Archive [October 1999]

FLY TRAP

Well, you won’t believe why construction has been halted on a Los Angeles-area hospital and school. According to The Washington Times, eight flies were discovered near the building site. Not just any flies. These are the Delhi Sands flower-loving flies — the only fly on the Endangered Species List.

Though National Wilderness Institute president Rob Gordon pointed out that “no one actually knew … if they counted the same fly eight times,” the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is making San Bernardino county spend $220 million to set aside two acres of dune sand for inch-long flies. The kibosh has also been put on a $500 million project of homes and shopping centers in nearby Fontana, CA — despite the fact that it is in a designated “enterprise zone.”

The Fish and Wildlife Service is worried that the Delhi Sands fly will meet the same fate as the EI Segundo fly, which vanished after its habitat was paved over at the Los Angeles International Airport.

Yeah, we couldn’t have that.

That’s All, Folks

In a Bugs Bunny episode titled “Bewitched Bunny,” Bugs eludes a witch by blowing her up with magic powder. When a beautiful girl rabbit emerges from the puff of animated smoke, she and Bugs walk arm-in-arm into the sunset — with Bugs remarking to the cartoon audience: “Ah, sure, I know! But aren’t they all witches inside?”

When this aired on Canada’s Global Television channel in July 1998, a woman viewer demanded that Global’s president offer a televised apology for airing “this anti-woman cartoon.” Global defended itself: “We do not believe that this episode of Bugs Bunny … contravenes any provision of the Sex-Role Portrayal Code.” (They have a Sex-Role Portrayal Code! Well, this is what you get.) Next the woman went to the Canadian Broadcasting Standards Council, which last month bravely ruled that there was “nothing in the demeanor of Bugs Bunny or any other character or element of the episode … which could be broadly interpreted as constituting ‘negative or degrading comments on the role and nature of women.’”

And you know, some might accuse this woman of making Bugs’ point.

Rocket Man

Libya’s Colonel Muammar Gaddafi has been busy: inventing what Libya says is the safest vehicle on earth. At a special summit of the Organization of African Unity, Gaddafi unveiled the five-passenger Saroukh el-Jamahlriya (Libyan rocket), complete with an electronic defense system, air bags, and a collapsible bumper to protect passengers in head-on collisions. Dukhali Al-Meghareff, chairman of the Libyan Arab Domestic Investment company which plans to start production in Tripoli, told a news conference that Gaddafi had spent his time “thinking of ways to preserve human life all over the world.” That, after Ronald Reagan bombed his rear end to suggest he find an alternative to international terrorism.

FALL IN

This year, the army is expected to miss its recruitment goal of 74,500 by 8,000 enlistments. According to Doug Smith, spokesman for the Army Recruiting Command at Fort Knox, it has been the worst recruiting year since 1979. This is not good — I don’t like hearing this at all. And I’m glad the military has been studying what it can do to reverse the trend. But you are not going to believe what the Army is proposing as a solution. They are going to change their recruiting song. You know, the one in the TV ads: “Be All That You Can Be.”

I kid you not. Army Secretary Louis Caldera, in an interview with The San Antonio Express-News, said there’s “a question of whether the song] is a little bit dated.” Caldera said he wasn’t sure how they’d modify the slogan, used by the Army since 1981. By the way, Advertising Age recently ranked it as the century’s second-best commercial tune, topped only by the McDonald’s “You deserve a break today.” But, recruits are down. It must be the ad music!

I have a question for you. Who was President when the successful “Be all that you can be” campaign began In 1981? Hmmm? Could it possibly be, ladies and gentleman, that the biggest key to recruitment success is … leadership?

Taxman Cometh

More evidence that we’ve successfully imported liberalism. The Canadian version of the IRS, Revenue Canada, says Winnipeg chiropractor Richard Rosenberg owes 800,000 Canadian dollars. Rosenberg disputes that. “We’ve had disagreements and they’ve never been resolved to my satisfaction,” he says. (A Revenue Canada spokesperson would not discuss the specific case.) But now Rosenberg says the Canadian tax authorities have gone too far. “With no warning they walked into my home and proceeded to raid my home,” while he was at work and his wife and three children were home, Rosenberg told Reuters. “My seven-year-old son was in the bedroom and they were taking his teddy bears and they said: ‘We can get money for these.’” Rosenberg said authorities also grabbed his daughter’s Barbie dolls. The good doctor should be grateful that Revenue Canada didn’t call in the Delta Force.