Al Qaeda Hates Your Commute!
Could terrorists have caused Bay Area freeway meltdown? How about your lousy haircut? Spilled coffee? Sure!
This is how it works: Random accidents happen all across America, every single minute. Water mains burst, light bulbs pop, smoke alarms wail, bad haircuts resound, you run out of hot water in the shower and the evil coldness rains down upon your humble flesh and your nipples are like oh my God someone please make it stop.
It gets worse. Traffic accidents wreak havoc, fires erupt in old buildings, trees fall and sinkholes collapse and birds die and Britney shows the world far too much of her labia as giant tanker trucks full of chicken fat overturn on a Midwest highway and everyone for forty miles around sniffs the air and thinks of rancid buckets of KFC.
Then the magic happens. The media gets ahold of the drama. It is spun and torqued and packaged and handed back to you like an unwanted gift, like that nasty polka-dot sweater you didn't want for Christmas, and everyone seems to lap it up like force-fed puppy dogs and of course in the never-ending wake of Sept. 11 that context invariably has something to do with -- say it with me now -- terrorism.
Oh my yes. Did terrorists cause the big fire at the shoe factory down by the Boise Savings & Loan? Experts say, "Um, no." Were terrorists involved in that 17-car pileup at the icy expressway in Colorado which in turn caused the local ski resort to lose revenue due to the fact that no one named Rick or maybe Jenny could go snowboarding and drink a ton of beer and get crappy tattoos? Experts say, "Wait, what?"
Did terrorists induce Paris Hilton to wear a miniskirt that makes a piece of lint look like a wall tapestry? Experts say, "Well, OK, maybe."
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http://sfgate.com/columnists/morford/
