The Bombing Buddhists

So let's say you were in charge of emergency planning for, say, a western Michigan county. You want to have some scenario that you can use to test the local emergency response system: are all of the departments able to communicate; how does the dispatching system function and what is your response time; can hospitals handle the incoming wounded; how do you deal with media and distraught families? What scenario would you use?

Perhaps jihadi terrorists have attacked in the area - no, don't want to upset the Muslims, who will immediately let you know that using any kind of Arab or Muslim group is completely unrealistic in the world today, especially since you've chosen a bombing of a school bus as the attack, and everyone knows that Muslims do not bomb buses or kill school kids. Guess that rules out the Bombing Buddhists and other religious groups, as well as any ethnic or national groups of any kind.

Maybe we could make up a group...how about People Against Yellow Buses And Children Knowing Anything - PAYBACK? No, too cutesy. How about Grandmothers for Social Security, whose motive is to free up money for Social Security transfer payments by killing the children who take up so much money to educate? No, too much danger of pissing off the AARP. How about the God Botherers, whose beef is against secular education? No, beyond the pale; religious people don't do that anyway. We need something plausible.

Who then can be safely demonized? Who is so beyond the pale that it is both realistic and unremarkable that they would turn to violence against children to further their agenda? Who would we realistically expect to take such an action against the innocent so that no one would be too busy laughing at the supposed motives involved that the scenario would become useless? I know, how about homeschoolers. (hat tip: Steph) I wish I were kidding.

The exercise, which will involve the aftermath of a supposed explosion on a school bus at 9:30 a.m. at Durham and Holton-Whitehall roads in Whitehall Township [in Muskegon County, MI], is being funded by homeland security grants awarded to several area school districts and Muskegon County.

Local school district transportation directors instigated the exercise because they wanted to test their abilities to respond to emergencies, said Tom Spoelman, transportation consultant for the Muskegon Area Intermediate School District. They eventually hooked up with Muskegon County Emergency Services, and planning for the event has been under way for about a year, Spoelman said.

The exercise will test not only school transportation directors, but also the Muskegon County Emergency Operations Plan, which involves many agencies throughout the county.

[SNIP]

The exercise will simulate an attack by a fictitious radical group called Wackos Against Schools and Education who believe everyone should be homeschooled. Under the scenario, a bomb is placed on the bus and is detonated while the bus is traveling on Durham, causing the bus to land on its side and fill with smoke.

It's a good thing that emergency response departments want to test their disaster preparedness. It's great that they feel the need to make it as realistic as they can, and that as a part of that they'd need someone with a plausible reason to do this. But come on, you'd be more realistic by far if you just assumed it was PETA protesting the serving of meat-containing lunches at the school. Never mind the most realistic threats: a lone psycho or an honest-to-goodness jihadi attack. No, no! Let's pick on someone who hates children: homeschoolers! They're probably Rethuglican religious wackos anyway - hey, there's a name for the group, too!

Bah!

Posted by Jeff at September 21, 2004 11:34 AM | Link Cosmos