Buster Poindexter And The Domino Effect
I visited the exalted IraqWarWasWrongBlog this afternoon and perused a fascinating comment thread wherein ideas were being exchanged with regards to the notion that one way to help the Palestinians prepare for their imminent statehood would be to give them a crash course on the necessary import of Punk Rock.
As the thread evolved, the idea was proposed that it would also be a good idea to introduce the work of Marlene Dietrich. I believe that her honor/shame paradigm is, indeed, a good fit for the Palestinians. In a sense, the Marlene Dietrich model probably represents a sort of intellectual wormhole between the two dimensions of the U.S. and Palestine.
The author of the particular Marlene Dietrich proposal then went on to name a veritable liturgy of Western popanalia, which traveled through Elvis, Disco, and finally to the sublime apex of the, quite understandably, vaunted Pixies.
I countered (for I do on occasion get involved in such intellectual melees) that it is my contention that we must also consider Buster Poindexter.
I say "must" because it is apparent that Buster Poindexter embodies a peculiar crossroads of American culture, as he is the intersection of Dietrich, Sinatra, Elvis, Disco, and Punk.
And as I turn this idea over in my mind, slowly pondering the fragmented prism of thought, as if it were a broken crystal, the idea becomes larger, and takes on a more portentous quality. Clearly, the Poindexter archetype could, if applied with the necessary velocity, achieve exactly that "Democracy Domino Effect" in the larger Middle East, which the Bush Administration is flailing so pathetically to exert through the barbaric means of war.
