Warning, Mountain People! Be Suspicious of This App!

(Is it odd that KY Homeland Security has an armed citizen for its logo?)

While browsing through online news, I discovered that the Kentucky Office of Homeland Security has developed and released an iPhone App that allows people to send the state Homeland Security Office tips and leads on any suspicious behavior that may be linked to any terrorist activity. These tips and leads can be made anonymously, if so desired. 

(The App)

“Instead of having to wait until they got home to the desktop computer or laptop computer in accessing our website and then linking to the reporting portal, they could bring up that app on their iPhone and basically enter the same information while they’re standing there watching the activity or looking at whatever it is they might see,” said Shelby Lawson, the KOHS’ deputy executive director of operations and prevention.

While this is all very fine and good, and probably very useful in the more urban areas of Louisville, Lexington, and Northern Kentucky, I have to wonder what behavior in mountain towns such as Hyden, Hazard, Harlan, and Manchester would be deemed terroristically criminal?  I smell trouble a-brewin'.

(Could be seen on streets of Hyden anytime)







Certainly, seeing a grown man wearing camouflage, a baseball hat, and sunglasses with a rifle hanging over his shoulder riding a four-wheeled ATV and an unmarked cooler strapped on the back cruising down Main Street in Hyden is not an usual sight.  It is probably Billy Bob or Bobby Dean just heading home from one of the trails or possibly going to the IGA grocery store for his wife, Bertha Mae.  With this new iPhone App, some city slicker who is visiting our fair town may be frightened and feel threatened.  Little does he know that the rifle is probably not loaded and that cooler is just so Billy Bob/Bobby Dean can get his milk and New York strip steaks (they are on sale this week) home safely from the IGA home to Bertha Mae.  But now, this visitor can use his App to take a photo and send the information on the Homeland Security Office.  The next thing Billy Bob/Bobby Dean knows, a SWAT team surrounds his trailer, confiscates his four-wheeler, and hauls him off to be water-boarded, leaving stunned Bertha Mae standing at the grill with two New York strip steaks frying.

(Billy Bob/Bobby Dean and Bertha Mae.  Poor Bertha Mae.)

(Harmless or Terrorists?)

In front of the Leslie County courthouse, on the corner of Main Street and River Road a group of men can often be found sitting on the benches each evening.  Most of the time, some storytelling and gossiping is all that goes on, but occasionally, the talk may turn to pistols or knives.  When this happens, they all pull out whatever weapon they have either in their pocket or under the seat in their truck.  They brag and go on and on about each particular weapon of destruction, as proud as they were when they had their first child.  Now, suppose during that very moment, a woman from Louisville is driving through Hyden and looks over at the men.  In her eyes, she sees a rogue militia, gathering their weapons and getting ready to storm the courthouse.  With this new App, all it takes is a punch and a click for her to report what she has seen to Homeland Security.  The end result is that 4 deacons of the Baptist church, 2 Elders from the Presbyterian church,  3 Pentecostals, and 9 Masons are hauled off to Guantanamo for suspicion of terrorism.

(Hyden, no place for terrorists!)

If this iPhone App prevents actual terrorists from blowing up the Humana building in Louisville, or attacking a school or university in Kentucky, then it will be well worth it.  Until then, my mountain people, I leave you with a quote from President Franklin D. Roosevelt: "So let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself."

Truer words never said.