27 November 2007

Tackling the News























You had to be outside of the loop to miss the story of the death of Redskins safety Sean Taylor. The gifted athlete never found himself far from trouble early in his career, but recent reports saw Taylor staying on the straight and narrow. This is a tragic event. I looked for some insight from the medical community, and I discovered that the 7-hour surgery might have been an effort to keep Taylor's leg intact rather than amputating his limb. This would be one more complicated detail in a life beset by bad decisions if it were in fact true. I wish everybody involved nothing but the best...hopefully, Taylor was able to outrun his life problems one last time.

If at first (in the Middle East) you don't succeed, try, try again. Following on the heels of the rolicking success story that is Iraq, President Bush has jumped with both feet into the eternal quandary that is peace in Israel. Never mind that he has ignored peace in Israel for the entire tenure of his Presidency...Bush really needed to try and start an endeavor with less chance of success than democracy in Mesopotamia.


Pakistan is back at the forefront of the battle between U.S. interests and the evangelical distribution of democracy. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is openly critical of the American-backed leader Pervez Musharraf, and his opposition is throwing a monkey wrench into another experiment in democracy that is going horribly awry for American interests. America always supports democracy...as long as democracy always supports American interests. Elsewise, Bush will mail Sharif back to whatever Saudi Arabian hole he crawled out from to deliver his rebuke of our party-line towing General Musharraf.


If you've been trying to sell your house, chances are you don't need a Wall Street analyst to tell you that the economy might be headed into a recession. Definitely don't bet your home against that one.


Those who don't believe that FCC regulation has screwed up the broadcast airwaves will be happy to learn that they are trying to backdoor their way into legislating cable television. Just keep your grubby mitts off of my HBO programming and I'll leave you be (for now).


Finally, in news of the what the f%#@!, a British teacher in the Sudan is being held for allegedly insulting Islam by naming a teddy bear in her classroom after the prophet Mohammed. This egregious act was considered slightly more insulting than the fictional act of a Chicago teacher whose class named a stuffed animal "Bartman the Bear" and equally insulting as a Romanian teacher naming a stuffed animal "Ceausescu the Bear."

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