different. Quentin Tarrantino may have made the Bill movies for the same reason Imus seeks to shock and titillate his audiences - for the dollars. But Tarrantino’s is a stylized violence - an artistic artifact that reveals a larger truth than the simple sum of the film’s parts. For Imus, he shocks simply because he is able to. This truly places him in a cultural gutter along with rape pornographers, some rap artists, , and others who seek to manipulate the emotions of their audience in order to elicit a base emotional.

Imus should have been fired long ago. Perhaps the action taken by MSNBC will dampen the enthusiasm of the “shock jocks” who seek to skirt the edge of propriety all in the name of listeners and ad revenue.

But I wouldn’t count on it.

In the past, I have voiced my support for the Public Broadcasting System and its continued funding from taxpayers because I believe that there are dozens of excellent productions that otherwise would not be broadcast even in this age of cable and satellite saturation. Science, nature, drama, and music shows of a consistently high quality has been the hallmark of PBS since its inception and most if not all of those productions would never see air time without taxpayers footing the bill.

And while cable outlets like Bravo, Ovation, Discovery Channels, and The History Channel now offer similar programming options to the consumer, the fact is the PBS productions have over the years proved to be a cut or two above the best that those channels have to offer. With several outstanding exceptions, there simply isn’t enough original programming on those outlets. (A current exception is The Discovery Channel’s “Planet Earth” which should surely be considered among the best nature series ever photographed.)

Can any science program shown on cable outlets compare with the consistently high standards of excellence exhibited by PBS’s Nova? Or productions of opera and symphony from Live at the Met? There is no doubt cable channels have their moments. But PBS has offered extremely high quality arts and science entertainment since its birth. And I have been more than willing to support their efforts in this regard in the past and will continue to do so in the future.

Where PBS fails miserably is in airing shows with political content. This includes many productions that purport to be “history” as well as shows that examine issues facing the country today. And while there is excellence exhibited in these areas as well - The American Experience comes to mind as a show of quality and intelligence - most, if not all political programming on the network is of such an obvious bias that for conservatives, it becomes nearly unwatchable.

Therefore, it was not surprising to read about the problems a producer of a documentary has had with PBS affiliate WETA of Washington D.C. in getting his piece about moderate Muslims being reviled and threatened by extremists on the air. For the politically correct, multicultural warriors at WETA, terms like “Islamafascist” and “terrorist” are considered “unfair.”

The question is…unfair to whom?

The producer of a tax-financed documentary on Islamic extremism claims his film has been dropped for political reasons from a television series that airs next week on more than 300 PBS stations nationwide.

Key portions of the documentary focus on Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser of Phoenix and his American Islamic Forum for Democracy, a non-profit organization of Muslim Americans who advocate patriotism, constitutional democracy and a separation of church and state.

Martyn Burke says that the Public Broadcasting Service and project managers at station WETA in Washington, D.C., excluded his documentary, Islam vs. Islamists, from the series America at a Crossroads after he refused to fire two co-producers affiliated with a conservative think tank.

“I was ordered to fire my two partners (who brought me into this project) on political grounds,” Burke said in a complaint letter to PBS and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which supplied funds for the films.

Burke wrote that his documentary depicts the plight of moderate Muslims who are silenced by Islamic extremists, adding, “Now it appears to be PBS and CPB who are silencing them.”

First, it should be said that the series America at the Crossroads looks like a typically earnest PBS effort to educate the public. The problem can be seen in these actions taken by project overseers to blatantly interfere in the production and their attempt to change the intent and point of view of the show’s producer:

Before filming began last year, Burke says, (WETA’s exec. producer Jeff)Bieber asked him, “Don’t you check into the politics of the people you work with?”

Bieber said PBS was concerned that the Center for Security Policy is an advocacy group, so its leaders could not produce an objective picture. Because of that, he suggested that Gaffney be demoted to adviser.

Burke, who did not honor the recommendation, says that funding was delayed and WETA began to interfere with his film until it was “expelled” from Crossroads.

Among Burke’s examples of tampering:

• A WETA manager pressed to eliminate a key perspective of the film: The claim that Muslim radicals are pushing to establish “parallel societies” in America and Europe governed by Shariah law rather than sectarian courts.

• After grants were issued, Crossroads managers commissioned a new film that overlapped with Islam vs. Islamists and competed for the same interview subjects.

