Rant: The Oral History of Buster Casey

Shot Dunyun: I don't give a shit what the song says, sometimes a kiss is not just a kiss. That's for sure. My theory is that, every time a bat or skunk bit Rant, he'd by accident let the rabies go a little farther before he'd get treated. If he was trying or not, Rant hatched some bug that medical science couldn't touch.

Phoebe Truffeau, Ph.D. (Epidemiologist): The only two untreatable rabies-type viruses were the African strains Mokola and Duvenhage, prior to the identification of the Rant serotype.

Galton Nye: The Bible says, "…thus if poisoned be the child not of service beneath the parent." You just keep that in mind.

Neddy Nelson: Have you read that Kissinger report he's supposed to have submitted to the National Security Council in 1974? The one where Henry Kissinger warns that the greatest threat to the future of Americans is overpopulation in Third World countries? How's it go? We need the minerals and natural resources of Africa? Pretty quick now, those banana republics will fall apart as their populations rise too high? The only way America can protect its prosperity and political stability will be to depopulate the Third World?

Should we be surprised that the AIDS virus showed up about 1975?

Do you understand what the term «depopulate» means?

Jayne Merris: Under the I-SEE-U Act, the antiexclusion laws guaranteed equal access to all public places for people of day or night status; but if you ask me, people got so paranoid about sweat on gym equipment, things like that, spit on apples, that the nicer places—bars, restaurants, salons—they just closed up at night.

The two cultures shared the same city, but they kept drifting farther and farther apart.

Neddy Nelson: How do you explain this—the first explosion of AIDS infections in Africa started in missionary hospitals where Christian volunteers reused the same needles to vaccinate local kids against smallpox and diphtheria? Does that sound familiar? Could be millions of kids. Doesn't this explain how, between 1976 and 1980, the infection curve rose from 0.7 percent to 40 percent in some parts of West Africa?

Does that scenario make you want to rush out to any public clinic and stand in line for a free vaccination of anything?

Phoebe Truffeau, Ph.D.: Any vaccination carries a small risk of post-treatment encephalitis, so it was inevitable that a few individuals immunized with a pre-exposure prophylactic did develop mild rabies symptoms and required additional treatment. The sheer numbers of people vaccinated made patient tracking impossible, and, yes, at least two persons died as a likely result of their immunization.

Shot Dunyun: Another morning, I'd wake up and the pillow next to mine was soaked in spit, my dog's drooled that much in her sleep. Pugs slobber a shitload, so I didn't give it another thought. Talk about denial.

Phoebe Truffeau, Ph.D.: Rumors within the target community exaggerated and misinterpreted the vaccination-related deaths, and this dampened their enthusiasm to fully participate in further treatment programs, virtually guaranteeing a constant, significant reservoir of the virus within the nighttime population.

Shot Dunyun: Rant Casey used to say, "No matter what happens, it's always now…" Talk about cryptic.

I think what Rant meant was, we live in the present moment of reality, and no matter what's come before, no matter how much we loved a person or a dog, when it attacks us we'll react to that moment of danger.

Neddy Nelson: Doesn't it seem weird that a government report recommends depopulating Africa, and by the end of the twentieth century entire generations were dying? Isn't it suspicious how former European colonies with rich natural resources, stuff like gold and diamonds, countries like Botswana, Zimbabwe, and South Africa, were most hard hit by the AIDS epidemic?

Shot Dunyun: A great dog like I had, and I let her drink my spit. Sometimes I'm light-years beyond stupid. That's for sure.