Act!
[Ed. Note: Originally “published” 11/18/02.]
I applaud the U.S. legislature for broadening the investigative reach of the FBI. The USA PATRIOT Act (“Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001”), as the long form describes, gives the FBI increased leniency in gathering evidence and trivia about suspected terrorists and nefarious grandmothers-in-hiding. My cynical interpretation is that, if I’m a fed, I can look through all your issues of Swank, browse your bookmarks, all traffic into and out of your IP address, and, if you have a network-enabled refrigerator, exactly what it is you’ve been eating while you’ve been up to your naughty deeds.
Well, that’s all well and good, but where are the teeth of the thing? I can think of 13 ways to circumvent this authority, using some combination of latex gloves, a number 12 torx, and Vienna sausages. And, really, I’m not that clever. Really. What we need is the
- Digital
- Youth
- Symbolic
- Living-room
- Empathic
- Xylophonic
- Impish
- Crunchy
- Tabular
- Undulating
- Reinforced
- Kaleidoscopic
- Enterprise
- Yeoman
That’s right. The onus is upon our current administration to unleash the DYSLEXIC TURKEY Act of 2002 upon all would-be terrorists, drug dealers, and design consultants who may, or may not, at some point in the future conspire to wreak havoc or coordinating pastels upon the beatified American populace. The scope of this young, hip, digital, xylophonic legislative jackhammer will be truly awesome, encompassing all current and future electronic transactions (e-mail, web surfing, teledildonics), as well as KMart purchases and recorded instances of lower-lip-biting funk-ass-shaking dancing.
And that’s just the beginning.
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