Wednesday, February 17, 2010

in the interest of public safety


forget terrorism. the most dangerous thing you can do: climb in your car and drive to the grocery store. especially at night, on a two lane road. (85% percent of highway fatalities.)

i just did it, going downtown to check my mail. a mile of that happens on highway 32, a stream of headlights coming my way. any one of them could take me to my maker. a boeing 747 remains a haven of comfort by comparison.

safety, what is it really? i lived 42 years without health insurance, travelled all over the world. lucky? undoubtedly. but i figured to impoverish my experience for the sake of living forever! hey, that's the chance you take. if you live for the next life, this one's going to be pretty dull.

after the fall of communism, conservatives in disarray didn't know what to do. they'd used the fear of russia to maintain power for many years. fortunately for them, 9/11 came along and saved them. suddenly, a muslim could be planted behind every bush, a bomb in his/her shoe. instead of eastern europe, we inherited the whole islamic world as an enemy. if would be a joke, if it hasn't proved so tragic.

you know, last nite it hit me: afghanistan's a lost cause. the russians destroyed the civilized infrastructure. the taliban guerillas come from every direction. cut off the head of one leader, and a dozen new ones spring up. the warlords go with the winner. the heroin farmers undermine the rest of the world. (why don't the americans simply pay them not to grow poppies? they pay people in their own country not to grow crops in order to keep the prices up.) all this said, i personally don't want the taliban back in power. they've nothing to offer women but their chains.

finding safety has its limits. common-sense goes a long way. and so many eras in history desolate as eastern new jersey. even if our bodies were plastic, they wouldn't last forever. poor robots, running down. power supply! power supply! it's the voice of a child crying wolf.