Yesterday brought the shocking news that some weirdo really hadn’t snuck half way across the country, killed little JonBenet, and ultimately turned up in Thailand. I’m still trying to come to terms with this stunning development.
And so after a week of breathless TV news reports on what John Mark Karr eat or went to the bathroom, and endless hours of legal pundits speculating on a case that never materialized, we’ve come to this.
I agree with Howard Kurtz:

Will every anchor, correspondent and producer who shamelessly hyped the John Mark Karr story now apologize for taking the country for a ride?
Don’t hold your breath.
This was such a sham, from the opening moments, that it instantly goes down with the greatest media embarrassments in modern history.

Yes, I’d like an apology from all the news people who wasting my time with this garbage when I wanted to watch real news. CNN, MSNBC, and FNC producers: feel free to leave your apologies in the comment section.

I was listening to talk radio on Monday and a bothered caller phoned in. He had seen on Fox News Channel that the UN had passed a “law” (valid in 180 countries) which threatens to punish parents who didn’t let their kids play outside with other kids when they want to.
Worse yet, according to the soon-to-be parent/caller, there’s a movement to pass this law in America!
Really, is it any surprise that people in power can get away with doing all sorts of crazy stuff when we have Americans gullible enough to believe everything they hear (or think they hear) on Fox News Channel and talk radio? If people believe the UN will mandate outside playtime, what purported “threat” won’t they believe?

I watched parts of CNN’s documentary last night. While it did provide more depth than the “they want to kill us because of our freedom” mantra we typically hear, it still seemed superficial. Here we have reporters who have supposedly been monitoring the guy for nearly 10 years, and they don’t offer much more than general observations on how he gave up wealth to wonder in the mountains in pursuit of his spiritually-motivated war. That’s really insightful.
It’s interesting that in a program supposedly intended to help us get to know the enemy, CNN only plays a handful of very brief clips from bin Laden interviews. I guess they had to run it through the politically-correct sanitizer before releasing it for public consumption. Or are we still worried about encoded messages buried in eight-year old interviews?

Which is responsible for more American deaths last year?
(a) The terrorist who want to kill every one of us
(b) Motor vehicles
If you only watch national TV news, you’ll undoubtedly be surprised to learn that it’s (b):

The number of people killed on U.S. roadways in 2005 climbed to the highest level in 15 years, an increase tied to rising deaths among motorcyclists and pedestrians, the federal government reported yesterday.
A total of 43,443 people died in traffic accidents last year, up 1.4 percent from the previous year, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said. The agency said the motorcycle death toll rose for the eighth consecutive year.

Full report here (.pdf file).
Let me get this straight: since 2000, we’ve had what, 5,000 Americans killed from terrorism? And in the last year alone, over 43,000 were killed out on the roads.
But if you were a Martian whose only contact with Earth was in watching MSNBCNNFox, which of the two would you think was more dangerous to human life? Terrorism, of course. It’s terror all the time. Terra, terra, terra. If there’s not an alleged terrorism plot for the news networks to cover, they’re talking about potential future plots. “Are we safe?”
I’m not suggesting that terrorism isn’t something to be concerned about (especially if you’re a public policymaker). But how about some perspective on things? You know, a “fair and balanced” look at risk. Statistics suggest that 1 in 84 people will die in a motor-vehicle accident. Perhaps if the media devoted more air time to this threat, people would be more conscientious of road safety.
There’s another element to this. Not only are people far more likely to have their safety threated by a vehicle than by a terrorist, but the former is something you may actually be able to control. If a bomb goes off nearby, there might not be much you can do about it. You might simply be at the wrong place at the wrong time. But you can minimize the threat of auto accidents by taking precautions (e.g., seat belts) and driving safely (don’t drink or speed).
So ultimately, which of the two threats is it more useful to fret about?

Hmmmm:

In the 2005 Tour de France with 189 starters, here’s the profile of the average rider:
* Height — 1.79 meters (5 feet, 10.4 inches)
* Weight — 71 kilograms (156.2 pounds)
* Resting heart rate — 50 bpm
* Lung capacity — 5.69 liters (1.48 gallons)

Me:
–Height: 5 feet, 9.5 inches (?) [it’s been a while since my last laser measurement)
–Weight: 156 pounds (per doctor’s visit this week)
–Resting heart rate: the machine at Wal-Mart said it’s 39, but it has to be wrong. Last time I checked manually it was in the 48-50 bpm range
–Lung capacity: I have no idea
So there you have it, I’m the mirror image of a Tour de France rider. All I need to do is to be able to ride a tiny bit faster (easy enough said) and next year I can be ridding down the Champs-Elysées.