• WETA appointed an advisory board that includes Aminah Beverly McCloud, director of World Islamic Studies at DePaul University. In an “unparalleled breach of ethics,” Burke says, McCloud took rough-cut segments of the film and showed them to Nation of Islam officials, who are a subject of the documentary. They threatened to sue.

“This utterly undermines any journalistic independence,” Burke wrote in an e-mail to WETA officials.

Beyond the question of whether it is appropriate to penalize a documentarian for the politics of his producers, one might ask why it matters in this case. The left wing bias of many PBS producers has never been a problem for WETA in the past - including William Cran who wrote and directed the premier segment for the series Jihad: The Men and Ideas Behind Al Qaeda as well as participating in numerous other projects for Frontline and other PBS specials.

Cran’s documentary on Christianity done for Frontline - From Jesus to Christ, the First Christians - outraged conservative Christians not only for its content but because he used liberal theologians as his only commentators. Similarly, Cran gathered as many critics of the oil industry as was possible back in the early 90’s and made Extreme Oil, a three part hit piece so one sided in its content that most oil industry groups refused to participate.

In fairness, Cran has also made several first class documentaries including one on Aids and an entertaining and fascinating look at the English language in America. But regardless of his talent, would Mr. Beiber question Cran’s politics in the making of his Jihad piece? Evidently not.

And an executive producer trying to alter content - especially content central to the thesis of the documentary? In a word, outrageous. It is apparent that Beiber and his friends at WETA don’t read the newspaper very often. If he had, he would have discovered that Muslim extremists in Europe have been trying for years to do exactly as Burke is trying to show; establish a “separateness” from European society (sometimes with the active encouragement of European governments) in order to live under Shariah law rather than the law of the land they live in. Numerous examples abound that evidence this fact. Trying to silence this point of view is inexplicable and indefensible.

Beiber’s criticism that the documentary is “unfair” can mean only one thing; the piece is unfair to Muslim extremists. Another documentary in the series, also on moderates in Islam apparently takes care of that. Here’s a blurb from the press release touting the show “Faith Without Fear:”

But is debate possible in Islam? That question brings Manji to Spain, where different religions, cultures and ideas flourished under Muslim civilization. It happened because of “ijtihad,” Islam’s own tradition of independent thinking. She shows the art, architecture and achievements that Muslims could once claim. In so doing, Manji finally encounters the Islam that she can love. Far from being a relic of the past, ijtihad is key to curbing atrocities committed today in the name of Islam. Manji introduces us to two Spanish Muslims who represent the humanity that ijtihad can restore to Islam, and the cruelty that Muslims will suffer at the hands of other Muslims if ijithad remains buried.

Throughout this high-stakes journey, Manji challenges herself to change. Wondering if her heart is blocked to the beauty of Islam, she invites one of her fiercest Muslim critics to break bread — and what she takes away aren’t crumbs. Yet Manji’s greatest epiphany comes from her pious mother. They don’t see eye to eye. But her mom’s dignified response in a moment of humiliation teaches Manji that Muslims can, in fact, have faith without fear. Islam allows it, if only Muslims will too.

One would think that a series that purports to show our country at “a crossroads” would want an unvarnished, PC-free perspective of exactly who the enemy is and what their intentions toward us (and anyone who opposes them) might be. Instead, in the interest of “fairness,” we are treated to the milquetoast perspective that gives equal weight and consideration to a point of view very much at odds with our values. This is not a question of fairness as much as it is a point of view that is lost due to the stifling conformity of a liberal world view that holds sway at PBS and its dominant affiliates.

This is where public TV fails the public; their rank bias stifles opposing viewpoints. They do it in the name of “fairness” or their version of “accuracy.” But it is obvious that the dead hand of conformity overlays so much of their political programming that any point of view that deviates from established liberal norms has enormous problems in making it past the gatekeepers at the “Big Three” who produce almost all public TV political content; WNET, WETA, and WGBH Boston.

This bias was fully on display in 1999 when it was discovered that those three stations along with dozens of others routinely swapped mailing lists with the Democratic National Committee. (Some PBS outlets also swapped lists with the GOP). It wasn’t so much the shocking ethical lapse on the part of the various stations that made this such a revealing episode but rather the open acknowledgement that the stations were much more likely to mine donors to public television from a list of liberal contributors. If that doesn’t show an awareness of bias on the part of PBS affiliates, nothing does.

