Ain't Complicated

Yeah, I know. It’s one of those “black helicopter” reactions, the knee-at-jerk response of a quivering kook.

OK. I agree. 🙂

But the thought flickered briefly in my mind when I read this breaking story:

A passenger who claimed to have a bomb in a carry-on bag was shot and killed by a federal air marshal Wednesday on a jetway to an American Airlines plane that had arrived from Colombia, officials said. No bomb was found in the bag, a U.S. official said.

Homeland Security Department spokesman Brian Doyle said the dead man was a 44-year-old U.S. citizen. It was the first time since the Sept. 11 attacks that an air marshal had shot at anyone, he said.

“Yeah,” this theory goes, “the guy was probing airline security and the presence of federal air marshals. His job was to test their alertness, their procedures, and their willingness to use force (and what kind of force). They weren’t supposed to shoot before…something.”

The theory fizzles with this next paragraph:

According to a witness, the man frantically ran down the aisle of the Boeing 757 while his wife tried to explain that he was mentally ill and had not taken his medication.

Oh. The wife is alleged to have said her husband was bipolar (a mental illness also known as manic-depression).

Well, maybe that lays the probe theory to rest.

Wait! Maybe the woman is in on the plot also.

I don’t believe any of it for a bit. But in case it turns out to be true, I (and perhaps you) read it here first.

All that aside, pray for the widow and any other families that may be involved. Pray for the federal agents involved (and be thankful for them). Pray for others who witnessed the tragedy.

Because even if it was an Al-Qaeda probe, it is still a human tragedy. That should never be overlooked or forgotten.

If you haven’t known about something else to consider worrying about, World Tribune offers this:

Unfortunately, that scenario is not far fetched. It is the conclusion of a report issued in 2004 by a blue ribbon commission created by Congress. The commission found that a single nuclear weapon, delivered by a ballistic missile to an altitude of a few hundred miles over the United States, would be “capable of causing catastrophe for the nation.”

How is that possible? By precipitating a lethal electromagnetic pulse (EMP) attack.

In 2000, concerned about EMP technology, Congress created the “Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse Attack” (the EMP Threat Commission, for short). In its final report, presented in summer 2004, the panel warned that terrorists could indeed execute such an attack by launching a small nuclear armed missile from a freighter off the coast of the United States.

Maybe World Tribune isn’t a credible source.

Maybe the EMP Threat Commission overstated its case.

Maybe EMP ranks alongside Y2K.

Maybe EMP and Y2K co-exist with solar flares as catastrophic cripplers.

Maybe. Maybe not.

God knows. I don’t. I rest in Him.

Can this man survive? I’m harassed with doubts.

Here’s a little of what Reuters is reporting:

“I swear by God I walked by a room and on my left I saw a grinder with blood coming out of it and human hair underneath,” said 38-year-old Ahmed Hassan, who said he had been kept in room 63 at the Hakmiya intelligence headquarters in Baghdad.

Hassan, the first witness to face Saddam in court, said he was 15 when Saddam visited the village in July 1982 and Shi’ite militants tried to assassinate him.

. . .

Hassan risked reprisals by letting his face appear on television as he gave evidence.

Courageous, I would say.

Maybe hostage is the wrong word, but it seems to fit. Whatever the case, it doesn’t look good for them, humanly speaking.

Despite calls and appeals for their safe release from a variety of Muslim individuals and groups, we have this report via Yahoo! News:

Kidnappers threatened to murder four Western peace activists abducted in
Iraq last week . . . .

In a video that appeared on Al-Jazeera television, the kidnappers said that unless all detainees in Iraqi and coalition prisons were released by December 8, they would kill the American, British and Canadian hostages.

A story I read yesterday said even some Palestinian terror groups have called for their safe release.

So, if the kidnappers are ignoring all these folks and making a demand they know won’t be met . . . .

Like I said, it doesn’t look good, humanly speaking.

I wonder what God’s plan is for these people:

Pray for them and their families.

And their captors, too.

Yesterday. In Woodburn, Oregon. With a clear conscience. Aware of the vitriol and/or complaints directed toward the company.

In Woodburn, in my estimation, WalMart drove out KMart. Naughty WalMart. Except, in my estimation, KMart had already driven out PayLess/RiteAid. Oh. Well, then, naughty KMart. Except, in my estimation, PayLess/RiteAid had already driven out Ben Franklin. OK, then — naughty PayLess/RiteAid. But I wonder what business(es) Ben Franklin had already driven out. Probably some mom-and/or-pop operations. Fine — naughty Ben Franklin. Except it’s likely those smaller operations competed against others, driving them away.

Sounds like Darwinian Capitalism — dog eats puppy (ie, survival of the fittest).

Am I saying the fittest is always the most fit to survive? I’m not that silly or deluded.

So, what did I buy at WalMart yesterday? A box of envelopes of a type available nowhere else in town that I’m aware of. And prints of several photos I’d uploaded from home via the Internet.

I suppose I could have gone to Salem (20+ miles one way) to find those envelopes. But it would have cost me way more than the envelopes. Besides, I would have gone on a road and used an automobile which “drove out” horses and wagons and trails from business.

And I likely would have gone to another big business to get the envelopes anyway.

Ditto for the option of ordering online instead of at WalMart.

I could say more, but what’s the use. I don’t have time nor interest.

So I shop at WalMart.

No problem.