Re: News

[Jim Devine <jdevine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

from SLATE, 22 February 2001:
> today's papers
>
> Pardon For The Course
>
> by Scott Shuger
>
> The NY [TIMES] and LA [TIMES] lead with the revelation that lawyer Hugh
> Rodham, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's brother, received fees totaling
> about $400,000 for his involvement in supporting a pardon application for
> a convicted swindler and a commutation  application for a convicted drug
> dealer, both of which were granted by his brother-in-law Bill Clinton just
> before he left office. The WSJ [Wall Street JOURNAL], which runs the story
> atop its front-page world-wide news box, declares this development to be
> "yet another blow to both Clintons on the heels of a humiliating series of
> controversies over their departure from the White House last month." Most
> of the papers quote Republican congressman Dan Burton's comment that "Yet
> again, this makes it look like there is one system of justice for those
> with money and influence and one system of justice for everyone else." ...

What is this man saying? that we should get rid of the system in which fat
cats get more political influence? I'm surprised to see a GOPster saying
so, since the Republicans have always been so good at defending the rich in
the past. If we do this, won't it undermine the incentive to become rich
and/or famous, since access to the President and other elected officials --
including Dan Burton -- is one of the traditional perks of being rich?
won't that stifle the process of the trickle down of benefits to the
subordinate classes, a process which has worked so well in the past?

> ... The NYT fronts three potentially relevant new facts turned up in the
> National Transportation Safety Board's investigation of the USS
> Greeneville's colliding into and sinking of that Japanese fishing boat: 1)
> The sub had detected the boat more than an hour before the accident; 2)
> One of the sub's crew told investigators that he could not complete his
> assigned task of updating a paper-and-pencil chart of surface vessels
> based on incoming sonar information because there were so many civilian
> guests in the control room;...

Here we see another sign of the growing one-sided class war against the
rich: if this kind of talk is allowed to continue, the wealthy and powerful
won't be allowed to get free sub rides anymore!

Dropping irony, we see the following story:
> The [Washington POST] fronts word that although the Pentagon's initial
> bomb damage reports about last week's strike on Iraqi radar stations were
> glowing, the Pentagon now says most of the bombs dropped "missed their
> mark." Most of the misses were by the Navy's new and expensive guided
> bomb. The story has one military source saying the bombs were "tens of
> yards off," and another saying the average miss was by "more than 100
> yards." A WSJ story on the raid says that only about half the bombs
> dropped hit their targets.

Jim Devine jdevine@xxxxxxx &  http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine