At around 3 PM yesterday, news outlets all over America ceased idle reporting on international reaction to Kim Jong IL’s (alleged) nuclear weapons test, the fallout from the Mark Foley (Congressional-Page) sex scandal and even on the breaking news of Madonna following the new celebrity fashion of adopting African babies the way others adopt exotic pets. Because at that time, news broke that a plane had flown into a building in Manhattan; and, evidently, all any news director could think of was “oh my God, it’s another 9/11!”
In fact, what happened was that a novice pilot, New York Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle, apparently lost control of his small plane and crashed into a 50-storey residential building near 71st Street and York Ave in New York City – in a tragic accident. Period!
Yet, watching and reading reports, even after these essential facts were firmly established, one could be forgiven the impression that news reporters were trying to convince their viewers that this was indeed another 9/11. Of course, given the deployment of every arsenal in America’s new Department of Homeland Security (with NORAD scrambling jet fighters to patrol the skies of major U.S. cities, including Washington DC – making it difficult for us to work and impossible to sleep), perhaps these reporters could be forgiven their hysteria.
But, thank God, their hyper reporting proved entirely unwarranted. And, even though my heart goes out to the families of the 2 people who died, I cannot allow my regret for their loss to eclipse my truly heartfelt sorrow for the families of many more Americans who are losing loved ones in Iraq everyday, and with barely a mention by these same hysterical reporters. (Never mind mentioning the Iraqi families who, according to researchers from Johns Hopkins, have lost over 650,000 loved ones. But, here, I clearly digress….)
NOTE: Sadly, the only thing my friends who are hard-core Yankee fans could recall about Lidle was that he was hired by George Steinbrenner just months ago to help the Yankees through the playoffs. And, that his failure to perform as expected, giving up crucial runs in their loss on Saturday, was the proximate cause for them being kicked out of the playoffs in the first round.
But no one wants to believe that this humiliation was sufficient to drive him to suicide….
ENDNOTE: Apropos the Yankees, see the article below entitled The New York Yankees: The worst Baseball team money could buy!
Cory Lidle, New York plane crash
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