posted on January 15, 2004 11:46:02 PM new
The other night I watched a forty-year-old movie, "Fail-Safe". (Brief synopsis for those who've never seen it: At 5:30 a.m. one day our Vindicator bomber squadrons are scrambled to their "fail-safe" positions after a UFO is detected by our early-warning radar systems. The UFO is ultimately identified as a commercial airliner that has flown off course due to the failure of two of its engines. Our Vindicator bombers are recalled -- all except Group Six, which cannot be reached by radio transmission due to a jamming device the Russians have developed. The story gets REALLY GOOD at this point, so rent the video if you haven't seen it!)
I grew up with the threat of nuclear war... diving under my school desk like an idiot and truly believing that at any minute Life As I Knew It could end. When the Soviet Union crumbled in the 80's, I didn't cheer; I felt as though I'd been the butt of some grand joke -- the ultimate in mind control and behavior modification. All those decades of worrying... for what? The Russians didn't even have half the stuff we thought they did, and what they DID have was so decrepit that it never would've flown past Finland.
So here we are, with yet another Force of Evil to reckon with called Terrorism. At any moment my town might be wiped out by some madman poisoning the water supply with motor oil or setting the hills afire. No need to learn to fly a 757, just hop the gates at the PG&E sub-station and topple a few high-voltage towers with a battery-powered sawz-all. Or, don't even go to all that trouble; simply telephone a radio station and SAY that you're going to destroy something. What I'm driving at is that we've recreated the same climate of fear that I grew up in, and that we're in no more danger now than we were then. Think about it: if these terrorists had any organization at all, they'd be able to wreak havoc all over this country all the time, by doing the very sorts of things I mentioned above, in every town, every day. So, why don't they? Where are they? Where are these people who've made boarding a plane in this country so inconvenient? Where are these people who've made my librarian log the titles of books I check out? Where are these people I'm supposed to guard against and watch for?
They're where they've always been: behind closed doors in Washington, D.C.
posted on January 16, 2004 11:59:44 AM new
I've seen that movie, it was ok...I liked
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb. Peter Sellers was the President in that one
Where are these people who've made my librarian log the titles of books I check out?
Some people will say there is a 'shadow government', but I doubt that is true.
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"Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known."- Carl Sagan
posted on January 16, 2004 02:08:27 PM new
hahaha, Krafty, I doubt anyone gives a flying frog about how I've been! Which is why I like this place (when I like anyplace at all, that is) -- none of the die-hards still posting here go in for "personal chat" !
Certainly, calling Twelvepole a drunk doesn't qualify as personal!
