leethar

Well damn... Things are getting really, really strange. Burch didn't show up for class today. How weird is that? Most of the psych professors aren't showing up. But it gets weirder...

The train has stopped going by. I noticed last night. No room-rattling noise... Not all night, not today. Add to this the fact that I simply cannot reach anyone on my cell. It says "Not Allowed" when I try to contact ANYONE. Regardless of long distance or local, or cell reception.

Scan America is STILL completely down, and major news sources are just showing... Random crap. Like, I haven't heard anything about the president all day. That's the first time in a while. I've notices WEIRD videos showing up on youtube for just a couple hours of what looks like riots. Then they get deleted and the users banned with NO commentary. Arfcom has been in all out chicken little mode, but it's basically insane stuff. Posting pages and pages of "proof" of the apocalypse, people posting that they're going to their SHTF locations, and yet still nothing specific! What the HELL is going on!?

Mandy, please, get back on! What's in the water? Are you okay? I don't think I can get down there right now, it sounds like things are about to get really dangerous. What should we be doing?

Okay, so Peszka didn't show up for the meeting today. Which is weird, cause she's never missed one without telling us three weeks in advance. That kinda caught me off guard, so I decided to go into LR a little early to skip rush hour.

Guys, something is definitely up. Little Rock was seriously weird. First of all, there was less traffic coming into LR than I was expecting. Second off: You guys all know that national guard depot on the side of I-40 right? Well, right now it's almost entirely empty. Almost all the trucks are gone, and definitely all of the hummvees. What the hell? You'd think if the national guard had been mobilized, it'd at least make the LOCAL news much less major networks. Anyone seen anything on this?

It gets weirder too. Of the 4 gun shops in LR, 1 was outright closed. It had a giant "NO AMMO" sign taped on the front door and some of the windows blocked. There were shards of safety glass on the ground. The next one I went into, well... They were sold out of nearly EVERYTHING. Okay. For reference: I went in their last week. They had crates of 1000rds of 5.56 ammo stacked literally waist high. They had piles of dozens of AR mags. This week, almost nothing. Only a few rifles, and almost no handguns to speak of. Only a couple of mags out, and get this: NO ammo. None. At all.

I talked to the guy behind the counter, and he gave me a canned response about supply and demand. I really leaned into him, laid in all the "fellow gun owner" buzzwords. He let it out that most people were hoarding. There had been a lot of REALLY strange local reports about... anything. Random violence. Civil unrest. Impending nukes. Spreading diseases. Biological attack. Take your pick.

Anyway, I managed to persuade him to sell me some ammo he had hidden back there, and I grabbed a couple mags. Story was the same with the other two places I went... And they were large chain sporting goods stores. Hell, even Academy Sports was nearly picked clean. I had to get ammo in chunks where I could... And I'm glad I did too.

I just checked my email. I got a weird email from Dr. Peszka. I know she knows that I started the Disaster Preparedness Club, and she knows I know her and her family are... extremely well prepared. The email, summed up, pretty much said: "Hunker down. Something big is coming."

I have no idea what's up, but I'm nervous. If you hear a clicking sound from my room, it's me charging mags...

Well today was interesting. Like almost no one showed up to class today. Burch seemed distracted, and Zorwick wasn't even there, we were just watching movies. I think she's at some sort of conference. Anyway, today just kinda feels like a vacation. It's weird, it's sorta quiet on campus today.

Also, Rob: Miranda rights, lol! I hope that kid turns out okay in the movie we're watching, poor guy's had his rights pretty well trampled.

Anyway, I'm going to go into LR today to get some more casings for my art project, mebee grab some ammo in the process.

Seriously, did anyone else see that crazy guy in the brick pit today? He was some kind of crazy delusional and was running up to students and yelling at them. Clothes were all torn up and stuff... I think he was seriously delusional or something, cause he was yelling something about "It's coming." I think he was trying to get people to run from "Them" or "It" or whatever... He was pretty out of it, he was muttering to himself a lot... My bad situation vibe went off, so I got outta there PDQ and told the psych profs about it. On my way back to the apartment, I saw a couple squad cars pull up so they musta taken him in. Hope they didn't tase the poor guy, he looked like he was skin and bones...

Anyway, expect some kinda "Don't go outside at night and lock your doors" email from public safety again. Kinda creepy stuff.

At lurker's insistence and internet sad puppydog eyes...

Where do you fall politically and what are your views:

Technically, a Moderate/Independent. I'm the rare, endangered breed that believes we should rationally approach each issue and solve it to do the best overall good possible regardless of spin or sensationalism. Crazy, I know, right?

