Tylor Brand

I really wish I was in the military right now. I mean, with this war on terror that's just starting to heat up, I'd have a pretty good shot at a permanent vacation ÷ albeit to pretty lousy spots like, say, Iraq, North Korea, and maybe France, if they get too uppity.

Which is really not out of the question, since as far as we know, terror is a pretty damn open-ended thing!

According to the U. S., prosecutors in the inquiry of an American man who had links to al-Qaida, a judge whose job it was to decide whether the man could be held indefinitely, (i.e. eternally) couldn't be told what the definition of terrorist was because it was classified! Sweet Jesus! What other words are they going to classify to allow the government to act even more arbitrarily? War? Nation? Pretzel?

Let's see what Webster had to say about this one: "terrorism: n. the use of terror and intimidation to gain one's political objectives." Interesting. Well, less interesting to you, as you probably haven't had extended "hold your breath" contests as recently as yesterday.

Now, let's look to our much less esteemed, yet infinitely higher-powered Congressional definition! According to the half-hashed Patriot Act passed last year, it includes: trying to coerce a civilian population

by terror, using intimidation to influence government policy and affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, kidnapping and general naughtiness.

"But this was passed last year! You need to check the dates on the newspapers you read and/or use to protect your pasty frail skin from the elements."

On the contrary. With George II's recent success in drawing the line to be crossed behind Saddam, this is quite relevant to the political atmosphere at home. If you've been spending a large portion of your time taking intravenous drugs or frequenting pro-Israel rallies, you may not be aware that there is a strong opposition to the whole notion of "kicking Iraqi ass again" that has been so popular in Washington these days. However, based on the definition that they themselves have offered, it appears that our own nation has been engaging in domestic terrorism!

Since Sept. 11, George II has taken up the heavy task of gossiping like a seventh grade girl about the habits and natures of various regimes around the world that he sees as a danger to American business, er · the American way of life. Iraq, Iran, North Korea and France are just the beginning.

From listening to his speeches, the only thing the world in general would enjoy more than burning the American flag would be urinating on it to douse the flames.

As a result of the constant drum beating, terror warning system that hasn't dropped below three ever and when it is raised, it is done along with a general terror advisory, as though that would help anything ("Hey, look! A general act of terror is taking place!"), and constant demonizing of various peoples who don't agree with us or we want to whack, the public has been stirred into a haze of fear-induced trust.

Isn't it ironic that it's after we are attacked that we have a stronger confidence in how the government protects us?

From this vicious attack on American sensibilities, the public has been fearfully duped into thinking that national security crisis are more imminent threats than people not holding jobs, and thus, the "foreign policy" party has been elected in totality (when it was largely their fault our foreign policy has royally pissed off the world to start with).

Well, actually, it is more important now, but only because we've just appropriated $200-plus billion for the war on Iraq that we've been "avoiding at all costs" by stumping for it for the last half year.

To compound things, they've been classifying and hiding all information possible in order to claim that we need them to protect us because "the president knows more than we do, so we should trust him," while neglecting to think that "the president knows more than we do because he keeps all information buried somewhere on the White House lawn, so we have to trust blindly."

So what's the next logical step in the war on terror that would actually protect the nation? Washington D.C.