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May 29, 2002
Vol. 5 No. 22

In this issue:
1. Terror on the Brain
2. Park Place
3. Garish Border
4. Quick Hits
5. Scanning for Health? - and other highlights from Reason Online
6. Defending SUVs - Reason's print edition
7. News and Events

Reason Express is made possible by a grant from The DBT Group, manufacturers of affordable, high-performance mainframe systems and productivity software.

1. Terror on the Brain

Please excuse Mr. and Mrs. America if the recent warnings about terrorism -- which, curiously, have not been accompanied by an official change in the threat level, from Defcon Chartreuse to Lemon Yellow on Tom Ridge's bewildering scale -- have them tuning it all out faster than John Ashcroft snaps off The Osbournes.

The blizzard of possible threats now includes: suicide bombers (both apartment and shopping mall varieties); scuba terrorists (seaports are now deemed generally vulnerable, particularly to naked Chinese); subway and/or railway attacks (great potential in the nation's capital, where emergency workers still cannot use their radios within the system); small plane attacks (presumably excluding the now trite crop duster gambit and assuredly not triggered by Accutane); and nonspecific but inevitable deployment of "weapons of mass destruction" (subsuming both the "dirty bomb" and the elusive "suitcase nuke"). All national landmarks are targets, up to and including the Waffle House in Dothan, Alabama (sites destroyed in any Godzilla feature are doubly doomed), and nuclear power plants could go up like bottle rockets at any minute.

Meanwhile, to the list of folks who knew something was amiss pre-9/11 and tried to get somebody's attention -- previously populated by FBI agents in Minneapolis and Phoenix -- add actor James Woods. Woods, being a highly trained sentient being, noticed odd behavior by a group of men on a flight he was taking. He deduced it to be a casing operation and sought to report it to the authorities. A Federal Aviation Administration report was generated, but nothing came of it. Woods thinks two of the men he saw crashed into the World Trade Center.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0528/p01s01-uspo.html

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?020603fa_FACT

2. Park Place

Predictably, federal law enforcement efforts against so-called cannabis clubs in California are beginning to drive medically needy pot smokers back into the streets.

State law allows medical uses of marijuana, and several smokers clubs have served HIV patients in and around San Francisco. But with the Drug Enforcement Administration cracking down on club operators, those who say they need pot to help keep food down or otherwise ease their suffering are going to public parks to make their buys.

One club, Californians Helping Alleviate Medical Problems, no longer sells pot but still functions as a place to meet similarly situated people and fire up. That is expected to end soon too, as without drug sales it will be impossible to cover the $4,000-a-month rent for the group's space. Then the whole operation will be back out in the streets, which is presumably where the DEA wants it.

http://www.sfexaminer.com/news/default.jsp?story=n.potclub.0523w

3. Garish Border

Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.) has hysterically accused the Mexican army of a "military incursion" into southern Arizona after an incident in which Mexican soldiers fired shots at a U.S. Border Patrol vehicle. Tancredo is afraid American personnel will take a hit sooner or later.

The congressman is convinced that Mexican military or federal police units are providing protection muscle for drug shipments into the U.S. If that is indeed the case, then a unilateral cease-fire in the War on Drugs would quell violence on the border. That option probably never occurred to Tancredo, who opposes even modest reforms aimed at reducing the side effects of prohibition.

http://www.denverpost.com/framework/0%2C1918%2C36%257E53%257E626846%2C00.html

4. Quick Hits

Quote of the Week

"Last year the World Bank lent $300 million to Uganda. What was so important that there wasn't $25 million to $30 million to give everyone in Uganda clean water? Where did the money go?" -- Treasury Secretary Paul H. O'Neill after learning that a well costing $1,000 provided clean water to more than 400 people in a Ugandan village

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A18309-2002May27.html

Quote of the Week, Animated Uproar Division

"This isn't a second-rate city that should be taking our name from a cartoon show. We're talking about people naming things who aren't from here. These names are important." -- Albuquerque Mayor Martin Chávez on naming the city's new minor league baseball team the Isotopes, after the Springfield squad from The Simpsons. The team owners like the cartoon-inspired name, but the New Mexico Hispanic Culture Preservation League prefers Dukes.

http://www.abqjournal.com/paperboy/text/sports/693477sports05-26-02.htm

Something Borrowed and Something Boom

Government officials in eastern Afghanistan are warning Pashtun tribesmen not to make with the traditional celebratory gunfire during marriage ceremonies after U.S. warplanes again mistakenly bombed a convoy of wedding guests.

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/020524/5/mm19.html

Pork Flakes

Supermarkets in Saudi Arabia mull pulling Kellogg's breakfast products after it was discovered that some contain pork gelatin. Kellogg's brands already have been removed from the shelves in the United Arab Emirates.

http://www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=15605

5. New at Reason Online

6. The Print Edition

Preview the 7.02 issue of Reason's print edition, which celebrates the SUV, is now on its way to our subscribers' mailboxes.

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7. News and Events

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