Super Powers

Superman sits in front of a bank of video screens in his Fortress of Solitude. On one monitor, he sees a talking head telling the world "Iran successfully test-fired a missile that can avoid radar and hit several targets simultaneously using multiple warheads. A weapons expert at Jane's Information Group, said the missile test was 'a step on the road to have the capability of having a nuclear arsenal.'"
On the screen just to the left Supes sees footage of three strong earthquakes and several aftershocks that reduced villages to rubble in western Iran early Friday, killing at least 66 people and injuring about 1,200 others. His impulse is to leap from his naugahyde command center seat and relieve the suffering of the victims of this disaster.
Why does he hesitate? Could it be the conscience of the super-hero has experienced a momentary vapor lock? Another hero of the atomic age, Albert Einstein once suggested," You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war." Would The Man In Red and Blue make a deal with Tehran to aid the multitudes if he could return to hurl their weapons stockpile off into the sun? Hasn't he earned self-righteousness?

"Sometimes when Supe was stopping crimes
I'll bet that he was tempted to just quit and turn his back
On man, join Tarzan in the forest
But he stayed in the city, and kept on changing clothes
In dirty old phonebooths till his work was through
And nothing to do but go on home"
- Crash Test Dummies, "Superman's Song"