So I'm really getting sick of the sensationalism being propagated by the media, and I'm about ready to grab a stick or a two-by-four, hop in my car and go driving around the country to every newspaper, newsmagazine, TV and radio newsroom, and just start smacking editors and reporters upside the head. What are you thinking, putting together these stupid sensationalist pieces? All you're doing is riling up all the survivalists and the paranoids, then setting them loose on the rest of us level-headed people! You don't have to deal with these morons, because you're sitting in your offices dishing it out to them! They love you for giving them something to worry about! And the rest of us hate you because we have to deal with them!

For example, Fox 25 here in Boston did this piece on their 10PM news last night on just how open our borders with Canada are. I saw the promos for it, which was basically a camera pointed out the window of a car at desolate land, while a disembodied voice said, "This is the U.S.... aaaaaand this is Canada." The announcer then came on and said in his sinister voice something along the lines of, "Open borders. See how easy it is to cross between the U.S. and Canada. Is our government doing anything to protect us?" The thing is, it looked like any space of desolate land. It could've been Iowa that they were filming for all we know. There was no sign to say "You are now entering Canada. Don't litter, eh?"

And this is the part in the rant where I once again rail against our government's incompetence and lack of common sense. Need I remind you that the guys who took over the planes on September 11th all had student visas granted by our government, so stricter borders don't matter because they had government permission to enter our country? They didn't drive into the U.S. from Canada, they probably flew into JFK along with tens of thousands of other foreigners. And yet, a measure by our government to federalize airport security -- basically, to make sure security guards at airports were federally employed and met certain personnel standards, instead of using rent-a-cops who have been responsible for security breaches at almost every major airport since they reopened with "stricter security" -- was struck down before it even left Congress.

Furthermore, it's not like terrorists bring all their hijacking and bombmaking material into the country with them, so it wouldn't matter if we stopped them at the border, they'd probably still pass inspection. Timothy McVeigh didn't leave the country to make the bomb that exploded in Oklahoma City, he made it right here within our own borders. And just about anyone can buy a knife or a gun, they could probably get one in a few hours from some guy downtown and given the current state of airport security, anyone could probably get a gun or knife on a plane too -- hell, some people already have.

On top of all that, hazardous biological materials aren't licensed. According to an article I read a few days ago, almost every university or biological research lab in the country has some form of virus -- either deadly or extremely harmful -- in their possession but they're not required to register it. They only have to register it if they're transporting it or selling it, which is how the government tracked down a lab in Georgia selling viruses when some guy in the Midwest claimed he bought anthrax over the Internet (he didn't -- he only bought antidote, but the scary thing is that this lab had bubonic plague for sale over the Internet).

So maybe I should include a few government offices in my whacking-with-a-two-by-four spree. Anyone want to come with me? It'll be fun.