Star Wars can stuff it. We want "peaceful" contact
and on our terms. Ask Orson Welles.
Or H.G.Wells.
Time machines are old hat and another invasion in
Newark is too much to absorb.
With NYC across the river, they've already got all the
action they can handle.
We like our extraterrestial life tailormade and
preferably in our own image. We're prepared to accept
them if they conform to stiff criteria. They have to be
like us and prepared to cooperate. Seeing eye dogs
help the blind, horses were good draft animals for
centuries. We might even want to decorate it like the
Hindoos do elephants; make it into a "religious"
procession such as a Roman Triumph. It would be the
same for outer space visitors. No mutants or Roving
Intelligences allowed. Earth is "off limits" to
marauding predators -- we'll fight at the suggestion
they're here on "reconnoitering missions" as a prelude
to Conquest or the Bermuda Triangle is one of their
many "staging areas" or dress rehearsal sites.

Earth for humankind carries more immediacy than
"Canada for the Canadians". If they are "out there",
they'd better behave.

Page 84
Hollywood's got it all figured out.
There's no shortage or scenarios.
Life support systems will be rushed wherever there is
a sighting with artillery back-up.
The Pentagon is in control.
The Moonies have asked to be informed.
Crackpots the world over await deliverance.
The Earth has big plans for the visitation.
Contact would displace Ihe Copernician revolution as
"a first" in blockbuster events: edge out Columbus'
hat trick, even erase Caesar's Gaelic campaigns.
Such things are no longer "relatable".
Every school kid can fathom "aliens" even if he can't
decline a Latin noun or understand the causes of the
Renaissance.
Unveiling the first spaceship would cap the
evolutionary quest for Enlightenment or realization of
a greater Oneness.
The universal thirst for knowledge would be satisfied.
Still, our trek to the stars would turn in on itself if they
got here first. Something like the Seminoles arriving
in Paris in the 13th century overland from Nice or
finding an orangutan piloted the Viking ship, Sutton
Hoo, into Vineland. It's barely credible and has to be
remade into "tangible" dialogue. No sapient, red
puddles or Dryads need apply. Fuel up the
Crematoria. Break out the electric cattle prods. They
may be common as blades of grass in a meadow but it's
our show. Orange Pekoe intellects will naturally be
sus