What The Hell Is Going On Around Here?

I look out the window, and I see a nice, quiet city street with steady foot traffic and the occasional kid on a bicycle. You know. Common tranquil sights. Sure, there's the underlying threat that any car could be loaded to the gills with modern Vikings bent on pillaging and ransacking the area, but with so many cars and so few Norsemen chasing around, the odds are quite against it.

Apparently, the rest of the country isn't quite so lucky.

I stay up on it with internet news and whatever printed rag my neighbors let lie in the hallway or lawns overnight. This afternoon's cull through the headlines was focused on the Fox News website. Are they conservative-biased? Perhaps out of a need to counter all the Liberal-biased news sources? Funded, perhaps, by secret Right Wing money? I don't know. I don't care. Their version of reality can't be any farther off than anyone else's, and when you're throwing darts at the target, the eight-point ring is worth eight points all the way around.

What I do care about is what's going on over at the next street down, or across town, or in neighboring states, what's weighing on the minds of legislators and pressing on precedent. The Supreme Court just dealt perhaps the most confusing blow ever to the fight for - or, against - pro-marijuana legislation. Folks can legally acquire and use weed for "medicinal purposes" if they jump through certain hoops in ten states, but the Supreme Court ruling said that even these folks - who count among their number vast armies of cancer patients, the elderly, and mortally sick or wounded folks from all walks of life - can be arrested and prosecuted under federal anti-drug laws. So, they have protection from the State, but not the Feds.

Huh?

How about a little consistency in policy...what would happen if Pennsylvania said I could drive 65 on the Turnpike, but the Federal Government said I could only do 55? Might I go whizzing past a Podunkaville city cop as we waive good naturedly to one another, only to get nailed by a secret task force from the Drug Enforcement Agency's Traffic Policy Center? Sound absurd? Of course. Because it is.

What about money for college...with a new school year coming up around the corner there are thousands of horny liquor-thirsty incoming freshmen bursting at the seams to run rampant across campuses around the country. Well here's a novel way to pay for it: get a scholarship from death row inmates. Yes, by entering your essay into a contest sponsored by "Compassion," a magazine written and edited by death row inmates. Subscription money goes towards covering printing costs and funding the scholarships, as it can't go to benefit the prisoners themselves. This seems like a great use for the generated proceeds, if in fact that's where it's all going. But still, getting a scholarship from death row inmates? There's not a little about that which strikes me as quite, quite odd indeed.

Speaking of folks in jail, another headline that grabbed my attention was the plight of Rancocas Foreman of Little Rock, Arkansas; or, rather, the three year old boy who died in the day-care van he was driving when Foreman allegedly forgot the kid was in there, parked the van in the summer heat for a few hours, then returned to find the kid dead of apparent heat-related injuries.

How the hell can you forget there's a 3 year old in the van with you? Anyone who's spent time in the physical company of a three year old knows the commotion that even the most sedate of the little buggers brings. Some call it cute; some call it unconscionable. No normal human being would be able to ignore such a kid in any event.

And he forgot the kid was in there? Hardly.

Call it tragedy, call it murder, call it oversight. I'm calling it a bad day for a lot of folks and cause to seriously reconsider the condition of the village in which such things happen. As former Arkansan Hillary Rodham Clinton said, "it takes a village (to raise our kids)."

Ever hear of a "rainbow party"? You can read all about it in the book "Rainbow Party," by Paul Ruditis, but I'll save you the hassle: folks get together and have group oral sex. The rainbow part? Each girl wears a different color of lipstick, so the guys' dicks end up looking like something that belongs in a leprechaun's trousers. That sounds like a great idea, eh? Here's the kicker though:

In this novel, the "folks" attending are fourteen year olds.

Some schools have banned the book; some chain book stores refuse to carry it on their shelves (but do on their websites). Simon & Schuster, the publisher, insist that there's a redeeming cautionary tale value to the work. Ya wanna read about fourteen year olds gettin' jiggy with it? I sure as hell don't. Yet this is not only published, but also front page news. Supposedly it really happens. Not on my street...but somewhere out there, in places I don't want to go.

Here's a handy dandy story I found through another news source: a website where I can plot the effects of a nuclear explosion delivered by car or airplane relative to its yield in kilo- and even mega-tons. I can plot an explosion as it would rock Los Angeles, Chicago, New Orleans, or hey, even Washington, DC. Place your pointer on your choice of Ground Zero, calculate the megatons you think you...um, I mean, the hypothetical yield of a hypothetical bomb delivered, hypothetically, by your choice of light aircraft or automobile, to see what would, of course "hypothetically," be the result.

This is a great resource for terrorists...I mean, high school kids doing research reports.
No, actually, I do mean terrorists. As they say, freedom isn't free; well, neither is freedom of information, press, or free will, and apparently the cost has something to do with dropping relevant intelligence right into the palms of hands that wish to strangle us.

What's that about loose lips and sinking ships? Oh, I forget, a mind-numbing sitcom is calling me again.

So I suppose all is well on my street. I've got a fridge full of beer, and so long as those Vikings just keep on driving at least it won't be my village that gets pillaged.