Friday, July 09, 2004

Weapons of Mass Transit Destruction Emboldened by their March 11th commuter train attacks in Madrid that produced a surprise election defeat for the Spanish conservative party, Al Qaeda plans to launch an attack within the USA to disrupt our November election. This according to Tom Ridge, who as usual claims there is "credible intelligence" to that effect.  In other words, it's Khalid Sheikh Muhammad, being held in some mini-Abu Ghraib, pulling our chains again. Ridge says that despite the threat, there's no reason to raise the terror alert level to orange (high) from the present yellow (elevated).  However, it might be a good idea to devise a more informative alert level system -- something like "One if by land, two if by sea." Meanwhile, now that Kerry has selected Edwards over Gephardt as his running mate, the latter is free to run against Ridge in the Howdy Doody look-alike contest, an event unlikely to be disrupted by any terrorist attacks. 12:22:12 PM

Familiarity Breeds Contempt These days, the members of Enron's rogues' gallery are usually referred to in the media by their schoolyard names: Ken Lay, Jeff Skilling, Andy Fastow. Likewise for Worldcom's Bernie Ebbers and the SEC's Dick Grasso. Only in America can average citizens be on a first-name basis with the kleptocrats who pick their pockets. 12:20:40 PM