Mike Palecek knows a bit about dissent, and to his credit, is an "enemy of the (corrupt and tyrannical) state". He has been crusading to find and expose the truth for years as a journalist, editor and writer. At one point, the rulers of the "land of the free" held him as a prisoner of conscience at seven different federal prisons for his non-violent civil disobedience he carried out against their sacrosanct military industrial complex. Yes, Mike Palecek is an enemy to that soulless coalition of the wealthy elite, corporate interests, pro-Israeli forces, powerful lobbyists, and conservative Christians who hold most of the power in the United States. They despise gadflies like Palecek, who challenge their perpetual lies and obscenely immoral abuses of the public trust, domestic law, international law, and human rights.
Flag Wavers and "True Patriots" will not enjoy this read
I would venture to say that many of those who tend toward the deeply conservative end of the political or social spectrum would find Looking for Bigfoot to be highly offensive and perhaps "treasonous". More is the pity that their closed minds render them incapable of seeking or seeing the truth. The individuals to whom I refer are content to wear the rose-colored glasses while continuing to believe that the United States of America is a paragon of virtue and that might does indeed make right.
"The more compelling our journalism, the angrier became the radical right of the Republican Party.
"That's because the one thing they loathe more than liberals is the truth. And the quickest way to be damned by them as liberal is to tell the truth."
The Quest and the Quester
While Looking for Bigfoot is a chronicle of Jack Robert King's tragic search for the truth, it is also a portrait of a man tormented by the knowledge that he is living in a nation governed by shamelessly immoral, avaricious individuals living comfortably behind a carefully crafted illusion of their virtue. An unemployed, unpublished writer who served prison time for civil disobedience and who broadcasts an Internet radio show espousing his "radical" political views, Jack and his family live in Dyersville, Iowa in the home sitting on the movie site of the ball field portrayed in Field of Dreams. How ironic that a man cursed with the knowledge that the "American Dream" is actually a nightmare (except for a select few patricians) would live in the Heart of America on the location where the corporate media created an extremely popular film which glorified "America's Pastime". Baseball is as American as Mom, apple pie, and murdering millions of innocent civilians in the interest of imperial expansion.
After receiving a copy of a magazine with a cover story profiling his beloved high school baseball coach's search for Bigfoot in Oregon, Jack decides that it is his destiny to follow his former coach to the Great Northwest. Literally taking his show on the road, Jack begins his physical quest for truth on a bus bound for Oregon, broadcasting his radio show via his laptop at various stops along the way.
As one might expect of a bus trip, Jack encounters a wide variety of personalities, beliefs, races, and religions in the people he sees and meets.
In one of the more poignant moments in the book, Jack has an exchange with an Air Force retiree who overheard him recording his next show. The military man confronted Jack:
"I disagree with everything you've been saying. They ought to place you in prison, son. I served so punks like you could be free."
Jack responded with an interesting counter to the widely believed "truth" that Americans who have not served in the military owe the "privilege of their existence" to those who have:
"So...I'm free to do what I'm doing, thanks dude. By the way, next time, don't do me any favors, okay?
"Unless I specifically ask you, don't kill anyone for me, okay? Don't bomb anyone; don't nuke anyone; don't napalm anyone; don't murder any men, women or children for me, okay?
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