William Shatner, long since departed from the deck of the Starship Enterprise but wonderfully re-recreated in Boston Legal, now has a new role. He fronts a series of TV3 called ‘Weird – or what?’ We could send him some contenders for the programme like these from a range of sources quoted in that great site, www.alternet.org.
- Gun sales increased after the Tucson rampage which left six dead and local congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords critically injured. One-day sales of handguns in Arizona jumped 60 percent to 263 on Jan.10 compared with 164 the corresponding Monday a year ago, the second-biggest increase of any state in the country, according to FBI data. Sales increased nationally about 5 percent, to 7,906 guns.
- From 2008 to 2009 the number of conspiracist and antigovernment Patriot groups soared from 149 to 512 and the number of militias from 42 to 127.’The number of extremist groups in the United States exploded in 2009 as militias and other groups steeped in wild, antigovernment conspiracy theories exploited populist anger across the country and infiltrated the mainstream’, according to a report issued today by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).
- The FBI logged a 53 percent rise in hate crimes against Hispanics from 2003 to 2009 from 42 to 127.
- Long before this weapons dealers in much of the United States were reporting sharply higher sales since Barack Obama won the presidency According to FBI figures for the week of November 3 to 9, the bureau received more than 374,000 requests for background checks on gun purchasers - a nearly 49 percent increase over the same period in 2007. (CNN)
- Since Mr Obama took office, the rate of threats against the President has increased 400 per cent from the 3,000 a year or so under President George W. Bush, according to Ronald Kessler, author of In the President's Secret Service. (Daily Telegraph).
- The Daily Kos reports this week that President Obama's job approval is no longer in the red.
As Shatner says in his programme - "Is that weird – or what?" |
