Per Atrios, we see that the Department of Homeland Security has slashed anti-terrorism funds for New York, having concluded that the city has No Icons, No Monuments Worth Protecting.
The formula did not consider as landmarks or icons: The Empire State Building, The United Nations, The Statue of Liberty and others found on several terror target hit lists. It also left off notable landmarks, such as the New York Public Library, Times Square, City Hall and at least three of the nation’s most renowned museums: The Guggenheim, The Metropolitan and The Museum of Natural History.The form ignored that New York City is the capital of the world financial markets and merely stated the city had four significant bank assets.The formula did note a commuter population of more than 16 million around the city twice struck by fundamentalist terrorists and twice more targeted in plots halted in pre-operational stages. It noted the more than eight million residents and the largest rail ridership in the nation – more than five million. It is those commuters and rail riders who are expected to suffer most from the cuts since mass transit is listed on most DHS alerts as the top terror target.
Now, a lot of people are upset about this, because they simply don’t understand the complicated formula the government uses to determined why, for instance, the Mall of America is far more likely to be the site of a major terrorist attack than the Statue of Liberty or the New York Stock Exchange. (Well, not the entire Mall of America, but there have been credible threats against Camp Snoopy.) These critics are superficial and uninformed, the type of people who look at a drum and simply see the skin, never realizing there is actually a complicated network of intricate moving parts underneath the drumhead that makes that thumping sound. The Department of Homeland Security spits upon idiots like you, but really more in sorrow than in anger.
Carpers and cavilers who rush to judgment are clearly unaware of the Department’s ongoing efforts, based upon the FBI’s Witness Relocation Program, to safeguard America’s irreplaceable cultural and historic treasures by transferring them from noisome and crowded urban conditions to the clean, bracing air and wide-open spaces of our vigorous Western states.
The Statue of Liberty, a piece of vaguely pornographic French bric-a-brac that seems to attract immigrants like a bug zapper without the corresponding virtue of electrocuting the wretched refuse as they approach, has nonetheless been admitted to the program. The DHS, concerned about the damage Lady Liberty sustains daily due to the briny air, rescued her from the island upon which she has been marooned, Gilligan-like for the past 120 years, and transported her to a dry, corrosion-free climate: Texas.
In addition to benefiting from year-round sunshine and low humidity, this overgrown lawn gnome now has a far better chance of attracting visitors as it basks in the reflected glory of a genuine American icon, the Cadillac Ranch.
But it’s not only brobdignagian representations of French whores that have profited from the Department’s tireless efforts. The United Nations, a social club for swarthy men who like to flout municipal parking regulations, has likewise been relocated. Plucked from the insecure shores of the East River, the General Assembly building and it’s dusky occupants now enjoy the comforting if symbolic protection of the Golden Driller, a Colossus who bestrides Tulsa Oklahoma and sleeplessly watches over its petroleum extraction industry.
Even kitsch artifacts from the distant past have been spared by the Department of Homeland Security, such as the Unisphere from the 1964 World’s Fair. The theme represented by this hokey chunk of pop art was “Peace Through Understanding.” What the Department understands is that if it were destroyed by Al Qaeda, our offices would be swarmed by hippies and t-shirt-sporting mothers of Iraqi war dead, and we’d never get the stink of patchouli and pot out of our nubby cubicle wall fabric. So the Unisphere has been relocated to a plot of pristine desert land set aside by the Bureau of Land Management for the exclusive use of off-road vehicles and giant leftist hood ornaments.
All significant icons and monuments, and all buildings of historic and cultural interest have been removed from New York City, and relocated to the economically and demographically vibrant Southwestern States. With the exception of the New York Times building, which we’re leaving behind as bait.
13 Responses to “JUST ANOTHER ROADSIDE ATTRACTION”
I still say the NY Times building lends a certain noblesse air to Crawford, Texas. Can’t we move it there?
We could trade for a pile of thoroughly slashed brush, which could serve as more comprehensible reading material.
We could trade for a pile of thoroughly slashed brush, which could serve as more comprehensible reading material.
[...] Over at World o’ Crap’s new home (and do update your blogrolls you scurvy scalawags), Scott completely understands why Homeland Security won’t protect NY City’s icons: they have a heckuva better protection plan. [...]
Goddammit. I was witty and brilliantly insightful and stuff, and it ate my goddamned comment. It won’t let me alt-backtrack, either. This sucks, kids.
Okay, once more from the top.
Really, this is a fairly reasonably explainable decision from the Bushes. In fact, considering they’re sending NotJenna to the UN AIDS conference as a delegate, the whole security-fund-disbursing thing may very well be one of their more transparent policy decisions.
As Carl Hiaasen has pointed out, Florida has this huge long coastline over which illegal immigrants routinely arrive.
Of course, none of these people are likely to be a National Security Risk except by the strange new math that translates “border security” into “English-only legislation”.
That is to say, they are often brown, and poor, and rarely speak English, and often don’t even have the decency to be really good at baseball. Consequently, they must be kept out.
Since building a fence would destroy both the real estate and the tourism industries, the only real solution is more guys in dune buggies or speedboats or whatever. And as we all know, speedboats aren’t cheap, even when purchased at DEA seizure auctions, which actually brings up another issue which clearly trumps any effete immigrant-attracting so-called monuments those weirdos in the blue states think are so important.
