Unbelievable...

Robert,
I was about to send you this, but I see you have it up already. It's because of stuff like this (as I suggested to you) that I tend to read a lot more non-fiction than fiction. As a novelist, there's no way that I would ever be imaginative enough to make this stuff up! And if YOU put it in a serious screenplay (non-comedy), I would have rolled my eyes. But as the old cliche goes, truth IS stranger than fiction -- and in recent years that's become more and more the case. After all, most folks never would have imagined, pre-9/11, that a handful of terrorist would kill thousands of people in downtown New York. Unfortunately, lots of people still can't imagine that it can happen -- again. I wonder how well a novel or screenplay would do that revolved around such a plot?

This is disgusting! Utterly appalling! Do people learn NOTHING from Prince Harry's "Nazi gaffe?" Even better...now we have the Palestinian suicide bomber Halloween costume. Amazing. Absolutely astonishing.

Young people are merely stupid. The more horrible thing is that a president of a university like U. Penn, who presumably had half a brain (obviously wrong) would not only not pose with them but not throw them out in disgust, is itself totally revolting.

She is supposed to be an example-setter. There is a nobless oblige to not act like a reprehensible moron, but...I guess that is asking for too much.

And the Penn sports team cheat too.

David:

Hollywood will not make a fictional movie about Arab terrorists. Invariably, they morph into modern-day Nazis. I have first-hand experience in this cowardly and stupid development process.

Chana:

Yup, truly disgusting. But you know among our elites homicide bombing is just the "act of desperate people." Once that kind of stupid rhetoric becomes accepted, well, anything goes.

Maurice:

Gutman's judgement is so poor that I believe she should fired. The student who dressed up as a homicide bomber should be carefully watched by the FBI. Some day he will want to act out his fantasy.

Jake:

Not surprised.

Robert, I second your motion on firing Gutman and watching the idiot kids.

Young Mr. Saadi and President Guttman operate within a moral vacuum that has more to do with the nihilism of "modern liberalism" than with dedicated Islamic fanaticism. Yet Islamic fanaticism is, obviously, his default sense of humor. And accommodating that is President Guttman's default sense of Halloween decorum.

Mr. Saadi remninds me very much of me when I was his age, when, like him, I took and/or made opportunities to assault acceptable limits in the media and political culture. (My stunts were reproduced in the New York Times and other mainstream media). Having emerged from all that, I like to think that my Halloween costume, a Homeless Suicide Bomber, anticipated and even pre-empted his costume.

Well done costume actually. People should be allowed to express themselves without having to be "fired" or "watched". Honestly, life is too short to care about things like this.