Dirty Deeds

And he dug up her grave and built a cage with her bones
Excitable boy, they all said
Well, he's just an excitable boy
--Excitable Boy, Warren Zevon

We can't let you go. You're dangerous to us.
Don't fight it, Miles, it's no use.
Sooner or later, you'll have to go to sleep
--Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)

There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create
And time for all the works of days and hands
--The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, T.S. Eliot

The world needs a wake up call, gentlemen...
we're gonna phone it in
--They Live (1988)
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"They Live" was a classic zombie movie about keeping people blinded to reality. It should be remembered for the vapid enthusiasm of the television commentator:

"The feeling is definitely there. It's a new morning in America... fresh, vital. The old cynicism is gone. We have faith in our leaders. We're optimistic as to what becomes of it all. It really boils down to our ability to accept. We don't need pessimism. There are no limits." Sound familiar? All of this, if you just keep the reality glasses off. Right-o.

Here's your pop culture fix, with a national security slant. Don't say Ranger doesn't try and raise the discourse level above that of the madding crowd.

Dexter is a new, slick series on commercial t.v. about the titular Dexter, who has the asocial affliction of being a serial killer. It is o.k. though, because he only kills other killers. He is an avenging serial killer. In these vigilant days, it is a simple and attractive premise.

Instead of buggering up the judicial system with his likes, he is employed as a Darwinially well-adapted fixture of society. Extending the fitness theory to the biological level, Dexter is a macrophage, an organismal garbage man. And of course, per Hollywood, Dexter is preternaturally good-looking, young, intelligent and engaging.

As childhood background, Dexter ends up in the care of a police detective who recognizes Dexter's proclivities and channels them into his current constructive homicidal behaviors, i.e., scouring the streets of killers. The youth is trained early on in the art of the kill.

Now, Dexter too works in the employ of the police as a crime scene blood-spatter expert, giving him the inside track on tips to facilitate his righteous serial killing. There is a not-so-subtle subtext that sometimes, the good guys (=police) must do some bad things to effect justice.

Torture under the aegis of government, anyone? John Yoo as script consultant?

However, one disconcerting aspect of Dexter's clearing of the dead-enders is that he takes glee in their destruction. Dexter stalks and kills in the name of justice, but he tortures them before their demise as a sociopath is wont to do. Reveling in murder and mayhem outside of the boardroom generally is not kosher. Typically, he dismembers the victim's bodies, disposing of the remainders in a shrink-wrapping.

Dexter's psychopathology is justified by the vendetta-like nature of his kills. Though attractive, Dexter is a sociopath, despite his self-deluded and convenient justifications. The program is symptomatic of a shifting morality in the U.S. viewing audience, and it occupies a key Sunday night viewing slot.

The Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©) infects the media yet again. In effect, Dexter is following VP Cheney's injunction that to defeat terrorism, it is necessary to walk on the Dark Side (Don't do it, Luke.) The U.S. has now walked that dark side, so as embodied by this series, it is not a stretch to believe that good is the result of evil.

If the evil is directed at achieving their perverted interpretation of good, then evil has become a good. It is Neitzche's mad and arrogant transvaluation of values come home to roost. But the ubermensch doesn't much care.

For the simple mind inclined to see every battle as a Manichaean struggle, it is simplicity itself for good to employ evil to its own end. Ho, ho Silver and happy trails, to you. In this show, Dexter-cum-Cheney is a hero because he has fashioned a higher good out of dirty doings.

The father figure in Dexter is GHWB, former CIA director clearly versed in dark side etiquette. As on the show, he has taught his son how to sublimate his murderous impulses into acceptable channels. Terrorists and accused terrorists are bad, so you can torture, kidnap and kill them with impunity; in fact, with societal approval. Or at least, implicit approval. This is the era of don't ask, don't tell. Just don't get caught, for that is the cardinal sin.

Like Dexter, George W. Bush presents as a hale, well-met fellow, but underneath he is an unprincipled killer. Unlike Dexter, he tortures nations vs. individuals, per se.

The remaining characters also analogize nicely to the current paradigm. Dexter's sister is a fledgling homicide detective with an inkling of Dexter's after-hours romps. Her character equates to Condoleeza Rice: she is striving, hungry for acceptance and success, and will do anything legal to climb the career scaffold. But in her silence, she is the unwitting tool of Dexter in his murderous pursuits.

Dexter's girlfriend and her children reflect the U.S. population at large. She struggles to hold her family together as a single mother. Dexter hides his unsavory reality from her by presenting himself as a loving and caring individual. She buys into his persona as America has bought into Mr. Bush's version of reality.

Dexter and GBW are heartless, unfeeling murderers walking amongst us while pretending to be normal functioning beings. It is a vision of America straight out of a George Romero nightmare. We the viewers and we the voters have bought into the illusion of goodness.

How much longer will Americans play the dupe?