Modern-Day Chile, USSR, and Argentina, All Wrapped Into One

When I was growing up, in the dusk of the Cold War, I would daydream about becoming a modern day Jane Bond, Super Spy. I’d be sent on dangerous missions, risky but full of adventure. (I’d have a great soundtrack to my adventures, but none of those tacky seduction scenes.)

My employer would use my skills against governments which routinely jailed people for years without charging them with a crime. I’d rescue victims from secret prisons where torture was a legal and acceptable means to procure “evidence” against people loosely defined as enemies of The State. I’d whisk away detained citizens before they’d have to face military tribunals that were already stacked against them, as evidence consistently would be withheld from the defendants. Before leaving on assignment, I’d have my gadget guy provide me with an ample supply of anti-bugging micro-machines, so I could defuse any domestic wiretaps planted on the phone lines (plus, in the modern world, in the computers and cell phones) of the beleaguered citizens of these rogue governments.

Back in the days of my youth, I thought to prepare myself for such a career by learning Spanish and Russian.

Today, I see I’d need no foreign language training, as I could fulfill my Jane Bond daydream by being fluent in American English.