On Monday night CBS had its cake, ate it and let out a long, odorous, self-satisfied belch. The network got all the ratings-boosting hype of a full-fledged contestant mutiny without any of the unpleasant side effects.

Not only did the Lords of Inertia provide a solid half-hour of -- yes -- drama, but they also provided evidence that the long-awaited seed of paranoia and mistrust has been planted.

Josh spilled the beans, Eddie confessed he trusted no one and the Great Hamster Revolution of 2000 was smothered in its crib -- only you wouldn't know this last bit from watching Monday's show.

Tonight was just the setup for total hamster humiliation.

As anyone who has been watching the live feeds or reading the reportage of Salon's Martha Soukup, the "Big Brother" housemates on Saturday resolved to jump ship during Wednesday's live broadcast.

The decision came about as a result of a lunatic notion of George's; the "chicken man," as he is virtually exclusively known in the house, has been showing signs of strain.

He contends that the point of the show was for the contestants to quit and show the world that some things are more important than money. Having arrived at this conclusion he scoured the game-show rule book. He found no evidence, but George's powers of interpretation amaze and mystify his flock.

Such crackpot revelations have in the past created some interesting events: Judeo-Christanity, Mormonism, the introduction of New Coke and the presidential campaign of H. Ross Perot.

"Big Brother" lets us watch such a movement take form -- and then fall apart. There's a reason the words "hamster revolution" don't have a familiar ring.

Big Brother has been engaging in psychological skirmishes against the hamsters by doing things like shutting off the hot water and strictly enforcing the housemates' dwindling food budget -- innocent pranks designed to make the hamsters cranky and vindictive.

But instead of turning against each other, as we know, our bovine neo-Waltons have only bonded together against the producers. The producers, in what can only be construed as retaliation, have kept their own provocations off the air, making the housemates look like milksops. Until now.

George comes into the darkened bedroom where Eddie is lounging in a righteous rage.

"Tell them to turn the hot water on."

"I don't need to tell them," Eddie points out. "They got cameras all over this place!"

"You're just gonna have to tell 'em, 'Screw it, I ain't moving my ass out of the bed until you turn the hot water on.' Because you wanna know what I figured out, Eddie? This place is a two-way street. You go back to bed, Eddie."

Our lovable tough needs no further encouragement.

"I'm gonna!"

George is taking charge. He calls a 10 a.m. meeting.

"It's right here and we never figured it out," George tells Jamie as she pensively chews her cud. "I figured it out last night and it's so simple." Jamie chews her cereal and thinks, thinks and chews.

Her lip gloss is impeccable.

George's revelation is this: "There is more to this show than the stupid banishment, than the stupid challenge and everything else. The show is meant to tell us, and tell the world, that if we all stay together, we all work together as one, we win!"

Yes, George, and there's a Santa Claus, too! What the "Big Brother" producers really wanted was for the show to be a Marxist-Leninist critique of consumer society wrapped in a cute Frank Capraesque, anti-Orwellian package.

And you're Jimmy Stewart!

The next sequence has George hopping around the kitchen, declaiming in the manner of an amalgamation of characters he's seen in football movies, POW-escape movies and after-school specials, all delivered with a crazed, beatific look on his face.

George confesses that after the first time he got nominated, he had "fun with it." He made up some signs saying "Save the chickens" and "Save George" to flash the cameras with.

"I stepped out on my own," George explains, for those of us who have trouble following him. "But last night when Curtis won the ticket [to the Emmys], it all fell into place. [Not everyone operates at the same speed -- Eds.] What they were trying to do was break us apart. They are trying to pit us all against us."

We are so shocked we promptly fall asleep.

"They need Curtis," he says. "They need him to go on 'Entertainment Tonight.'" (Slow celebrity news day, what with the Emmys and all.)

(Incidentally, there's no footage on tonight's show about Curtis' trip to the Emmys. We saw him interviewed, briefly and soporifically, by Joan Rivers' pregnant daughter on the E! channel's pre-show.)

"But what it comes down to is this: If we all walk out as one, we're all winners. What we got here is six winners at one time."

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