The people wearing jackets with FBI and ATF on them, the ones who supplemented the admirable Boston and Massachusetts officers, are part of top-heavy federal government?
The brainy public officials, current or retired, who went on television, glowing with expertise and assurance, are a drain on our tax dollars?
The men and women driving off into the Boston night, to the sounds of applause and cheers from the crowds lining the roads, are the ones who are going to come and take guns away from the so-called good guys?
The 50 states could all put up web sites like the FBI's, with its photos of the two suspects?
Amen George, or the secular equivalent.
GV - I love the work of Douglas Adams, the since-departed creator of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," because every paradox of human life is explained to some degree in his narrative. In this case, we are introduced to the glowing prerecorded face of Slartibartfarst, warning us that our continued approach to a seemingly lifeless planet is about to be halted by a pair of nuclear-tipped missiles. It turned out that both the missiles and Slartibartfarst were real enough, but only representations of their true meaning.
What you have described above, George, is the perception of greatness, the afterglow of a dying society. I watched those talking heads on television, both current and former civil servants, and was left a bit less impressed than you by them. The criminal investigators, local, state and federal, invested an enormous amount of capital, human and otherwise, to track down a couple of knuckleheads, only to kill the brains of the outfit and lucky not to have had the other bleed to death prior to capture - not impressed there, either. The lesser souls were, as always, the greater heroes; the doctors and nurses and passers-by who lent immediate aid to the stricken. Those weren't people on the government payroll. Those were just people. We should come, at this point in our lives, to bury Caesar, not praise him. He is only made to appear alive as he lay there, George. He is dead, as sure as we all will be some day, despite his glowing image on our screens warning us not to approach any closer.
I think we owe it to each other to "man" the barrier.