BakerMuckraker

Blogs in the Month of August - 2006

- August 25, Blogging on Red Herrings and Extra Inches
- August 15, Lebanon Explained

Muckraker is feeling a little lazy, but happily he finds plenty in one newspaper alone to keep his red pencil occupied….

THE INVESTIGATIVE MIGHT OF THE NEW YORK TIMES!

The off-lead in the Friday New York Times is a big, double-bylined investigative takeout on the Duke Lacrosse rape case.

>…By disclosing pieces of evidence favorable to the defendants, the defense has created an image of a case heading for the rocks. But an examination of the entire 1,850 pages of evidence gathered by the prosecution in the four months after the accusation yields a more ambiguous picture. It shows that while there are big weaknesses in Mr. Nifong’s case, there is also a body of evidence to support his decision to take the matter to a jury....<

True, there’s a racial component, with a black female alleging that three white college athletes raped her. But is it really worthwhile for the Times to devote this vast effort, when tremendous law enforcement resources are already devoted – to say nothing of the considerable energies of the cable networks and tabloids?

But wait. Here's the result of all this Times spadework, neatly summed up by whoever wrote the headline:

Files From Duke Rape Case Give Details but No Answers

So, let’s see. An examination of nearly two thousand pages of evidence, not by one but two Times investigative reporters, and then, "no answers."

When was the last time you saw such resources regularly devoted to what really goes on inside the White House, or in corporate America? When did a reporter last read an 1,850-page report on, say, military contracting? Or tax law changes?

THE BUYING OF THE PRESIDENCY, 2008

Another piece examines the earliest-ever start of positioning in the race for the White House, particularly in Iowa and New Hampshire. Several things jumped out at Muckraker:

>…[Massachusetts Governor Mitt] Romney, clearly enjoying his role as chairman of the Republican Governors Association, went to Cedar Rapids (Iowa) to campaign with Representative Jim Nussle, the Republican candidate for governor. There, Mr. Romney announced, to the audible gasps from an audience of devoted Republicans, that his committee was giving $500,000 to the Nussle campaign.<

Well, isn’t that generous of him! He’s trying to raise money for his own campaign, and he gives a half a million bucks to another person. You wouldn’t call that bribery, would you? Regardless, imagine Nussle getting elected governor of Iowa, then using his new position to support, say, John McCain instead. That will be one teed-off Mitt Romney.

Then there is George Pataki, the unspeakably lightweight and goofy governor of New York – he who lends comparative gravitas to George Bush, yet on the basis of Bush’s improbable ascendancy truly believes anyone can now become president:

>…Mr. Pataki of New York is using the lure of the Saratoga Racetrack to make friends. Aides said he was bringing 15 Republican state senators from New Hampshire for a day at the races on Friday. <

Day at the Races? Night at the Opera? What difference does it make? They’re all Marx Brothers adventures. But at least the Marx Brothers were competent at their trades.

And finally, the man we’ve all been waiting to hear from. What will Karl Rove’s role be in finding us another magnificent leader come 2008?

….>Karl Rove, the president’s chief political adviser, and Ken Mehlman, the chairman of the Republican National Committee — have told friends they are unlikely to do another campaign.<

Karl Rove is hanging up his spurs? That’s near the bottom of the article. Me might be misguided, but methinks that’s a bit of a headline. Perhaps:

AMERICA’S LONG NATIONAL NIGHTMARE IS OVER

Or is it? If not politics, what area might Rove choose next to make his mark? Perhaps he will retire to the bed & breakfast inn he and his wife ran (seriously) in the Texas Hill Country.

If so, and you go to sample the delights of the place that could be rechristened the Turd Blossom Inn, remember: sleep with one eye open.

DECONSTRUCTING THE DESTRUCTIVE CONSTRUCTION BUBBLE -- CONSTRUCTIVELY

Columnist-economist Paul Krugman tells us that the real estate bubble is already deflating in a big way, and cites proof.