Gun control:
Like it or not, gun possession is in our bill of rights, up there with free speech and religion. It's there for a reason. A gun is the government saying "We can trust you to rely on yourself." For self defense, food, whatever. But to much of our current society, guns are big bad black scary bogeymen, so scary that some places won't let POLICE have semiautos. This is ridiculous. Furthermore, out and out banning whole categories of guns simply doesn't work, the assault weapons ban is one of the best examples of politics by fear on record (Not as bad as say, Patriot act, but up there.) It's like they went down a list and marked everything scary as illegal. It's been shown that the people who banned this stuff don't even know what it IS. Stupid, stupid. That said, not against a little more regulation of firearms. I'd be okay with going through a few more hoops to get a gun, maybe even having a license. Encouraging safe gun ownership is key, as well as preventing guns from being given to criminals by relatives or friends, or stolen from homes. And as far as registering individual firearms... I cite One Dead in Attic and Katrina.

Abortion:
If the mother's health, in a significant way, is on the line, she has a choice. I think abortion should be legal early term... If you have a problem pregnancy, you know right away that it's a problem. Not entirely comfortable with it, but it's been proven empirically to lower crime rates in the long term. Not pleasant, but perhaps better than generations left behind.

Euthanasia:
Should be tightly regulated. People have a right to die, yes. But we don't let people just commit suicide and say "Well it was their right!" Should be tightly regulated to control for major depression, insurance scams by other family members, and the like. It's worth taking time and effort to manage.

Marriage:
Well, as far as the Christian tradition, it's up to that church. But government and tax wise, if you're going to give benefits to ONE type of exclusive union of two people, well... I have a rather liberal view on that one. Same-sex marriage is perfectly fine. Banning it is in my mind akin to banning cross-race marriage. Or maybe the government should just start calling EVERYTHING "civil unions."

Religion:
Should.
Not.
Be.
In.
Government.
Ever.

Separation of church and state is one of the concepts our nation was FOUNDED on. It's fine to have a leader who is religious, and it's important that religions can voice their opinion. But getting religion and government together is violating one of the most important principles our country is based on.

Rights:
What does this even mean? The bill of rights is good? Human rights are good? Women should vote?.... So, my answer is, uh, yes please?

Immigration:
Uh, well, it IS illegal for a reason. We should be providing people with better, more productive routes to citizenship, not camping out on the border with sniper rifles, or just handing anyone who manages to make it in a green card. Lot of crime comes in illegally. Might be better to make legal entry more possible, and then crack down on illegal. Not to well-educated on this one, though.

Medicine:
A privitized system certainly has it's flaws. Socialized healthcare is honestly, even worse. I don't mind the government getting involved here, but we should try to just find a better way of doing it rather than saying "Hay, england does it, let's be like them KAY?"

Energy:
We need to get off oil and coal as much as possible, that's true. But renewable energy sources aren't good enough at the moment to be anything other than a good supplement. That they should be, of course, and we should continue researching how to make them better, well... Nuclear power is clean and efficient. Not perfect, but better than coal. Mostly, I think people get caught in a saliency effect... That is, that it's like taking a car versus flying a long distance. Taking a car is statistically much more dangerous, but the plane is what scares people because a plane crash, though rare, is dramatic. I think that's what it's like. Once again, not all too well educated on this one, so I may be wrong.

War, the middle east, military, global policy, etc:
Wow, big question much?
Okay, global policy: A good start would be NOT appearing to be psychopaths to the rest of the world. Also, we are not "world police." Though, that's not due to any moral issue. We simply, as a nation, do not have the resources to go out and right every wrong. No nation does. Technically, the UN should be able to handle that, but well... They can be too slow to act. So what's the solution? Mercenaries? I dunno, but it's not US of A.

As far as Iraq... Well. We were lead into the war on false pretenses. I was worried about this actually... back in high school. Step 1: Our republican, gung-ho cowboy president is gonna get us into a war without a serious cause, and though it will probably serve good ends, the consequences will not be thought out. It'll be long, grueling, and hellish cause hey, guess what! Wars are like that! People die, some of them are civilians and your own soldiers. Step 2 is that we elect a really democrat president who immediately pulls us all out of Iraq. The country cannot stand on its own two feet, and collapses into anarcy. Who the hell knows what comes out of it. Might be worse than Saddam. And then we, the American people, look like asshats.

Regardless of why the war started, we have a responsibility not only to the people of Iraq, but to the world at large to make absolutely sure that the country can stand on its own two feet before we leave. Responsibility seems like sort of a forgotten concept in our political system and media at the moment. From what I have been told by people actually there, the day when Iraq can support itself is in fact coming. I sure hope they're right. But preemptively... Sorry, people of Iraq. Really.

What I want from my government:
Keep stability and safety, and do your best to keep equality, freedom of speech and religion, and the basics of human rights. This is another huge question, but the American government should exist to provide the American people a nation in which they are both free and safe. These two goals sometimes conflict, and it's a hard job to do. But we have this wonderful constitution thing that tells us how we should start doing it. Breaking that thing, well, it's a signal that you're DOING IT WRONG.

Also, breaking the constitution is illegal. Like, even for the president. NO, REALLY?