Under the Wire

It would be the world’s biggest understatement to say we are concerned about terrorism in our Country. Since 9/11, no corner of America has been immune to the fear terrorists have brought to our home soil. Our politicians have stood up and said, “Don’t worry we will protect you.” Personally, I find having that group protect me is a little scary all by itself. Normally I feel the need to be protected from them!

Rural folks are generally unaccustomed to being taken care of by someone else. We are a resourceful little group who have learned at an early age if you want something done properly, you must do it yourself. We can fix our pickups, repair saddles, invent machinery that best suits our needs, even do a certain amount of our own doctoring. Based on our acknowledged resourcefulness, I think it is time we took on this terrorist threat ourselves. Let the politicians protect us with various colored alerts. I can just hear two terrorists complaining, “Darn, we can’t blow up anything today, they have a red alert out all week.” This might keep the folks in Denver from burning their fireplaces, but how scary can it be to a guy wearing nitroglycerin underwear?

Terrorists need money to conduct their activities. I’m not sure about the going rate to get a fellow to blow up himself, his car and everything around him, but we all know these things must cost big bucks. Old Saddam wasn’t hoarding those millions just to make a payment on his Mastercard, I’ll bet. This money, I’ve read comes from all sorts of places from oil sales to investment revenue. I heard old Benny Ladin once invested in our own stock market. That’s when I got my idea for ending terrorism once and for all. Let’s get Benny and his buddies in the livestock business!

It should be easy to get the Ladin Ranch up and going. We’ll just sell Benny some cows, then sit back. It’s a natural since we’ve all seen pictures of Benny riding around on a horse. I couldn’t tell if he had a good dally horn on his saddle though, what with those baggy pajamas and that long greasy beard he wears. If not, we’ll sell him one since he’ll need it to catch the bovines we’ll inject into him!

He is going to need something better to ride than that sorry old plug he usually rides. I know a couple of horse traders who could have him drooling over a few new mounts. He’d become a steady customer, too, since these guys would be palming off every navicular damaged, sore backed, cribbing ex- saddle bronc in the United States.

While these guys were busy reducing Ben’s funds at a near record pace, the cow traders would be hard at work, too. The Benny L Ranch would soon be stocked with every late calving, fence crawling reject from Montana to Florida. Even if Benny got wise and required a preg check and bangs test before they shipped, I figure we could still accomplish our mission. He could learn about drought, BSE, Bangs and TB. His lessons would involve less traumatic but also significant facts of life such as the Big Three Packers, feedlot yardage, rising and falling futures contracts and BLM grazing permits. Benny could experience $40 swings in the fed cattle market, EPA regulations and $45,000 dually pickups to haul his $35 horses around with.

I figure in about two years without really trying at all, we could have all those terrorist dollars gone.

Now for the really good part. You and I deal with these things daily. We take the bumps and move on. Old Benny and his bunch, however, lacking any sort of character or moral fiber won’t be able to deal with it all. Not only will they no longer have any money to finance their horrible plans, but the stress brought on by daily life as we know and accept it will make them jump off the nearest cliff. It’s a win-win situation.

By the way, is there a chance I could have that poor old pony Benny L rides? I know a Texan witch doctor who might be able to put him back in team roping shape.