>…Moreover, it could be both a deep and a prolonged bust. Since 2000, much of the nation has experienced a rise in home prices comparable to the boom in Southern California during the late 1980's. After that bubble popped, Los Angeles house prices began a slow, grinding deflation, eventually falling 20 percent (34 percent after adjusting for inflation). Prices didn't begin a sustained recovery until 1996, more than six years after the downturn began.

Now imagine the same thing happening across a large part of the United States. It's an ugly picture, and not just for people and companies in the construction business. Many homeowners -- especially those who bought their houses with interest-only loans or with minimal down payments -- will find themselves in financial distress. And the economy as a whole will take a hit.<

May we discuss the bigger picture? The love of endless construction that dare not speak its name? The United States economy is largely based on the environmentally, financially and morally untenable notion that the answer to everything is to just keep on building, putting up more houses and offices and roads, more, more, more. Almost no other country operates like that. Typically, the goal is to improve what you have – through renovation and replacement. Besides getting over our Real Estate Fixation, we might also want to think about controlling the still rapidly-expanding US population so that we don’t end up paving every last inch of the country (to say nothing of taxing its resources unconscionably). And ask whether speculating on other people's shelter is really an admirable pursuit.

And that’s the way it is. Harrumph.

GUTSINESS AND CANDOR, LIKE WOW

Speaking of bluntness, surely one of the more remarkable pieces in recent memory ran a bit earlier this month in the Times. It was by Irshad Manji, a fellow at Yale University, and the author of “The Trouble with Islam Today: A Muslim’s Call for Reform in Her Faith.”

If you missed it, here’s an excerpt:

> [Earlier this month] the luminaries of the British Muslim mainstream — lobbyists, lords and members of Parliament — published an open letter to Prime Minister Tony Blair, telling him that the “debacle” of both Iraq and Lebanon provides “ammunition to extremists who threaten us all.” In increasingly antiwar America, a similar argument is gaining traction: The United States brutalizes Muslims, which in turn foments Islamist terror.

But violent jihadists have rarely needed foreign policy grievances to justify their hot heads. There was no equivalent to the Iraq debacle in 1993, when Islamists first tried to blow up the World Trade Center, or in 2000, when they attacked the American destroyer Cole. Indeed, that assault took place after United States-led military intervention saved thousands of Muslims in Bosnia and Kosovo.

If Islamists cared about changing Iraq policy, they would not have bothered to abduct two journalists from France — probably the most antiwar, anti-Bush nation in the West. Even overt solidarity with Iraqi suffering did not prevent Margaret Hassan, who ran a world-renowned relief agency in Baghdad, from being executed by insurgents.

>…. at least as many Muslims are dying at the hands of other Muslims as under the boots of any foreign imperial power. In Sudan, black Muslims are starved, raped, enslaved and slaughtered by Arab militias, with the consent of an Islamic government. Where is the “official” Muslim fury against that genocide? Do Muslim lives count only when snuffed out by non-Muslims? If not, then here is an idea for Muslim representatives in the West: Go ahead and lecture the politicians that their foreign policies give succor to radicals. At the same time, however, challenge the educated and angry young Muslims to hold their own accountable, too.

This means reminding them that in Pakistan, Sunnis hunt down Shiites every day; that in northern Israel, Katuysha rockets launched by Hezbollah have ripped through the homes of Arab Muslims as well as Jews; that in Egypt, the riot police of President Hosni Mubarak routinely club, rape, torture and murder Muslim activists promoting democracy; and, above all, that civil wars have become hallmarks of the Islamic world.

Muslim figureheads will not dare be so honest. They would sooner replicate the very sins for which they castigate the Bush and Blair governments — namely, switching rationales and pretending integrity.

In the wake of the London bombings on July 7, 2005, Iqbal Sacranie, then the head of the influential Muslim Council of Britain, insisted that economic discrimination lay at the root of Islamist radicalism in his country. When it came to light that some of the suspects enjoyed middle-class upbringings, university educations, jobs and cars, Mr. Sacranie found a new culprit: foreign policy. In so doing, he boarded the groupthink express steered by Muslim elites.

