I live less than 15 minutes from Reagan National Airport, so last night’s deadly collision between an American Airlines commuter jet and an Army helicopter from Fort Belvoir was just about the only news available on satellite or network after 9 pm. yesterday. Why, after all this time, is this still the practice in news reporting? All four local networks, plus the PBS outlet, and CNN, Fox News and MSNBC, reported exactly the same lack of developments for the rest of the evening. This used to puzzle me when there was a major news story when I was a kid. The practice makes no sense, wastes money, and leads to not-so-bright people, which is to say most talking heads and reporters on the scene, to resort to saying silly things to fill dead air. What is this, virtue-signaling? To show they care? Why don’t all of broadcast news sources have an advance, rotating agreement for one of them to cover these things after the others put up a screen that states, “We at [station or network] care about X, and you will find complete coverage at [the designated pool broadcast location]. We will let you know about any substantive developments”?

Literally nothing happened last night after the crash itself and the rescue teams arrived. Reagan quickly announced that it was suspending flights at least until morning. Meanwhile, we were hearing dumb statements. A couple of far away videos of the accident showed a tiny light, the aircraft, being met by another tiny light, the copter, followed by brief flash and a hint of something falling into the Potomac. These videos would have had to be explained if one saw them out of context, yet one of the newscasters introducing one felt required to issue a trigger warning: “We must warn you, these images are extremely disturbing.” No, they weren’t. Anyone who is extremely disturbed by little flashes of light needs to be in a home for the bewildered.

At around 11 pm, someone on CNN felt the need to ask some guest in the airline industry who had nothing substantive to say, “What would you tell anyone watching who fears for her life and those of her loved ones in future flights as a result of this tragedy?” The guest blathered something innocuous, but should have said, “I would recommend that anyone who reacts like that brush up on their understanding of statistics and critical thinking. This event has literally no significance as far as calculating the safety of air travel.” The exchange reminded me of the argument I had just had with my occasionally woke-addled sister, who said that she was fearful of going to a movie theater because of the risks posed by legal semi-automatic rifles being legal. (She isn’t really, but was desperate for an anti-Second Amendment argument.) Even asking a question like that makes the vulnerable, the hysterical and the stupid (Hey, wasn’t that the title of a Clint Eastwood spaghetti Western?) dumber still. It’s irresponsible and incompetent.

Ugh. Then President Trump this morning decided to speculate on the causes of the crash and where the fault lies. In 2013, I recapped all of the times President Obama had done this kind of thing, why it is so irresponsible for a President and why any responsible leader should be able to figure out that it is wrong. I wrote in part,

“Waaay back in 2009, when the new President improvidently and recklessly commented on a local dispute between a Harvard professor and a Cambridge policeman, I pointed out that Obama needed to learn the ethical limits on his power and influence. Teddy Roosevelt’s “bully pulpit” is not license for the highest office-holder in the land to try to mold public opinion on every conceivable matter, local or national, and to influence decisions solely within the authority of others….It is an abuse of power—a President behaving like an emperor… [H]e has engaged in exactly the same unethical, arrogant conduct repeatedly, here, and here, and here and here, and here, and especially here—and I’m sure I may have missed a few. Each time I pointed out this inexcusable habit, I was barraged by glossy-eyed readers who made excuses for Obama  and rationalized his grandstanding remarks, accusing me of being biased and hypercritical. But with each new instance, it should have been progressively clearer that I correctly diagnosed this malady in 2009.”

Of course President Trump can’t resist this kind of irresponsible conduct. It is one of the habits there is no chance that he will break. The investigation of the incident has barely begun, and as anyone who has watched the series, “Airplane Disasters” knows, the explanations behind such disasters are usually a confluence of human decisions, mechanical failure, flying conditions and terrible luck. Nobody can announce what happened and why right after the event, certainly not someone with no flight experience like Trump.

President Trump speculated that the accident was caused by pilot error in the helicopter, or, triple ugh, because of a DEI issue in the control tower. The latter allegation is too stupid to require detailed condemnation. As to the first, one printed source wrote that Trump’s blame-casting was “completely without evidence.” Well, not completely without evidence: I’d call the fact that a passenger jet on a normal landing approach at a civilian airport was hit by an army helicopter evidence of a likely screw-up by the latter. It’s not proof, but the collision certainly provides a just basis for suspicion. The President of the United States, however, is about the last person who should be spouting theories.

Back to the newscasters: several kept saying that the crash was especially tragic because young figure-skaters were on the American flight. Sixty-seven people died, but that wouldn’t have been so bad if the death list hadn’t included skaters. Brilliant.

Finally, I just heard Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin, a Republican, give a long prayer to begin a press conference. I regard that as an abuse of position. I propose this deal: politicians promise to stop behaving like ministers and priests, and ministers, priests, and the bishop of the National Cathedral promise to stay out of politics.