In a futile attempt to change this culture at PBS, President Bush nominated Kenneth Tomlinson for Chairman of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the entity that is responsible for PBS who immediately sought to broaden the base of PA programming at the network by bringing shows with a more diverse perspective. The outrage from liberal board members as well as liberal activists who see PBS as their own private media preserve was immediate and vicious. And they went absolutely ballistic when Tomlinson wanted to force PBS to live up to its charter by holding off the signing of the annual contract between CPB and PBS until the stations promised to live up to the “objectivity and balance” language in the PBS charter. Until that time, PBS stations only had to promise to employ “journalistic standards” to PA programming.

You can see where liberals would be outraged.

In the end, Tomlinson was outgunned and outvoted. Eventually, he was forced out for misusing his email account for personal business. But it is illustrative of the liberal mindset that permeates the CPB and PBS from top to bottom.

It is not clear at this point if Burke’s documentary will ever be shown on PBS. There has been so much double-talk from the network about this project that it’s anyone’s guess whether the American people will ever have a chance to see the truth about radical Islam and the Muslim moderates who bravely speak out against them. But if PBS were smart, they’d find room to show this documentary, if only to try and dispell the notion that they are nothing more than liberal hacks who can’t stand airing opposing viewpoints.

For that reason alone, Islam vs. Islamists will be must see TV if it ever airs.

UPDATE

Hugh Hewitt highlights the censorship angle:

This is the real deal: state suppression of ideas with which the authorities disagree on ideological/political grounds. Where’s the ACLU? Where’s the left? Where’s the Bush Adminstration?

I don’t know if the film is any good, but I strongly suspect that the government censors are forcing it down the memory hole because it is powerful and persuasive, not the opposite.

Over the years, Jack has had some memorable single combat battles with the villians who populate 24’s terrorist universe. His one on one war versus Marwan two years ago resulted in a titanic struggle in a parking garage where, after finally cornering the fanatic, Marwan denies Jack the ultimate release of killing him by jumping to his own death.

No such cop outs this year for the writers. The battle royale between Jack and Fayed was so good, so satisfying, that it should have been on pay-per-view - perhaps as a warm up for Wrestlemania. The two fought with a ferocity rarely seen on TV. The animal like grunts and explosions of sound that peppered the action gave a realistic sheen to the entire fight while both men - exhausted and bruised from their day long ordeal - showed an unflagging will to fight to the death.

But it wasn’t just Jack’s battle with Fayed that made the moment. It was how Jack got to Fayed in the first place. Agent Doyle summed it up succinctly upon reaching the scene as he looked around the immediate vicinity and saw 5 dead terrorists as well as the dangling body of Fayed. “Damn, Jack,” was his quiet, awestruck assessment. Whether he was commenting about Jack’s courage, or rashness in taking on so many terrorists at once, or more likely, the ruthless barbarity of Jack’s attack, Doyle spoke for many of us who have watched as Jack has morphed from a duty bound soldier who did bad things because he loved his country to this incarnation of a terror warrior who metes out justice to those who threaten what’s left of his personal universe with a troubling, personal satisfaction.

The look on Bauer’s face after hanging his nemisis was one of deep emotional release. He had won. And more importantly, he had defeated evil. But at what cost to his own psyche? Clearly - and the writers seem to hammering home this point more and more the last couple of years - Jack is becoming indistinguishable from the terrorists he hunts.

The fact that he’s on “our side” makes us ask ourselves some tough questions. Many of us still excuse Jack for his transgressions against human decency. But what do you make of his goodbye bon mot to Fayed before hanging him? Is there any justification whatsoever for Jack to whisper savagely into Fayed’s ear “Say hello to your brother” as he ratchets up the chain that gruesomely chokes Fayed to death? Are those the words of a hero doing what is necessary to save us? Or an out of control sadist who derives great pleasure in not only killing his enemies but making them suffer in the process?

More of the latter than the former, I’m afraid. And the metamorphosis of Jack from Season 1 to this episode that has seen him change so drastically - from something of a mild mannered family man who would do anything to get the job done to this near monster of a death machine - isn’t done yet. That’s because the one real link he has left to the human race is now a prisoner of those who perhaps did more than any terrorist ever could do in taking away his humanity.

