What Rep. Foley appears to have done is pretty awful. One tiny sliver of good news about it for the republicans might be that this is proof that homosexuals, like blacks and other races, women, and even the occasional handicapped folks, do not find the party too scary to join & represent.

There is an interesting parallel between the recent spate of school shootings and the September 11 hijackings.

That is that, in both cases, the hijackees/victims were (a) physically disarmed by virtue of being there (in a school / on board an airplane) as well as (b) trained to cooperate with armed attackers. In both cases, the attackers were bent on murder/suicide, so the usual presumption of rationality on part of the attacker flew right out the window.

It seems to me that a new more violent reality is around us. Being a passive victim can no longer be assumed to be a good idea. Faith in the police as an effective rapid-response force is obviously unjustified. People need to realize that, when a life-threatening attack is underway, one has to be willing to act to defend oneself. One has to be willing to counter-attack or escape by any means necessary. This could extend to the standards of chivalry, where spontaneous heroes would throw themselves in front of a weapon to save others. No more emasculated males marching out of a misogynist maniac’s execution chamber, as happens time after time. We need more Todd Beamers, not just with terrorists, but also with violent criminals.

I wonder if this self-reliant sort of mentality can be revived in a populace trained to co-operate with violent attackers like muggers, rapists, home invaders, carjackers. I hope that it can – and that it doesn’t take too many more lives before it happens. Perhaps one day people will start to value again a heavily armed civilian population, with all the deterrent value such an empowered and self-confident citizenry would entail.

I found out today that a Toronto colleague named Paul S. has left the company. Reading Li’s article about motherhood reminded me of one of Paul’s zen observations to me, years ago.

Kids … they are the best things that ever happen to you. They are also the worst things that ever happen to you.

Having spent around two years in the company of the procreative minority of society, I’ve seen this duality face to face. Due to a fortunate stash of resources and lack of tragedies, the “worst” times have been tolerable, and the “best” simply sublime.

But not the one you think.

Too little, too late?

I’m sorry about three politics-related items in a row, but something jawdropping showed up in the news a few days back.

It appears that during the early 80s, at the height of the Cold War, US senator Ted Kennedy¹ conspired with leaders of Soviet Union toward the defeat Ronald Reagan in his presidential reelection campaign.

Isn’t America great? A member of the government can get away with taking the side of an enemy and yet continue to get re-elected? In a lesser nation, people who do that could be convicted of treason and executed.

¹ This is the same Ted Kennedy (D-MA) about whom Mary Jo Kopechne has no comment.