Get ready for some Raccoon City shit

Back at the beginning of the summer, Time had an article about Hardin, Montana, and its quest to transform itself into the next Guantanamo Bay. Hardin, recognizing that all those freedom-hating terrorists and very unlucky Uighurs were going to need a new place to go when the fiesta ended in Cuba, lobbied to become that new place and soak up whatever federal funds would come with them. They even had an empty prison, the Two Rivers Detention Facility, all ready to go. While the political argument at the time was the usual not-in-my-backyard nonsense, it seemed like a novel way to kill two birds with one stone and that was the last I heard of it.

... Until today. In one of the creepiest possible turns, the Two Rivers Detention Facility was instead purchased by a company calling itself American Police Force. Here's the good stuff:

A shadowy private security company that has no known clients but claims to have helped foreign governments combat terrorism and will protect anything from cruise ships to Pakistani convoys has taken over a jail in a small Montana town, with plans to build a law enforcement training facility on the property.

The state legislature is looking into the matter and residents of Hardin, MT, were alarmed last week when executives from the firm, American Police Force, showed up in the town, which does not have its own police department, with Mercedes SUVs bearing "City Of Hardin Police Department" decals.

And the town has had to tamp down reports on conspiracy Web sites that APF plans to impose experimental H1N1 vaccines on residents under threat of quarantine in the jail.

And if you're wondering about the coat of arms, it belongs to one Aleksandar Pavlov Karageorgevich, a Serbian prince, whose facebook page helpfully points out that "On 17 February 2008, Alexander issued a statement condemning the declaration of independence by Kosovo."

Anyway, who knows where this is going. Half of me feels it's just a group of recently retired banking types with lots of money and not a lot to do, looking for an excuse to wear shades and shoot guns. But there's that other half of me, and I know that those of us who got more out of Resident Evil than a chance to look up the president's daughter's skirt (i.e. not Dan) are feeling exactly how I'm feeling on this with that H1N1 rumour:


Time to stock up on herbs and cat's eye gems, that's all I'm saying.