"But I am a blasted tree; the bolt has entered my soul; and I felt then that I should survive to exhibit what I shall soon cease to be--a miserable spectacle of wrecked humanity, pitiable to others and intolerable to myself."
- Mary Shelley, Frankenstein
"If you have given up your heart for the Tower, Roland, you have already lost. A heartless creature is a loveless creature, and a loveless creature is a beast. To be a beast is perhaps bearable, although the man who has become one will surely pay hell's own price in the end, but if you should gain your object? What if you should, heartless, storm the Dark Tower and win it? What could you do except degenerate from beast to monster? To gain one's object as a beast would only be bitterly comic, like giving a magnifying glass to an elephant. But to gain one's object as a monster - To pay hell is one thing. But do you want to own it?"
- Stephen King, The Dark Tower Vol. II, The Drawing of The Three
Monsters. They're not just in books (or those really bad SyFy Movies) any longer.
They are real. They are here. They will be with us always.
Last winter as TSA 'Body Scans' became BIG news, I had a thought born of a news broadcast. It was not a comforting thought. It was not a happy thought. It was a thought about monsters and the men who create them. I believe monsters don't create themselves, they're spawned of hate, science, and / or obsession.
As news folks reported endlessly about the technology being used to see your 'bits' under your clothing, I had my momentary crystallized thought of monstrous clarity. It was the by-product of an off-hand question asked by some frustrated-ex-model-turned-reporter holding the microphone to the TSA agent as she asked the question, "So, what exactly CAN you see with these scanners? Can you see internal organs or hip replacements, or anything similar to that? How strong is this new X-Ray system?"
The TSA agent's response, "No, you cannot see anything within the body, or below the skin - only the surface of the body is visible."
Following the logic then, anything below the skin or within the body is 'hidden'...
Here there be monsters.
I turned off the television, sat back in my seat and crossed my arms. I wasn't necessarily cold, but I had that, "A goose walked over my grave" feeling. Yeah, the goose was loose and that little fella was dancin' ALL over my grave. Unable to shake the feeling, I got up, walked to the back door, let the dogs out, pulled up a chair from the back patio and slouched bonelessly down as I pondered the thought which had just materialized within the twisted confines of my skull.
It turns out that I was not the only one watching this broadcast. Worse yet, someone else had the idea which had sprung into my mind from the interview. The Daily News put my fears into print in December - confirming that I was not the only one watching, listening, and thinking.
Curse you Daily New, curse you...
From the article:
WASHINGTON- Jihadis bent on concocting a "new kind of terrorism" are brainstorming how to surgically implant explosives to make undetectable Frankenbombers.
"What is your opinion about surgeries through which I can implant the bomb ...inside the operative's body?" an apparent mad surgeon recently asked an online forum used by Al Qaeda affiliates.
He called on bombmakers and doctors to cook up the perfect solution to murder "larger numbers of unbelievers and apostates."
"I am waiting for the interaction of the experienced brothers to connect the two sciences together and produce a new kind of terrorism, Allah willing," he wrote, according to a translation by terror experts at the SITE Intelligence Group.
...
"What is your opinion about surgeries through which I can implant the bomb ...inside the operative's body?" an apparent mad surgeon recently asked an online forum used by Al Qaeda affiliates.
He called on bombmakers and doctors to cook up the perfect solution to murder "larger numbers of unbelievers and apostates."
"I am waiting for the interaction of the experienced brothers to connect the two sciences together and produce a new kind of terrorism, Allah willing," he wrote, according to a translation by terror experts at the SITE Intelligence Group.
...
Stitching a bomb into the abdominal cavity made of plastic or liquid explosives - such as semtex or PETN - was judged the best method.
"It must be planted near the surface of the body, because the human body absorbs shocks," advised one terrorist.
The goose is loose.
Okay, so here's the thing - TSA agents all across America are searching for guns, knives, explosives, etc. hidden underneath the clothing of passengers while Al Qaeda heads are looking for ways to put small scary packages INTO the passengers themselves.
This leaves us with two options:
OPTION 1: Strip search all passengers prior to entering the plane, paying special attention to any LARGE recently-sutured areas of the body. Typically a long fuse running out from someone's navel is a good indication that there 'may be' a problem with this passenger. The TSA 'may' want to question them.
OPTION 2: Take all passengers out to the ramp which 'normally' takes them into the cabin of the plane and push them one-at-a-time from the ramp onto the tarmac ten feet below. If they EXPLODE - they were a safety risk. If they slowly stand up again with nothing worse than a compound fracture of the femur, there's nothing much to fear other than perhaps, a really large lawsuit and 'bloody tarmac'.
