The Toy Robot that Brought Denver to it's Knees!

Let’s face it there are times when the War on Terror on the domestic front here in the United States reaches a level of absurdity as to be almost comical.

It probably would be laughable at times if it weren’t for the frustrating inconveniences and sometimes stinging indignities Americans suffer as the brave men and women of Homeland Security, the TSA and Federal and Local Law Enforcement wage there ever vigilant, and sometimes very harrowing war on the would be “Evil Doer’s” of the world!

It’s easy for us to make light of villains like the “Underwear Bomber” and “Shoe Bomber” until you become the brave man or woman in uniform that has to face down this…

The Toy Robot!

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/5f1a41d1c504.jpg[/atsimg]

This 8 inch toy robot was so assured and committed to carrying out a terrorizing act on innocent and hapless Americans he unflinchingly and brazenly stared down the police without fear as the Police sealed off a hundred square yard area in downtown Denver on the 1st of December this week, as they bravely assessed the threat and patiently waited for the robot’s demands!

Traffic was detoured and snarled and pedestrians denied access to local businesses and homes as the area was cordoned off in one of those “Interventions” by Homeland Security ‘you never hear about’.

"Are you serious?" asked Denver resident Justin Kent, 26, when police stopped him from proceeding down 20th Street. Kent said that he lived just past the closed area, but was told he would have to go around via Park Avenue.

"I can't believe it. This is ridiculous," said Kent.

www.denverpost.com...

The Patriot Act

Kent is obviously not a good patriotic, decent God fearing American and is likely a “Domestic Extremist” or possibly an “Internet Conspiracy Theorist” or some other kind of malcontent, who just can’t recognize the seriousness and potential danger of a 8 inch plastic toy robot prowling the streets of Any Town USA.

Meanwhile people who understand what the Patriot Act is really all about, drinking your self into a near state of stupefaction as to achieve the drunken mindset of the bureaucrats, law enforcement personnel and politicians waging it did what good patriots do!

Some pedestrians, unable to reach their vehicles at a lot adjacent to the robot, decided to wait it out at a bar on 20th Street, asking uniformed officers to let them know when the road reopened.

Naturally they took real interest then and pride as they inebriated themselves with the confidence that not only would ‘our side’ be able to eventually outsmart the toy robot, but that the police would be too busy congratulating one another as their adrenalin rushes subsided in the haughty aftermath of victory to hand out DUI Tickets.

They were not disappointed, for it only took an hour or so until…

Robot v Robot!

A bomb squad robot was sent it to examine the troublesome robot before a bomb squad officer, dressed in heavy protective gear, took a turn.

Our robot met ‘their’ robot and terrified it with its sophisticated surveying and analytical abilities and superior range of movements!

Yet evidently its refracting remote control powerful video lens spotted the one thing every man and woman in blue that dramatic day was secretly fearing, a “Made in China” engraving!

Knowing then that while the toy robot had no explosives the plot finally was clear, it meant to do harm with its cheap easily separable parts that could present a choking hazard to the Officers if swallowed, no doubt replete with toxic glues and paints that could result in a harrowing frantic cross town trip to the Poison Control Center.

So naturally the brave Bomb Control Officer who evidently drew the short straw for this potential suicide mission in protecting the ‘Homeland’ dressed to the nines in protective gear and before making the Sign of the Cross to confront the plastic beast asked him self “What the Duke would have done”.

Sadly he lamented he could not go join the stranded commuters and pedestrians in the bar and bravely sauntered up to the toy robot where he was pretty darn sure it looked like a toy robot!

The Villian Meets it's Fate

What to do, what to do, what to do?

Then the answer dawned on all those brave men and women assembled to face down this most villainous and malignant of children’s toys…if it would not blow itself up in true terrorist fashion then they would blow it up!

Murray said that the bomb squad couldn't be sure if the robot was safe or not, and so remotely detonated it at about 5:30 p.m. to "render it safe." The robot exploded into several chunks.

There are a million stories that go unsung in the heart of the naked city, but this one was just too important to let the story go untold, when the victorious officer was asked to sum up his uncommon bravery and valor that dark December day as the War on Terror came to Denver he replied…

“There was really nothing to it”

The good men and women at the bar cheered and as they piled out they too realized that when it comes to the War on Terror there is really nothing to it!

This goes in the hall of fame with the Adult Swim ads in Boston and the baking flour in New Haven.

