I was scanning Twitter this morning, looking for a good booty call, when I came across this headline “World War II veteran en route to Pearl Harbor ceremony booted from flight.” I knew the story was going to follow a certain formula, so I read it so I could write this blog post.

In the story, a WWII veteran is put on a flight departing 8 hours later than his original flight because the flight he was on needed to cut weight so that they could have extra fuel due to inclement weather. He still made it to Hawaii with plenty of time to spare for the ceremony.

It is sold to the reader that it was fucked up to boot this veteran from his flight. I agree, it’s a shame. But what they don’t mention, and what makes the airline seem like jackasses, is why he was chosen to be rescheduled. There’s a presumption that the airline was profiling passengers to reroute and they chose him in spite of the purpose of his trip. In reality, the airline almost certainly has a protocol for passenger selection that does not profile in any way. Maybe he got his ticket last? Maybe his seat was in a certain part of the plane? Maybe he paid the least for his ticket? Whatever the rationale was, I’m certain in our litigious society that it was fair. So you leave out that detail, everyone seems like a jackass, and you have your story.

And although I used FOX News, this isn’t a FOX News specific criticism. All media outlets do this. Because by the time a criticism like mine is out there, they’ve already aired and posted dozens more stories. They just all keep churning this shit out. I guess what I’m really saying is the only people you can trust for information are the Capital Fools.