Let me begin by distracting you with some self-cutting photos. If these don't trigger you to start ritualistically hacking away at yourself, the writing that follows it will. Don't worry, he's doing fine by the way — although I worry because his cuts get deeper every time I hear from him.
"How much evil must we do in order to do good? We have certain ideals, certain responsibilities. Recognize that at times you will have to engage in evil, but minimize it."
- Robert S. McNamara
"There is a greater than 50 percent probability of a nuclear strike on U.S. targets within a decade."
This morning I read “Apocalypse Soon” by Robert McNamara, the US Secretary of Defense during the sixties and the president of the World Bank until 1981 and one of the primary architects of US nuclear policy. The article is on the lunacy and danger of the US's continued expansion of its nuclear arsenal and the hair-trigger-apocalypse risk it keeps us all within reach of.
As much as it seems like regional conflicts (a la Iraq) are all the future holds, the strong possibility of environmental crisis coupled with severe resource shortages (water and oil) bring forward the likelihood of conflict with other sleeping giants. China's current Dong Feng-31 “limited range” ICBM can fly about five thousand miles, allowing its nuclear warheads to incinerate continental US cities on the West Coast… as I said, sleeping giant — according to the Federation of American Scientists, China's nuclear stockpile may at this point be larger than Russia's. Within five years, the DF-41 (roughly equivalent to the US Minuteman III) is expected to be operational, capable of launching within three minutes of orders being issued and delivering as many as six separate warheads to cities across the United States.
China is far from the only threat.
North Korea, the crazy
nuclear wild card of the axis of evil, has its
Taep'o-Dong 2 ICBM (with the amusingly named
No-Dong-3 version) which depening on
variant can deliver a nuclear payload to Hawaii and Alaska, and maybe even California. More threatening though is North Korea's willingness to sell their missiles to anyone willing to pay (Pakistan, a Muslim
nuclear military dictatorship is an obvious customer, desperate to thwart threats from
apocalypse-happy India). North Korea has also worked with Iran, who the US is on the brink of war with, to develop the
Shahab-6, a nuclear ICBM with almost 4,000 miles of range — not quite enough to strike the continental US, but certainly enough to strike European targets.
Beleaguered Russia continues to push both its terrifying array of ICBMs capable of striking within hours, anywhere in the world, as well as their Mach 10+ intercontinental cruise missiles (evolutions of the old Burya system) which Vladimir Putin promises are more than capable of “punching through” any missile defense system the US is capable of building.
I see skies of blue, clouds of white…
Bright blessed days, dark sacred nights…
Thank God America, probably the only nation in the world capable of stopping this madness, has embraced the culture of life. But seriously, WTF is it with this insane meet the new boss, same as the old boss Christian-Taliban xenophobic America? It doesn't even seem real, but in America people are literally losing their jobs and being threatened with legal action for co-habitation outside of marriage.
I'm not talking about dudes exploring sodomy.
I'm talking about getting an apartment with your girlfriend.
This isn't some “unenforced archaic law” — not only are criminal charges being laid, but the Supreme Court was unwilling to entirely strike down the law, and in January 2005 the ND State House upheld the law by an almost 2:1 margin. Is stoning far off?
Then there's the insane bans on everything from gay marriage, gay adoption, and now even gay sperm donation. Gay sperm donation? If being gay is a “choice” rather than something hardwired, then why would sperm donation be a problem? The whole thing is a smokescreen — it's not as if the Republican party isn't full of gay pedophiles, dudes that like to screw donkeys (it's as American as it is Swedish), and evangelical meth-pushing whoremongers.
Don't pay any attention to the fact that over 1,600 Americans have been killed in Iraq (to say nothing of the tens of thousands being sent home sans legs or with brain damage). Don't pay any attention that some of those deaths are due to faulty body armor — you mean “multiple complete penetrations of 9mm rounds” isn't a selling factor? Tell that to the people in sales. Don't pay any attention to the fact that friends of the President have made billions selling faulty “war on terror” gear to the taxpayers. And whatever you do, don't let the 2002 memo about essentially fabricating evidence to justify an invasion of Iraq get on TV.
Ah, profit…
Don't worry Bush, if you don't become Emperor, the future Prez has got your back. It's a tradition.
And it's all hidden under a bizarre pseudo-Christian cult-of-personality wrapped around various loyalty oaths and symbolic gestures of servitude.
Don't support the Fuhrer?
get kicked out of church.
Forget nails in your pocket after a Cub Scouts meet? Get arrested.
Don't complete your non-graded citizenship and sports class? Don't graduate.
Build a snow fort at your school? Spend some time in jail.
Spray-paint graffiti on someone's gas-guzzler? Spent eight years in prison.
Ah, America… The land of vigilantes, government surveillance, and anti-science freakshows starring crazy, crazy Muslims claiming evolution is a Zionish conspiracy. Every day I become increasingly convinced that all of this is a drunken hallucination.
Why oh why couldn't I just imagine pink elephants?
Maybe my feelings are all a product of aging — what we're facing now is probably no Cuban Missile Crisis — but the future really did seem so much more bright when I was a kid. I suppose every generation has its fearmongers, but sometimes I just want to get in a tiny plane and fly away. Or maybe a futuristic car at least. The two things below make me smile…
I also like
tax-free strippers, but that's an entirely different sort of “like”.
Norway rocks. Meh, I could
go on on about this stuff forever. I'm done, stick a fork in me.
I'm fucking moving to the
Philippines.
After I sober up that is.