These overreactions are making it easier and easier to commit crimes.

While every agency in the tri-state area surrounds toys, blink signs and cake ingredients you're pretty much free to waltz into any building across town and blow yourself up or slam a tanker truck full of industrial chemicals into a populated area.

All of these "security" measures are making us less secure by the hour.

Wowzers!!!

I hope we arent in any risk of robot attack, here in the deep south!!!

He just looked like he was up to no good. That dastardly robot!

Great article...i live in denver and i didnt even hear anything about this. definatly worth a S&F to point out how "special" some of our terrorism threats are.

Hahaha this is awesome. S+F. Odd that they're not covering it on the TV news in Colorado. Too embarrassed maybe. It's actually kind of disturbing that people's response was to ignore it and start drinking early. Alcohol works better than fluoridated water.

Come to think of it this would be a great way to bleed the beast.

Just leave toys and cheap bags all over the place. At building entrances, bus stops, train stations, airport terminals.

Dont dress them up with wires or labels or do anything that would permit them to accuse you of attempting to create a scare. Just forget your Spiderman backpack from Walmart against a bench.

Millions of dollars and thousands of hours right down the drain.

Bleed them dry with their own stupidity.

reply to post by ProtoplasmicTraveler


don't know if this makes me feel safe or not?? any one know did they have to raise threat level to red ? ...... thanks for the funny story !!!

1) This thread is awesome and better than some Hollywood movies I've seen. Epic tale, sweeping, grandiose! I laughed, I cried, I shook my tiny fist at the robot!

2) Flag and star for the wonderful narrator of this thread. It was like I WAS ACTUALLY THERE! But of course I was not...too dangerous.

3) This is why they didn't let Droids in the cantina (Mos Eisley) in Star Wars.

MM

reply to post by thisguyrighthere


The sad thing is that there was probably some 8 year old kid who left it there watching the six o'clock news that night, saying "Mommie, Mommie they blew up my robot!"

This is the insane level of fear the media and Homeland Security have drummed up with all these stories of Home Grown Terrorists that are usually just recruits of the FBI and it's unscrupulosu informants.

It might be costing the beast money, but sadly it just makes the whole premise seem more real than it actually is to civilians and law enforcement alike.

Pretty soon you won't be able to walk down the streets with a child carrying a toy!

Originally posted by Mr Mask
1) This thread is awesome and better than some Hollywood movies I've seen. Epic tale, sweeping, grandiose! I laughed, I cried, I shook my tiny fist at the robot!

2) Flag and star for the wonderful narrator of this thread. It was like I WAS ACTUALLY THERE! But of course I was not...too dangerous.

3) This is why they didn't let Droids in the cantina (Mos Eisley) in Star Wars.

MM

I felt what ATS is really lacking at times is a Dave Barry style approach to some of this madness!

I don't think the average American is actually goint to get 'it' until they realize just how absurd and commical some of this stuff is.

What 25 years ago would have been turned into the lost and found, now results in a major police operation whose end result is blowing up a harmless child's toy where it stands.

Thanks for posting.

Originally posted by InertiaZero
Wowzers!!!

I hope we arent in any risk of robot attack, here in the deep south!!!

He just looked like he was up to no good. That dastardly robot!

I think this story illustrates we should all be afraid, very afraid.

Hopefully even though it might lead to World War III, the Department of Defense and the President will have the good sense to bomb the factory that made these insidious robots!

Thanks for posting.

Well, you gotta remember that the SWAT teams, TSA, FBI, Police, special agents, EOD personnel, snipers/countersnipers, etc. gotta make it look good for the press and the taxpaying public and for their wives/girlfriends/boyfriends in order to live up to that "tough guy, roootin' tootin' shootin' hero stuff that they are paid richly for by your and my taxpayer dollars.

