Thank the heavens for a news cycle on Boxing Day

The nets are abuzz with the first anniversary of the Boxing Day Tsunami that devastated the Indian Ocean region. (If you don't know what Boxing Day is, just remember it's another one of those freebie holidays from which our country's self-punishing Puritan forefathers fled.)

I'm sure the nets are happy about this. What else did they used to fill time with the day after Christmas? Long return lines? Christmas family tragedies? Now they have this awful terrible tsunami for the next couple of years. Sure, it affected largely poor populations and a few famous and/or rich individuals, but, by God, it's a bona fide giant tragedy.

Speaking of Christmas family tragedies, a recent car accident in Chicago took the lives of two young women. This in and of itself is terrible, but the local news just had to tack on that the women "were really looking forward to Christmas." And this right here says everything about the news, doesn't it?