Follow up...

Here is an article on the fate of the companies that were envolved in the boston bomb scare (courtesy of Reuters):

BOSTON (Reuters) - Turner Broadcasting and a New York marketing firm agreed on Monday to pay $2 million in compensation for a "guerrilla" advertising campaign that sparked fears of terrorism in the Boston area last week.

Travel on major roadways and rail lines was suspended and police responded in large numbers last Wednesday after the discovery of blinking electronic devices meant to promote an adult-themed show on Turner's Cartoon Network.

Authorities have charged Sean Stevens, 28, and Peter Berdovsky, 27, in the security alert, Boston's biggest since the September 11 attacks. They pleaded not guilty last week to charges of placing a hoax device and disorderly conduct.

The two were paid by Interference Inc., a New York marketing company hired by Turner Broadcasting System Inc., a unit of Time Warner Inc..

Turner and Interference have agreed to pay a combined $2 million in restitution and other compensation to communities and agencies affected by the scare, Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley said in a statement.

The settlement includes $1 million to the cities of Boston, Somerville and Cambridge along with Massachusetts state agencies and another $1 million in "good will funds" to finance homeland security and other programs by various groups.

At the peak of the alert, authorities mobilized emergency crews, federal agents, bomb squads, hundreds of police and the U.S. Coast Guard as traffic came to a halt in busy areas. Roads, bridges and part of the Charles River were closed.

© Reuters 2007. All Rights Reserved.

I hear from a junior (his name will remain anonymous) that many cities are making fun of Boston for thinking this was actually a bomb threat. Most other cities just thought that they were a bunch of Lite-Brites that were stuck to different public places.

This is what we have come to in America: spending millions of dollars to mobilize bomb squads to defuse "something" that we thought was a bomb. Nice. Nice. Check out the new Budget for the 2008 fiscal year, it looks like we are going to raise our Homeland Security spending by 11%.