Stop the Paranoia

A harmless lunchbox falls off someone's wheelchair, and people think it's a bomb. That's the level of hysteria our country has come to.

Last Wednesday in La Crosse, Wis., authorities closed off a 300-foot area near downtown to investigate a purple lunchbox with an "open me" note attached to it. A pedestrian saw the lunchbox on the sidewalk and called the fire department. A bomb-sniffing dog was brought in to check the suspicious lunchbox. The dog, trained to detect materials used in 12 different kinds of explosives, detected something.

So authorities cleared out the area, packed sandbags around the lunchbox, and blew it up. Fortunately, the lunchbox contained no bomb. In fact, it contained nothing at all.

Bomb-sniffing dogs can be misled by a variety of household products that contain materials used in explosives. A bomb-sniffing dog's sense of smell is keen enough that even if someone who handled a firecracker touches an item, the dog could detect the scent.

It was later revealed that the empty lunchbox belonged not to a terrorist, but to La Crosse resident Kathy Freidhof. It fell off her wheelchair on her way home from work. The "open me" note was from earlier in the day, when Freidhof shared some birthday cake with a co-worker. The note had the co-worker's name on it, along with the "open me" instruction.

Isn't all this just silly?

The phrase "better safe than sorry" is usually a good rule to abide by, but in this case it's simply ridiculous. I agree that terrorism can happen anywhere, but not in a purple lunchbox with a personalized post-it note attached to it. I could see if the note just had "open me" written on it, but it didn't. It was personally addressed to Freidhof's co-worker. There was absolutely no reason for anyone to believe that it would be a bomb.

If a terrorist or random nutcase rigs an explosive in a lunchbox and leaves it on the sidewalk, obviously, their intent is to get someone to open that lunchbox so it will blow up. What kind of an idiotic terrorist or terrorist-wannabe is going to personalize the "open me" note? Does anyone else see that plan as kind of idiotic?

If I saw a lunchbox with a note that said something like, "Todd: open me", on it, I certainly wouldn't call the fire department. I'd clear the fog out of my head and take the so-called "suspicious item" for exactly what it is: a lunchbox that someone lost.

How much did it cost to bring in a bomb-sniffing dog and a military team of explosives specialists from the Fort McCoy Army training base? How much did it cost when they brought in equipment to try to x-ray the lunchbox? How much did it cost for the explosives they used to blow the lunchbox to smithereens? I'm willing to bet it was more than a few thousand dollars.

This large cost could have easily been avoided. But alas, some paranoid citizen who watches too much CNN went 9/11 crazy, and it resulted in a bomb scare. It's nice to see that any irrational person on the street can waste my tax dollars, along with the politicans.

I'm sure I'll get angry e-mails from people because of my unorthodox view, but I'm sticking to my guns. Our country needs to get away from its obsession with terrorism, and the mass paranoia that comes from it. Things may have changed in this country, but that doesn't mean we have to go overboard, or approve of those who do.