Five Friday thoughts….
I’ve spent the largest part of this week surveying the headlines for news items that would be flying under the radar, something apart from the typical fare of confirmation hearings and disaster relief-budget breaking packages, and the like. As it has been a thin news week, I will simply offer my five thoughts of the week that was and will be.
#1. When listening to Ted Kennedy, did anyone else think that getting the ‘Advice and Consent’ of a man who couldn’t recognize where a bridge began and ended seemed like a bad idea? Maybe if they just asked for information on ‘Vice and the Age of Consent’ instead. Ted can be downright affiable at times, but did little to help his causes with the free national television coverage he recieved as a member of the committee. Rumors persist that Welches will be calling him after the Senate votes, to endorse their new Sour Grapes products.
#2. I love baseball. I love the English language. I love politics. Sometimes you can cram three things you love together, to find the results are nauseating. I appreciate the candor and directness, and think that a complex judiciary structure that can be made a bit more readily accessible to the layman is a good thing. After the fifth baseball analogy, though, to borrow a baseball analogy of my own– I was looking for the quick hook.
#3 . How many folks recall the following news headlines? “Local mortuaries have been told to prepare for up to 40,000 bodies” ; “New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin stated on August 31 that the death toll of Katrina may be in the tens of thousands”; “Senator Mary Landrieu says ‘We understand there are thousands of dead people’. ”
Do you think the press could have been a bit more sensationalist with their rhetoric? Looking at the evidence of 16, September, 2005 : 5 State Death toll at 710 ; 474 of those in Louisiana. Still a good deal of human misery and suffering, but perspective seems to be lacking. The total is now expected to top out at or below 1,000 , but I don’t see Wolf Blitzer saying a single word about the fundamentally flawed projections that were tossed about as facts for over a week and a half. Then again, CNN should know better — they’ve had projection problems before.
#4 Don’t look now, but Schroder’s going in the tank. Not the loveable Peanuts character, but the darling of the Left German chancellor who is about to loose his job as the head of government in Germany. His SDU-Green coalition faces likely defeat in Sunday’s elections. To whom? While in recent weeks it has appeared that the female head of the CDU would have to head a coalition government with Schroder’s SDU, the most recent polling shows that it may be possible that the CDU might manage to be able to form a government with the Free Democrats (FDP), a pro-business party also on the Right end of the spectrum. Merkel would be the first female Chancellor in German history.
#5 The best news of the week: today is Constitutional Education Day in American schools. Proving that this column can recognize good work, regardless of it’s origin, I commend Senator Robert Byrd (WV-D). Byrd finally snuck in a worthwhile rider to a 2004 spending bill that requires constitutional teaching on or around Constitution Day (Sept. 17th) , although schools are free to choose how to impliment the lessons.