SMART BOMBS
                             by Rev. Chris Korda

I think we can all agree that violence is best left to the experts.  The
Unabomber killed people, and he didn't ask for permission first.  He even
made his own bombs.  How do you suppose the economy is going to work if
people start making their own bombs?  When Nixon wanted to blow something
up, he called his pals at the Air Force and said "I've got a map of
Cambodia here, and some pins, and wherever I put the pins, I want big
holes.  No need to tell Congress, though.  It'll be our little secret,
okay?"  And his pals said "Can do, Mr. President," and pretty soon
Cambodia looked like the surface of the moon. 

Now when you bomb a country back to the Stone Age, you ensure that only
the toughest, most ruthless people survive.  So suddenly it's year zero,
and the Khmer Rouge are marching everyone out of the city into the
countryside, or what's left of it, to fend for themselves.  People
couldn't stay in the cities, because there wasn't any food.  We bombed all
the food.  But that's okay, because--as the New York Times pointed out at
the time--"the destruction was mutual."  All over America, farmers are
still being maimed by unexploded landmines.  That's why President Clinton
wants to outlaw them.  Here in Boston you can hardly walk down the street
without falling into a bomb crater.  We never hear about it because
history, as we all know, is written by the conquerors, not by us, the
poor, conquered Americans.  It was a noble effort, but they beat us,
didn't they.  We slaughtered millions of them gooks, ravaged their land,
and completely destroyed their way of life, but we lost the war.  We
didn't actually manage to make them love America. 

So violence is best left to the experts.  Like George Bush.  He was no
draft-dodger.  He was an expert.  No one ever questioned his credentials. 
When Iraq threatened America's inalienable right to control the price of
oil, did George make a pipe bomb and send it to Saddam?  He called up the
Pentagon and said "Pave Iraq."  The Joint Chiefs sure do love a chance to
test those nifty new weapons that you--the hard-working taxpayer--pay top
dollar for.  So they said "Can do, Mr. President," and pretty soon there
were burning oil wells, and the bodies of a hundred thousand dead Iraqis
were baking in sun.  Kinda makes you thirsty, don't it?  Pass the bottled
water.  It's hard work, but hey, we can't let those towel-heads tell us
what to do.  Wait a minute, they're the terrorists, we're just
peace-keepers.  We're on a mission from God!  What are you, some kind of
Communist?  Do I sound like Noam Chomsky yet?  Bear with me. 

Sure the Unabomber was violent, and got away with it, but that's not so
unusual.  The peculiar thing was that he used violence to gain access to
the media.  And he didn't just want to go on the Jerry Springer show, he
wanted 35,000 words in the Washington Post.  Eight pages, in small type.
Unmediated access, with no editorial clearance.  This made reporters mad
as hell.  They have to deal with editors every day, telling them what to
write, cutting up their stories, dropping them for no reason, and here
this Unabomber comes along and publishes a whole manuscript, footnotes and
all, right there in the damn newspaper.  Who's his agent?  I mean we can't
have this, for God's sake, it's totally irresponsible.  He could have said
anything.  He could have criticized our corporate clients. It's funny, I
didn't see any advertisements on those pages, I wonder why.  And what if
everyone wanted access to the media, then where would we be?  Out of a job
is where.  The American people need us to decide what's important and
newsworthy.  That's why the TV news is half weather.  Americans have a
right to know what the temperature is out there. 

The Unabomber stormed the media fortress, and he captured the flag, but
his strategy had a fatal flaw.  In the end, most people skipped his
manifesto, either because they'd already been convinced that he wasn't an
expert, or because they just didn't care.  Computer literacy is one of
those oxymorons, like "sustainable shopping": why read when you can click
on things?  The average American is unlikely to read 35,000 words on any
subject, not even sports, never mind the future of industrial society. 
Too many words, not enough pictures, and who reads the Washington Post
anyway?  He should have cut it down to a page and run it in "USA Today,"
or better yet, made it into a screenplay.  A Unabomber video game. 
Merchandise rights.  It's probably just a matter of time. 

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