Amber Alert is Law of the Land
While Congress is often derided as a talking shop of windbags and egomaniacs, they got something done this week, which Mr. Bush wisely signed into law. The "Amber Alert" system is now nationwide. In a country that can't seem to keep up with its children, this may save a life or two. The sad part is that is has become necessary.
America is a highly transient and mobile nation. People move around all the time, and so the traditional vigilance adults have over children, not just there own but all kids, is thereby weakened. Still, it is mind-numbing to think there are thousands of children who are not sleeping in their own beds each night. Some have been kidnapped, others murdered, some have runaway.
The Amber Alert, named after a young murder victim, will alert people, through street signs and other means, to keep an eye out for a specific, recently vanished kid. Critics say over time people will become de-sensitized, and they have a point -- what kid's face is on the milk carton, anyone recall?
Yet in those states where it has been instituted already, children have been re-united with their families. Making the system national only makes sense. And the cost? Millions rather than billions. More was spent on cluster bombs that did not explode in Iraq, but that is a different children's issue for a different time.