This didn't seem to have any effect. "I'm going to need a number," he said again, and then again, and then again. Each time I shrugged and stammered, terrified that I might be sent to the back of the queue or worse, into the little room with the men in Marigolds. But I simply didn't have an answer.

"I'm going to need a number," he said again, giving the distinct impression that he was an autobank, and that this was a conversation he was prepared to endure until one of us died. So with a great deal of bravery I decided to give him one. And the number I chose was 2,649,347.

This, it turned out, was fine. He'd been told by his superiors to get a number. I'd given him a number. His job was done and so, just an hour or so later, I was on the streets of Los Angeles doing a piece to camera.

Except, of course, I wasn't. Technically you need a permit to film on every street in pretty well every corner of the world. But the only countries where this rule is enforced are Vietnam, Cuba, North Korea and the United States of America.

So, seconds after breaking out the tripod, a policeman pulled up and demanded that we show him our permit. We had one that covered the city of Los Angeles . . . except the bit where we were. So we were moved on.

The next day I was moved on in Las Vegas too because the permit I had didn't cover the part of the pavement I was standing on. Eight inches away was fine.

You need a permit to do everything in America. You even need a passport to buy a drink. But interestingly you don't need one if you wish to rent some guns and some bullets. I needed a 50 cal (very big) machinegun. "No problem," said the man at the shop. "But could you just sign this assuring us that the movie you're making is not anti-Bush or anti-war."

Also, you do not need a permit if you want - as I did - to transport a dead cow on the roof of your car through the Florida panhandle. That's because this is banned by a state law.

Think about that. Someone has gone to all the bother and expense of drawing up a law that means that at some point lots of people were moving dead cows about on their cars. It must have been popular. Fashionable even.

Anyway, back to the guns. I needed them because I wished to shoot a car in the Mojave desert. But you can't do that without the say-so of the local fire chief who turned up, with his haircut, to say that for reasons he couldn't explain, he had a red flag in his head.

You find this a lot in America. People way down the food chain are given the power to say yes or no to elaborately prepared plans, just so their bosses can't be sued. One expression that simply doesn't translate from English in these days of power without responsibility is "Ooh, I'm sure it'll be fine".

And, unfortunately, these people at the bottom of the food chain have no intellect at all. Reasoning with them is like reasoning with a tree. I think this is because people in the sticks have stopped marrying their cousins and are now mating with vegetables.

They certainly aren't eating them. You see them growing in fields, but all you ever find on a menu is cheese, cheese, cheese, or cheese with cheese. Except for a steak and cheese sandwich I bought in Mississippi. This was made, according to the label, from "imitation cheese".

Nope, I don't know what that is either but I do know that out of the main population centres, the potato people are getting fatter and dimmer by the minute.

Today the average petrol pump attendant is capable, just, of turning on a pump when you prepay. But if you pay for two pumps to be turned on to fill two cars, you can, if you stare carefully, see wisps of smoke coming from her fat, useless, war losing, acne-scarred, gormless turnip face.

And the awful thing is that you don't want the petrol anyway, because it'll simply get you to somewhere else, which will be worse. A point I shall prove next week when we have a look at what happened in Alabama. And why the poor of New Orleans will sue if the donation you make isn't as big as they'd hoped for.

According to the current issue of Mother Jones:

• One in four U.S. jobs pays less than a poverty-level income.
• Since 2000, the number of Americans living below the poverty line at any one time has risen steadily. Now, 13 percent -- 37 million Americans -- are officially poor.
• Bush's tax cuts (extended until 2010) save those earning between $20,000 and $30,000 an average of $10 a year, while those making $1 million are saved $42,700.
• In 2002, Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, compared those who point out such statistics as the one above to Adolph Hitler (surely he meant Stalin?).
• Bush has diverted $750 million to "healthy marriages" by shifting funds from social services, mostly childcare.
• Bush has proposed cutting housing programs for low-income people with disabilities by 50 percent.
• A series of related stats -- starting with the news that two out of three new jobs are in the suburbs -- shows how the poor are further disadvantaged in the job hunt by lack of public or private transportation.

Meanwhile, for those who have been following the collapse of the pension system, please note a series in The Wall Street Journal by Ellen Schultz taking a hard look at executive pension obligations:

• "Benefits for executives now account for a significant share of pension obligations in the United States, an average of 8 percent (of large companies). Sometimes a company's obligation for a single executive's pension approaches $100 million."
• "These liabilities are largely hidden, because corporations don't distinguish them from overall pension obligations in their federal financial findings."
• "As a result, the savings that companies make by curtailing pensions of regular retirees -- which have totaled billions of dollars in recent years -- can mask a rising cost of benefits for executives."
• "Executive pensions, even when they won't be paid until years from now, drag down the earnings today. And they do so in a way that's disproportionate to their size, because they aren't funded with dedicated assets."

