matthearn.com

Someday, I’d like someone to explain to me why it is that Americans think they have a right to never be scared by anything. Over the last few weeks, Gilbert Arenas has been waving guns around, and a guy tried to blow up an airplane with his crotch, and suddenly everyone’s losing their minds.

Arenas will probably do serious jail time, and may never play in the NBA again, despite the fact that nobody actually got shot. A couple of schmucks waved guns around, and because they’re black, the white establishment thinks “Boyz n the Hood” and drops the guillotine. To put things in perspective: Gilbert Arenas may end up in jail longer, for a victimless crime, than Michael Vick was for murdering dogs. (My feelings on Vick’s rehabilitation can be found here.) He may get an suspension from the NBA that’s longer than Ron Artest got for charging into the stands and beating up the wrong fan. I’m not saying that Agent Zero shouldn’t get disciplined; at the very least, he’s demonstrated that he can’t be trusted with firearms. So take them away, suspend him for a while, fine him, whatever. But let’s not take away his freedom and livelihood for merely frightening David Stern.

Along the same lines, in response to one idiot lighting his dick on fire, the TSA is enacting restrictions that make flying about as enjoyable as prison rape, and don’t do a damn thing about making flying any safer, and just makes folks drive long distances instead of flying them. Don’t get me wrong, I like a good road trip, but you’re more likely to die by driving from Chicago to New York than by flying. (Folks like to throw statistics around that say that, in 2006 for example, only 655 people died in airplane accidents and 45,316 died in car crashes, but that ignores the fact that the average American drives, what, a hundred times as many hours as he flies? So for each hour, I’d say the odds of dying in a plane crash are about the same as in a car crash. It’s certainly not the 2 orders of magnitude difference that flying enthusiasts say. The problem is that driving a given distance takes roughly 10 times as long as flying it, so for a given trip, it is an order of magnitude difference.) The problem is that news reports about brown bearded men trying to blow up planes scares people, and driving around in a 3 ton SUV makes them feel in control. So thanks, TSA, for killing Americans. You’re doing a bang-up job.

Dear America: you need to make a decision about whether you want to feel safe, or be safe. Locking someone up for a victimless crime (be it drug use, or “being stupid with a gun”) does not make you safer; every time you put someone in jail, he becomes far more likely to be a violent criminal than he was when he went in. So congratulations: you turned someone from “moron” to “mugger.” Just take his guns away, put him on probation, help him stop being an idiot. TSA: the odds of me blowing up the plane with my iPhone are remarkably low. How about we just agree that I can use it anytime I want, and I’ll promise to not pack C4 into my scrotum? Awesome. Citizens: sometimes scary stuff happens. How about you stop being such wusses?