…….Whether in Britain or America, those who claim to speak for Muslims have a responsibility to the majority, which wants to reconcile Islam with pluralism. Whatever their imperial urges, it is not for Tony Blair or George W. Bush to restore Islam’s better angels. That duty — and glory — goes to Muslims. <

AN HONEST ADMAN

ANOTHER courageous must-read in the Times was by John Kenney, described as “a creative director at an advertising agency” (You have to pay a bit to read it online, but here’s an excerpt:

>… I was particularly interested in the recent news about BP shutting down the nation's largest oil field, in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska.

I was interested in part because six years ago I helped create BP's current advertising campaign, the man-in-the-street television commercials. I can't take credit for changing the company's name from ''British Petroleum'' to ''beyond petroleum'' (lower case is cooler); my boss at the time came up with it.

That was the summer of 2000. Ideas were needed. We were pitching to the top man, Sir John Browne (now Lord Browne). My partner and I got the assignment….

…I started reading. The facts alone are amazing: 85 million barrels of oil a day used worldwide; 250,000 people born every day; climate change. I read Sir John's speeches and read about BP and its technological achievements and investment in hydrogen.

This wasn't my idea of an oil company chief. This was hope. Why didn't they talk about this stuff? And why did all big oil company advertising look alike? The typical helicopter shot of a tanker at sea, sunlight reflecting off the logo as it dissolves to a towheaded urchin on the beach, frolicking in the pristine waters. A voice like Morgan Freeman's saying, ''At Gigantico Petroleum, we're on the move to keep the world on the move. And to fill this tanker with cash.''

So we thought, what if you stripped away the corporate speak? What if you engaged in the debate that was happening with oil and energy and the environment?

We borrowed a video camera and approached people on the street, asking them questions:….People stopped. They talked. They were intrigued and passionate and intelligent and a little angry. …….In short, they knew the power of an oil company executive. And they wanted leaders.

After a day and a half of interviews, we had enough footage for five commercials. They were raw and emotional. The things people said were sometimes none-too-flattering to BP or the industry. At the end of each spot, we put up a list of what BP was doing in terms of cleaner fuels, alternative forms of energy, recognizing global warming and reducing their own emissions; stuff you didn't hear from an oil company. Before the ''beyond petroleum'' tagline, we added, ''It's a start.''

We did print ads too. The same way. Real people, real quotes as headlines that challenged BP and the industry. No oil company -- few companies at all -- had ever spoken like this, confronting the debate so frankly.

They liked it.

….Rarely are you faced with whether you ''believe'' in a product or service. This was different. This was serious. I believed wholeheartedly in BP's message, that we could go -- or at least work toward going -- beyond petroleum.

The campaign first appeared a few days before Sept. 11, 2001. It was shelved for a long time. Then relaunched. In that time, I moved on to other assignments and later another agency.

The campaign is running again. I heard that the interviewees are prescreened now, which is too bad. And last week, I heard that the pipeline in Prudhoe Bay is corroded and leaking. The company that claims to be beyond petroleum shut down a pipeline that serves up 400,000 barrels of petroleum a day. Maybe Coca-Cola's new line should be ''It's good for your teeth.''

I read too that the energy expert Daniel Yergin claimed last week that ''new analysis of oil-industry activity points to a considerable growth in the capacity to produce oil in the years ahead.'' It seems unlikely that anyone's going to push hard to change our energy future.

I guess, looking at it now, ''beyond petroleum'' is just advertising….

It's just that I believe that the handful of men who run these remarkable companies possess something more valuable than wealth, privilege and power. They have at their disposal the truly rare possibility of creating a legacy, the ability to change things, on a huge scale.

I never actually met Lord Browne. He announced recently that he'll retire at the end of 2008, when he reaches BP's mandatory retirement age of 60. I have no doubt he is a good, decent and exceptionally bright person. But imagine what the headlines could have read: ''Lord Browne to retire; changed oil industry and the world.''

