incrementally increasing madness?

[Madelon Umlauf]

It must seem a truism to say that 9/11 was 
a watershed, a turning point in microhistory.

The country has become palpably madder
than before with cops in the library and ever
more arcane password security measures. 

As for viewing this whole biz from on high,
as though one were a god, if Americans 
are so stupid as to believe as they do,
don't they "deserve" another Bush 
administration? I am using the word deserve
in the poetic sense as though one were 
writing literary fiction: 9/11 implies cops 
in libraries, a quagmire war in the middle
east, etcetera

Univ of Texas library is a bastion of old-time
freedom: they have walkup Internet access
stations without any ID required, none, zilch.
nor no cops either.

Their most recent password security hurdle
includes picking 3 out of 12 security questions
and providing answers. Such as name of
first pet, name if you could choose one other
than your own, favorite childhood dish, and
on and on. Otherwise the terrurists might know
that my roommate has 10 books checked out
of the art library if they could only figgur out
her password and peep at the list of books.
The 8 elements of the password must include
a letter, a number and a keyboard symbol.

The cops talking more and more loudly in 
the lobby of the public library is so over the 
top compared to the previous American 
on the ground reality before 9/11 that it makes
me realize more and more and more how
watershed an event it was.

incrementally increasing madness?