Jack’s two years under torture at the hands of the Chinese helped to create this new personae. Or perhaps it simply accelerated a process that has seen Jack’s purity tarnished considerably once the bad guys began targeting his friends and family. And the fact that his former tormentors now hold Audrey captive will only drive Jack to more extremes in seeking revenge and attempting to get this last, tenuous tie to the human race free from their clutches.

But what about the nukes? Are we done with that plot line and will now watch as the final 7 episodes become little more than a glorified rescue mission? The show can’t have gone downhill that much, can it? Surely the writers have a surprise or two relating to those nukes left up their sleeves. And since they are in CTU’s possession, it’s time once again to put your Official CTU Mole Hunting Hats on because I have a feeling sometime over the next two episodes, those nukes are going to “disappear” from CTU custody and plunge the nation once again into dire straits.

SUMMARY

Drama in the conference room as the missile rises into the air headed for Fayed’s country and a demonstration of…something. Our will to protect ourselves by using a weapon of mass destruction, I guess. But as Lennox tries to point out, the President may just have started something that the rest of the nuclear powers on the planet are likely to finish.

Frantically, Karen calls Bill at CTU and asks if Jack has been able to get anything out of Fayed yet. Since Bauer has just begun his “interrogation” Bill reluctantly tells Karen that he has nothing concrete to offer the President and give him a reason to abort the launch. Karen still tries to convince Wayne that Jack will get the job done but the President isn’t hearing it.

The Admiral reports that enemy radar is now tracking the missile which means there are probably a lot of wet pants in the Presidential Palace of Fayed’s country as that government realizes what is about to happen. Not surprisingly, a call comes in from the Ambassador, pleading with the President to abort. Apparently, they have new information that may be helpful. It seems one of their leading generals has been running Fayed from the time he got to America, directing the nuke attacks.

This information doesn’t surprise Wayne Palmer nor should it surprise us. The fact is, there are several countries in the Middle East we claim as “allies” who have elements within their governments who would like nothing better than to see America destroyed. It is thought that there is a faction within the Saudi royal family who have close ties to al-Qaeda. This rogue faction has allies in the banking, construction, computer, and hi tech industries as well as Saudi intelligence.

Then there is the strange, frustrating case of Pakistan. President Musharaf is beset with internal enemies who strenuously object to his forging close ties to America following 9/11. These opponents reside mainly in the secretive Pakistani intelligence service, the ISI. It was they who created the Taliban back in the 1990’s and who may to this day be assisting Bin Laden in escaping capture.

The question for American policymakers has always been how do we treat countries with these kinds of internal divisions? Even the highest ranking members of the Saudi royal family probably turned the other way prior to 9/11 when Bin Laden was using his government contacts to build up and finance his operation. And Musharaf has had a devil of a time living up to his agreements to fight al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Pakistan, preferring instead to sign agreements that give the terrorists a free hand in provinces bordering Afghanistan to infiltrate and kill NATO soldiers.

The answer is - there is no answer. Or at least we haven’t come up with a coherent one yet. And Wayne Palmer’s “solution” is definitely not the way to go.

At any rate, the attack itself turns out to have been a ruse to get Fayed’s government to cooperate fully. It turns out that there was no warhead on the bird and once Wayne aborts the launch, much to the relief of the Ambassador, he demands information on this General Habib and that the Ambassador deliver it personally to the White House.

For the first time in 6 seasons, Jack Bauer actually hurts his hand from hitting a suspect too hard. After clocking Fayed in the cheekbone with a terrific right hook, he grimaces in pain and shakes the pain from his knuckels. Obviously, being away two years has worn away the callouses he built up over time using terrorist’s heads as punching bags. But he is really letting Fayed have it, delivering blow after blow as hard as he can. It’s interesting because for years, Jack was a one punch knock out artist, putting Ali himself to shame in that department. Maybe he’s gotten a little long in the tooth.

It doesn’t matter anyway because Fayed ain’t talking - not even when Little Ricky tells him that if he friends set off those nukes and they kill more people, he will no longer be the hero of “your jihad.” The way Fayed spits out “I serve the will of God,” in response makes me think that Little Ricky should have probably stayed in Denver interrogating illlegals. He has no clue what motivates the guy and when he raises his gun to pressure the fanatic with a death wish, Jack orders him to desist. Fayed laughs at Little Ricky’s amateur attempts at breaking him. Realizing he won’t get anything out of Fayed this way, Jack decides to take him back to headquarters. On the way, he gets a call from Bill telling him about Habib. This gets Jack’s thinking moving in a familiar direction - outside the box.

