KaraokeFanboy

That does it.  I'm a Chris Hansen fanatic.  Thanks to his To Catch a Predator book promotional tour, I've caught Chris on Larry King LIve and the local John & Ken radio show, and had I bested the Sandman last night, I would've seen him on Late Night with Conan O'Brien.  Regardless, what sealed the deal was last night's Dateline NBC and the first installment of Hansen's latest series, To Catch a Con Man.  While the investigation seems somewhat less noble, since the victims of Internet scams aren't helpless children but stupid adults, the effort is certainly more daring.  The targets of Hansen's investigation aren't coming to him, in a wired, heavily secured house, but he's going to them, flying to London and meeting these creeps in hotel rooms, bars, and public squares, presumably the places they're used to doing business.  Like his first round of Predator stories, law enforcement is not involved, and in fact an interview with a FBI agent reveals that law enforcement most likely cannot get involved, what with terrorism at the top of their "to do" list.  (Never mind that Chris is doing the real dirty work.  Ever wonder how some of those international terrorist outfits find their funding?  I bet at least one of these financially frustrated "Nigerian royalty" is really some Bin Laden agent, scamming funds from the American common man to blow up one of his treasured landmarks some years later.  But, no, the FBI is more concerned with your shoes.)  So, who's the real hero?  Chris isn't armed or armored; he just has the gathered facts and his wit, which was in rare form last night, by the way.  Indeed, this was Chris Hansen unleashed, role playing a straight-talking American businessman with surprising ease, expressing anxiety and even anger toward his target during the elaborate ploy to catch him.  Chris is using a "when in Rome" strategy, abandoning his gentile handling of those child predators for a more adult treatment under the presumption that these guys could take it.  They could not.  Of the three cons Chris busted last night, two whined restlessly and one bluntly ran.  If Chris wasn't a real guy, if he really was the comic book-like tough guy I imagine him to be, I'd wish he would meet his match -- some international kingpin pushing financial scams and child pornography and all things cyber-crime, and that Chris would single-handedly take him down.  Of course, if such a kingpin existed, he would probably undo Hansen in the way the Kingpin unraveled Daredevil in Frank Miller's classic "Born Again" story arc.  I can settle for the small fish, if Chris can.  His dedication is unrivaled, his relevance in realm of social justice becoming unparalleled.  I mean, Giraldo dug around in empty graves.  Chris Hansen is proactively pursuing the men out to rape our children and our bank accounts.  Ironically, just watching him is a rich experience, and evokes a child-like wonder at his integrity.  So, who's the real perpetrator?