# 319, May 11, 2004

COLUMBUS: I have been in a fair number of photos in my time, and my friends know I’ve snapped quite a few Kodaks. So I’m sorta fond of picture takers. But this week you kinda wish the photographer, instead of snapping pictures, had used his camera to smash someone over the head.

Our President apologized on television and said those photos from the Iraq prison were “abhorrent and disgusting”. Next thing you know, those terrorists said right back to him, “that’s nothing, we’ll show you some pictures that are REALLY abhorrent and disgusting.”

Just about everything that could be said about those photos of Abu Ghraib prisoners has been said, over and over and over. So I won’t contribute to the confusion of either side.

But when it comes to that al-Qaida executioner in the video with the machete, there’s one thing I have not heard, but I venture it’s true…he was experienced at his trade. He had executed others before, and my guess is most of them were women and girls. And they were all Muslim. So any argument he only committed the murder because his Iraqi terrorist friends were photographed in a few scenes somewhat worse than a college fraternity hazing just don’t hold water.

I didn’t intend to make what our better writers humorously call a “transition”, but I do want to say something about Water. Bottled water. I read in the newspaper or saw on television, maybe both, that we are spending $8 Billion on bottled water. Now if the New York Times had reported that our federal government was spending $8 billion on those little bottles we would all march on Washington and demand that Congress put a stop to the waste and fraud. But no, it’s not the government doing the spending, it’s us. And most of the time it’s for the same city water you use to refill your flush toilet, wash your car and irrigate the lawn. Same water, different package.

You know, if you buy enough water in those little bottles to fill a barrel, why paying $40 a barrel for oil shipped half way around the world won’t seem like such a bad deal. I joke about folks trading their big SUVs for a horse, but gas at $2 a gallon is a bargain when you start watering your horse at $1 a bottle.

Now I might be a bit more lenient on you big water spenders if I was in on it. See, if you give me a third of this water market, like the Coca Cola company has today, I’ll be right up there too, encouraging you to avoid the sins and contamination of water from your kitchen faucet and office water cooler. Why, some of those pipes have been delivering clean water for fifty years, so there’s no telling what germs and bacteria might be lurking in there waiting to attack your taste buds.

Historic quote from Will Rogers:

(Don’t read too much into this quote, at least the first half. It is a bit out of context, and Will was referring to the Japanese invasion of Manchuria…)

“I am a peace man. I haven’t got any use for wars and there is no more humor in ’em than there is reason for ’em.” DT 1674, Dec. 4, 1931