STRANGE THINGS ARE HAPPENING...

A couple of weeks ago, I decided to try driving more or less at the official speed limit, in an effort to save gas. In the first place, it seems to have worked--I got 40 miles more out of my last tank of gas than I had been accustomed to. But in the second place, other people seem to have slowed down too. Last time I paid serious attention to traffic speeds (back last Fall, I think), Chicago-area traffic generally moved at about 15 mph faster than the official speed on any given road, and even people doing 5 mph faster were likely to get dirty looks and tailgating. (A few years ago, my husband, when trying to keep to the official limit, actually got forced off the road by a truck.) Now most people seem to be doing 5 mph over the limit, and I have gotten no unpleasant reactions from my fellow drivers. Are people taking gas prices seriously?

ODD LOTS #13

(Jon, are you still out there?)

Rachel Barton Pines (violinist)
Heather Mills McCartney (soon-to-be ex-Beatle-by-marriage)
Sarah Bernhardt (actress)

JonBenet Ramsey and the Coming of Martial Law

The FBI has tracked down the man who killed JonBenet Ramsey. Nightline spent its entire program last night on the case. If Ted Koppel were dead, he'd be spinning in his grave. I would be less nervous if the killer had been caught by the local Colorado cops. But the FBI is under federal executive branch control. What they find, and more important, when they find it, can also be controlled by the executive branch. "How convenient," as my mother would say.

A US Army officer has been charged with murder in Iraq. I can't even find that story online.

The ceasefire across the Israeli-Lebanese border seems to be holding, but nobody has yet taken responsibility for restraining Hezbollah. They aren't a country, they aren't under the official control of any country, so the UN and all of the other national and international authorities are just sitting back and hoping they will be good boys.

But none of this is as important as the FBI conveniently turning up the killer of JonBenet Ramsey? Gimme a break! I know that Edgar Allen Poe says nothing moves the emotions so deeply as the death of a beautiful young girl, and JonBenet was only a few years younger than the lost love of Poe's own life. At the time of her death, I found the pictures of her beauty-queen career far more repellent than the picture of her dead body, and was far more saddened by the premature sexualization of her life than the violence of her death. I believe that, intentionally or not, her parents and the child-beauty-queen industry made her a target, and that the pervasive sexualization of childhood is making targets out of most young girls today, exposing them to similar violence.

But I still think that when the FBI chose to announce that the killer had been caught is just awfully convenient for an administration that really wants the American people to be watching something other than the violence in the Middle East and the corruption in Washington.

And the fact that the administration was able to pull it off is even scarier. They have been doggedly working at limiting what the people are allowd to see and hear--retroactively classifying thousands of documents, chasing down leakers of information that needed to be leaked, telling the American people that it is none of our business what our government does on our money, in our name, and presumably for our benefit. But the Ramsey ploy takes disinformation to a new level. The administration is not only trying to empty the news of important content, but deliberately replacing it with a purely local, back-page story, replacing Nightline with Entertainment Tonight.

If they are allowed to get away with it, I don't know what the next step will be, but it's entirely possible that the step after that could be a declaration of martial law and cancellation of the 2008 elections. After all, we are at war, aren't we? And this particular war is likely to go on for at least the next ten or twenty years, right? And we can't change horses in midstream, right? Watch this space. You heard it here first.

NEW WRINKLES IN AIRLINE SECURITY

Air travel is returning to its roots. "Back in the day," the word "travel" was closely linked to "travail," which at the time meant "torture." Because of the latest plot to blow up planes, airlines are now forbidding passengers to board with any liquids except medicines and baby formula. The list of stuff British passengers can't carry on board also includes purses and handbags, and food purchased in the airport. Given the current quantity and quality of airline food, this is serious deprivation.

Don't get me wrong, I believe in making flight as safe as possible. I just don't think the airlines have gone far enough. First of all, airports and airplanes are all climate-controlled these days. So why not require passengers and airline and airport employees to disrobe immediately on entering the airport? Never mind strip searching--just plain strip. Actually, I think that may just be a pilot program (you should pardon the expression) for a more general movement toward nudity for purposes of crime control. Think about it--right away you've gotten rid of indecent exposure and peeping-tom offenses, not to mention concealed weapons and a lot of other possessory crimes. For airline passengers, the plane would have to provide blankets, of course.

The British restrictions also include electronics such as radios, CD players, Ipods, telephones, and computers, and make it really hard to carry books and magazines. So once you board, you not only have nothing to eat or drink, you have nothing to do. But that's okay, because the next move on the part of the airlines should be to sedate all passengers and just stack them like cordwood. No more worrying about reclining seats or putting tray tables in an upright position, or that awful center seat, or getting up to use the washroom--you board, you get your shot, you nod off, and the next thing you know, you're landing. This is the natural limit to the trend toward making air travel more and more uncomfortable. The unconscious feel no discomfort and make no demands. They also don't hijack or blow up planes. You heard it here first.