An observation about Beth Holloway Twitty (the mother)

[steve2470]

I know that she is dealing with a horrendous thing. If I were the dad of Natalee, I'd do what I could as well and spend my own money. Maybe I am missing something, but has she ever expressed profound gratitude to the American taxpayers for the FBI going down there ? I seriously doubt the FBI would go to Aruba for my kid. It'd be "So sorry, dude. Here's a hankie".

[SoCalDem]

1. You wouldn't even get the "Sorry, dude".

You would get the brush-off..and a lecture about how once a US citizen leaves the US, they are "on their own".

[PatriotGames]

2. She doesn't realize how lucky she is to have the MSM hanging around her.

So many go missing overseas every year and we never hear a peep about it. Must be nice to be affluent, white, and pretty.

[Princess Turandot]

19. For all the hand-wringing over this, the MSM coverage of missing women..

doesn't usually help find them. It is just sensationalism. This case might be a little different only in that the government of Aruba is feeling pressure because of the tourist industry's significance to them. ( Although at the same time,I have no reason to believe that they would not be looking for her even w/o the tv coverage.) Once the MSM started pitching the 'white slavery' notion, this no longer had anything to do in reality with this girl.

There was a lot of MSM publicity about Elisabeth Smart in Utah for awhile after she was kidnapped. However, in the end, she was saved because her parents persisted in distributing drawings of a man whom their younger daughter had described to them. The police had assumed the handyman who died of a stroke before being indicted was the culprit and the MSM had pretty much dropped covering the story. Her parents, aided I think by John Walsh, plastered their younger girl's described drawing everywhere they could and that was how she was recognized.Her 2 kidnappers, including the wacko who assaulted her as his 'second wife', not long ago were both found unable to stand trial because they were nuts. The end to her saga barely got any coverage.

As much as the white blond teenagers stories piss off so many people here, the national cable coverage IMO is much more abt exploitation than it is an attempt to locate a 'special' missing person. I cannot think of a single person saved as a result of the MSM cable coverage, which is what counts in the end.Local coverage is what matters, and local news coverage of missing people is not generally limited to blue eyed blonds, at least not where I live.

Awhile back, one of my best friends who happens to be black, commented to me that she wondered if Tiger Woods married a Scandinavian model because he was ashamed of who he was. My reaction was that it was more likely that he was just as shallow as many a wealthy man of many of an ethnicity, who was claiming a 'trophy wife'. Like it or not, those blue eyed blond supermodels, or supermodels to be, appear to be at the top of many peoples' list of trophys. IMO, it's the current & future trophy wives who the cable stations focus on, because they grasp that that particular shallowness sells, and sells well.

[SammyWinstonJack]

3. Well she does have republican ties to the Senate.

She got a US Senator involved! Lucky her. No the FBI wouldn't go to Aruba for your kid nor mine either. We aren't repugs!

[PatriotGames]

4. I figured she was a registered Republican.

[SammyWinstonJack]

7. I think she got Sen Shelby involved.

But don't quote me on that!

[steve2470]

6. Ahhh. The plot thickens.

Equal justice for all. Yeah, right.

[PatriotGames]

9. I'm pretty sure if she was Dem, she would not have gotten

the pols attention. Yes, he was involved in some capacity.

[formernaderite]

18. Remember the Chandra Levy thing....

her parents were dems, they also understood the need for PR and media support, they did this by slowly leaking other sordid facts about her relationship with Condit. Natalees mother/family learned well...feed the media cycle and you've won half the battle. I think any media savvy family could pull something like this off.

[bluestateguy]

5. I'm not going to attack a grieving mother

I'm just not going to go there.

Now the media whores who are juicing this case up, that's another matter.

[SammyWinstonJack]

11. If Cindy Sheehan got even half the exposure that Natalee's Mom

is getting.............! Just saying! No one is attacking a grieving Mom...well some are, but it's not Natalee's Mom!

[PatriotGames]

12. Yup. Tabloid news trumps real news any day of the week.

And yes, I do feel for the Halloway Momma.

[emdee]

8. On one of the talk shows....

an Aruban official said that her expenses are being taken care of either by each individual facility or by the government.

And, as you, while I feel for the woman, I doubt that I would receive the same. Sending such young kids to a foreign area without much supervision is too dangerous for my taste these days. Heck, *I* don't want to go to foreign nations these days without protection!!

Not blaming the victim but, still, I wouldn't send my daughter on such a trip.

emdee

[PatriotGames]

10. Aruba really IS a safe place. Our media sucks in that they tried to

make Aruba look seedy in the beginning of the investigation. Yes, there are a few rough areas, but no rougher than parts of NYC. (No knock on the NYers out there)

[emdee]

14. "no rougher than parts of NYC"

LOL I'm in rural Tennessee! So, I'm 'askeered' in NYC too!

:silly:

It just seemed to me that there was not enough supervision for such young kids - but, yes, many parts of the US are probably even more dangerous *and* the story and the family probably wouldn't get as much coverage if it were, say, in Detroit.

The media is using the Aruba story as filler to keep from reporting the big issues of the day. The day they reported on a barrel that was not connected to the case at all was amazing. Hour-long shows about the barrel that is not connected in any way, shape, or form.

emdee

[PatriotGames]

15. And the duct tape. LOL

Remember the focus on shark attacks before 9/11? News was really slow tha summer.

[emdee]

17. Who could forget the duct tape?

Who knew it was so powerful?
:wtf:

emdee

[shaniqua6392]

13. Kids that age can barely drive a car safely

much less handle a trip out of the country with all the dangers, yet parents continue to send them. I told both my kids when they started high school: Don't ever even ask to go on spring break because the answer is NO WAY IN HELL! So, they did not even ask. LOL

[emdee]

16. I agree!!

I went on such trips (not outside the country, though) in my mid-to-late-20s and had a great time!! But, going under the age of 21 would have been a terrible mistake *for me*. Besides, my parents would have said NO!
emdee