Word

Wolcott gets it right:

Today one of the themes was the shooting of the passenger at the Miami airport, which most people would regard as a human tragedy, but to the fun-lovin' guys on "Bulls & Bears" a dead body is a buying opportunity. One guest recommended airlines stocks--American Airlines in particular, I think--because American travelers would now feel safer knowing that security forces leap into action with such lethal authority. Although his stock pick was ridiculed (razzing each other's picks is part of the chortling entertainment here--my wife says the guests snap and bark like dogs fighting over a choice cut of meat), everyone agreed that killing the passenger was a show of strength that would boost Americans' confidence in Homeland Security. It meant the system was working, and that the sky marshals were up to the task. It was asserted as fact that the poor guy claimed to have a bomb--the truth of the situation is considerably hazier--and scant attention was paid to his bipolar condition, or the reactions of his fellow passengers to his killing. This is how bad it's gotten in Bush America: gunning down a mentally ill passenger is now a thumbs-up sign of virility and vigilance.

On Neil Cavuto's "Cavuto on Business," the passenger's death was also touted as a big thumb's up for Homeland Security, with the odious Stewart Varney (can't we send him back from wherever he and his approval-courting accent came?) claiming Americans were "reassured" by the dispatch with which this passenger was put down with deadly force. Perhaps the sky marshals should have shot the man's wife too, so that Varney's imaginary Americans could be doubly reassured.

Killing the mentally ill: that's Fox News's idea of a "feel-good."

Then followed "Forbes on Fox," hosted by David "The Assman" Asman, which exploited the Miami incident as a springboard to propose that victims and victims' survivors of Homeland Security excesses be denied the right to sue. Because otherwise trial lawyers are going to infest the scene and clog the courts with their frivolous lawsuits seeking restitution. One Forbes editor who was against the lawsuit ban nevertheless lambasted trial lawyers as "terrorists against the economy." The words "terrorist" and "terrorism" mean nothing spouting out of a Republican mouth now, they're used so promiscuously.

I made only a passing reference to this story last week (noting that Bush's latest non-major address about Operation Enduring Clusterfuck was likely to lose top billing in the day's headlines)...as more information came out, it's become pretty apparent this was indeed a tragedy, and not a case of defeating terrorism. Which, by the way, is probably why the story dropped so quickly from the headlines.

Of course, wingnuts will continue crowing--as long as it's not anyone they know, 'nuts have no problems with dead bodies, be they tourists, US soldiers, Iraqi civilians, etc.--if they're not directly affected, it's just a tv show.