Somewhere in some FBI file is locked a list of what American’s are most afraid of, and in what order. It’s been a while since I hacked that particular computer, but, if memory serves me correctly, the things that rate highest are:

* Things that can’t be seen. (cancer, A.I.D.S.)
* Things that require a working knowledge of science to understand. (radioactive fallout, electromagnetic impulses)
* Things with scary-sounding names. (Al Qaeda, Hell’s Angels)

Genetic engineering has long qualified for the first two things on this list, and thus are oft-maligned by both the public and the press. But now those Genetic Engineers (who prefer the term “Nature’s Little Helpers”) are striking back by announcing a cure for something that hits all of the big three: Mad Cow Disease.

No matter if this disease makes you think of babbling bulls, herds of charging cows, or just human beings writhing in bed as their brains are being eaten alive, chances are you dislike even so much as the idea that Mad Cow Disease exists. So much so that when you hear the FDA has slaughtered massive numbers of cattle just out the suspicion they might have been infected, you nod your head and feel it’s a sad but necessary action to protect us all. Such is the fear we all have. And why not? It’s Mad Cow Disease, after all. Scary name, invisible to the naked eye, difficult to understand how it works. Hell, you can’t even comfortably pretend it only affects homosexuals. It’s scary stuff.

And even if you don’t find yourself afraid of the disease directly, you are still affected by the billions of dollars lost every year because many countries are afraid of importing American beef. As a result, there’s less money coming into this country. And, therefore, less money flowing to China for those incredible dancing santas they build.

So how are them Genetic Engineers helping us with this truly American tragedy? Well, they’ve created a cow that is free of Prions!

A little embarrassed you didn’t think of it first, huh? A cow sans Prions. It’s so obvious.

Yeah, but what are Prions?

Not to be confused with Toyota’s world-saving publicity-machine, the Prius, Prions are a protein, one produced naturally in healthy cows. But when Prion goes bad, it can become a common form of TSE that is known as BSE …er, I mean, it can horribly mutate into Mad Cow Disease. Scary scary Mad Cow Disease!

There’s going to be a lot of controversy over these genetically-engineered, Prion-free cows, but frankly–now that a cure for that you-know-what disease is well in hand–I’ve grown tired of the subject. I’m gonna go see if there’s anything good on TV.

Anyone keeping an eye on the whole Iraq thing (I know it’s difficult to tear away from the Britney scandal) has probably noticed that we seem to be making enemies faster than we can kill them. In fact, the balance seems to have tipped to the point where we’re pretty much universally considered the bad guy by those people.

I’m pretty sure the place we went wrong was by getting all them Iraqis killed. No matter if you believe Bush (30,000 dead), Tony Blair (50,000 dead), or those epidemiologists who do all the major disaster death-counts for a living (650,000 dead), the point is we’ve caused a lot of folks over there to get killed and it’s put us on shaky ground with the Iraq population who, for some reason, would like to see us leave their country before we get them personally killed.

Whichever death toll you believe, it would seem that the majority of Americans still felt that the death count was too low by at least one, and were looking for looking forward to Saddam Hussein’s death (Ironically, for crimes against humanity.) Now Saddam was a pretty bad guy and all. He was responsible, sometimes directly, for the death of anywhere from a half a million to a million people in Iraq ( a difficult feat to beat: to make sure we’ve got the high-end covered, we’re going to have to stay in Iraq at least until the end of the Bush presidency. ) But crimes aside, what better way is there to let the citizens of Iraq know who’s really in charge than to have their government (which we established) ‘execute’ the guy who used to run the country?

None that I can think of.

Of course, killing the old boss is a time-honored tradition here in the west. To take just a small period in English history, we see can see it in action:

This New Years, at midnight on the dot, the government will be declassifying hundreds of millions of documents. Why? Executive Order 12958.

Not to be confused with the lame ‘Order 66’ invented by George Lucas as part of his wide-scale attempt to destroy the most popular Sci-Fi trilogy of all time, Executive Order 12958 was issued by Clinton in 1995, and, after two extensions, is now being enforced by George Bush Jr. The order states that every document over twenty-five years old that isn’t specifically requested to be exempt will be made public. It’s always possible that this could be a non-event, but let’s consider what we might learn about:

* How many times has the U.S. tried (and failed) to assassinate Fidel Castro?
* Did the CIA do secret LSD experiments in Vietnam?
* Who slept around more: George Washington or Ben Franklin? (to get Clinton in the pool, we’ll have to wait until 2025)
* What the hell fell out of the sky in Roswell, New Mexico in 1947?
* How many Cuban cigars did John Kennedy illegally purchase? (against his own order)
* Why does Henry Kissinger hate everybody?
* Who really killed Marilyn Monroe? Bobby Kennedy? Laura Palmer?

All the big stuff will certainly make the news (overshadowing, as usual, news from Iraq) but if you really want to dig through the details yourself, check out this place here: The Digital National Security Archive.

If you were thinking perhaps of bonding with the father or son this Santamas season by seeing a movie about football, you might consider a movie that is actually about football and not, as the case would be, We Are Marshall.

No, We Are Marshall isn’t about football any more than Apocolypse Now was about Vietnam. It’s merely a convenient setting in which to tell a different story. Like in this case, one about people who cry a lot.

Really, crying. No amazing passes. No astounding plays. No last minute, make this touchdown and win the woman/trophy/respect of your fellow inmates. The few football scenes are more about bringing someone to tears than playing the game. In this movie, if someone isn’t tearfully shouting “We are Marshall,” then they’re crying.

All that happens in the bulky two hours and seven minutes of We Are Marshall is everyone cries. Almost every story arc in the entire movie is just the progression of a character from a non-crying one to one that does cry. The talented Anthony Mackie cries every fifteen minutes, often with declarations of how much pain he’s in over the loss of his teammates. Matthew Fox and Ian McShane get to save their crying to the climax of the movie. Oh, wait: Their crying is the climax of the movie. In fact, the only person who doesn’t cry is Matthew McConaughey, who, in some drive to win an Academy Award, seems to have stapled his lip half shut. He uses what’s left of his mouth to continually and rapidly spout that right-thing-to-say-and-also-funny-and-insightful dialog that is falls just short of the realism one experienced in For the Love of Benji.

Now it’s appropriate, mind you, after such a tragedy as one witnesses in We Are Marshall to cry. But do you really want to go and spend both time and money to watch his useless cryfest? Couldn’t you just just pop your own popcorn and then break your nephew’s favorite new Santamas toy? At least then you could sit in a comfortable seat.

I never thought I would see the sun rise on such a day here in America, but it’s happened.

It seems the the White House (a term one can only think refers to President Bush) has censored a New York Times article about Iran. Follow this link to see the scariness itself: an American news article with dark black lines blocking out sections of the article.

Of course, the ‘White House’ has presented the usual security-related reasons. (which for any other administration would seem valid). But I ask you, Do you think Fox News ever had an article censored?

I don’t think this administration is taking their defeat at the polls (and therefore the loss of their self-proclaimed ‘mandate’) very seriously.