Security only matters if it's good for business. That's the message John Ashcroft's Justice Department and Las Vegas authorities conveyed when they failed to inform the people of Las Vegas about surveillance tapes seized from terrorism suspects in Detroit and Spain in 2002. The videotapes showed that terrorists considered targeting Las Vegas casinos before 9/11. Apparently, the FBI informed the mayor of Las Vegas in August of 2002, but Mayor Oscar Goodman was worried about the "deleterious effect on the Las Vegas tourism industry" if the public found out about the risk. The FBI set up a meeting in Las Vegas to brief local police and business owners about the evidence, but the major casinos refused to send any of their security staff because they feared that viewing the evidence might make them liable in court if an attack actually happened. Such logic is beyond the understanding of ordinary, decent human beings. Only two Las Vegas cops showed up to view the tapes; apparently everyone else was busy guarding the casinos from thieves and card-sharps. This was after one of the Detroit terrorist suspects told police that Las Vegas was the "City of Satan" and said that "the brothers are going to destroy it." When we compare this absolute lack of concern to the recent hoopla over three-year-old evidence that Al Qaeda was casing buildings in New York, New Jersey, and Washington DC before 9/11, we can draw a couple of important conclusions: 1) the timing and announcement of anti-terrorism alerts are meant to serve George Bush's political agenda, and 2) "security" is a concept reserved solely for the safety and profitability of the American business elite--when it would serve customers' interests at the expense of profit, well, then security can go to hell.--Maria Tomchick. Source: "AP: U.S. Didn't Warn Las Vegas of Threats," John Solomon, Associated Press, 8/9/04.

The Democrats' National Convention is but a memory now. But yours truly is still having difficulties coming to terms with their event's "Free Speech Zone." Not that the herding of protesters into caged-off enclaves far removed from the objects of their protests is anything new, even for the "Democratic" Party. But rather than rubbing our faces in our impotence, couldn't they at least have given it a nice, Orwellian name? Something like the "Enhanced Access and Maximum Exposure Centre," or some shit?

One can't help wonder how long 'til the "Free Speech Zone" is located in the middle of the ocean? Or on the fucking moon?

And how long until one or two ZIP codes in each state are declared "Affordable Health Care Zones," or "No-Police-Shooting-At-Unarmed-Citizens Zones," or "Clean Water Zones," or "School Buildings Still Standing Zones," or the like--while the rest of the country's ZIP codes are "set aside" as "Maquiladora Zones?" --Eddie Tews

Meanwhile, several groups, notably War Resisters League, have announced their intent to commit nonviolent civil disobedience during the Republican National Convention protests in New York at months' end. All year, anti-war groups have been haggling endlessly with the city over protests plans, alongside the usual nonsense confusing ordinary Americans with opinions with those Satanic Terrorists. Given the farces of the last year in New York, in Boston, in LA, and in Philly four years ago, ad nauseam, it's a gutsy and welcome escalation in tactics. --Geov Parrish

And maybe I've just been sensitized by two weeks in Canada, but the Kerry/Edwards tag line "For a Stronger America" makes me want to puke. THAT'S THE PROBLEM, DUMBFUCKS. We're too strong for our own good--a good dose of humility is what we need--along with sanity, wisdom, intelligence, moral courage, and about three bazillion other things that rank higher on America's need list than strength. Woe be the world if this country gets any more stupid and muscle-bound than it already is. --G.P.

The Wall Street Journal, in its more lucid moments, can leak an impressive amount of information about the agenda of those who determine our public and foreign policy. In a recent column by DC correspondent Gerald F. Seib on the worldwide risks of nuclear proliferation, Seib discusses the fallout from the Bush administration's belligerent rhetoric and lazy lack of diplomacy regarding North Korea and Iran. He points out that, if North Korea becomes "openly and promiscuously nuclear," it would lead to an arms race in the region, with Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan all lining up to acquire WMD. The US would lose its role as big brother and protector of these nations--a major blow to US elites, who want to exert control over the "Asian tigers," preferably in an outwardly beneficent way: through their need for our military protection against the rabid commies (never mind that trade with China has become the major engine of growth in the region--some say the entire world).

As for Iran, Seib gets all sweaty over the possibility of an Arab bomb, with Egypt and Saudi Arabia acquiring nuclear weapons, too. Presumably, there's something more subconsciously menacing about Arabs having nuclear weapons than Asians, although the subtlety escapes me. Of course, he mentions Al Qaeda salivating over this prospect, as if all Arabs are terrorists--you know, the usual anti-Arab racism that US elites wear like a badge these days. The fact is, if either or both scenarios play out--and they are being made more likely every day that the Bush administration refuses to get off its ass and do some real negotiating--the laudable, indeed necessary, goal of nuclear nonproliferation will die. That's a nightmare that makes a Kerry win in November absolutely necessary.

If you're looking for a difference between the two major candidates, here it is: Bush won't lift a finger on the single most important issue of global security, which is nuclear nonproliferation, and his military threats against Iran and North Korea are making matters worse by giving them further reasons to develop nukes to keep the Bush administration at bay. John Kerry, on the other hand, favors immediately entering bilateral negotiations with North Korea over its nuclear facilities (which Bush has refused to do), and Kerry has said he would offer Iran assistance in building commercial nuclear reactors which can be used to generate power but not make nuclear weapons (another thing Bush has rejected). What hangs in the balance is the future of the human race, and US voters have a choice about what that future will be. Either the nuclear terrorist wins or the hawkish, conservative, pro-business pragmatist. We may not like either of them, but we'd be fools to chose the former over the latter.--M.T. Source: "Capital Journal: As Bush and Kerry Focus Elsewhere, Atomic Threats Stew," Gerald F. Seib, The Wall Street Journal, 8/11/04, p A4.