Number One in the Hood, Gee (But Not Boston)

Wow, how tightly wound do people in Boston look today? The city virtually ground to a halt yesterday because of the discovery of what authorities thought were some type of terrorist bombs. They weren't, of course. They were guerrilla marketing props for the upcoming Aqua Teen Hunger Force movie, featuring a Lite-Brite* lookin' thing displaying a pissed-off Moonite giving people the bird. Now the two guys who set up the displays - 38 of them around town - have been arrested and charged with, among other things,"placing a hoax device."

I know nothing of Massachusetts law, and the authorities in Boston are certainly pissed, but I can't stretch the definition of "hoax" far enough to include this stuff. A hoax is when someone makes a false claim of some dangerous condition in order to produce fear. A bomb threat is a hoax. Movie promotional materials (perhaps somewhat poorly conceived) are not a hoax. Prosecutors disagree:

Assistant Attorney General John Grossman called the light boards 'bomb-like' devices and said that if they had been explosive they could have damaged transportation infrastructure in the city.

Yeah, and if ifs and buts were candies and nuts . . .. Seriously, is this the best they've got?

In the end, there's an enormous amount of face-saving that the Boston authorities need to do here. Why?

Turner said the devices have been in place for two or three weeks in Boston; New York City; Los Angeles, California; Chicago, Illinois; Atlanta, Georgia; Seattle, Washington; Portland, Oregon; Austin, Texas; San Francisco, California; and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

So, not only did several other major cities deal with the Meatwad Menace without going apeshit it took Boston's finest 2-3 weeks to uncover the menace in the first place!

* Am I the only one who thinks it's hilarious that the Lite-Brite entry at Wikipedia has a subsection entitled "Method of Fun"?