Those evil NASA goons will stop at nothing

        So the power went out just before Mike Bara's presentation of his crappy Powerpoint slides at the Woo-Woo conference yesterday. Annoying.

        Mike blames NASA. Presumably he thinks the following conversation took place.... [cue the harp arpeggios]

--"Please hold for the NASA Administrator."

--"Good morning, Mr. Perala."

--"Good morning, General Bolden. To what do I owe this distinct pleasure?"

--"I'll come right to the point. You're organizing a conference of pseudoscientists and dreamers in early August, correct?"

--"Yes sir, it's the second annual Contact in the Desert. This year we have a particularly fine line-up including...."

--"Yes, including a speaker named Michael Bara, is that correct?"

--"Oh yes, Mr Bara will be showing images from his recent book Ancient Aliens on Mars Part 2. He's a very knowledgeable man and an excellent speaker. I'm personally looking forward...."

--"Mr Perala, it is not in the interests of this nation that those images be shown."

--"Really? I don't...."

--"I'm telling you, we cannot allow this public display. I speak with the full knowledge and support of the United States Government. Do I have to spell it out?"

--"But General, the images have already been published. The horse is out and galloping across the moors already. It's a bit late to be closing the stable door now."

--"We believe that this Michael Bara person, thanks to his great skills at research and interpretation, and his fine understanding of planetary astronomy, may have much more to show. Information that might cause an invasion by... let's just say a very powerful intergalactic invasion force."

--"Wow!! So what do you want me to do?"

--"A convenient power outage is my suggestion. There's no need to get physical with Mr Bara. In fact, my understanding is that his prowess at self-defense would make that a foolhardy enterprise. He has a twin brother, you know, who could single-handedly defeat a platoon of Marines. Plus he has pet cats. With sharp claws."

--"I see. Well, it is true that power outages are a fairly frequent feature of life here. It's 106° out there, and the demands of our air-conditioning systems are very great. I'm sure that could be arranged."

--"Thank you, Mr Perala. We will be watching. And everything you have just heard will be expunged from your memory afterwards, using the same techniques we used on those Moon-walking astronaut patsies, to stop them blabbing about the alien cities on the Moon.."