Terror threat in the Heartland

The City of Des Moines blocked off a an area of the urban core after a citizen reported a suspicious object on the sidewalk. Crack hazardous-objects officers in full armor charged to the scene and successfully disarmed a cylindrical plastic tube used for dispensing dog crap bags.

You may recall a TMR report of a few months back detailing another suspicious object on one of our highways. In that case a road-kill muffler was neutralized.

So much for my life-long view that paranoia is not a Midwest trait.

Gee, maybe President Obama really is a Christian

Or maybe he just decided a new Christmas tree tax was not the wisest  possible political move.


Big Christmas tree growers actually wanted a 15-cent-per-tree tax to promote Christmas trees, and the Obama Administration went along. Then those pesky conservatives started tossing around words like "Grinch." The President turned 180 and advanced, warp speed,  to the rear

The immediate result of the tax would have been a national board for the promotion of Christmas trees. We can't actually prove that the new bureaucracy would have immediately set up a lobbying effort to extort a little extra from the general fund of U.S. Treasury, but  if you suspect this was the real motive, I forgive you.

Anything happening out in the world?

I'm sorry, but...

Guiding the nation's political process has become a lower priority here this week as Camp J hosts the annual Brome Shark Convention and great F. and S. Clans  (Plus Friends ) Great Annual Pheasant Shoot-At.

Six are in the field at the moment. I'm recuperating and will join them later.

Generally, the ringnecks are in a state of annoyance, more due to some classically beautiful dog work* than to any real fear of bodily injury.

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*A nod to Budda and Storm. Unfortunately,New Dog Libby, turns out to be a hoplophobe and will henceforth earn her keep through sweetness.

Slaughter in the woods, a national crisis

The Minnesota press is reporting tragedy during the firearms deer season opener. Three humans died, giving new urgency to the need for common-sense regulation.

The three men perished in falls from tree stands. Nothing else is needed to  illustrate the vital  need for common-sense ladder control -- license to possess,  mandatory government training,  and certainly a strict one-tree stand-a-month purchase limit.

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But leave it to my buddy B to make light of the special horror inherent the the 82 -year-old man's fatal fall.

"He just fell asleep."

"Yeah. On his way up."

I'm not telling who made that last wiseass remark.