Hold on, I just realized that there may be an OPTION 3 after all! But this one is politically-incorrect so it has about the same chance of happening as I do of growing two inches taller by morning (this only happened once in my life, but I was MUCH younger).
Shoot, what the heck, let's go for it, shall we?!?!
"Hey Mike, what's OPTION 3?"
OPTION 3: If someone looks like a Muslim-Extremist-Terrorist... Tap them on the shoulder, pull them out of line and talk to them for a while 'away from other travelers' (preferably as you're standing on the OTHER side of the explosion-proof glass).
No, you don't need to tell me that I'm talking CRAZY as I already KNOW that I am. Who would ever think that the 'stereotypical' terrorist would look like a 'stereotypical' terrorist? The TSA had better keep 'patting down' those Nuns, old people, cancer survivors, and children whom we're pulling out of line today, because THEY could be the real threat to our country.
That's the thing about monsters - they could look like anyone: You, me, a six year-old girl with a doll, or the elderly woman with a walker hobbling slowly towards the terminal gate... ANYONE!
Darn those shape-shifting terrorists -- darn them to HECK!!!
If I were a shape-shifting Terrorist, I'd disguise myself to look like a Muslim guy in my late twenties. The TSA will wave me through immediately to avoid being accused of racial (and religious) 'profiling'.
Profiling, I'm told, is insensitive to people who exhibit certain racial and / or religious beliefs. We should NEVER EVER speak to them about whether they want to blow us up or not. That would be MEAN.
America, in spite of all of its warts, is NOT a MEAN place - no matter what Michelle Obama says.If you'd like to read the entire article from the New York Daily News - click anywhere within this really long link.
No geese were injured in the generation of today's post.
The goose? He continues to dance.
"It must be planted near the surface of the body, because the human body absorbs shocks," advised one terrorist.
The goose is loose.
Okay, so here's the thing - TSA agents all across America are searching for guns, knives, explosives, etc. hidden underneath the clothing of passengers while Al Qaeda heads are looking for ways to put small scary packages INTO the passengers themselves.
This leaves us with two options:
OPTION 1: Strip search all passengers prior to entering the plane, paying special attention to any LARGE recently-sutured areas of the body. Typically a long fuse running out from someone's navel is a good indication that there 'may be' a problem with this passenger. The TSA 'may' want to question them.
OPTION 2: Take all passengers out to the ramp which 'normally' takes them into the cabin of the plane and push them one-at-a-time from the ramp onto the tarmac ten feet below. If they EXPLODE - they were a safety risk. If they slowly stand up again with nothing worse than a compound fracture of the femur, there's nothing much to fear other than perhaps, a really large lawsuit and 'bloody tarmac'.
Hold on, I just realized that there may be an OPTION 3 after all! But this one is politically-incorrect so it has about the same chance of happening as I do of growing two inches taller by morning (this only happened once in my life, but I was MUCH younger).
Shoot, what the heck, let's go for it, shall we?!?!
"Hey Mike, what's OPTION 3?"
OPTION 3: If someone looks like a Muslim-Extremist-Terrorist... Tap them on the shoulder, pull them out of line and talk to them for a while 'away from other travelers' (preferably as you're standing on the OTHER side of the explosion-proof glass).
No, you don't need to tell me that I'm talking CRAZY as I already KNOW that I am. Who would ever think that the 'stereotypical' terrorist would look like a 'stereotypical' terrorist? The TSA had better keep 'patting down' those Nuns, old people, cancer survivors, and children whom we're pulling out of line today, because THEY could be the real threat to our country.
That's the thing about monsters - they could look like anyone: You, me, a six year-old girl with a doll, or the elderly woman with a walker hobbling slowly towards the terminal gate... ANYONE!
Darn those shape-shifting terrorists -- darn them to HECK!!!
If I were a shape-shifting Terrorist, I'd disguise myself to look like a Muslim guy in my late twenties. The TSA will wave me through immediately to avoid being accused of racial (and religious) 'profiling'.
Profiling, I'm told, is insensitive to people who exhibit certain racial and / or religious beliefs. We should NEVER EVER speak to them about whether they want to blow us up or not. That would be MEAN.
America, in spite of all of its warts, is NOT a MEAN place - no matter what Michelle Obama says.If you'd like to read the entire article from the New York Daily News - click anywhere within this really long link.
No geese were injured in the generation of today's post.
The goose? He continues to dance.
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