Think of it. Going beyond petroleum. The best and brightest, at a company that can provide practically unlimited resources, trying to find newer, smarter, cleaner ways of powering the world. Only they didn't go beyond petroleum. They are petroleum….. <

(How's this? BP: Bull Pucky)

JIVE TURKEY IN THE OVAL:

Earlier this month, inside the Times was an easy-to-miss but important article about debate in Ohio over new voter registration rules. Readers will recall that Ohio is the place where the presidential election of 2004 was decided. Now, the GOP is finding new ways to keep black people from voting. What a revolutionary notion!:

>For Tony Minor, the pastor of the Community of Faith Assembly in a run-down section of East Cleveland, Ohio's new voter registration rules have meant spending two extra hours a day collecting half as many registration cards from new voters as he did in past years.

Republicans say the new rules are needed to prevent fraud, but Democrats say they are making it much harder to register the poor.

…..Under the law, passed by the Republican-led state legislature in January 2006, paid voter registration workers must personally submit the voter registration cards to the state, rather than allow the organizations overseeing the drives to vet and submit them in bulk.

By requiring paid canvassers to sign and put their addresses on the voter registration cards they collect, and by making them criminally liable for any irregularities on the cards, the rules have made it more difficult to use such workers, who most often work in lower-income and Democratic-leaning neighborhoods, where volunteers are scarce.

….Backers of the new regulations say they were needed, pointing to the fake names that appeared on voter registration cards in 2004, like Jive Turkey Sr.<

''The new regulations have everything to do with preventing Jive Turkeys from showing up on cards the way they did last time,'' said John McClelland, a spokesman for the state Republican Party. ''They've got nothing to do with suppressing voter participation.'' <

(Besides, Muckraker’s sources point out that Jive Turkey Sr was living in Houston at the time, while Jive Turkey Jr….well, he was on the Ohio ballot.]

But elections experts and liberal grass-roots organizations say the new rules go too far.

''All this flak about Jive Turkey is a red herring,'' said Catherine Turcer, the legislative director for Ohio Citizen Action, a nonpartisan government watchdog group in Columbus. ''Yes, his name showed up on a voter registration card along with Dick Tracy, Mary Poppins and Michael Jordan. But none of them showed up at the polls, which is really what matters, and cases like theirs were a total rarity that did not justify such restrictive new measures.''<

(That seems, to Muckraker, a perfect example of why the reformers always lose. Obviously, Jive Turkey is NOT a red herring. He is a money-green octopus, though he sometimes appears as a red, white and blue bulldog, or a yellow hound dog. Anyway, wait til Karl Rove gets his hands on this one, and starts spinning it. Remember – he’s not retired yet. )

FROM THE ENOUGH-ABOUT-YOU- LET’S-TALK-ABOUT-ME DEPARTMENT

Everybody knows that the best pieces in the paper are those that tell us how to get an advantage over the next guy or gal in this clawing world. Some will be appalled by the following from the Times, while some will take instruction:

>DAVID BARLOW, a senior executive for a relocation company in San Ramon, Calif., and a Southwest frequent flier, covets a particular window seat, 20A, four rows up from the rear of the airline’s 737 aircraft and will do just about anything — including paying any passenger who nabs it before him — to sit in it. (The clinching price usually ranges from $10 to $20.) The seat, he said, is precisely in the spot where the plane’s fuselage bows out and therefore offers passengers who sit there slightly more width and additional shoulder room.

“Some people think I’m totally crazy, but when you’re in the air like I am, virtually all the time, every inch counts,” Mr. Barlow said.<

(Barlow sounds a bit like Mae West, no?)

>It’s getting harder to score a good seat in the air….. In March, Northwest began letting passengers pay $15 to reserve some of the better coach-class seats on domestic flights…. Some Southwest customers are even paying a new company called BoardFirst.com $5 to check in for them to ensure a better chance at being among the first to board.

In general, there are no hard and fast rules for scoring a good seat….. That said, there are a few basic guidelines that travelers should consider when trying to get the seat of their choice.

