As we all know by now, three people were killed and several others injured by a bomb placed at the Boston Marathon finish line by the Tsarnaev brothers on April 15.

And in typical American fashion, we freaked out.

Bostonians fled the city, and what looked like nothing less than the initial assault on Fallujah, Iraq, every local, state and Federal agent with a gun and a badge descended upon the city. Boston was under siege all right, but less by the bombers and more by the cops.

Of course, bombings and killings and terrorism are all horrible things, and we have a right to be mad, sad and all sorts of upset about them when those things happen. We wouldn’t be human if we weren’t, after all. However what was a local problem–that is, local to Boston, Massachusetts–became a sudden national crisis.

There are lots of reasons for that, many or most of them caused by mass media naturally, but it’s led to renewed cries of the old slogan “If you see something, say something” and other post-9/11 Homeland Security “1984”-type warnings from Big Brother.

Yes, if you see a bomb or terrorists planting a bomb, call the cops. Please. But if it’s just a bag sitting in the corner, maybe exercise a little common sense before you dial 9-1-1.

On Monday, someone reported a “suspicious package” sitting outside of Kinnick Stadium in Iowa City. Now, while Cyclones might not mind Kinnick Stadium being blown up (with no one inside or injured of course), the local bomb squad–and pretty much every cop in the area–swarmed Herkey’s hideout, surrounded the package and discovered…A box of tea, ginger and a greeting card.

Whew, thank God. Crisis averted! But wait, there’s more:

The same day, the Ames Police shut down the downtown post office for yet another bomb threat. Apparently postal workers were freaked out about a backpack sitting in the lobby of the post office. After all, what are the odds of that happening in a college town–or really any town for that matter? So just after a few minutes of it sitting there, suspiciously unattended, the would-be bomb was called in, the post office closed down, and the entire block cordoned off.

The police said later that they wouldn’t have bothered so much a couple weeks ago.

We can only assume this is because the police would have rightly exercised common sense. But that begs the question: Why has common sense gone away just because a couple idiots blow some stuff up 1,300 miles away from here?

Facebook was awash with “this makes me proud to be an American!” posts after the remaining Tsarnaev brother was captured and cheerful mobs filled the streets of Boston cheering and celebrating. But was there that much to celebrate?

We claim we’re strong, but we gave in to the terrorism: We let the incident scare us into fleeing our homes, reporting every person with brown skin or a backpack to the cops for being terrorists, and reporting every unattended box and bag to the bomb squad. We let the Tsarnaev brothers change everything about how we live our lives, even if just for a few days.

We let the Tsarnaev brothers remove our common sense, too.

Yes, if you see something, say something. But don’t be an idiot, either.