I find the gorillas in the original movie "Planet of the Apes" and the behavior of today's republicans stunningly similiar, and even frightening.

After a long journey, astronaut Taylor landed back on Earth after four thousand years of space travel, but instead of going forward in time, he went backward. Taylor and his two fellow space travelers crash landed on an unknown planet. Soon after, Taylor was hunted down with his fellow crewmembers Dodge and Gunner by gorillas and captured. Taylor was the lucky one. His friends were butchered by the gorillas. Their brains were cut out of them and left like human vegetables. The gorillas did this out of lust for death and irrational fear. And irrational fear leads the less-than-bright members of any society into acting in devious and dangerous ways.

In the movie there were three classes of apes, the chimpanzees, who were the liberals of their day; the gorillas who were conservative; and the Orangutans. The 'liberal' chimpanzees filled important positions such as researchers, doctors, and archaeologists but just as Rush Limbaugh, and his fans from the republican party do, they constantly berated and condemned anyone from academia. The Orangutans made up the governing body led by Doctor Zaius. The gorillas were on the lowest tier in their civilization. They were led by a ruthless and bloodthirsty General Ursus. The gorillas were the enforcers of the ape-law. They possessed a built-in aggressiveness and had a disdain for the ‘lower’, or fragile, creatures of their world.

Chimpanzees Zira and Cornelius were among the intellectual elite in their Simian society. Because of their compassion and their desire to look for peaceful resolutions to problems they were considered 'liberals'. Zira and Cornelius saw things globally and understood the ramifications of irrational acts. They used their minds to ponder the implications of war and enslavement of others. They were sympathetic to others. As chimpanzees, they always choose peace over war. Along with other chimpanzees, they demonstrated against the warmongering, bloodthirsty gorillas. Chimpanzees always thought that war should be used only as a last resort, and only to defend themselves from a foreign aggressor. Compare that to republicans who still believe that Saddam Hussein had the capability to strike the United States with weapons of mass destruction because Bush lied to them.

But the Gorillas, led by the Orangutans Zaius and ruthless gorilla General Ursus and his mindless followers, were hell-bent on going to war and oppressing others. The gorillas constantly chanted for war. They were easily whipped into a frenzy by their leaders who used buzz words to incite them into irrational actions. The gorillas were always for war. They were also for enslaving humans and treating them like animals. They took great delight in torturing and humiliating humans. The gorillas loved hunting humans for sport. They shot them, caged them, and treated them like animals. GW Bush's can be compared to an illiterate Doctor Zaius and Donald Rumsfeld can be compared to General Ursus. Gorillas, or republicans, merely react to stimuli. They are not capable of seeing the big picture or the future consequences of their actions. They are only capable of reacting to short term events.

Doctor Zaius used his power to keep the gorillas ignorant. He convinced the Gorillas into believing that humans were a threat and must be stopped. Doctor Zaius and General Ursus wanted nothing to do with enlightenment, research, or a quest for the truth or knowledge. When presented with the truth they used any means to hide it. Compare them with the Bush regime which is the most secretive one in our country's history. And Bush and all of his cabinet have used lie after lie designed to instill fear into the masses so that they would be stirred into clamoring for war.

When Zera and Cornelius found a discovery of prior human life in a cave by the ocean, well beyond the 'Forbidden Zone', they found that humans were once a very intelligent life on earth. But Doctor Zaius and the apes did everything they could to destroy the evidence.

Of course, all of the above is from the original movie, "Planet of the Apes". I find the comparisons between gorillas in the movie and republicans of today stunningly, and terrifyingly similar. There are so many parallels between the gorillas and the republicans that it is startling. Like the gorillas, republicans always embrace war to resolve any conflicts. Both the gorillas and republicans are aggressive. And like gorillas, republicans are easily manipulated by fear and words of war.

The gorillas in "Planet of the Apes" also didn't believe in evolution, just as Christian republicans do not believe in evolution. And both groups did everything in their power to try to discredit evolution.

And both labeled those who they wanted to oppress with words designed to make them seem less than human. This is a common tool used by our world's totalitarian leaders. It is easy to manipulate the masses into killing others if you first find a way to dehumanize them. Adolph Hitler did it, Pol Pot did it, Benito Mussolini did it, Joseph Stalin did it, Andrew Jackson did it, Saddam Hussein did it, and George W. Bush has done it. One common thread that runs through all of these despots is a self-binding arrogance, fanaticism, and prejudice. One way to judge Bush's effectiveness in this regard is it observe how many republicans chant traditional republican phrases "Nuke them back to the stone age" or "Turn their desert into glass!". Republicans apparently lack any empathy at all for the tens of millions of innocent people and the carnage those people would face with attacks from our modern military.

BTW: Unlike Bush's Iraq war, no human was harmed during the production of the movie, "Planet of the Apes". If you need additional proof that the republicans are led by a person with simian tendencies check out the following website:  http://www.bushorchimp.com/. You will see that Bush's appearance is strikingly similar to that of a monkey. If you have problems determining which is which just remember, the intelligent-looking one is the monkey.

Lastly, while our troops are dying in daily battles in Iraq I am sure that their simian leader Bush has bananas in both hands as he hops up and down in an ape-like frenzy blurting out mindless, junglish jingles like "Bring em on!".