Do your research. <

(Muckraker Corporation intends to do just that, opening an entire seat-research department…)

>…Look at diagrams on the airline’s homepage to see which spots are open. Then cross-reference your findings with Web sites like SeatGuru.com or SeatExpert.com, which rank seat quality and offer insider information like which exit-row seats won’t recline.

…..Another tip: Airlines sometimes rotate jumbo jets used on long-haul flights through their domestic routes. When this happens, business class seats are classified as part of the coach cabin and high-ranking frequent fliers can nab one by selecting a seat in the first few rows of coach.<

(And best of all, say the airlines, if you sit in the first few rows of coach, there’s precious little chance that you’ll have to sit next to either Jive Turkey Jr. or any of those Ohio undesirables Though Karl Rove might be there -- but we hear he’s a pretty entertaining fellow. And wait til he gets going about his Bed and Breakfast.....)

Tuesday, August 15, 2006

LEBANON EXPLAINED

The Hatfields and McCoys, and the McHatfields and the Goys. And the Druze

Did I miss anyone?

If you’re sure you have the answers on Lebanon, or know who to believe or even think you have a grasp of what is going on, you’ll want to read a piece by an American journalist with roots in Lebanon. If you can’t get through this lengthy and complex article, let Muckraker spell it out for you: Blecccccch.

It’s a big bleeping mess. No one can be taken at their word, everyone is changing sides or killing everyone else. For his own purposes, the leading foe of Syria has now become Syria’s closest ally. The Lebanese want Hezbollah in the government – or out of the country, or maybe something in between. Some Muslims don’t like other Muslim denominations, and some prefer others than their own. Some Christian groups are fighting with each other. And some people even just want to go to a café without being shot or bombed. (Next week: Israel explained. Or not.)

EVERYTHING IS DISAPPEARED

On Monday, NASA revealed that the original recordings of the Apollo moon missions are missing – including the priceless 'One small step for man' tape:

>WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- The U.S. government has misplaced the original recording of the first moon landing, including astronaut Neil Armstrong's famous "one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind," a NASA spokesman said on Monday.

Armstrong's famous space walk, seen by millions of viewers on July 20, 1969, is among transmissions that NASA has failed to turn up in a year of searching, spokesman Grey Hautaloma said.

"We haven't seen them for quite a while. We've been looking for over a year and they haven't turned up," Hautaloma said.

The tapes also contain data about the health of the astronauts and the condition of the spacecraft. In all, some 700 boxes of transmissions from the Apollo lunar missions are missing, he said...<

Muckraker’s anonymous and occasionally-reliable sources say that the tapes’ disappearance had something to do with an archivist thinking that ‘one small step for man’ indicated that the tapes contained information on George W. Bush’s military record.

ROGUE STATES UPDATE

[per Slate]

>The Wall Street Journal notices that Kim Jong-il hasn't been seen much lately in public. Which is understandable really, since according to a state news agency cited by the Journal, the Dear Leader has been busy writing a screenplay: "Diary of a Girl Student."<

With Arthur Golden writing Diary of a Geisha, and now North Korea’s leader so engaged, Muckraker plans to attain fame and acclaim (to say nothing of a lucrative book contract) with his “Inside the Mind of An Aging Stripper”.

WHAT’S WITH JOE?

Via our friend Steve Pizzo, a lively commentary posted right after Joe Lieberman lost the Democratic primary in Connecticut: (typographical errors were in the original)

Lamont's Victory & Lieberman's Insult to Democracy & the Democratic Party

By David Sirota

At the end of every gut-wrenching horror movie, when the hero seems finally to have vanquished the enemy, there is always that last moment where the enemy, lying lifeless on the floor, finds a last gasp to fire off one final round, usually dealing a fatal blow to one of the good guys.

In the incredible story that concluded tonight in Connecticut, Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Ned Lamont was the successful hero, representing the hopes and dreams or ordinary citizens by mounting a truly grassroots campaign against Joe Lieberman's massive war chest of corporate cash and universal support from Washington, D.C.'s cabal of lobbyists, pundits and insiders. Yet, in his last coughing gasps, Lieberman is now saying he will, in fact, fire off that last spiteful round - right into the gut of the Democratic Party.

