Octuplet Mom Stokes National Fury

One woman. So. Much. Anger.

Why focus on the economy?

The fury over the Octuplet Mom has reached a fever pitch. The publicists for the mother, Nadya Suleman, have quit after receiving countless death threats.

The husband-wife PR team of Joann Killeen and Mike Furtney decided to drop Suleman as a client after the threatening e-mails and phone calls they received became too much.

After creating a website for Suleman that asked for donations for the mother and her now 14 children - probably not the wisest PR move - Killeen says she received 55,000 emails - most of them quite rabid, and a stack of angry letters.

The messages were both vitriolic and specific. "They hope I die, they hope my business goes under, they want to rip her uterus out," Killeen said. "They say I should be anesthetized and put down like a dog."

Lovely.

Killeen says the Los Angeles Police Department told her the threats were the worst they had seen since the O.J. Simpson case. She says she and Suleman stayed at a "secure location" last week because they felt threatened.

Something about this situation really seems to be bringing out the nasty in people. Killeen speculates These Economic Times might be to blame. "The American public have just lashed out," she said. "I think it has to do with the economy, healthcare -- there's not a lot of jobs, people are unemployed and are trying to take care of their families."

In light of the hostility, The Learning Channel (TLC), which we half-jokingly speculated might be waiting to get in on the octo action, is taking things slow. The network had been looking at the Suleman clan for a possible show - seriously, TLC? - but viewers have threatened to boycott any new show that features the Octo Mom.

TLC President Eileen O'Neill told EW, "There are so many things going on in that woman's life right now ... we're all waiting to see what happens next."

Perhaps the understatement of the year.

Until then, I suggest we, as a nation, take a Xanax, or five.