Betty Hill has died at the advanced age of 85, giving the lie to
the Surgeon General’s warning that alien abductions are “bad for
you.” Betty and her husband Barney had mysteriously disappeared for
two hours during a drive from Canada to New Hampshire in 1961, and
later recalled under hypnosis that their DTs had been caused by
ETs. Serves her right for marrying a purple dinosaur.
We would be remiss if we did not note the title of her magnum
opus, published in 1995. It was A Common Sense Approach to
UFOs. Now, without her steadying hand at the helm, the
movement is in danger of being hijacked by kooks.
But let us not be flippant or cavalier. The Bush campaign is in
a tizzy, as well it might. This event is sure to rally the UFO
vote, who otherwise rarely leave their bomb shelters. And it is a
well-known fact that UFO enthusiasts vote Democrat by a margin of
ten to one! Even our recent inroads into the Lesbian vote may not
be sufficient to overcome this handicap.
Facing so grim a prospect, it behooves us to shed our
constricting mantle of skepticism and step into the world of the
abductee (okay, I made up the word, so sue me). The horror, the
upheaval, the overturning of familiar norms, it’s no less of a
culture shock than being a Peace Corps volunteer in Timbuktu or
even Arkansas. The kid took a nap and woke up kidnapped. And now
folks look at him like he is one saucer short of a full set or,
conversely, one saucer long. We ought not to judge him before we
have walked a mile in his Birkenstocks.
Let us be bold and enter for a moment the world of the UFO
voter.
In this world, a man can come back from four months of fighting
a war and throw away his medals in a public demonstration, go
before Congress and tell it that he and his comrades routinely
committed war crimes and atrocities on the scale of Genghis Khan,
then run for President on the basis of his military record.
In this world, a man can be a United States Senator who votes
against every major weapons system and every military engagement,
including a police action to expel Saddam Hussein from an
egregiously overrun Kuwait, then run for President on the premise
of being uniquely suited by temperament for the role of
Commander-In-Chief.
In this world, a man can submit a tax return which shows that he
and his wife employed an array of loopholes to pay a 12 percent tax
rate on a grossly understated income of $5 million, run for
President against a man who paid a 27 percent rate, and say that he
will stop pandering to the wealthy and see that they pay their fair
share.
In this world, a man can sit in the United States Senate for two
decades, not have a single memorable legislative achievement to be
distinguished by, have a voting record that marks him as Number One
most extreme in one political direction, and then run for President
as a centrist who will provide solidity and nuance.
In this world, a man can run for President and claim to have no
connection to a series of proxy organizations receiving many
millions of dollars from billionaires and running paranoiac ads
that paint America as a puppet regime run by Saudi Arabia and
Halliburton, yet demand that his opponent stop the ads run by
opposing organizations.
In this world, a man can argue that an activity which his
religion regards as murder is not within the province of his
legislative mandate, that its practitioners deserve to be shielded
from the scrutiny applied to all other medical procedures, and that
his coreligionists should elect him based on their shared
faith.
In this world, a man can openly condemn a war while the men are
in the field, a war which he voted for, vilify the ally countries
by calling them bribed and coerced, disparage the newly installed
government of Iraq, boycott the Prime Minister’s address to
Congress, then maintain that his superior diplomacy will improve
foreign relations.
This moment of outreach and empathy has been most invigorating.
We are learning to reach beyond the parameters of our narrow
existence. Not all aliens are illegal. Not all science fiction is
fiction (or science, for that matter). We need to be more open to
the fringe members of society and not cede their votes to the
Democratic Party. This is a breakthrough. We’re definitely on to
something. Today the UFO voter, tomorrow the Wiccans. Come and join
our big tent. If they have Streisand and Springsteen, why can’t we
have Barnum and Bailey?
So go in peace, Betty Hill. Oh, and if you ever want to
collaborate on a book called “A Common Sense Approach to The
Democratic Party,” drop in on my next séance and I’m sure we
can work something out.
