Odds to No Particular End

"Obama Details New Policies in Response to Terror Threat" provokes some deep thoughts.


"The man [who attempted to blow up an airliner], Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, is to be arraigned Friday on charges of attempted murder on a plane, attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction and other offenses."

Is anyone else in the Nation surprised to find out that "attempted murder on a plane" is a specific crime? We were. Further research unearthed some other little-known aggravating factors in the criminal code. If you plan to attempt murder, please be aware of these:


--Attempted murder on a carousel
--Attempted murder in Kentucky
--Attempted murder with a llama


Interestingly, "Attempted murder at a Bar Mitzvah" is a lesser offense in New York. Obviously sympathetic legislators have been to one too many of those.


(Digression: Sideshow Bob: I am, currently, in prison--FOR A CRIME I DIDN'T COMMIT! "Attempted murder!" Do they give a Nobel Prize for "attempted chemistry"?!? EOD)



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"The internal report. . . blamed a host of errors for the intelligence lapse, including a misspelling of Mr. Abdulmutallab's name."


Sloppy, sure, but we were willing to cut analysts some slack for misspelling a name like "Abdulmutallab." Until we found out that they had spelled it "Ira Finkelberg."


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Check out the italicized section:


"The White House released the declassified report in an effort to show that the administration is conducting its business with transparency and willing to admit mistakes in order to correct them. The classified version offered a far starker view, officials said, of how close the United States came to averting the near tragedy."

Huh?

Wasn't the "near tragedy" averted? For that matter, if you avert a "near" tragedy, couldn't that be interpreted as saying the tragedy itself was not averted? Who edits this stuff?


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Our influence is spreading!


Faithful Sloppists read our commentary on Affluenza: The All-Consuming Epidemic. Yesterday, we received an e-mail from one of the co-authors! John de Graaf writes:


"Thanks much for the kind review of Affluenza. It's the first time it's ever been reviewed by a raccoon!"


Thank God he did not see through our clever disguise!


(Digression: While we appreciate Mr. De Graaf's appreciation, we notice that he, like a disturbing number of Sloppists, has a problem with the spelling of our name. For future reference, please note that 'solipsist' is spelled. . . well, it's spelled 'solipsist.' Not 'silopsist,' not 'solopsist.' And certainly not 'ellipsis'--you know who you are! EOD)


This makes us wonder how many other best-selling writers are members of Solipsist Nation, just waiting to reveal themselves until they are mentioned and hyperlinked in a post. Hmmm. . . .


The Solipsist is a huge admirer of Harlan Ellison. . . .


He would also enjoy having lunch with Stephen King, Michael Chabon, and/or Neil Gaiman. . . .


Maybe he could get his picture taken with Thomas Pynchon. . . . (The latter link is, unsurprisingly, an unauthorized webpage--we expect the webmaster will pass our comments along to Mr. Pynchon.)


And now, we wait!