KIDNAPPED on the 4th of July

Imagine having front-row seats with your friends and family at one of the finest fireworks shows in California. Imagine the punctuating drama of six military assault boats storming the beach. It's part of the show, a demonstration of American might. Your smart phone records it all on video. Imagine how it becomes almost too real as a gunfight erupts and people fall. Imagine how one is the husband of your best friend -- and he doesn't get up. Imagine the horror of seeing your friend forced to one of the boats and tied to two others, before the six boats charge out to sea with 18 kidnapped women. Imagine the four dead men and women around you, the helplessness, the rage that this could happen. Here. Imagine the desperate clings and cries of their two grade school children, now at whose mercy? And how, oblivious to it all, the automated fireworks display reaches its magnificent conclusion.