Spokesmen for the Army and Mayor Bloomberg specifically stated that the Times Square bombing was a direct insult to all of our troops - that may or may not necessarily be the case.

Photo: Sarah Baker

“The fact that this appears deliberately directed at the recruiting station insults every one of our brave men and women around the world,” the mayor said in a news conference today.

Whoever planted the bomb is indeed a terrorist and should be treated as such, but Bloomberg may have inappropriately stretched the meaning of the event, like a baseball catcher trying to curb slightly errant pitches into the strike zone for the umpire’s approval.

Yes, the act may very well have been intended to be an insult against American troops, but there are some reasons to doubt that was the specific intent.

The attack targeted the most prolific and pretentious recruiting station in the US. To some people, the Times Square location is in questionable taste. Some feel that recruitment should be a thoughtful and sobering atmosphere, and not conspicuously conducted in the center of the worlds largest neon smörgåsbord under a 500-ft picture of The Lion King.It is not disrespectful to our troops to insist that their recruitment atmosphere be, a the very least, distraction-free and appropriate as to its potential consequence.

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The attack takes place during a war when the administration has come under criticism for its recruiting practices.

Could it be that the attack was to specifically protest those recruiting practices, and not the troops themselves? Yes.

Mayor Bloomberg, who is considered conservative towards the war, may not wish anyone to reflect on that. His words direct the act towards our servicemen, whom are often inappropriately abused as the defacto standard for deflecting criticism.

In reality, it may have been an attack on behalf of some servicemen who were recruited into the war using questionable practices.

Some may believe that giving notice to the intent of a terrorist act is to give it more meaning, but it is also unethical when leaders attempt to change the meaning of a terrorist act to send their own message. They may not be planting the bomb, but they are utilizing it to forward their own agenda.

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There is another question to be asked here - when Bloomberg said this, was he commenting on the intent or effect of the act? If he was commenting on the intent, he is clearly ignoring the specificity of the act. If he was commenting on the effect, he is at the very least being presumptuous.

Certainly there are US soldiers who feel this was an attack on them. There are definitely other soldiers who feel it was an attack on recruitment policy and not an attack on them at all. Finally, there are likely soldiers in Iraq right now who wish that the Times Square recruiting station had been closed the day they personally entered it.

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As salacious as it may sound to some, it may be the case that a handful of US teenagers visiting Manhattan today just unknowingly got the lucky break of their lives. Granted, there are certainly others who will miss out or suspend the first day of a very rewarding and most honorable career.