There is a wonderful, chilling scene in the movie "Dead Zone," where precognitive schoolteacher Johnny Smith touches a Presidential candidate and has a vision of a grim future nuclear holocaust. "The missiles are flying. Alleluia," says the gleefully insane Martin Sheen.

Despite my obvious elation at the party-line 4-3 vote taken by the School Committee tonight to engage attorney Steven M. Robinson and pursue a "Caruolo" action in Superior Court, I couldn't shake the feeling that the PCC has been waiting for just this moment, whipping its adherents into a fine frenzy, and that there are missiles aplenty just over the horizon.

They certainly had the PCC camp out in force at the meeting, well rehearsed in all their arguments:
-"If this was a business/I've run businesses for 40 years and let me tell you..."
-"This town is already divided too much."
-"Town Charter blah blah blah." [paraphrased]
-"How did you get us into this position without accountability?"
-"You need an audit of the entire process and the value to the community"
-"You threaten to sue the town because you lack the courage to comply with the voter-approved budget."

PCC leader Larry Fitzmorris summed it up nicely: "The decision to sue the people of Portsmouth is an attempt to subvert the decision of the people at the Town Meeting. The Charter reserved [the right to change the budget] to the meeting in August. Your vote is a statement that you don't accept that authority and that you are replacing the electors of Portsmouth."

Against all that rhetoric, let me cite the strongest evidence for the other side, advanced inadvertently by Jamie Heaney. In explaining his vote against going Caruolo, he said, "I ran on a platform of opposing Caruolo, and that's the way I'll vote."

What was probably not immediately obvious to Heaney is that the converse is also true -- the 4-3 majority of the School Committee is patently the will of Portsmouth, res ipso loquitur support for Caruolo, as Rob Schulte pointedly noted: "Or Carpender wouldn't be here."

And, lest we focus too much on just the laws the PCC happens to like, Mark Katzman reminded everyone, seeking a "Caruolo action is following the law just as much as the Tent Meeting."

The PCC can't have it both ways: you can't claim that the people spoke on August 19th, but not on November 7th. And you can't claim to defend the Town Charter and just ignore Rhode Island General Law.

Oh, but they will. They've threatened to sue the town, and now their bluff has been called. The missiles are flying. Alea iacta est.