Sunday, September 28, 2008

Great Expectations

Really, David. I expected better from Bracken, and I certainly expected better from you.

Commentator Joel expresses disappointment with racial theme elements in the "Foreign Enemies" online sample.

Author Matthew Bracken responds:

I’m not sure what politically correct planet Joel hails from, or if he has some other axe to grind, but I’m confused by his comments. He begins by referring to “all those EEEVIL dirty brown people” in Domestic Enemies. Was he referring to the heroine, the Arab-American Ranya Bardiwell? Or perhaps to the hero, Alexandro Garabanda, a Cuban-American? Domestic Enemies is set in the future in New Mexico, during a period when the Southwest is fracturing away from the United States. Yes, plenty of bad guys in the novel are Hispanic. Plenty of the good guys are as well. Perhaps if I had set the novel in North Dakota, and invented an immigration invasion by Canadians leading to…never mind. You get my point. If I’m going to write reality-based fiction about the breakup of the USA, set in the Southwest, it’s going to be pretty hard to avoid some Hispanic bad guys. Sorry Joel, if that offends your PC sensibilities. (And don’t hold your breath waiting for my novel about North Dakota.)

As far as cannibalism occurring three weeks after the complete cutoff of Memphis from the outside world, following a Richter level eight earthquake—yes Joel, that would happen. Spend a little time researching such disasters. People don’t quietly starve, while calmly sitting at home. The young and the strong quickly revert to cannibalism in the face of the total cutoff of other sources of food. History shows this, over and over. In the posted excerpt, there is one case of cannibalism described, in a city of over a million inhabitants.

Considering that you found the internet posted sections of Domestic Enemies to be full of “all those EEEVIL dirty brown people,” (despite the ethnicity of the heroes and its Southwestern setting), I’m not surprised that you would compare the posted excerpt from Foreign Enemies to the infamous white racist screed, “The Turner Diaries.” Perhaps you stopped reading these excerpts, before you got to the story of Web Hardesty? He is a white racist villain of the first order, using the breakdown of law and order following the earthquake to engage in a vendetta against African-Americans and Hispanics in Western Tennessee. I’ll say it in your terms: Web Hardesty is an “EEEVIL dirty white person.”

In Foreign Enemies, a rough sort of race war is introduced as one of several background plot elements. Blacks and whites are portrayed in both heroic and evil roles. Perhaps you are simply offended that I would dare to suggest that a complete breakdown in the social order would lead to racial atrocities being committed on all sides? If so, I would suggest that you are a Pollyanna, inhabiting the lofty airs of politically correct thought, viewing the world through rose-colored glasses.

Forgive me if I don’t think that folks will be holding hands and singing Kumbaya, three weeks after an earthquake wrecks most of the bridges between Little Rock, Saint Louis and Nashville. In Memphis, after three weeks with no food, drinking water, electricity or gas, I believe that we would see many of the worst traits that humanity has demonstrated under similar circumstances down through the ages.

I don’t expect that Joel will be reading Foreign Enemies, after he saw “all those EEEVIL dirty brown people” in Domestic Enemies, (in spite of the fact that the heroes are themselves “brown people.”) But for anyone else who read and enjoyed my first two novels, I make this promise: Foreign Enemies ends with a positive resolution of most of the various crises described. This includes a racial reconciliation by several of the characters, who had come to distrust members of differing ethnicities.

And please don’t get the idea that Foreign Enemies is primarily about racial conflict. That is merely one of the plot elements, in a novel that is mainly about the total usurpation of the Constitution by a rogue President and Congress.

Matt Bracken

Florida

The Buck Stops There

Gov. Brian Schweitzer believes a university system policy banning those with concealed weapons permits from bringing guns on college campuses conflicts with state law, his campaign spokesman said Friday.

The issue arose the night before in a debate with Schweitzer's Republican challenger, state Sen. Roy Brown. During the debate, Brown said it was wrong that those with permits to carry guns could not do so on college campuses...

The Montana Board of Regents, however, has a policy restricting firearms to law enforcement and other officials.

There's something to be said about political rivals arguing over who is the bigger gun rights supporter. And also, lest we become too assured, something to keep an eye on and question more deeply.

Thing is, you can't shove all blame off on the Board of Regents, who are appointed by the governor and confirmed by the state senate.

Well, gee, our underlings decided and now our hands are tied.

Right.

That ain't where the buck stops.

Bought and Paid For

The buyback is being financed by $50,000 in assets forfeited through seizures from drug investigations and other crimes.

So it's all good, right? And we don't need to think through any deeper implications...?

Ballpark Franks

The discovery of several hot dogs in packages outside Citizens Bank Park brought the bomb squad out and forced the temporary evacuation of the stadium Wednesday evening.
Between scary hot dogs in Philly and Lite Brite Mooninites in Boston, let's take a moment to be thankful we have an all-pervasive government to protect us from such horrors--that is, to protect us from ourselves.

This Day in History: September 28

The enquiry into the Conduct of Dr. Church, Director General of the hospital, and the respective Regimental Surgeons, being finished in the four Brigades in and near Cambridge, conformable to the General Orders of the 7th Instant -- The same is to take place to morrow in Bridgr. Genl. Thomas's brigade, and in Brigadier Genl. Spencer's brigade on saturday.