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March 23, 2001: Antichrist & Time Traveler Lines
Published 1 year, 5 months ago
Description
Art Bell dedicates the evening to open lines with two restricted phone lines: one for callers claiming to be the Antichrist and another for time travelers. He reasons that if time travel is ever invented, travelers from the future would logically exist in the present. Multiple self-proclaimed Antichrists phone in with wildly different personas, from a San Diego man who speaks of a coming spiritual awakening to a caller with a sinister voice who identifies as a son of Lucifer.
The time traveler calls prove equally memorable. One caller claims to be reaching the show from 2008 via the internet, predicting Bush will win a second term and that mad cow fears will reduce beef consumption by 30 to 40 percent. He fades out mid-sentence in a way Art finds genuinely unsettling. Another caller from 2008 warns of nationwide rolling blackouts and claims 90 percent of the population carries a variant of mad cow disease.
Between calls, Art covers headlines including another school shooting near San Diego, a massive crack forming in Antarctic ice, stock market declines, and growing fears about mad cow and foot-and-mouth disease. The atmosphere of mounting real-world crises gives the stranger calls an eerie resonance.
The time traveler calls prove equally memorable. One caller claims to be reaching the show from 2008 via the internet, predicting Bush will win a second term and that mad cow fears will reduce beef consumption by 30 to 40 percent. He fades out mid-sentence in a way Art finds genuinely unsettling. Another caller from 2008 warns of nationwide rolling blackouts and claims 90 percent of the population carries a variant of mad cow disease.
Between calls, Art covers headlines including another school shooting near San Diego, a massive crack forming in Antarctic ice, stock market declines, and growing fears about mad cow and foot-and-mouth disease. The atmosphere of mounting real-world crises gives the stranger calls an eerie resonance.