It Wasn't Me

On Monday a 747 airplane with two U.S. fighter jets in hot pursuit flew alarmingly low over Manhattan. The incident incited pandemonium, as buildings were evacuated, numerous 911 calls were made, and New Yorkers panicked in the belief that an all too familiar type of terrorist attack was underway. However, the plane flew low enough for some New Yorkers to see the Presidential seal on the side of the menacing jet. By now just about anyone who has any access to the news media knows that the ordeal, which brought back images of September 11th 2001 to frightened New Yorkers, was simply a poorly planned and insensitive attempt to take publicity photographs of Air Force One with the statue of liberty (Which apparently neither the President nor the Mayor of New York knew anything about). Or was it that simple?
The mainstream news media has pretty much eaten up the explanations for the incident provided by the White House and Michael Bloomberg without question. Critics outside of the mainstream media have begun to question the assertions that have been so easily accepted by major news outlets. The blame so far has been placed solely upon White House Military official Louis Caldera for approving the flight, and New York City Hall official Mark Mugnos for failing to alert Mayor Bloomberg. The mainstream media has accepted the notion that these two officials alone are to blame for this debacle, but bloggers, and of course right wing nuts without muzzles like our old friend Rush Limbaugh, haven’t been as willing to swallow the idea that the President was completely in the dark about where his airplane was Monday, or that Mayor Bloomberg had no idea that Air Force One would be circling ground zero for a few glamour shots.
Not surprisingly, Limbaugh (who has gleefully adopted the name, “scare force one”, which was first coined by the New York Post for the incident) has had a field day in the aftermath of the flyover. Unfortunately, while I disagree with the way he goes about saying it as well as his insistence that George Bush would have taken responsibility for an action like this if he were he still in office; I have to say that I agree with a lot of what Limbaugh and other non-mainstream news sources are beginning to point out. The idea that air force one took a 329,000 dollar flight over Manhattan without either the president or the mayor of New York knowing anything about it in advance in ludicrous. That the American people are supposed to believe two officials set the whole thing up by themselves without their superiors’ knowledge is an insult to our intelligence. Even the mainstream news networks that are reporting that the FAA and other agencies knew about the flight and kept it quiet for security purposes are still parroting the White House/City Hall line that the President and Michael Bloomberg are enraged and are in the process of reprimanding the officials responsible for this. What a joke. If I did believe that Barack Obama didn’t have any idea about the whereabouts of his plane on Monday (which I don’t) that wouldn’t really make me feel any better about the situation because there is no reason he shouldn’t.
The fact that he and Mayor Bloomberg are willing to let a couple of patsy’s shoulder the blame for them either knowing nothing about an idiotic and unnecessary publicity stunt, or screwing up and lying about it, is unsettling to me as a New Yorker and an American. Furthermore, why are 329,000 dollars in American taxes being devoted to something as unnecessary as new pictures of the President’s plane for the White House website during a recession? The major news media’s complete acceptance of the White House’s explanation and subsequent hollow apology make me wonder how far our new president can ride on his celebrity status without being challenged for a misstep.