You gotta have some time to put on the 5000$ worth of weapons and personal protective gear, use the snazzy communications stuff, jump like Bruce Willis into the 250000$ special operations van, race with siren blaring and lights flashing and tires screaching, pumped up with heroic self-righteousness and vein self-importance, and live up to the action movies we were weaned on, to save the barely capable public that haven't had the training and are incapable of having the expertise we have, coordinating with each other, giving orders, cordoning off large pieces of private property to keep the sheeple safe from the most dire of terroristic threats, doing interviews, taking questions, basking in the warm loving public glow of the GE kleig lights at press conferences, delicately selecting, editing, classifying and sharing bits of or heroism with the blonde newsgirl who's upper lip glistens with dewy hopefulness as she thinks of headlining the evening news with OUR pictures and video of us taking charge, breasts heaving as she looks into "the safety zone" at US pointing, looking through 2000$ binoculars, assessing the danger of the situation and developing the best angle for enfilade with our custom made german submachine guns, then after we have taken charge and eliminated the threat and launched intel investigations into motives of the conquered enemy, bonding together as only men can bond, doing things that men do, so when we go back to our brand new 30 million dollar law enforcement and emergency response center and start shedding our gear and weapons in the locker room, we can look at each others' glistening naked bodies and feel like real, beefy, rigid, proud MEN!!!!

reply to post by MMPI2


Kinf of reminds me of one day out on the Golf Course of Whiting Naval Airforce Base when a landscaper decided to use a back hoe to dig a hole for a sapling to be planted and severed the Dopler Radar Lines burried in the ground shutting down air traffic for hours.

"Little Boys and Their Toys"

Thanks for posting.

reply to post by ProtoplasmicTraveler


Funny, but...did Dave Barry write that?

I felt what ATS is really lacking at times is a Dave Barry style approach to some of this madness!

I thought he lives in Miami? (Plenty of fodder there, for comedy, to be sure....)

Anyway, I expect that Dave Barry knows the difference (and usage) of its versus it's??

Sorry, pet peeve. Still, doesn't diminish the point of the story (nor the hilarity)...and the ironic tragi-comedy nature of it....

BTW: Simple link---garyes.stormloader.com...

If that 'device' had contained anthrax, this charade could have resulted in a whole block being contaminated.

They didn't test it for anthrax - how could the cops be so sure they weren't about to contaminate an area with anthrax. The terrists use high-grade weaponized anthrax like the kind the US makes - we all know this.

reply to post by Exuberant1


"IF"!!??

If that 'device' had contained anthrax...

My, my.....where the mind will sometimes take one....

...really, you could put "anthrax" into ANY benign 'container'....millions of options!!! Discarded coffee cup, for example.

Sheesh! Over-complicated, it is becoming......

Originally posted by weedwhacker
reply to post by ProtoplasmicTraveler

 

Funny, but...did Dave Barry write that?

I felt what ATS is really lacking at times is a Dave Barry style approach to some of this madness!

I thought he lives in Miami? (Plenty of fodder there, for comedy, to be sure....)

Anyway, I expect that Dave Barry knows the difference (and usage) of its versus it's??

Sorry, pet peeve. Still, doesn't diminish the point of the story (nor the hilarity)...and the ironic tragi-comedy nature of it....

BTW: Simple link---garyes.stormloader.com...

Are you kidding? Trying to get Dave to write a new column is like trying to get Led Zeppelin back together again.

This is all proto, except for the stuff in the external text quotes!

I am a big fan of Dave Barry though, and I think this is pretty much how he would have summed up the story.

Coincidentally I live in Miami too, it's the tropical sunshine that bakes your brain to this semi-vegetative state!

reply to post by ProtoplasmicTraveler


All Proto?? Well, then applause!!!! And, a bow.

Now...since Mr. Barry is retired, and a ten-yard-long crowbar won't coax him in the direction of his word processor (and away from his band), seems there is a void that could use some filling.....

Originally posted by weedwhacker
reply to post by ProtoplasmicTraveler

 

All Proto??

Well, then applause!!!! And, a bow.

Now...since Mr. Barry is retired, and a ten-yard-long crowbar won't coax him in the direction of his word processor (and away from his band), seems there is a void that could use some filling.....

He still does a column every now and then for big events. Personally I have always thought Carl Hiassan is funnier as evidenced by his books "Stormy Weather" and "Strip Teaze" but the Herald actually has him doing 'serious' political commentaries instead of humor.

Politics.

I think if Dave ever does retire, they will move Carl over into that slot!

It would of been more interesting if the robot was remote controlled and made demands. It seemmed harmless enough to me, but who knows. Maybe the robot could of had inside a micro switch to detonate high exsplosives by remote control. You know, 8 inch high fake robot, filled with c-4 could do some damage. Who knows. People are getting very inventive these days. This only proves what people can invent to create a problem for our officers on duty. PEACE.