Back at the White House, Tom apologizes to Wayne for doubting his strength of purpose. The President then asks Lennox how he got the Veep to drop his challenge. Being cryptic about his gambit of taping Daniels and catching him in the act of planning perjury, Tom says “I’m here to inform you and also protect you.” And, the two don’t necessarily follow each other.

On the way to CTU with Fayed, Jack and Little Ricky have casual conversation about the use of drug induced torture. Jack favors it (having just seen it work on his own brother) while Little Ricky doesn’t think much of it. Just when the subject was getting interesting, their vehicle is broadsided and flipped by an armored car. Helpless and upside down, Jack sees several terrorists exit the van and make their way to flanking positions. Our boys are sitting ducks and they know it.

Jack is out first cutting down a couple of bad guys while Ricky exits, gun blazing and dropping another. But a couple of well placed shots bring down both our heroes and the terrorists free Fayed and hustle him away.

The fact that the episode was barely 15 minutes old gave away the fact that our guys weren’t dead. That and the idea the show still had 7 weeks to go made you suspect immediately that all is not it appears. Sure enough, as the armored car turns a corner, we see a caravan of cars arrive at the scene of the firefight and Jack sitting up suddenly, a Lazarus with a gun. Having to erase two kills from Jack’s body count column was disappointing - until the end of the episode.

With all hale and hearty, we are told that the attack was a ruse. Those were Arab speaking CTU agents (Maybe they could lend a few to the FBI who still, 6 years after 9/11, can’t recruit enough Arab translators to help keep the country safe.) who will attempt to trick Fayed into taking them to his hideout and the nukes.

Following the fake terrorists, Jack tells Bill that he needs an AV hookup to catch what’s going on in the armored car. Glancing over at Little Ricky he notices that the boy is bleeding in the back of the head. Concerned, Nadia asks if he needs medical assistance. Ricky assures her that he’s fine but thanks for asking. Milo looks over at Nadia and wonders if she was thinking of playing doctor with the agent.

Fayed himself looks like he could use a medical break. Between the pummeling of the Longshoremen and sparring with Jack, he looks pretty beat up. But he’s also a suspicious cuss. He won’t take the agents to his hideout unless he speaks directly to General Habib.

This presents something of a problem as Bill discovers when he calls the White House asking the President to set the call up. Apparently, Habib is in the gentle hands of Fayed’s government and being “interrogated” himself. Lennox expresses concern about the plan, believing that regular methods of torture should be used rather than trying to get this call from Habib to Fayed. The President demurs, saying that “If Jack Bauer says that’s a dead end, then it’s a dead end and I believe him,” closing off all objections. But Wayne is noticeably weakening. His hands trembling and his gait unsteady, we realize it only a question of time before his body breaks down again and the country falls by default into the evil clutches of Vice President Daniels.

Meeting the Ambassador, Wayne bluntly tells the diplomat that they absolutely must have Habib talk to Fayed. Out of the question, says the Ambassador. He is not cooperating. We even arrested his family to put pressure on him.

Have you threatened to kill them, asks the President?

Even Tom is shocked to hear him say that. The Ambassador make a big show of being offended but the President satisfyingly bores in on the heart of the matter. “We know how you treat your dissidents” says the President so don’t give us any hypocritical nonsense about human rights. Gulping noticeably, the Ambassador promises to do what needs to be done.

CTU sets up the links to carry out the plan while Bill asks Nadia to translate for everyone. Needing a separate link for that purpose, she asks Milo to take care of it. But Milo is pouting. He thinks she’s being too friendly to Little Ricky, someone he still sees as a mortal enemy. After an intervention by Morris, the two go their separate ways with Nadia perplexed and Milo seething.

With a little geek magic, Habib is on the line talking to Fayed in a couple of minutes and ordering him to hook up with his men. The general also pretends to be angry at Fayed, telling him he “should have sent Sameer” to do the job. The gambit works and Fayed tells the driver where to go so that they can meet up with his men.

When this good news reaches the White House, Wayne rises unsteadily to his feet and dismisses the Ambassador. But something is really wrong this time and after Karen and the Ambassador leave, Tom is the only one there to catch Wayne as he collapses, crashing after his adrenaline high.

