Just making it worse
by Matt Worley

As the McVeigh Bombing Trial shifts from prosecution to defense (and so quickly, too!), I must once again face the stupidity of our current government. I will be broad. I will paint masterful strokes. I will use strange references as often as necessary. One must wonder, as our native son, Tim, faces instant and almost immediate death (after a few appeals and years of sitting on death row) for staging a TV movie without the required permits or permission of everyone else involved (and killing many of the participants in a vain attempt to expose the world to his "art"), if the government is learning the correct lessons. Or if they have the ability to learn at all.

The Oklahoma Bombing, while first thought to be a terrorist act by angry Muslims forced to celebrate Christmas and Easter yearly, was apparently a "statement" against actions taken by government forces (most specifically the FBI and ATF) verses the militant religious fanatics at Waco. McVeigh and his buddies didn't think it was right to annihilate a bunch of wackos who thought their Christian rock star leader was, at the very least, son of God. Those level-headed, barricaded, heavily-armed people of God thought it necessary to protect their religion with large stockpiles of ammunitions and children. The FBI, possibly aware of many other religions in the country that don't find it necessary to arm their parishioners, thought it necessary to disarm the group. Unfortunately, the people's devotion to David Koresch was a bit more fanatic than the FBI or Janet Reno knew.

To put that last paragraph in simpler terms. A bunch of people didn't exactly like what the government was doing, and they took action. Remember Waco! Remember Ruby Ridge! Remember the Unabomber! Remember the Freemen! Remember the Alamo! Remember TWA Flight 800! Remember the mighty Fremen warriors! Remember Rancid at the Wool Warehouse! Remember when I had sex in an alley! When are they gonna play "Ruby Soho?" Encore, baby, encore!

The people in government don't really remember anything except anniversaries of the death of people. Not to knock Memorial Day, but there seems to be a prevalent notion in this country to remember the affect and not the cause. As far as history goes, the best way to keep it from repeating is to understand the why and not the what. It is very obvious that the federal building in Oklahoma City blew up. It is very obvious that there is no UFO trailing the Hale-Bopp comet. It is very obvious that the next season of the "X-Files" is going to be about cloning. We must look into these obvious situations and understand. Or we will suffer the same fate as Alderan.

So to my most specific point we go. Congress was recessed (temporarily) for the Memorial Day weekend. For those wondering why the Congress Memorial Day weekend lasts until June 3rd rather than May 27th like the rest of us (actually, I have to work on Memorial Day), one must ask a more pertinent question: which part of the body do you spite if the nose was already blown off a few years ago?

The congress went on holiday with a nice big steak of legislation sitting on the desk. Remember those floods a month or two ago up in the northern territories (okay, they're states, but did you see Fargo?). Well ever since houses started floating around against the will of their owners and others who only built their fences "so high," the Congress has been talking about getting some money together for the victims. It's been put on the back burner so many times, the back burner doesn't work anymore. The Republicans (who, as they are in majority in Congress, were the ones to throw down the gavel to start vacation) say the people will continue to get money while Congress takes a Florida holiday, which is true to an extent. Relief funds will flow while Washington is barbecuing in the sun, but rebuilding funds will not. Imagine actually living at the YMCA of a different town as you wait for money to rebuild your life. This is not what the Village People were singing about.

The one common factor in all the babbling I've done today is the government's inability to understand the common person. Treating people like people hasn't been a government guideline for quite a while. The rest of us sit around and accept that our congressmen and presidents and aides and sports commentators are regular people who screw up once in a while, but we also trust that their indiscretions will not affect our lives too seriously. It would be nice if the government could extend us the same courtesy.

Matt Worley believes that if everyone in the world could meet everyone else in the world we could all live like the people on Star Trek. Oh yeah, Alderan is the planet that gets blown up in Star Wars. Duh.

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