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Last week's NewsNews article for the week of 10/23/08. Kansas City Attempts To Exploit Internal Kill Zone By Grey Events When people think of Kansas they think of tornadoes, gingham dresses, little dogs, low cost transportation to other lands, and the occasional orphaned super powered child with a taste for primary colours. The reality these days is something a little grimmer in Kansas City, with the number of murders climbing every year since President Bush’s disastrous “Toys for guns” program and “Crack for shoelaces” initiatives (reportedly launched as a part of a bungled communiqué within the White House) – a failure so massive that it was only overshadowed by a massive failure in conjunction with a natural disaster, Hurricane Katrina and Madonna posing for another round of nude photographs. Social programs, crackdowns, afterschool specials and free brownies have all failed, with local officials and residents admitting that the increased violence has more than one cause. Poor education, unemployment, easy guns, and overexposure to Jerry Springer reruns resulting in a sense of being lost in time and hounded by the same problems are just the main, easily identifiable causes. So what is a poor town supposed to do? Exploit it for money, of course. In these trying economic times there isn’t much any city official would pass up to make a fast buck. So by not spending money on the murder problem and using murder to make money the Kansas City officials are killing two financial birds with one stone. While most of the murders happen in typical fashion, the majority of victims know their attackers, there are those who make practice runs at killing, usually picking off someone who looks like an outsider to the neighbourhood. Consequently Kansas City is marketing itself as the perfect place to leave the mother in law. Kansas City is also negotiating with Texas and other states with the death penalty on working out an exchange program that sees condemned prisoners released on the streets wearing a shirt painted with a bull’s eye. The ultimate in last chances if the prisoner makes it to the nearest safe suburb their sentence is reduced to life. Human Rights Activists have called this cruel and inhumane. There is no guarantee that a shot to the torso will be an instant kill, thus a bull’s eye should be tattooed to the forehead. Nationally there is great unease with the plan. In fellow Kansas bound city Topeka the general mood is one of disappointment, and the belief that “this sort of thing should be happening in New York. Do they want to extend their boundaries to Kansas City?” Internationally there has been mixed reaction. Brazil is outraged as this was originally their idea for Rio and are fuming that they are not getting any original credit, while France is intrigued, since French killing French went out of style just last winter. Amid the storm of criticism Kansas City officials stand firm in their decision to let failing demographics serve an economic purpose, pointing out this is not the most despicable thing ever done by US officials for money. Which, since the start of public funding for American Idol when the stock market crash threatened to end that show, is now true. |
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