Griper News: Dept. of Homeland Security has Nothing Better to do but Confiscate Grandma's Fosomax

On the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on 9/11/01, the President addressed the nation. He basically repeated the election year spew; this is WWII, terrorists are the fascists, and if democrats are elected, we'll all be speaking german. Within that taxpayer funded campaign ad for the GOP was this:

In the first days after the 9/11 attacks I promised to use every element of national power to fight the terrorists, wherever we find them. One of the strongest weapons in our arsenal is the power of freedom. The terrorists fear freedom as much as they do our firepower. They are thrown into panic at the sight of an old man pulling the election lever, girls enrolling in schools, or families worshiping God in their own traditions.

Sounds like a weird phobia to me, but if there are people who are terrified of going outside, we'll accept for the moment that Osama Bin Laden gets night sweats thinking about old guys voting under his bed.

If elderly voters are one of the strongest weapons in our arsenal of freedom, why are we treating them like terrorists? Dave Zweifel, editor of Madison, WI's The Capital Times had this to say yesterday:

A story in this month's edition of the AARP Bulletin provides yet another example of how the current administration in Washington does the bidding of special interests at the expense of the American citizen.

For more than a year now, the article points out, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has been confiscating packages of prescription drugs ordered by American citizens most of them elderly from drugstores in Canada.

It uses the example of Nancy Popkin of Salem, Mass., who was one of an estimated 39,000 American citizens to have their drug orders seized under the pretense that they represent a security threat.

Popkin had been buying the drug Fosamax, an osteoporosis medication, by mail from a source in Canada for the past couple of years. The cost for a three-month supply via Canada was $110, compared to a $76 charge for one month of the drug here at home.

She was waiting for her latest package this spring when instead came a notice from Homeland Security that she was violating federal law. The warning letter said she had the option of "voluntarily abandoning" the drugs or asking the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to determine if they "should be refused admission into the United States."