I’m not discounting the notion that Jeb has aspirations or Dubya has aspirations for Jeb or whatever the hell is going on in that fucked-up family, nor am I prepared to ignore both GOP and Bush family history in the state of Florida. But I’m willing to bet the whole “Aliens Are A Security Issue” thing was going through more than a few of our finest policy-making minds.
Today’s GOP: We have *plenty* of terrible reasons for everything we do!
Really, this is a fairly reasonably explainable decision from the Bushes. In fact, considering they’re sending NotJenna to the UN AIDS conference as a delegate, the whole security-fund-disbursing thing may very well be one of their more transparent policy decisions.
As Carl Hiaasen has pointed out, Florida has this huge long coastline over which illegal immigrants routinely arrive.
Of course, none of these people are likely to be a National Security Risk except by the strange new math that translates “border security” into “English-only legislation”.
That is to say, they are often brown, and poor, and rarely speak English, and often don’t even have the decency to be really good at baseball. Consequently, they must be kept out.
Since building a fence would destroy both the real estate and the tourism industries, the only real solution is more guys in dune buggies or speedboats or whatever. And as we all know, speedboats aren’t cheap, even when purchased at DEA seizure auctions, which actually brings up another issue which clearly trumps any effete immigrant-attracting so-called monuments those weirdos in the blue states think are so important.
I’m not discounting the notion that Jeb has aspirations or Dubya has aspirations for Jeb or whatever the hell is going on in that fucked-up family, nor am I prepared to ignore both GOP and Bush family history in the state of Florida. But I’m willing to bet the whole “Aliens Are A Security Issue” thing was going through more than a few of our finest policy-making minds.
Today’s GOP: We have *plenty* of terrible reasons for everything we do!
Remember tho, the real problem isn’t that funding was slashed, the real problem is that New Yorkers are too whiny:
http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=50471
http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=50471
Let’s not forget the Excrement House in Cheney, Wyoming. that’s worth at least $30 million.
So did that penguin ever get to Biosphere before it closed for the day?
Moving the Statue of Liberty to Texas? But won’t that just encourage the Aztlanistas and Latinofascists and other brown people with scarry, made-up labels?
What other New York landmarks should be relocated? I suggest we move the Convention Center and its Free Speach Zone to Manzanar. I’m sure Halliburton could spiff it up where Michele Malkin and others of her differently-melanin-abled sort would just love.
And as D. Sidhe noted, Florida has really suffered since the largess of the early Bush years has apparently dried up slightly. Why not send them the whole of the New York City Port Authority? I’m sure Orlando could use another Freedom Tower.
And don’t just think of landmarks. What about the poor people who are vulnerable there, such as all the media elite? We could form the Federal Witless Protection Program.
What other New York landmarks should be relocated? I suggest we move the Convention Center and its Free Speach Zone to Manzanar. I’m sure Halliburton could spiff it up where Michele Malkin and others of her differently-melanin-abled sort would just love.
And as D. Sidhe noted, Florida has really suffered since the largess of the early Bush years has apparently dried up slightly. Why not send them the whole of the New York City Port Authority? I’m sure Orlando could use another Freedom Tower.
And don’t just think of landmarks. What about the poor people who are vulnerable there, such as all the media elite? We could form the Federal Witless Protection Program.
I think we should move the Statue of Libery to LaCrosse WI so she could drink the World’s Biggest Sixpack.
I think we should move the Statue of Libery to LaCrosse WI so she could drink the World�s Biggest Sixpack.
I’m not sure that’s wise, because after a night like that, odds are she’d wake up next to one of those giant muffler guys.
But I guess we wouldn’t know for certain unless she staggered into work the next day wearing the same clothes.
I’m not sure that’s wise, because after a night like that, odds are she’d wake up next to one of those giant muffler guys.
But I guess we wouldn’t know for certain unless she staggered into work the next day wearing the same clothes.
Apparently they have forgotten 9/11.
Here’s the Top Five reasons behind the cuts:
5)Terrorist attack in NYC will kill more liberals in proportion to total population killed than almost anywhere else, except maybe LA, San Francisco and Portland OR. Portland’s too small and the other two are likely to get wiped out by an earthquake anyway.
4)Let the terrorists take out the Museum of Natural History, which is a storehouse of evidence refuting intelligent design.
3) Ditto the UN–who needs all those scruffy third worlders talking all those weird languages and voting against all our brilliant plans?
2) Wall street blown up? Hey, now we got an ironclad alibi for the next recession.
NUMBER ONE: Last time NYC got hit, Bush’s approval numbers went through the roof. Who’s to say it won’t happen again?
5)Terrorist attack in NYC will kill more liberals in proportion to total population killed than almost anywhere else, except maybe LA, San Francisco and Portland OR. Portland’s too small and the other two are likely to get wiped out by an earthquake anyway.
4)Let the terrorists take out the Museum of Natural History, which is a storehouse of evidence refuting intelligent design.
3) Ditto the UN–who needs all those scruffy third worlders talking all those weird languages and voting against all our brilliant plans?
2) Wall street blown up? Hey, now we got an ironclad alibi for the next recession.
NUMBER ONE: Last time NYC got hit, Bush’s approval numbers went through the roof. Who’s to say it won’t happen again?
Ha! What a great blog..was that last one here in Phoenix? I’d love to see that!
Don Lapre Watcher
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Don Lapre Watcher
http://www.j-ams.org
webmaster@j-ams.org
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