Preview: F.M. Radio

       There are a million reasons to stay home. Everyone attached to the entertainment umbilical cord doesn’t need to leave the comfort of their protected little caves. There’s too much uncertainty out there anyway. You can’t drive anywhere because the Machine has finally, after all these years of making f**king huge profits on oil and its refinements, figured out that the basic rules of supply and demand actually work. The Machine can raise prices as high as Uncle Dick’s imagination can drive them. The Machine has convinced us that we need our cars. It has convinced many of you that you don’t just need a car, you need something so big its name needs to be abbreviated. So, as long as we all need our vehicles, we need gas too. So raise them prices, Big Boys, and we’ll keep paying them, because the Machine really works…for you.
       The Machine has also convinced us that there is evil around every corner. Check your bags on the subway. You can have only three-ounce containers of health and beauty products on an airplane. And before you get on the plane, take your shoes off. Evil can be anywhere, even in the souls of your shoes. The public has been convinced that it needs the Machine to protect us. High gas prices? The price of freedom. Even if Exxon has reported the highest profit of all time last year, we’re told the war in the Middle East is the real reason for the price gauging. Blame the terrorists. Right, blame them for giving the oil barons a good reason to raise prices. Freedom indeed.
       So what do you do if your umbilical isn’t feeding you what you want? What if the gruel the Machine’s prison guards have been serving you gets stale? What if you get to the point where you just have to get out? You must face the invisible evil and stand up for your right to live free. You must peel yourself off of your sofa and shut your door behind you. Call some friends and go out. Live, damn it, live! That’s not to say you should never stay home, just don’t make it a prison.
       As a matter of fact, the Machine wants us to stay home. The less we converse with others in our caste, the less we learn. Ignorance is the Machine’s lifeblood. The metal band, Megadeth, has many songs about political issues. At a recent show, Dave Mustaine seemed to sing “Washington is Next” with exceptional fervor when he screamed “The quiet war has begun with silent weapons/And the new slavery is to keep the people/Poor and stupid”. At a concert in 2002, Patti Smith told us, “Don’t mistake nationalism for patriotism. Remember who you were before 9/11.”