May I speak with Hillary, please?

Well, I’m not surprised that Hillary’s campaign headquarters isn’t taking calls from organizations such a Newsdive. And yet there are certain crucial questions that need to be answered, questions that aren’t likely to be asked at televised debates or town hall meetings. Indeed, the put-me-in-the-oval-office dog and pony show began way too early, and as the Book of Ecclesiastes says, “There is nothing new under the sun,” not in New Hampshire, not in Iowa. I know what the candidates believe in, and reruns of The Dick Van Dyke Show are looking better and better.

Here are some of the things I’d like know over and above a candidate’s position on war, immigration, health insurance, and education: “What do you think of Crosby, Stills, & Nash, Roswell aliens, out-of-body experiences, the Kama Sutra, penguins, MSG, Paul McCartney’s Wings’ period, Donald Trump’s hair, Britney’s lack thereof, the designated hitter rule, skinny dipping, Woody Allen movies, my personal profile, Little Women, big women, monster truck rallies, Discovery’s Shark Week, Jack Hanna and the San Diego Zoo, the Blue Man Group, and comb-overs? Do you like Curly or Shemp, Jay or Dave, Judge Judy or Judge Mathis, Kirk or Picard, PC or Mac, foreplay or spontaneity, nature or nurture, Brian Williams or Katie Couric, early Dylan or later, QVC or HSN, soup or salad? Have you ever sung “Ninety-nine Bottles of Beer on the Wall?” Will the universe expand forever or do we all collapse, start over, and reassemble to start blogging again in thirty-two million years? Where were you during the Beatles’ first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show?

I want to know what Hillary et. al. are made of. I want to see the candidates naked on stage, singing “Hair.” (Or maybe not.) But you get the drift. Let’s find out what makes these politicos tick and tock. It’s a government by, of, and for the people, and inquiring minds want to know.

(Picture: Public Domain)

Telemarketers and Pizza

Thankfully, the government established a Do Not Call list to ban telemarketers from disrupting that little thing we must attend to everyday: life. Unless you switched your phone off (no more taking the receiver off the hook because of the torturous beep-beep-beep to tell us that we’ve taken our phone off the hook), there was no safe time to eat dinner, take a nap, watch TV, or do the hanky panky. We now also have the extra protection of a Privacy Directory offered by AT andT and other carriers. But occasionally obnoxious sales pitches still get through. They are the Jehovah Witnesses of the phone lines.

My son came up with several interesting ways of dealing with these incorporeal intruders. Most reps are just doing their jobs, although I have been called some pretty foul names by telemarketers when I told them to take my name off their lists or asked to speak to their supervisors. My son, however, took a different approach. He would tell them that our house was on fire and start screaming. Other times, he would ask them what kind of pizza they liked best. My personal favorite was when he would inform the telemarketer that he should call later since the FBI had the phone bugged “because my dad’s been doing some pretty weird things with his offshore bank accounts.” (Click. Buzzzzzz.) If the telemarketer was female, he would ask her out on a date. Still other times, he would get out a textbook and begin reading his Spanish homework.

Cruel? No, not if the people refuse to honor my privacy, and I would argue that they don’t have the right to call me to begin with. My latest rant is against those companies that retain the right to call us because we do business with them: phone companies, credit card companies, cable companies, etc. Ironically, AT and T, which provides my Privacy Directory, keeps calling to see if I like its service. Fie on loopholes! Recently, the Hampton Inn Corporation called me seven times in less than two weeks because I stayed in one of their establishments eleven months ago. They kept calling even after I said I wasn’t interested in booking a room in Anchorage and then taking a cruise. In frustration, I started talking about pepperoni and cheese. The folks at Hampton don’t bother me anymore.

Today’s Slick Fish Award goes to companies that believe they have the right to bother perfect strangers using the telephone.

(Picture: Public Domain)

Online Dating and Tropical Fish

Ever read the personal profiles on major online dating services? Some focus on twenty-nine areas of compatibility. Whew, that’s a lot of compatibility, although the services claim that they broker love in a scientific fashion. I’m not sure that love is a matter of science and logic, however. Lust surely is, what with pheromones and hormones and other moans, but not love.

Here is a sample dating profile:

“I like walks in the rain, but only if the temperature is between 70 and 80 degrees (Fahrenheit, that is. I don’t go out with “metric people, so Celsius people—don’t waste your email.) I love all pets except parakeets, marmosets, and certain types of tropic fish with yellow markings. I don’t mind bling as a Christmas present, but I don't like to celebrate any kind of traditional holidays at all because of bad childhood memories I’d rather not go into. I love scuba, knitting, jigsaw puzzles, bingo, baseball, Cancun, rainy mornings, Nascar, ballroom dancing, antiquing, and Mahler, but not in that order. I like a man who is honest, sincere, loving, thoughtful, and it doesn’t hurt if he has a good physique, although I try my best to look beyond ordinary glutes and pecs. Must love to travel and make over $150K a year. My ideal mate is a man who is not afraid to let his true feelings show. It’s best if he has scaled at least one tall peak and been married at least once so I don’t have to break him in. He must have a love of adventure but be the nurturing type who loves to snuggle by the fireplace. If he has children, they should be at least juniors in college. Other than that, I’m wide open, with a sense of abandon and experimentation. No head games, please. ~ Cutey123”

My response to Cutey would be as follows:

“Hi Cutey. I like your profile, especially since there are so many people out there who like uncaring, insincere, and mean-spirited people. You’re so refreshing! I have scaled a hill outside of town—does that count? Now for the bad news. I like real Christmas trees, think Nascar is as boring as dental work, and I snuggle when the mood hits, not when stereotypical rain pelts my window. I do indeed let my true feelings show, but only when I get really pissed off. Otherwise I’m kind, caring, considerate etc. My children are young and love to fart when someone pulls their fingers. Would this bother you? By the way, “antique” is not a verb. Have you ever heard anyone say, “I antique, you antique, he/she/it antiques”? You didn’t say which Baskin & Robbins flavors you like. How do you expect me to select a mate without that kind of information, you adventurous vixen? By the way, you like S&M, right? As for head games, what the hell do you think online dating is? You’re a few plates short of a place setting, hon. I’ll take a pass. As a matter of fact, I was planning on buying some yellow tropical fish this afternoon.”