That's right - Lieberman is announcing he will move forward with plans to abuse loopholes in Connecticut's election laws, ignore Democratic Party voters who voted in our democratic process for change, and mount a Lieberman for Lieberman Independent bid. This, from the guy who went on television after the 2004 presidential race (which was the closer than the Connecticut primary) to declare that "there's no prizes for second place in American politics." Yes, you read that right - the Senator who says there's "no prizes for second place" and who has in the final days of Democratic primary campaigning been running around claiming that he gets the message and realizes he no longer should enable George W. Bush's right-wing agenda now is saying that he will try to rely on hard-core Republican voters and money men in a general election contest in a desperate attempt to hold onto power.

Understand how insulting this is - Connecticut taxpayers just spent a large sum of money to hold a democratic primary election in a country founded on small-d democratic principles. An 18-year incumbent who had 100 percent name ID and a $12 million war chest (thanks to, among others, Joe's good friends in the pharmaceutical and financial services industry) was unable to win that election. Now, instead of respecting small-d democracy or the party he has spent the last week pledging his devotion to, he's behaving like a Third World autocrat that ignores democracy, and running to hard-core GOP voters and fund raisers in Connecticut and begging them to help him hold onto his job in the Senate club. This undemocratic chicanery from a man who has long justified his support for the Iraq War by saying he has a supposedly heartfelt devotion to spreading democracy.

Make no mistake about it - be prepared for Lieberman, the Enron lobbyists, corporate lawyers, Establishment pundits and other assorted characters in the Washington brothel to run out immediately and trumpet how incredible it was that Lieberman got so close, insist that Lieberman loss was supposedly the doing of anti-semites, and demand that every god-fearing, terrorist-hating American support Lieberman's selfish independent candidacy or the Republic will not be able to go on. What they want to do is pretend that Lieberman hasn't spent 18 years in the Senate, wasn't have every single advantage, didn't outspend his opponent with a massive corporate-funded war chest, and was, instead, the courageous underdog who supposedly did not arrogantly ignore mainstream public opinion with his stands pushing the Iraq War, Social Security privatization and corporate-written trade deals that sold out American jobs. That storyline provides a convenient excuse to justify Lieberman ignoring Connecticut voters, Connecticut taxpayers who funded the election, and all the democratic principles this country is supposed to be based on. It provides a consultant-packaged excuse for Lieberman to ignore voters and insult the Democratic Party by running as a party of one, and potentially throwing the general election to the Republican Party.

....Lieberman's concession speech… spitefully announcing that he will abandon the Democratic Party that he has spent the last week transparently pledging his fealty to is classic Lieberman. You may recall that after he was crushed in the New Hampshire primary, he proudly boasted that; "we are in a three-way split decision for third place" - as if he really thought voters were stupid enough to think that was a good thing and that he was well on his way to winning the nomination. Similarly today, he is claiming that the Democratic Party primary election is just the "first half" of the election process - again, thinking voters are so stupid, they don't see that what he's really doing is giving the big middle finger to American democracy.

But voters do see what's going on - and that's why Lieberman, an 18-year incumbent who outspent his opponent, was handed a crushing defeat tonight: because ordinary people realize that Joe Lieberman and the Washington Establishment he represents has for too long been allowed to sellout their constituents and this country as a whole. Ned Lamont is the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in Connecticut. Every single Democratic officeholder in this country (that means YOU Kerry, Feingold, Clinton, Edwards, Warner, et al.) has an obligation to respect the Democratic Party primary election that took place tonight, lest they too go on record as saying they see Democratic Party voters and America's democratic as an afterthought in comparison to their own personal political ambitions (Good news: Lieberman's DLC colleague Sen. Evan Bayh immediately announced after the primary his endorsement of Lamont). Likewise, Democratic leaders in Congress now have an obligation to remove Lieberman from his committee assignments, and cut off Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee resources, now that he has officially left the Democratic Party.

