Ok, this really is something else. Two things.
One, the Boston Bomb Scare. Read the story if you haven’t heard about this. Apparently, someone in Boston noticed a strange device hanging from an overpass, and called police. The police decided to go into overdrive, called in the bomb squad, and had the device blown up. Several other similar devices were found across the city. They were disposed of, or removed. It was determined by “experts”, that the devices were a hoax. What were they in fact? Advertisements for the Cartoon Network show “Aqua Teen Hunger Force”. In fact, they were freakin’ LITE BRITES. That’s right. Gajillions of dollars (ok, maybe not, but a lot of money) were spent getting these things down, with streets shut down, and people evacuated, and they were light boards like the one my cousin had 20 YEARS AGO! My God, Boston! Even better, they’d been there for WEEKS before anyone noticed! And to top it all off, the devices were in several other major cities, and no one cared! Can someone say, “overreaction”? I knew you could.
Second, though, is the fact that the above article and this one (http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2007-02/06/content_5704846.htm) are from Japan and China respectively. The ones I’ve found from the U.S. major news sources seem to be concentrating on the so-called “hoax perpetrators”. The two men who were scapegoated into jail. The overseas articles seem to be much more neutral, letting the reader judge how idiotic one American city can be.
I’ve got nothing personally against Boston. I’ve never been there. I know no one from there personally. So I have no grudge against them. But I cannot help but think, “DOH!”