Suspension? Fine? Points penalty?

Are you kidding?

NASCAR doled out none of the above to Carl Edwards for intentionally -- and with malice aforethought -- wrecking Brad Keselowski in Sunday's Kobalt Tools 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

“

I'm thinking about asking for a refund for all my penalties.

”

-- KEVIN HARVICK

Keselowski's Dodge flipped upside-down, slammed into the outside wall at the 1.54-mile race track, landed on its roof and eventually turned upright before sliding into the wall in Turn 1. So spectacular was the crash that it earned prominent placement on ABC's national newscast.

What Edwards earned seems trivial by comparison -- probation for three races.

NASCAR president Mike Helton announced NASCAR's stance on the wreck in a video teleconference Tuesday afternoon.

The immediate impression was the sanctioning body was more concerned with the fact Keselowski's car became airborne at an intermediate race track than with the vindictive act that triggered the wreck.

"It's important for all of us to step back and separate the issue of what happened with the 99 [Edwards] and 12 [Keselowski] on the race track and the fact that the 12 car went airborne. We've not seen a car get airborne much on the mile-and-a-half race track, and that's something that is very important to us, and we want to study very closely to figure out things that we can do to help prevent this very quickly in the future.

"This is a very important element of all of this that I would ask all of us to be reminded of the fact of the car getting airborne was a very serious issue. And that's something that we'll take a look at very quickly and try to figure out how to help prevent that happening in the future."

The school of thought that suggests that the severity of Keselowski's wreck shouldn't enter into the penalty phase of NASCAR's review of the incident is wrong.

The bottom line is that Edwards is responsible not only for the intended consequences of his actions but also for those that were unintended and unexpected. (Continued)