He does mention that in the post, and, yes, I think the author would also agree that it's self-serving. However, I would also argue that this is a symbolic mile

He does mention that in the post, and, yes, I think the author would also agree that it's self-serving. However, I would also argue that this is a symbolic milestone of the increased safety of US commercial flights, and an interesting thing to reflect on. I wouldn't take it too literally as any sort of real statistical measure, but it's certainly worthy of a blog post.