Formula for a fun Friday night: a cold brewski, a bag of popcorn and political discourse regarding electoral reform.
No foolin?. It?ll be fun. Just ask Megan Hamilton, program director for Baltimore?s Creative Alliance.
“We?re trying to enliven dialogue in the city, to encourage people to become engaged, whether it is with the local arts community, contemporary performance, film and intellectual dialogue,” Hamilton said. “We usually don?t use words like ?intellectual dialogue,? but we want it be fun.”
Of course it helps if the man leading the dialogue is nationally noted media critic and author, Mark Crispin Miller, who returns to the Patterson Theater stage 7:30 p.m. on Friday.
Miller has written several books investigating the Bush administration and electoral tactics, including “The Bush Dyslexicon” and “Cruel & Unusual: Bush-Cheney?s New World Order.” Most recently, Miller published “Fooled Again” (2005) which he describes as “a thorough expose of how Bush/Cheney stole their ?re-election,? with the help of theocratic activists who don?t believe in our democracy or the Enlightenment. None of that is speculation, as every point is scrupulously documented.”
Now out in paperback, the new edition features a 100-page afterword, entitled “The REAL Case for Electoral Reform.”
“I bring the story up to date with quite a lot about e-voting fraud and vote suppression that were also rampant in the last election. Because the Democrats appeared to do quite well, and because they?re suffering from battered spouse syndrome, they have turned a blind eye to all that fraud, even though they probably won twice as many House seats as they think they did, and may well have prevailed in Tennessee?s Senate race as well.
“So anyone who comes to hear me will learn a great deal that the press and Democrats have, for the most part, tuned out,” Miller said. Miller also promised to discuss “the unprecedented extremism of the Bush regime, which is not just ?about oil,? but also has a strong apocalyptic streak that threatens all of us directly, and that has had much to do with the theft of the last few elections.”
Miller, who first appeared at the Patterson in 2003 with his one-man show, “Operation American Freedom,” said he “loves coming back” to Baltimore, which he continues to think of as home.
“Mark has roots in Baltimore, was on WJHU-FM (now WYPR National Public Radio), and taught at Hopkins, so he?s kind of a homeboy,” Hamilton said. “He has a big following here.”
Miller will lead a book signing after the show which is expected to run about one hour.
IF YOU GO
Mark Crispin Miller
» Venue: Creative Alliance/Patterson Theater, 3134 Eastern Ave., Baltimore
» Time: 7:30 p.m., Friday
» Tickets: $12, $10 for members
» More info: creativealliance.org, 410-276-1651
