Hi jubileej!

What were they thinking (Turner)??? Just my opinion, but I think Boston acted prudently & appropriately. Much rather they erred on the side of caution.

I agree. It scares me more not that Boston called out the reserves, but that the other cities DIDN'T. I'd hate to be Ted Turner right now.

It seems that some people here in Boston have made comments that the police overreacted since "anyone could see they had cartoon characters on them". This strikes me as naive or disingenuous. As if anything with a cartoon character on it could not possibly be dangerous(?) It will be interesting to see if other cities had these things attached to bridges, underpasses etc.

So right you are, guys. Honeyb2, I saw a stand-up comedian who joked that in spite of 9 locks on doors in triple rises, people would fling open the door freely if the guy said, "pizza delivery"! Why should we trust rectangular devices on bridges with wires hanging out just because it has a cartoon character on it? (Especially one flipping its finger :) ).

Little wonder we didn't find any hidden WMDs in Iraq when we can't even notice these things prominently displayed all over 9 cities at home!

Hi all:

This issue affected me quite a bit. I work in Cambridge, and although I live north of Boston, I have to go south from work into the city to get the commuter rail home. I was stuck at work, along with many co-workers, waiting for the bridges and subway to re-open. I knew people who heard that the "devices" were found just blocks from their home, and they were terrified.

I am actually very glad the police took things so seriously. I have friends who work for law enforcement agencies, and they told me that two of the items had fake pipe bombs attached to them. These were placed near one of the largest and most well-known hospitals on the East coast. Many people I know who grew up in this area always heard Boston was a huge target for attack due to many reasons, including the medical technology availible in this region. It's not surprising people heard that there were odd items found placed on bridge supports and outside Mass General and then panicked.

What distresses me is what else I heard: some of the items were in place for as much as three weeks before they were found?? How could they even be put into place??

Emmie

Hey guys,
Yeah, I agree with all of you. I've been so sick I hadn't left the house and only heard all the news late in the day and it didn't affect my kids and their school at all. My own feeling is, like yours, that the police didn't overreact--they really only had the choice of reacting or not reacting and I'd prefer they reacted. I also fet really outraged that a paid publicity stunt was the cause. I'm all for free speech and protest and even for performance art--for instance I"m a big fan of the "freeway blogger" who puts up huge, self made, bilboards with political statements on them and then photographs them and posts them on the internet--but those things are done to raise consciousness not to sell a product. Commercialization creeps everywhere--there was just an article about how new yorks stringent anti billboarding ads are being circumvented by collusion between companies looking for advertising space and the special hoardings they build around job sites and over the sidewalks when they are working on skyscrapers. Ad companies are putting larger and larger and totally illegal wraparound bilboards on those things to squeeze more money from public space. I really resent that.

In this case I hope boston sues and wins.

abfab

ps emmie9999 did you get my person email to you? I tried to email you through the site. If you didn't, get my email from mindstorm and I'll resend you the information .

Hi abfab:

Nope, I didn't get it. I'll try to get that feature fixed on my page.

Emmie

I'm with you, abfab. I feel that the power of big business is probably our biggest, albeit most subtle threat. It's never had more power than it has now. Oh-oh. I guess I'm going to get in trouble for this. So be it.

Sorry you were sick, adfab.