You know, too many are bandying Hurricane Katrina about as a metaphor these days....comparing this, that, and the other situation to it to supposedly associate the massive destruction the storm wrought four years ago with the clusterfook-in-a-teapot Cash for Clunkers has been, or the psychological effects of being out of work in a time when this sort of thing just shouldn't be happening.

Thankfully, C for C is over and Mara Liasson apologized for using Katrina as a metaphor...but the latest one still remains, which might mean, if we aren't careful, people will start being treated for a different kind of RSD - not the Recovery School District, but Recession Stress Disorder.

Whatever do we do to counter these sorts of comparisons? Where do we draw the line? And if we are drawing the line, why is it constantly being stomped on and passed over? Is it a name versus a number? A country's failings in the face of nature versus human beings taking matters into their own hands and killing a bunch of people to make a point? What happens if we compare say, a massive natural disaster with, oh, 9-11-01?

"The Tsunami Killed 100 Times More People Than 9/11" is the tag line.*

Thankfully, the World Wildlife Fund had the sense to reject it... perhaps because the visual punch of this proposal was so shocking, all those planes headed for the towers driving home what the human toll is from a disaster such as the 2004 tsunami that devastated Indonesia.

A "brutally powerful" planet, indeed.

A terrible, terrible metaphor in bad taste as well.

Do we really need to be doing this kind of thing to get people to stop using Katrina as a metaphor? If so, I certainly don't have the heart that can do that...but I can keep telling these people to give this sort of nonsense a rest and exert their metaphorical creativity in a different way.

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*from Poplicks' latest, which also informs us of the Nelson Mandela air freshener and of how Florida prison guards roll with Take Your Kids to Work Day.