If I know my history—which I don’t—the human cannon was invented by some Italians during the first world war. The device, designed to safely launch soldiers behind enemy lines like so many ballistic salamis, was never adopted for military use. Instead, the contraption was embraced by circus clowns.

And now, the clowns at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, have patented a convoluted contrivance that can launch a cop or a soldier onto the top of a five-story building in less than two seconds. Or, at least that’s the theory.

Everyone who’s familiar with Wile E. Coyote’s ignominious career knows that such complex contrivances never work in practice. In the unlikely event that anyone is foolhardy enough to actually test the device, history tells us that some of the first volunteers will be blown up on the launch pad, smash against the side of the building, or be impaled when they land on a flagpole.

I suspect the whole shenanigan is based on someone at DARPA getting fat kickbacks from the Acme Corporation; that’s the way the military-industrial concept often works. If the bored would-be warriors at DARPA were serious about introducing a formidable new force against evildoers, I recommend they go back to the circus and figure out how to train a battalion of bears on bicycles.

And if anyone at DARPA is reading this (which they probably are as part of the program to spy on everyone everywhere all the time): don’t forget to slip me a juicy consultant’s fee!

Copyright 2006 David Rinehart. Reprinted by permission. Read more of David's insightful scribblings at www.stare.com.