"And the funniest part of all is, JMS actively supports the party and the
individual politicians who brought you the "Communications Decency Act,"
which would, if it hadn't been hamstrung by a court which had actually
read the Constitution, have resulted in eventual restraint of such modes
of expression......"

That's right, Gharlane. I supported the individuals now residing in the
White House, and still do...because I'm not a one-issue person. Is the
CDA a stupid, invidious, badly written, paranoid, neanderthal, repressive
bill? Absolutely. And I supported the people who were actively against
it, as I was actively against it. I don't have this notion that I must
agree 100% with a politician, or have that politican hew to every single
belief which I hold, in order to support him or her. There can be
respectful (or loud) disagreements on principle on individual points.

The issue is: *on balance*, which side do I tend to support? Both parties
are flawed. Candidates on both sides have eccentricities, failings,
misfired notions. But on balance...you've got Bob Dole, who doesn't have
any notion on the leadership of this country except the vague idea that
he's *earned* his shot, and he's going to have it. It's not about
providing a new vision, it's just about being the one wearing the pointy
hat. He wants the ultimate promotion.

Kemp I find interesting, but saddled with Dole this is a non-starter. And
from where I sit the Republican party has capitulated to the Religious
Right on every issue of substance...people who've said they want to
designate this a Christian nation, drag creationism into the schools
(saying they want balance, but I don't see anybody offering to let folks
teach Darwin from the church pulpit on Saturday nights), who've whipped up
so much hatred against physicians and classes that murdering doctors is
simply an unfortunate consequence....

Are there flaws to the Democratic side? Absolutely. An inability to come
to grips with social programs long in need of serious reform, a
soft-hearted and sometimes soft-headed approach to social organization,
de-emphasis on infrastructure in deference to social programming, too much
concern about words and not enough concern about actions, grass-roots
disorganization....

You say you're a fan of this show. Well, consider this: that if the
government envisioned by Phyllis Schlafly and Pat Buchanan and Robert Dole
and Bob Dornan and Alfonse D'Amato (possible spelling error there) ever
took serious hold in this nation, Babylon 5 -- with its sometimes
subversive nature, its open and frank discussions on religion, death,
sexuality, violence, the conflict between belief and medicine -- would be
the first program chucked out the door.

It was under the Reagan years that the Captain Power series -- for all its
flaws, some episodes very good, some less so -- got shot out from under
the producers because of the then-fashionable assault on violent TV by
pressure groups (many of them on the far right), so don't tell me it can't
happen...I was the one on the opposite side of the conference table when
religious-right "consultants" on Satanism advised the network on another
show where I was working on what they had to do to avoid sending
unintentional Satanic messages, which meant leaving out references to
fictional books like the Necronomicon, being unable to use the name
Lovecraft, and being told that the signs of a kid succumbing to Satanism
are "he's curious...he's sometimes depressed...he tries to reject
authority...and he's susceptiple to peer pressure." No, I'm NOT making
that up, that's verbatim.

And these are the same groups bending the Republican party to their own
whims. I've seen their work up-close and personal, and I tell you
frankly, that if they got in charge, this show would be deep-sixed so fast
it'd make your head spin.

The present administration may be muffin-headed at times, may have its
personal pecadillos and quirks...but compared to the mean, venal,
anti-intellectual, anti-artist opposition, the opposition of Jesse Helms
and Pat Buchanan...I'll take it, and be glad of it, and when something as
inherently dopey and destructive as the CDA gets passed, be absolutely
open in complaining about it.

And thank you for dragging my personal politics back into this...and
throwing it in my face. Anything else you'd like to drag up?


jms