Drones Over America!: Two Animated Satires of Misguided American Policy

Drones over Amer­i­ca –they’re a high tech assault on Amer­i­can con­sti­tu­tion­al rights, and they deserve to be met with a mod­ern form of dis­sent, some­thing more than a cranky op-ed in the pages of The New York Times. In this case, ani­mat­ed satire feels just about right. Enter Drew Christie, who cre­at­ed a satir­i­cal “Op-Doc” for the Times that mocks plans to use drones to police Amer­i­ca. Christie hails from Seat­tle, whose police force recent­ly announced it would adopt an aer­i­al drone pro­gram. When the plan was lat­er scut­tled, K.G.B. agents every­where were very upset. Who could blame them, see­ing that we were so close to achiev­ing our brave new world?

If Mr. K.G.B. feels a lit­tle too severe, then why not have a lit­tle fun with Mr. Blasty? He’s adorable, a bar­rel of laughs, but he pulls no punch­es. “While you’re all sud­den­ly won­der­ing about me and my drone friends blow­ing you to bits in Bowl­ing Green, I’ve been busy abroad for years killing thou­sands!…” “Don’t wor­ry, they’re usu­al­ly just for­eign­ers though. But whether they’re for­eign­ers or cit­i­zens– first comes fire­pow­er [blam], then comes legalese! And if the legalese does­n’t work, there’s always “state secrets” where nobody knows noth­in’–.” The more the admin­is­tra­tions the change, the more they stay the same.