It seems to me that we've seen enough evidence over the years that the capitalist system is not going to be destroyed by an outside challenger like communism -- it will be destroyed by its own internal greed. Greed is the greatest danger as we develop an increasingly winner-take-all system. And voices like The Wall Street Journal's editorial page encourage this mentality by insisting that any form of regulation is bad. But for whom?

It is so discouraging to watch this country become less and less fair -- "justice for all" seems like an embarrassingly archaic tag. Republicans have rigged the "lottery of life" in this country in ways we don't even know about yet. The new bankruptcy law is unfair, and the new college loan rules are worse. The system has been stacked so that large corporations have an inside track over small businesses in getting government contracts. We won't see the full consequences of this mean and careless legislation for years, but it is starting to affect us already.

Molly Ivins writes about politics, Texas and other bizarre happenings.

The authority will still remain part of the Department of Homeland Security, but will enjoy enhanced autonomy.

The reform follows a recommendation issued in April by a Senate commission on handling the Katrina disaster that was headed by Senators Susan Collins, a Republican, and Joseph Lieberman, a Democrat.

Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf of Mexico coast of the United States on August 29, 2005, and left more than 1,500 people dead.

Former FEMA director Michael Brown was forced to resign in the wake of the disaster.

"We cannot legislate leadership," Lieberman said after the adoption of the amendment. "But we can legislate changes in government structures to make them more sensible and better suited to protecting people in times of disaster."

The US government unveiled a communications system that in case of emergency should soon allow it to send SMS alerts to Americans' mobile phones and computers.

"We have the ability to do this. It's a major step," Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Director David Paulson told reporters outside the US capital as he unveiled the program's design.

The Digital Emergency Alert System (DEAS) will include the participation of television networks and public radio stations and be based on an existing alert system built in the Cold War era for use in the event of a nuclear attack.

The new system will initially allow the government to quickly alert public organizations and first-aid groups in case of an emergency.

It is planned to become operational in southern and eastern states by the end of the year, and nationally at the end of 2007.

At the same time, the government said it will build a system that can also send alerts to mobile phone users and computers linked to the Internet.

The SMS messages will be sent out in case "something unfortunate has happened," said John Lawson, president and chief executive officer of the Association of Public Television Stations.

Internet-linked computers will automatically switch on to a video message from the US Department of Homeland Security while downloading instructions prepared specifically from natural disasters, chemical and nuclear attacks, and other calamities.

Several smokers at San Diego's Ocean Beach welcomed the ban, which was pased late Tuesday.

"I think it's a good idea, as long as they don't make us stop drinking," said beach resident Libby Brignon, a smoker who is fed up with finding butts in the sand.

Solana Beach, about 20 miles north of San Diego, became the first beach town in California to enact a smoking ban two years ago. Officials have been pleased with the results.

"You have to look really hard to find a cigarette butt," City Manager David Ott said.

According to the American Nonsmokers' Rights Foundation, 17 states now have laws in effect to regulate smoking in public places. That means 44.5 percent of the U.S. population is restricted from puffing at bars, restaurants and other locations.

Many employers have voluntarily barred smoking in enclosed spaces. Even countries long seen as bastions for smoking, such as Japan and Spain, are seeing local bans.

"Nonsmokers are fed up and fighting for their rights to clean air," said Robert Berger, president of Healthier Solutions Inc., a nonsmokers rights group.

Berger believes a statewide ban on smoking at beaches and parks is inevitable in California, despite the narrow defeat of an attempt by the Legislature to do it in 2004.

Phone calls to two smokers rights advocacy groups - The Smokers Club Inc., and Forces International - were not immediately returned.

San Diego City Council President Scott Peters said parks were included in the council vote to reduce fire risks. The measure will take effect by mid-August.

Volunteers for beach cleanups often find thousands of cigarette butts, especially after big holidays like July 4, Peters said.

Some environmentalists said they fear that smokers will now congregate on streets near the beach and that butts flicked on sidewalks could get washed into the ocean.

Stefanie Sekich, of the local chapter of the Surfrider Foundation, said the organization is spending thousands of dollars to install theft-proof ashtrays in those locations.