Month: June 2005

Last night, I was listening to the late-night guy on Air America when he took at call from a lady who began by saying “I still have the ID card the Nazis gave me” when they over-ran Austria. The caller was very concerned that she saw distinct parallels between what happened to her homeland as a child, and what was happening in America today. She did not elaborate in detail, but a good history book can fill in the blanks.

Under skillful questioning by Mr. Malloy, she described having to present her card at every checkpoint she passed in the city. These checkpoints were fortified with machine-gun turrets. Finally, she was asked to describe the cards. She said they had her name, picture, address, thumbprint, the name of her school, and physical description, including distinguishing marks. This sounds to me like it’s a Social Security Number short of the Real ID requirements. If you haven’t written your Congresscritters and State officials, do that now, mmkay?

Of course, your Representatives in the House have been too busy to repeal Real ID. Fixing Social Security? Finding money for unfunded Federal mandates? Getting the Federal Budget ready for fiscal year 2006? Figuring out how to get Iraq stable enough that we can bring our soldiers home? No, nothing like that. They’ve been working on a Constitutional Amendment that would allow Congress to prohibit “Flag Desecration.”

Now then, unless my grasp of symbolism is totally astray, in which case the wine falling off the wagons at the beginning of “A Tale of Two Cities” is nothing more than wine and “A Separate Peace” was actually a good book, the Flag is a symbol. Once we start venerating symbols, we veer into a realm of idolatry. The reasoning is that by “Desecrating” a flag you are harming the country. Countless times I have heard veterans speak of how they fought for their flag. Personally, I’d like to think they fought for their country, represented by the flag, rather than killing other human beings over a bit of fabric.

Now think about this for a minute. Which would you rather a group of protesters did, burn a flag, or burn a courthouse? Those are two different things, right?

Dictators have known for decades that once you regulate what one can say and do regarding a symbol, you can regulate what one can say and do regarding what that symbol represents. The whole thing seems silly, until people start getting punished.

As if this stuff wasn’t scary enough all by itself, the Supreme Court has now ruled that municipalities can now seize any land they chose to allow “economic development.” The case in question concerns a middle-class residential community on the river. Such land is just too valuable to let mere single-family homes stand. Although I imagine this case would never have gotten to the Supreme Court if multi-million dollar homes were involved. This case should scare the pants off residents of mobile homes in metropolitan areas. For that matter, anyone who owns property now stands to lose it at the whim of some city council that receives sufficient bribes — excuse me, I meant to say incentives — from some developer.

Yet when I read this, it sounded strangely familiar. Ah yes, here it is. In Zimbabwe, the government has ordered poor areas of town bulldozed for economic development. Of course the United States has officially proclaimed that “bad.” I guess American companies aren’t making any money off the deal.

By way of disclaimer, I am not an expert on Far East cultures, history, and politics. Nor am I an expert in Korean affairs, despite the fact that in any given week I converse (in English!) with several native Korean speakers. When all is said and done, I plan to run this post past my friend Plunge, who is an expert (and a humanitarian, but that’s another issue).

United States policy on North Korea has been called “incoherent” and “a comic opera” by people who are in a position to know. But that was before it became clear that there were real live nukes involved — not that evidence of possible nuclear based research stuff that was all we could ever prove about Saddam Hussein. To say this is straining regional relationships is an understatement. Knowing that your next door neighbor is in a position to blow stuff up will make anybody nervous.

The United States, mostly in the person of a Mr. Christopher Hill, is trying to add fuel to the fire by saying stuff like there are “‘increasing doubts’ that President Kim Jong Il’s government was ready to give up its nuclear weapons program in return for security guarantees and economic incentives,” and China isn’t putting enough pressure on North Korea but far be it from us to tell China it’s business and my favorite line, North Korea will give up it’s nuclear weapons “one way or another.” Now, where I come from, those are fighting words.

This kind of rhetoric leads some Democratic Senators to question our current policies and flat out say what Hill implies: Are we looking for “regime change”? Because it sure sounds that way. Why don’t you guys figure out what you are going to do before you go threatening sovereign nations, mmkay?

The United States military already has substantial forces committed in Afghanistan and Iraq for the foreseeable future. And Mr. Hill sounds like he wants to start war on a third front. We already have serious problems recruiting for the military, meaning that news sources around the world are reporting that we may need to reinstate the draft. And let’s not forget that unlike Iraq, North Korea actually has nuclear weapons and more mouths than they can feed. Losing a few citizens might not be such a bad deal to North Korea. They also have a “Dear Leader” who has been described as “obsessed” and a “megalomaniac.”

Yeah, let’s go ahead and stick our hand in that hornet’s next. Where would you like that mushroom cloud?

In closing, I bring you common sense on identity theft, coming to our senses about what we can require of foreign passports, and “follow the money” on potential Presidential hopefuls. From the lighter side, an eagle delivers dinner, something for those of you without air conditioning, and brilliant satire on Big Media News.

It seems like the “news” has been dominated by things that are at best of local interest. Now, it is one thing for your local news to cover local stories, it is alright for industry news to be covered in the appropriate forum, it is fine to have a minute dedicated to fluffy items like entertainment news. But as I write, the top stories from the Associated Press and Reuters include things that are just not of national relevance. Top stories should be important, darn-it.

So which item is more important?

Jury deliberates fate of washed-up pop star, or banking information on almost 4 million people lost and potentially available for identity theft?

Under-supervised teenage girl on international trip vanishes after being seen on the dance floor with strange men at 1:30 AM a week ago, or Supreme Court affirms that Federal drug laws supersede state medical marijuana laws?

Some movie star allegedly slugs some guy you don’t know or changes to Federal housing assistance programs may result in thousands more homeless families, some of them in a community near you?

Missing woman turns out not to have been abducted, and has been working under her own name and Social Security Number for years, or large bank buys large credit card issuer — what’s in your wallet?

Some actress wonders why tabloids care about her life at all, (oh, the irony that this is a top news item on CNN), or the mounting trail of evidence that the Bush Administration was trying to get us to war in Iraq despite scant grounds. (Think that stinks? Read this and add your own signature)

Randi put it most succinctly: The News has been cancelled.

Finally, I bring you all that needs to be said about Mark Felt, and not one, but two brokerages downgrade the company that owns Olive Garden and Red Lobster and Smokey Bones and Bahama Breeze restaurants because, among other reasons, “traditional economic drivers of the restaurant industry, such as employment levels, interest rates, wages and consumer sentiment, may be poised to ‘become a drag by the end of 2005’….” Maybe the economy is great in Larry Kudlow’s world, but here in reality-land, we are talking about whether or not Joe and Jane Average will have enough money for dinner at Olive Garden in December.