HOUSE OVERSIGHT 024421 perceptions so as to restore that sense of inner control. I describe the Control Factor as an "active and continuous process" designed to maintain that sense, if not illusion, of control. We natural ly think that our thinking and feeling processes are passive; that they just happen. Yet when faced with truly frightening prospects, the mind is geared to actively distort. Similarly, the sense of control must be continuously maintained so the Control Factor operates constantly. In turn, the sum of this active and continuous undertaking makes these perceptions all the more familiar and thus seemingly all the more "real." In one sense, the Control Factor is the mechanism of what Andy McCarthy entitled one of his numerous excellent books- willful blindness. The Control Factor is cleverer than we are aware; that is almost tautological as, if our minds are to create ways to keep us in denial, they must out maneuver our conscious thinking. Since World War II, America has had limited experience with threats coming to the homeland. Most of America's history has been about "over there," where we have always known that if things got too out of hand (e.g. Vietnam) we could always ret urn home. The current generations, for a wide array of reasons, have had virtually no experience with a threat to this land. (The documentary, Generation Zero, is interesting on this point). Consequently, the process of waking up to such a threat parallels the arc of a typical horror film. In such a film, there is typically a cast of characters surrounding one or two main characters. We in the audience know there is a threat coming — be it a monster, a virus, a psycho killer, an alien, the blob that ate Cincinnati etc. This threat is typically defined by its intent- the singular goal of destroying the characters. Much of the initial exposition shows how the characters first are oblivious to the destruction the threat brings about, then explain it in familia