Moral Midgetry

Cue the Cheers music. “Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name…”

Other times, not so much.

Much of Boston shut down Wednesday… and I’m starting to think that maybe we should just shut the whole town down permanently.

The cause of the shut down was several “suspicious looking packages” that were found spread around the Greater Boston area. The packages turned out to be magnetic light devices with battery packs that looked like this.

According to Reuters, the discoveries triggered a citywide security scare that led the U.S. Coast Guard to close the Charles River and caused authorities to shut down major bridges, several roads, and some subway lines. All and all, the estimated cost of the shut down is $750,000.

And what could cause such a furor? Why a talking meatball, milkshake, and box of French fries, of course. Yes, in a move that would make Borat jealous, the Aqua Teen Hunger Force crew crossed over into the real world and shut down an entire city. Although it wasn’t actually Meatwad, Master Shake, and Frylock that did the deed. Instead it was Ignignokt and Err, two simple Mooninites, and they accomplished it all with a single upturned finger.

Yes, this thing caused everyone in the city of Boston to collectively soil their panties. Now, Boston has been the source of mass hysteria before. I’ll admit, we might not be the freedom loving people we are today if the city hadn’t freaked out and dumped some tea off a ship. But, really? This thing?

Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley said the device "had a very sinister appearance." "It had a battery behind it, and wires."

A battery and wires… yeah, so does my alarm clock AND this morning it was making a very suspicious beeping noise. I mean, in this post-9/11 world what am I to make of that?

Not only have Boston officials have stated they intend to seek restitution from Turner Broadcasting for the cost of deploying the police, but the BPD arrested the two men who installed the “sinister” items. Peter Berdovsky , 27, Sean Stevens, 28, now face up to five years in prison on charges of placing a hoax device in a way that causes panic and disorderly conduct. Two things they did not actually do.

Is everyone in Boston an idiot? Aren’t MIT and Harvard near there? Shouldn’t at least some of that smart rub off on the townies?

I’ll admit there might come a time in my life when I am confronted with a bomb and I might not recognize it. But I do know one thing about a bomb, in addition to all those wires and batteries, it needs some sort of explosive to work. Without an explosive you don’t have a bomb. You have a Lite-Brite.

These “devices” have been in place for two to three weeks in not only Boston, but also in New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, Seattle, Portland, Austin, San Francisco, and Philadelphia. Are you kidding me? Philadelphia is smarter than Boston. Who could have possibly seen that coming?

Funnier than the actual event is The Boston Globe’s special section on this cluster-fuck: titled “Froth, Fear, and Fury in Boston.” Froth? Froth! Okay, so the Boston Globe likes alliteration. Clearly they had “fear” and “fury,” but why would they choose to lead off with “Froth?” Maybe The Globe is trying to imply that a mass outbreak of rabies made everyone go crazy and run from the scary signs. That would at least give the populous some of their dignity back.

I’ve also read reports that people are worried this might dampen future guerrilla marketing efforts. Why would it? This is the most successful guerrilla marketing since the Blair Witch Project.

That’s right, successful. This Boston incident has turned a marketing ploy that would only have appealed to someone who happened to be in the right place at the right time and who recognized a relatively minor character from a relatively obscure cartoon that airs on a relatively insignificant cable channel into national coverage. On Tuesday, what could your parents have contributed to a conversation about Aqua Teen Hunger Force? Try talking about it with them today.

I can’t wait for the Boston premiere of the Aqua Teen Hunger Force film. You can bet there’ll be some fearfully frothy fury that day.