{"id":37966,"date":"2013-08-21T12:09:20","date_gmt":"2013-08-21T17:09:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=37966"},"modified":"2013-08-21T12:09:29","modified_gmt":"2013-08-21T17:09:29","slug":"never-waste-a-crisis-mate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=37966","title":{"rendered":"Never Waste A Crisis, Mate"},"content":{"rendered":"

For better or worse – and I think it’s largely “better” – I’ve tried to keep a high level of cultural literacy, not only about the US but around the world.\u00a0 At most, I’m a jack of many cultural trades, and goodness knows a master of none, but I do try.\u00a0<\/p>\n

One positive upshot is that I know – again, for better or worse – that different cultures see things differently than we do, sometimes for reasons that may baffle us, but that make perfect sense to them for reasons that, again, baffle us.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Downside?\u00a0 You find out that many foreigners are just as stupid as many Americans are.<\/p>\n

Earlier this week Chris Lane, an Australian baseball player going to college in Oklahoma was murdered by a couple of teenagers<\/a>; the teenagers were reputedly bored and looking for something to do, and murdering Lane apparently scratched that itch for them.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And in a burst of non-sequitur <\/em>worthy of Heather Martens or Jim\u00a0Backstrom, Tim Fischer – a former Austrialian\u00a0deputy Prime Minister and a prime mover in the disarmament of Australians during their spasm of gun control in the nineties – has urged a boycott of the US by Ozzy tourists:\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Tourists thinking of going to the USA should think twice,” Fischer said.<\/p>\n

“This is the bitter harvest and legacy of the policies of the NRA that even blocked background checks for people buying guns at gunshows.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Fischer is toking from the same bong that Jim Backstrom and Heather Martens are bogarting:<\/p>\n