In this column I pose questions and raise issues. I don't always agree with the conclusion, implied or stated. The purpose is to put a slightly different spin on each item and to promote discussion.

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• Were I a terrorist seeking to spread maximum chaos among the industrialized nations, I would breed deadly strains of avian influenza, and then loose infected fowl in Asia.
• Critics of electric cars as a clean and viable alternative to gasoline driven cars point out batteries produce lots of toxic chemicals. They're right. But there are numerous transitional technologies - some off the shelf, some in development - that would reduce both pollution and oil consumption with little if any compromise in our lifestyle. For example: More than 10 years ago, Unique Mobility proposed a design for a hybrid car that would outperform today's hybrids in every respect. And almost 20 years ago Mechanix Illustrated magazine introduced do-it-yourself plans for street legal hybrid cars that get more than 100 mpg. If we are willing to declare our independence from foreign oil, we can, and we can have fun doing it.
• Those who are closed to clarifying an issue with facts call reasons excuses.
• If we are to wean ourselves from oil or, setting our sights lower, if we are to simply wean ourselves of foreign oil, all it will take to make alternative sources and technologies more attractive to commercial development is for our government to stop subsidizing the low price of foreign oil. How do they subsidize the use of foreign oil? With military bases in the Middle East.
• The ultimate source of power is, as author Ayn Rand noted, the independent intellect. The only enduring means of harnessing that power is the collective will. Civilization is the point upon which the two balance. Move a culture too far in either direction, and it begins to slide toward chaos.
• Do employers who require applicants to be "fast learners" discriminate against people with learning disabilities?
• The job of the artist is, among other things, to color our dreams, while the purpose of a pundit is to add contrast to our dreams with the black and white of reality. There is a natural tension between the two which ought to include respect for the balance each provides the other. Too often, however, frustration converts this tension to contempt with each side shouting at the other, "Why can't you see!" But we need both: the pundit, to see what is, the artist, to see what might be.
• The engineers of today are the technicians of tomorrow.
• Recently on E!, a black entertainer said one purpose of rap music is to scare white people. Just keep pushing those fear buttons. Problem with that is, push an emotional button long enough and it stops working. That this is already happening to the "scare whitey" button is demonstrated by the growing contempt white adults feel for "gangstas," and the widespread assimilation of gangsta culture among white children.
• During its first few seasons, the fantasy series Xena catered to primarily male audiences and was played as a female version of the Hercules series. It wasn't until the new rage women took over that Xena was portrayed, for female audiences, as a caricature of bellicose hypermasculinity.
• We can, should and are asking what was John Walker thinking when he joined an organization to fight his own country. As we do, however, our inquiry will be incomplete if we do not also ask what we are doing to so disenfranchise our young men that some, such as Walker, are both willing and wanting to destroy us?
• If tolerance truly is the law, then it must also protect our right to laugh at whatever we find funny.
• On July 4, 2001, as I was driving to my parents' house in Olympia, I noticed a woman tailgating me. I got over, she followed, flipped me off, then pulled up beside me. A man in the car on the passenger side rolled down the window so he could spit on me, then they roared off, nearly running several other cars off the road in the process. I called the police with her license number. The police officer said the number didn't work and I must have gotten it wrong. When I persisted, he told me she was young (how would he know?) and I should forget it. In the larger scheme of things, this little brush with road rage is insignificant, but it points to a larger issue: in my experience and observation, the police in the capitol city of Washington state ignore road rage committed by young women.
• While throughout the world Muslims, Christians and Jews clash, in the west they live largely in harmony. Whatever faults our respective societies may suffer, other cultures can and should learn from our example.
• On the yelling shows, hosts ask their guests to explain why many Muslims in the Middle East hate America. Then, when the guest tries to answer, the host argues with them, shouting how irrational the reasons are. That's stupid. It's like shooting the messenger and serves only to provide the hosts with a stage upon which to puff and shout, like primates impressing themselves with flailing arms and flapping lips.
• Anybody who believes the media's portrayal of Islam as being comprised largely of American-hating Muslims should ask themselves if they really believe most American women support the National Organization for Women to the extent that same media says they do?
• Many Americans suffer from chronic snack pain.
• Bill O'Reilly says people get the government they deserve. Evidently, Mr. O'Reilly believes that, as a boy, George Washington deserved to be the subject of a British monarch, and that as a young man Nelson Mandela deserved to live under apartheit.
• Many Christians strive to prove Jesus is the "Savior," that theirs is the only path to salvation, and that unbelievers are damned. Now, Christians can believe whatever they want. Equalitarian kind of guy that I am, if they want to believe I'm damned for all eternity because I don't share their belief, that's cool. But those who strive to prove the rest of us are wrong must be ignorant of Hebrews 11, else they would save their shrill condemnation. Why? Because in Hebrews 11, Paul makes it very clear there is nothing to prove, nothing to fight over, because it's all about one thing: Faith.
• Innocent children get hurt in war. Sad but true. Another sad truth is that of those children who survive, some grow up hating the forces which harmed them. Such are easily recruited by the likes of Usama bin Laden.
• In 1994, 2 of my associates wanted to take control of The Backlash! so they could fill it with vulgar, misogynistic humor. Ironically, had they succeeded, this would probably be a major publication with a popular late night television show. Why? Because the pop feminist deterioration of femininity trashed male culture, too.
• Many women struggle with the question, "Am I a feminist?" It's a conundrum conjured with determined force by the folks at misandry central, who insist they stand for equality for all while making tight lipped demands that benefit women only. What they won't admit, and what women and men need to know, is that if you support gender equality, racial equality, equal rights, equal opportunities and all those good things, then you're neither a feminist nor a masculinist, but an equalitarian.
• Pundits shout down those who voice concerns over the secret military tribunals by saying terrorists have no rights. While they may be right, when did all foreign men of middle eastern descent suddenly transform into terrorists? Was that on the same day we discovered "all men are rapists"?