Opinion: Political encounters of the third kind

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What with all the presidential -- both past and some hoping for the future -- talk of UFOs, and the resulting jokes about illegal aliens, you just knew there would be a related PR push to try to ride the unexpected wave of publicity.

Next Monday, former Arizona Gov. Fyfe Symington moderates an international line-up of pilots, scientists and former governmental aviation officials at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., to talk about -- yep, UFOs. It’s tied to a documentary called ‘Out of the Blue,’ which seems to have its own mini-kingdom on YouTube. This is Part One:

Don’t bother stopping by the press club -- for some reason the event is open only to ‘credentialed media and Congressional staff,’ a sure way to limit turnout. One has to hope Steven Colbert will do his journalistic duty and cover it, though his trips to Washington can become a little unruly.

So why is Symington moderating this event? Turns out he’s part of the club and witnessed what has become known as the Phoenix Lights ten years ago. Though Symington wasn’t exactly forthcoming at the time.

This isn’t the first campaign to touch on the subject of UFOs. In 1998, Frances Emma Barwood ran for secretary of state of Arizona in part on a vow to open up state records and get an explanation of what so many thousands of people professed they saw in the desert sky. That didn’t turn out so well for Barwood -- she got beaten by a 3-1 margin in the Republican primary.

And we have to wonder whether Jay Heiler, the ‘alien aide’ in this Associated Press photo by Scott Troyanos, still has the costume from this press conference after Symington promised to order the Arizona Department of Public Safety to investigate?

What? You say that’s not a costume?

-- Scott Martelle