Gulf of Fear

Oliver Darcy: “When the eyes of the world fixated on the stranded NASA astronauts being rescued and touching down back on Earth, every channel danced around what precisely to call the body of water they splashed into.”

“A review of transcripts revealed an alarming reality: not one of the outlets could muster up the courage to simply refer to it as the Gulf of Mexico, the water feature’s name since the 16th century.”

“Instead, television news organizations tied themselves in knots, performing linguistic gymnastics to stay out of Donald Trump’s crosshairs, while also tiptoeing around audiences who would have surely been incensed to see them bend the knee and call it the ‘Gulf of America.'”