Casual Comments by Glen E. Hargis

Founded 1934 by John C. Leslie (1900-1975)

Glen E. Hargis

Editor

Carol J. Leslie Hargis

Advertising Manager

John H. Leslie Production and Classified Advertising Manager

Where There’s Smoke …

On the 49th day of 2010, a profoundly stupid practice reared its hideous visage. Other than National Crab Stuffed Flounder Day, Feb. 18 doesn’t have a lot going for it. So if the Darwin Award has no official holiday, I’m all for putting in this day for the honor.

Mrs. John C. Leslie (1912-2004) Publisher Emeritus

It was then that some student, smoking in a boy’s upstairs bathroom of W.W. Samuell High School in far east Dallas, chucked a smoldering cigarette into the trash bin. In such a fuel-rich environment it did considerably more than smolder. Soon smoke began to waft alarmingly through the building.

John C. Cross, Esq.

Publisher (Boston)

© Standard Publishing Corporation 2010 (ISSN 0020-4803)

For the nonce, let us not concern ourselves with the folly of self-poisoning habits or that of taking a cavalier attitude toward combustibility. Rather, let’s focus on what happened when a number of Spartan students and teachers hit the back door in an escape attempt.

It had been chained shut. That’s CHAINED SHUT!

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School administrators explained that door chaining was a security move designed to protect students from weapons smuggled in from the outside. Local media pointed out that this made the school a potential firetrap. Deathtrap would be more apt a term, since no fire was required. Only a desire to leave would be enough. With a sufficient number of trap-ees pressing toward the chained door, many could die against the barricade or trampled underfoot.

Fortunately, everyone survived this time. But next time — who knows?

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Considering all the cell phones around these days, maybe it’d be a good idea for us all to call 911 for the fire department and notify the authorities every time we encounter a locked or blocked exit in any public venue. Sure, it would be tedious, and the people called might well grow weary of it. But maybe, just maybe, those responsible (or irresponsible) for threatening all our lives would tire of all the official attention and the fines.

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It is to be hoped.

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Is The Fix In?

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Those delusional enough to claim that healthcare business-as-usual is in “fine whack,” to use the original 18th century term, will be forced to support their contentions in the public arena. Failing that, they’ll have to come up with fixes for the sputtering status quo. Some observers of Le Cirque Politique find irony in partisans who style themselves as paladins of the right-to-life crusade but who have little passion for keeping the rest of us alive once we start walking about.

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Will the faint stirrings of bipartisanship return from the dead? Will the more odious elements of healthcare reform make the cut? Will the specter of Simple Majority Rule stalk the Senate Chambers? We expect to know before the turn of the next century. — G.E.H.