Friday, January 12, 2007

'Hey! We're Not Irrelevant!'

As far as I can tell, that is the central message sent by the announcement that the jokers behind the Doomsday Clock are getting ready to move the hands forward. Either that or they need a reason to send out a fundraising letter.

Except whoops - they didn't say which way they're turning the hands! I'm just guessing the direction, based on the cryptic statement that the change was based on 'worsening nuclear, climate threats.' When the rationale is that elusive, who can really predict which way they're going to go?

How reliable is the clock? As far as I know, it has hovered around '7 minutes to midnight' since it was created in 1947. So far, there has not been a nuclear holocaust. According to Reuters, the hands have been shifted 17 times. So with 17 opportunities to correct the apparent error, they believe we've been on the Eve of Destruction for 60 years. Guess we've been really lucky!

Don't you think at some point in the last 6 decades they could have tinkered with 9:30pm or so? That way, we would all realize that planetary extinction was not that far off, but we probably had time to go make a sandwich.

Editor's Note: It is my considered opinion that the Barry McGuire version of 'Eve of Destruction' is far inferior to that of Joey Scarbury from the fantastic series 'Greatest American Hero.'



Stephen J. Cannell - you're a genius!

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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Dude, that brings back memories!

I remember wanting a t-shirt that said "Happiness is a Warm Pistol" just like Bill Maxwell.

Now I realize that Connie Sellecca was really hot.

As for the clock folks, they had a show on History Channel a few weeks ago. It was about as interesting as watching dust settle. History Channel had it on at 6am on a Saturday-shows how important they felt the show was.