As Bill orders precautions against CTU being discovered, Nadia reports the disturbing news that the “Sameer” referred to by Habib has been dead for two years and is probably a duress code used by the general to let Fayed know he was being forced to cooperate. This galvanizes Jack who realizes the jig is probably up and he calls the agent in the armored car with the bad news.

Too late. The armored car has gone into a tunnel and just as Jack was spelling out his warning, the signal went dead. They close in on the armored car only to see it stalled in the middle of the tunnel with the back door open. There are two dead CTU agents and one badly wounded in the back of the car with Fayed no where to be seen.

Jack sees a possible avenue of escape for the terrorist - a door to a maintenance room - and goes through it just in time to see Fayed killing an innocent garbage truck driver. Not alerting Fayed to his presence, Jack pulls an Indiana Jones and gets underneath the truck, grabbing on to the axle for dear life as Fayed rolls away.

Jack tries to tell Bill where he is but the noise of the engine is too great. Bill orders the tape to be run through the audio computers for analysis and tells Chloe to backtrace the satellite so they can catch any vehicle exiting the tunnel.

Back at the White House, Wayne is in a bad way. His blood pressure is lower than Draculas and his brain may be expanding inside his skull faster than Timothy Leary on acid. He demands another shot of adrenaline - something his doctor will not do. The doc even threatens to resign if Wayne doesn’t get his butt down to medical. But the President will see this through on his feet or not at all. And herein lies the potential for more mischief from Vice President Daniels.

And now the grand confrontation begins as Fayed arrives at his hideout with Jack still in tow. Ordering his men inside to get ready and move the nukes, he leaves one lone guard to handle any trouble.

Big mistake. Jack sneaks up on the terrorist and breaks his neck with a satisfying crack. But even though Jack has several targets in his crosshairs, he wants to wait and make sure the nukes are at that location before meting out justice. As he glimpses Fayed closing the cases to the two bombs, Jack very deliberately begins his attack. The first two terrorists are dispatched almost before anyone knows he’s there. The resulting firefight has Jack taking out three more AK-47 armed terrorists, all the while moving toward Fayed with terrifying deliberation.

Recklessly exposing himself and still moving with a purposeful gait, Jack advances toward Fayed, both men emptying their guns at each other in a spasm of hate and violence as they edge toward the final battle.

Jack strikes first with a kick to Fayed’s head. And then it’s all in or nothing for both. Vicious kicks and punches elicit animal like grunts and groans as both men - trained in the deadly art of one on one combat - compete for a prize that each would give up in the right circumstances but that neither will allow the other; life.

In another time, another age, this would have been the way to settle a war. The King’s Champions would take the field and fight to the death. The winner standing over his fallen foe and asking if there were any other challenges. But in these less chivalrous times, Jack bites Fayed viciously on the shoulder as his adversary screams in pain while Fayed whacks Jack with a steel pipe knocking him to the ground.

Both men are near total exhaustion but Fayed is still on his feet. Moving in for the kill, he keeps Jack down with a couple of blows that would have felled a lumberjack, all the while Bauer is moving toward a hoist with a chain link cable. Picking up a piece of steel, Fayed attempts the coup de grace only to find his blows expertly blocked by the cable. It is then Jack proves the old adage “The biggest man in the world will collapse like a ton of bricks if you kick him in the back of the knee.” And that’s just what Jack does, Fayed going down like a sack of potatoes.

Quick as lightening, Jack has the cable around Fayed’s neck and with his disquieting epithet “Say hello to your brother,” Jack flips the lever. Up goes Fayed, hoisted the way terrorists, highwaymen, murderers, and horse thieves have gone to the hereafter for a hundreds of years; the hangman’s noose.

Little Ricky arrives on this scene of horrifying carnage and can only say, “Damn Jack.” No other words appeared necessary. He informs CTU that the bombs are now secured and Fayed is dead. Relief is dominant until, a phone call, a breathless Audrey begging for help, and the oily voice of the Chinese security agent Cheng telling Jack to do exactly what he says or Audrey will die.

Once again, Jack’s life is going to get very, very complicated.

BODY COUNT

A history making night for Jack as he sends 6 terrorists to hell, the most kills he’s had since I began the body count 3 seasons ago.

Fayed takes out two CTU agents and the luckless garbage truck driver.

TOTAL:

JACK: 23

SHOW: 403