June 3, 2005
Female's Indy 500 Finish
Highlights Bush's Ignorance of Women
"It is very conceivable that the gap-toothed [team cosponsor] David Letterman
understands what revs a woman's engine more than the gender-gapped George W.
Bush. Besides, knowing what women want is not the expertise of the Bush
administration."
- Sports columnist
Selena
Roberts [1], using female Indy 500 driver Danica Patrick fourth-place finish to
rant against Bush and in favor of the federal Title IX mandating parity in
funding for school-based male and female sports.
The "Stern Message" of a Baby
Photo-Op?
"It was a White House photo-op with a stern message: President Bush, surrounded
by a passel of babies, warned last Tuesday against a Congressional bill that
would increase federal spending on embryonic stem cell research. The
legislation, which had threatened to veto, 'would take us across a critical
ethical line,' he said."
- Henry Fountain in the May 29 Week in Review.
The Charismatic Castro
"It is the kind of public adoration that brings to mind another Latin American
leader, Fidel Castro, who for more than 45 years has drawn accolades wherever he
has gone, much to Washington's chagrin. Now, it seems, the torch is being
passed, and it is [Venezuelan President Hugo] Chvez who is emerging as this
generation's Castro - a charismatic figure and self-styled revolutionary who
bearhugs his counterparts on state visits, inspires populist left-wing movements
and draws out fervent well-wishers from Havana to Buenos Aires."
- Juan Forero, June 1
.
Greenspan's "Irrational
Exuberance" Comment Heralded Stock Plunge?
"Alan Greenspan, the Federal Reserve chairman, did recently warn of 'froth' in
the market. Was that, perhaps, a polite way of suggesting 'irrational
exuberance,' as he did about stocks before that market tumbled in 2001?"
- Business writer Mark Stein on the potential real estate "bubble," May 28.
Reality Check:
The stock market began tumbling in 2000 (not 2001),
four years after Greenspan made his "irrational exuberance" claim.
Cox Worships "High Priestess of
Unfettered Capitalism"
"[Rep. Christopher] Cox - a devoted student of Ayn Rand, the high priestess of
unfettered capitalism - has a long record in the House of promoting the agenda
of business interests that are a cornerstone of the Republican Party's political
and financial support."
- Stephen Labaton, June 3.
But Good News for Us
"Bad News - This may have been the week the lame duck landed in the Rose
Garden."
- Headline over a photo of Bush in the May 29 Week in Review.
More Embarrassment for US in
Terror War
"His story has proved deeply embarrassing to American officials, even if they
continue to insist, privately, that Mr. Arar is not just the mild-mannered
computer consultant he seems, but a man with ties to a probable cell of Al Qaeda
in Canada, though he has never been charged with a thing. Whatever the truth,
Mr. Arar's soft, steady voice has touched the conscience of Canada and raised
disturbing questions about whether Washington's pursuit of terror suspects has
trampled judicial due process, or swept up guiltless bystanders."
- Scott Shane on Maher Arar, a Syrian-born Canadian who accuses the U.S. of
sending him to be tortured in Syria.
Canada's Left-Wing "Virtue"
"Canadian cities are among the most ethnically diverse and safest in the world.
Canadian tolerance took real form during the past two years with the extension
of marriage rights to gays and lesbians in most of the country.Canada's
reputation as an exemplary world citizen comes from its strong support of the
International Criminal Court, a ban on land mines and the Kyoto climate control
accord."
- Clifford Krauss, May 25.
Sen. Santorum, "The Too-Rough Kid
on the Playground"
"Rick Santorum, the boyish-looking 47-year-old senator from Pennsylvania, could
not, in more decorous political times, have risen to a position of much power in
Congress. He has been impatient and sometimes impertinent - the political
equivalent of the too-rough kid on the playground who either doesn't know the
rules of the game or just doesn't care to follow them.Santorum has never
entirely shed his image as someone not quite fit for polite political company -
he is the senator as hyperactive political pugilist, quick to engage in combat,
slow to yield the floor, a little too eager to crush opponents. His instinct
runs more toward total victory than to meeting somewhere in the middle."
- From contributing writer Michael Sokolove's cover story for the May 22
Times Sunday Magazine..
Didn't Even Know It Was
Contagious
"C.D.C. Investigates Outbreak of Obesity."
- Headline to a June 3 Gina Kolata story on obese West Virginians.
