I was just listening to the podcast of CNN’s AC360. I like listening or watching American news. Obviously the coverage of US politics can be more in depth than elsewhere but often I like the over the top reporting of incidents, making them out to be much more important than they are to justify hours of coverage.

One guest on the programme referred to the situation in Mumbai as “America’s 9/11″ and, of course, made several references to Al Qaida. I am not sure if news organisations are allowed to cover terrorism without reminding us of the perennial threat from Al Qaida even when the terrorists are some ragbag bunch who fail to carry out their evil plans through sheer incompetence.

How can someone calling these attacks “India’s 9/11″ be taken seriously? It is a ridiculous notion and an embarrassing suggestion.

The attacks on New York were years in the making involving men using commercial airplanes as missiles. These Mumbai attacks seem to be a group of stupid students with guns. There is a priceless clip from Indian TV of one of the terrorists on the phone to a TV station and having to ask someone else what their demands are.

Comments like “India’s 9/11″ only serve to deflect from a more worrying truth, that it does not take much for a group of young men with guns to get past slack security, shoot up the place, kill anyone on sight and get blanket news coverage across the world.

The more it happens, the more it will happen because disenfranchised youth will see all the notoriety that can be gained and see it as attractive in some way. It is the same argument that kids who go on shooting sprees in schools should never be named or have their photos shown.