Web Opinion by Todd Beezley

Teddy Bear APB

(Note: Due to technical difficulties, today's column will not appear in an audio version.  We hope to resume our regular format, early next week.  We regret any inconvenience that may result.  Thank you, TB)

Calling all cars. Calling all cars. Be on the lookout for a white, plush, stuffed Valentine’s bear. 20 inches tall. Goes by the name of Teddy. Wearing a small red heart."

Honest-to-goodness. The FBI is now concerned about "terror bears."

The story that follows is clearly more suited to Halloween than Valentine’s Day but remains too important to be ignored.

It seems someone with apparent Middle Eastern features purchased nine of the cuddly perpetrators at a California Wal-Mart store, last month. Eyebrows might never have been raised had he not added 14 propane gas cannisters and 12 packets of BB’s to his shopping cart.

I don’t want anyone to accuse me of planting ideas in anyone’s head, so I won’t begin to describe how gas cannisters and BB’s could add a powerful punch to the "PLO" teddies.

Perhaps there is a totally innocent explanation for such a purchase. The consumer in question may have been planning to take his 9-year-old son "bear hunting," and just wanted to practice with a few stationary targets.

Sure.

Then again, perhaps two plus two does equal four and someone intends to hand out the suicidal souvenirs at the Olympic games in Salt Lake City. Or perhaps the plan is sending them onto a jet airplane in the arms of some cute, unsuspecting toddler, whose Mom couldn’t resist the idea of a friendly stranger "bearing" unexpected gifts.

Maybe, just maybe, these media alerts might be able to prevent something awful from happening to our kids.

Let’s remember where we’ve seen this tactic, last. In the 1980’s, the Russians were famous for dropping toys laced with explosives across the Afghan landscape. Local children unfortunate enough to find them were often left maimed or crippled for life.

So, there is an international precedent for this practice in our lifetimes. We’ve just never had to face such evil here at home.

If there is fire to accompany this smoke and terrorists have now taken to booby trapping stuffed animals, it appears more than girders of twisted metal and their inhabitants were crushed by the undeclared war that struck America last September 11^th.

The most recent American victim just might be "innocence."

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