:: NEWS COCKTAIL aka BlahBlahBlog ::

:: 9.11.2005 ::

:: "TERROR IN TINY TOWN" ::

From an e-newsletter
Sunday, September 11, 2005
Greg Palast reporting from Southold, New York

In the War on Terror, we are all on the front lines. Now Southold has apparently
been targeted by Al Qaeda. I'm not surprised.

Southold, if you look at a map, is situated at the ass end of nowhere. We are known
for our Strawberry Festival and fire truck parade. According to the Census, this
tiny place is made up almost entirely of inbred farmers, real estate speculators
and volunteer firemen.

At one end of town is the "Brand Names Outlet Mall" and the water-slide
park. At the other end, there's a ferry boat that takes those who feel lucky to
the Indian casino in Connecticut. And in between, there's Main Street where we hold
the Strawberry Festival. (The festival is a quaint and annoying white-folks' ritual,
an opportunity for backstabbing, petty infighting and all-American small-mindedness.
But that's another story altogether.)

Last month, Town Supervisor Josh, with powers granted him by the Department of Homeland
Security, declared a "national security emergency." (Supervisor Josh Horton
is called by his first name because he was elected at the precocious age of 26 --
based, it seems, on his stellar qualifications: he wears shoes.) In light of the
clear and present threat of attack, Supervisor Josh ordered every one taking the
ferry boat to the Indian casino to park in the dirt lot across from the Country
Store and not along Route 25.

It was just after the London bombings and Supervisor Josh insisted this was truly
a matter of preparing for terrorist attack, though some locals suspected it was
less about Al Qaeda and more about zoning. Supervisor Josh had been trying all year,
unsuccessfully, to change the zoning on the dirt lot next to the ferryboat launch
from "farming" to "parking" to boost the town's take from the
inebriated gambling tourists. To scare off both Al Qaeda and parking violators,
Josh has posted, care of the federal treasury, an SUV at the ferry dock armed with
two .50-caliber machine guns. I kid you not.

The ferry to the Indian casino is our officially designated town "terrorism
vulnerability point" (TVP). If you don't pick a "terrorism vulnerability
point," the town can't get its slice of Homeland Security loot from the federal
government.

All ferry passengers are now asked for their home phone numbers, though if they
are suicide bombers, they will not, after they strike, be able to answer the phone.
No matter.

Homeland Security assigned three guardsmen, armed and armored, to the Vulnerability
Point because the town police are a little shorthanded since the crime wave in the
hamlet of Greenport a couple years back. It involved some petty theft, racial slur
complaints and baggies of pot sold. The crime wave ended when the village disbanded
its minuscule police force -- which had committed all the crimes.

Locals are taking the heightened security at the ferry with patriotic stoicism.
Our local pennysaver printed a letter from John Wronowski saying, "National
security and safety [must be] at the forefront of our efforts ?since September 11,
2001."

Mr. Wronowski owns the ferry boat and parking lot.

The paper, The Suffolk Times, interviewed a passenger who bravely travels to visit
his inlaws twice a week. He said, with true grit, "I am not afraid."

But I am. What if there's a sleeper cell in Southold? All they have to do is review
the Homeland Security website for the town's Vulnerability Point and they'll know,
"Hit the water slide, Ahmad! The casino ferry's being watched!"

And there's more here that scares me. There's a jug out at the Lickety Splitz Ice
Cream Parlor on Route 25 for the Cennar Family. It seems that one of the Cennar
kids has been diagnosed with some terrible disease. Undoubtedly, the doctor bills
are killing the family, could bankrupt them -- and the community jug is out. There's
always a jug out for someone who's ill or got crippled and whose bank account has
been wiped away.

And I thought: this is a national security threat. With the lumber yard shut and
the plastics plants gone to China, Al Qaeda could quite easily gain a couple of
recruits in our town: all Bin Laden has to do is offer health insurance.

**********

posted by me

:: 10:10:00 AM [+] ::
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