I am glad this story ended well. I think it is all too easy to interpret the anger or disgruntlement of one employee as the policy of an entire airline. Northwest's response, finally, showed that is not.

One other comment: it is a dangerous thing to defend this kind of offensive material as "venting", or even to say it's o.k. "in the back room." Wherever it is, it creates a corporate culture of customer-as-enemy, and that culture is in neither our-the passengers'- interest, or the airline's.