RIP Boston Marathon

[Enzo]

I have only seen some preliminary reports, but apparently someone has set off a couple bombs near the finish line in Boston, and I think they found another that had not detonated. At least a couple people dead and many injured.

[Arneb]

My German news site also reported that a thir bomb did go off in the Kennedy Library in Boston, or at least that there was a fire there at around the time when the explosions at the finish line occurred.

Good luck to all involved.

[wring]

Library fire now considered to be not related.

[tubeswell]

This is a terrible tragedy. Other words fail me.

[Мастер]

I sure as hell hope they'll now be invading some country other than the one I'm in . . .

[Lance]

Let's invade North Korea. I'm sure they are responsible.

[Мастер]

Let's invade North Korea. I'm sure they are responsible.

It's entirely possible that everyone would have headed down that road soon enough without any bombs in Boston . . .

[Lance]

Let's invade North Korea. I'm sure they are responsible.

It's entirely possible that everyone would have headed down that road soon enough without any bombs in Boston . . .

True, but now that we have something substantial that we can pin on them it is that much easier. Hell, they've admitted to having WMDs and we know they were shopping for "yellow-cake" uranium. What else do we need?

[Arneb]

Let's invade North Korea. I'm sure they are responsible.

It's entirely possible that everyone would have headed down that road soon enough without any bombs in Boston . . .

True, but now that we have something substantial that we can pin on them it is that much easier. Hell, they've admitted to having WMDs and we know they were shopping for "yellow-cake" uranium. What else do we need?

Lance, you...you don't happen to be Dick Cheney IRL, do you?

[Мастер]

Let's invade North Korea. I'm sure they are responsible.

It's entirely possible that everyone would have headed down that road soon enough without any bombs in Boston . . .

True, but now that we have something substantial that we can pin on them it is that much easier. Hell, they've admitted to having WMDs and we know they were shopping for "yellow-cake" uranium. What else do we need?

I thought they were going the plutonium route, but maybe I'm confused . . .

[MM_Dandy]

In case you are looking to find anyone from the chaos: Google Person Finder.

3 dead, 144 injured at last count.

[Heid the Ba]

I find it hard to muster sympathy for a city which was home to NORAID and other IRA fundraisers, and where bars regularly took collections and provided support for the IRA and INLA. I don't remember the people of Boston or their politicians (the Kennedys in particular) showing any support for the victims of the IRA and INLA, the very opposite in fact.

[Lance]

I'm surprised this sort of thing hasn't become commonplace in the US.

[Мастер]

I'm surprised this sort of thing hasn't become commonplace in the US.

I think it is this John Mueller fellow at Ohio who likes to argue that there is very little terrorism, because there are very few terrorists. In response to arguments that the measures put into place after 2001 in the US must be working because there had been no major terrorist attack on the US soil in the following five years, he would point out that there was no major terrorist attack on US soil in the previous five years.

[Мастер]

I find it hard to muster sympathy for a city which was home to NORAID and other IRA fundraisers, and where bars regularly took collections and provided support for the IRA and INLA. I don't remember the people of Boston or their politicians (the Kennedys in particular) showing any support for the victims of the IRA and INLA, the very opposite in fact.

Yes, I thought the Mountbattens might be behind it.

[Arneb]

I find it hard to muster sympathy for a city which was home to NORAID and other IRA fundraisers, and where bars regularly took collections and provided support for the IRA and INLA. I don't remember the people of Boston or their politicians (the Kennedys in particular) showing any support for the victims of the IRA and INLA, the very opposite in fact.

I admit I find it hard to go along with that statement. NORAID wasn't bombed, people were. Do the parents of the 8 yo boy deserve any less sympathy because (if at all) they are Bostonians?
If someone bombed the finish area of the Berlin marathon area, would you find it hard to sympathize with grieving Berliners because the Nazis, who marched through that very Brandenburg gate, were so evil?

[Heid the Ba]

Boston as a city elected Ted Kennedy and others who gave support for terrorists who bombed indiscriminately, it wasn't a minority. It is a cultural thing among a lot of the population, IRA songs playing in bars, students drinking cocktails called "Irish car bombs", collecting tins at the bar for "the boys across the water" and so on. Those same people are looking for my sympathy now they are on the other end of it.

Berlin would get my sympathy, not for what was done in the past but for the remorse shown for those actions, remorse which is completely missing in Boston.

[Lianachan]

I do feel sympathy for Bostonians, as I would people anywhere that something like this occurred, but I'm pretty annoyed at the news coverage and commentary when weighed against the level of coverage of events on the same day that killed over 10 times as many human beings.

[Heid the Ba]

I completely missed that; I thought you were going with this.

[Мастер]

I do feel sympathy for Bostonians, as I would people anywhere that something like this occurred, but I'm pretty annoyed at the news coverage and commentary when weighed against the level of coverage of events on the same day that killed over 10 times as many human beings.

But those weren't Americans.

More generally, the last I checked, it would be > 10,000 a day lost to malnutrition.

[Lianachan]

I do feel sympathy for Bostonians, as I would people anywhere that something like this occurred, but I'm pretty annoyed at the news coverage and commentary when weighed against the level of coverage of events on the same day that killed over 10 times as many human beings.

But those weren't Americans.

More generally, the last I checked, it would be > 10,000 a day lost to malnutrition.

Indeed. That falls outwith Stalin's (fictional?) "tragedy" firmly into the "statistic" category, though.

[Enzo]

Hell, we lose something like 800 a week on our highways.

[Мастер]

Hell, we lose something like 800 a week on our highways.

I just checked. Unless "we" is more than the US, it's closer to 600 :)

It used to be much higher, though. 1972 takes top honours, at over 1,000 a week.

[Enzo]

OK, it used to be about 40,000 a year when I was on radio, so that number is stuck in my head. If it is down to 30,000, then good for us... I think.