Elvis, el gato
por ran scot

http://www.lajerga.com/movies/elvis.mov

We, as clever monkeys, always need a symbol to help us define our times. While some point to Cindy Sheehan, Valerie Plame, or the lie-stuffed turkey that is the Iraqi war, I say that symbol is none other than Elvis the Cat.

See Elvis, he got the raw end of a run-in with a truck. Now the poor little critter is crippled. Elvis’s owner, who we will call ‘Dude’, decided he know exactly how to help Elvis out. But he did not approach the solution from a crippled kitty centric point of view. And unbeknownst to the Dude, he constructed the best hyperbole for the USA ever created.

See when America was crippled by 9-11, the Bush administration put us in a similar safe secure box, right down to the duct tape needed to hold this little kitty’s world together. Then there was the maddening Terror Alert Rainbow Color system, which makes about much sense as buttons do to a cat. But what completes this hyperbole is the dialogue between the Dude and Elvis, which I also see happening between the powers that be and the American public. It is a classic case of thinking you are doing right, but you could not be doing more wrong.

Case 1: “If Elvis could talk, he would thank me.” No, if the cat could talk, he would talk about what a world of shit you have put it in. Kind of like how I felt when I first read the Patriot Act.

Case 2: Elvis: “MEOW!!!! (distressed, obviously not enjoying the ride)” Dude: “See, he’s learning.” Yes, I feel you Elvis. I howl too at the roller coaster drops in fiscal responsibility and civil liberties. Bush keeps telling me this is Conservative. But as a Libertarian, I am just not getting it.

Case 3: Dude: “Go straight, no Straight! He always wants to go right.” Look man, Elvis is a cat. He does not speak English, trust me. Americans also head right when they hear a message they don’t quite understand. Truth be told, that is the correct thing to do. But the idea is to be somewhere near the middle and to shuffle to the right only when confusion reigns. And in a time of clarity, we do fox trot back to the left. Just like Elvis, we gotta learn to turn left again.

The movie ends with the howling Elvis spinning madly around in his box he doesn’t quite understand while his supposed protectors look down in a glow of a job well done. If that’s not the current state of affairs in the USA, I’m not sure what is.