Posthuman Blues

I've read a couple books by Kal Korff. Though poorly written, his condemnation of the Billy Meier "contacts" at least served a purpose. His subsequent treatise on the Roswell crash is perhaps the worst on the subject, pro or con, that I've encountered; for those looking for a full-bodied skeptical treatment of the Roswell mystery, I recommend the late Karl Pflock's "Roswell: Inconvenient Facts and the Will to Believe."

But it's Korff's website that really steals the show. I'm honestly not sure what to make of it. Paul Kimball, who's been plagued by Korff since questioning his alleged role as an "expert witness" for the O.J. Simpon trial on live radio, has generously speculated that Korff's engaged in a sort of long-winded practical joke.

But it's increasingly apparent that Korff's for real -- or unreal, as the case may be. We seem to be watching an inordinately messy case of online identity crisis, a descent into wishful thinking so pronounced it attains the status of comedy. (I'm reminded of Napolean Dynamite breathlessly defending his claim to have spent his vacation hunting wolverines to smirking classmates.)

The latest additions to Korff's blog take the form of vaguely threatening messages from sexy female Czech journalists (one of whom, aside from bearing a curious resemblance to Lara Croft, proves mysteriously invisible to Google). The alarming thing is that you know it's Korff writing this stuff -- but what's more disconcerting is the possibility that he expects anyone to take it seriously.