This is an incredible victory tonight. Ordinary people showed that no politician - even a snake like Lieberman with every single advantage - is above American democracy. Though Lieberman and the lobbyists who are backing him would like everyone to forget about democracy, Ned Lamont tonight showed that ordinary people in this country still have power and that no Senate seat is the exclusive property of any one individual. <

THE WORLD IS FLAT…TERING

The fellow who penned the above, David Sirota, also shed some interesting light on another influential figure of our times, the great Thomas Friedman:

>I've documented repeatedly how New York Times columnist Tom Friedman parrots the propaganda of Big Money, using his column to legitimize some of the worst, most working-class-persecuting policies this country has seen in the last century - all while bragging on television that he doesn't even bother read the details of the policies he advocates for. I have always believed Friedman's perspective comes from the bubble he lives in - that is, I have always believed he feels totally at ease shilling for Big Money and attacking workers because from the comfortable confines of the Washington suburbs he lives in and the elite cocktail parties he attends, what Friedman says seems mainstream to him. But I never had any idea how dead on I was about the specific circumstances of Friedman's bubble - and how it potentially explains a lot more than I ever thought.

As the July edition of the Washingtonian Magazine notes, Friedman lives in "a palatial 11,400-square-foot house, now valued at $9.3 million, on a 7½-acre parcel just blocks from I-495 and Bethesda Country Club." He "married into one of the 100 richest families in the country" - the Bucksbaums, whose real-estate Empire is valued at $2.7 billion.

Let's be clear - I'm a capitalist, so I have no problem with people doing well or living well, even Tom Friedman. That said, this does potentially explain an ENORMOUS amount about Friedman's perspective. Far from the objective, regular-guy interpreter of globalization that the D.C. media portrays him to be, Friedman is a member of the elite of the economic elite on the planet Earth. In fact, he's married into such a giant fortune, it's probably more relevant to refer to him as Billionaire Scion Tom Friedman than columnist Tom Friedman, both because that's more descriptive of what he represents, and more important for readers of his work to know so that they know a bit about where he's coming from……<

A COOL BANK

If Friedman wants to keep us posted regarding happenings on the creative edges of the free market, he should check out this remarkable ad for a Turkish bank. (thanks RIB) [and YES it is safe to double-click on the link icon above – no virus here, but do be patient and wait a couple of minutes for it to load, even on broadband]. And mind you, this bank doesn't seem to have anything to do with banking, which may be why it is so lovable.

TURKS DANCE, WE EAVESDROP

And now for a musical ditty with a domestic flavor….[via Lou Wolf]

SPEAKING OF EAVESDROPPING

While we were all worrying about Mel Gibson’s values, we missed Norm Coleman’s dad (Coleman is the Republican senator from Minnesota who has long criticized the leadership of the UN as not being in synch with American values). Here’s a wire service item that was overlooked by much of the media:

>Police cited the father of U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman, Norm Coleman Sr., on Tuesday for lewd and disorderly conduct for allegedly engaging in a sex act in a car outside a pizzeria.

According to a police report, the elder Coleman, 81, was having sex with 38-year-old Patrizia Marie Schrag, who was also cited for lewd and disorderly conduct. The St. Paul Pioneer Press first reported the citation. A police spokesman didn't immediately return a call from The Associated Press.

Coleman raised his son in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, and now lives in Minnesota.

"I love my father dearly," Sen. Coleman said in a statement Wednesday. "I do not condone his actions or behavior, and I am deeply disturbed by what I have learned. He clearly has some issues that need to be dealt with, and I will encourage him to seek the necessary help."<

A WARNING ON WARMING

Last week, newspapers ran a small item with some small news:

>The first seven months of 2006 were the warmest such stretch in the continental United States for any year since climate record-keeping began in 1895, federal scientists said. Scorching temperatures in July, particularly strings of hot nights, were almost certainly related in part to the continuing buildup of heat-trapping smokestack and tailpipe gases linked to global warming, said Jay Lawrimore of the National Climatic Data Center. “The long-term trend we’re seeing cannot be explained without the influence of greenhouse gases,” Mr. Lawrimore said.<