Today's slick fish award goes to ridiculous dating profiles and the people who post them.

(Pictire: Public domain)

The Running of the Thanksgiving Bulls

The day after Thanksgiving is the busiest shopping day of the entire year, and it’s not called Black Friday for nothing. So it’s off to the mall with a gazillion other people to beat the rush. (There’s a problem in logic here that I won’t even begin to tackle).

The doors of many stores, including several Madison Avenue icons, open at six in the morning, with hundreds of people—even thousands—huddled outside long before dawn, waiting to storm the first floor in a bargain hunting frenzy. I’d rather wait to the last minute and buy Aunt Mimi a cheap bottle of Manslaughter perfume than get trampled or gored by the holiday stampede. Injuries are quite prevalent as we attempt to buy presents to usher in the season of peace and goodwill.

It’s no different from the ritual at Pamplona. Gates are opened, and people run wild. Machismo carries the day, regardless of the gender of the shopper. The only thing missing is Ernest Hemingway taking it all in from a bar, drinking a daiquiri.

Happy Thanksgiving. Be safe.
(Picture: Public Domain)

Aliens Attack Mitt Romney

Why are we so fascinated with tabloids? Let’s conduct a thought experiment. We love these rags because:

A) We’d like to see a monster attack politicians, people who talk in movies, price-gouging oil companies, doctors who overbook, mothers who beat their children in Wal-Mart, noisy neighbors, etc. In short, we’re like Network’s Howard Beale, who screams “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not taking it anymore!” We’re filled with rage at the injustices all around us, but we never speak up and truly say what’s on our minds. We hold it all in.

B) As novelist Walker Percy said, we have the spiritual flu. We have no idea who we are and are lost in the cosmos. We live vicariously since anything is better than the mundane existence we lead. We therefore anesthetize ourselves with alcohol, tabloids, reality TV, Britney news, and soap operas.

I’m not sure A and B are mutually exclusive, but I think Percy had a point. If we’re not massively insecure, why do we always look at any reflecting surface that we happen to pass, such as department store windows or mirrors? I think it’s because we’re not sure we’re really there. (Picture: Public Domain).

Blogging Our Way to Freedom

Anyone can do it. You simply create a blog and post your thoughts for the world to read. It’s a piece of cake . . . unless you’re over thirty and don’t know anything about widgets, Flickr, Feedburner, technorati, pings, permalink, trackbacks, blogrolls, and html. Otherwise, you’re good to go.

Bloggers are the new columnistas (ka-lum-NEE-stuhs) of the world. They are like the new journalists, hunting down stories with their trusty Nokia camera phones. We columnistas are the new wave of publishing, bypassing the newspaper industry in the same way print-on-demand is doing an end run around the publishing giants.

Blogging runs the gamut, from columns by established news divisions and technocrats to Sue’s Potpourri and Aunt Sally’s Knitting Tips. If you want something, a blogger somewhere on this big blue marble has it.

If PCs and blogging had been around in the 1960s, the Berlin Wall would have crumbled and the Soviet Union would have gone belly-up right then and there. What could the KGB have done about Vladimir Vidanya’s Girls Gone Cuckoo Blog in St. Petersburg? Or Petruska Ratinov’s Fresh Muffin Blog in Moscow? The U.S.S.R.’s internal spy network would have been overwhelmed.

My neighbor, Mabel Mae Greene, is an elderly African-American who invites me over for dinner once a week. At the age of sixty-six, Mabel got her first computer last year. She decided to go online last week to get a recipe for a blogroll, which she thought she’d bake for Thanksgiving. After thirty minutes, Mabel hit the monitor with her black vinyl purse, a formidable weapon, and then sat down on her couch with a shot of Jack Daniels. There are people who still don’t want anything to do with technology. I find them rather refreshing. Rejection of the keyboard and monitor is also a form of free expression.

(Picture: Public Domain)

War with Iran: Winning Through Cholesterol

Invasions are passé. At least the ones with guns, bombs, and live ammo. If America really wants to westernize the world, it needs to do so with McDonalds, Burger King, KFC, Dunkin Donuts, and Baskin and Robbins. While we’re at it, lets give naughty countries WalMart and Mervyns so they can buy sans-a-belt slacks when those tummies start to bulge like a pregnant woman carrying twins.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with any of the above establishments, all of which I’ve frequented, but if we want countries like Iran to put away their fuel rods, let’s give them the heart and soul of capitalism: material possessions. Put away the preaching and the carrier groups and the saber-rattling rhetoric. All our enemies need is some food addictions.

Think I’m joking? No. If we would have lifted the embargo on Cuba long ago and moved in some fast food restaurants and department stores, Fidel would already have packed his bags and skedaddled to Bolivia, exiled by Starbucks and Quizznos. It’s war on the cheap, and no one gets hurt except by free will: to eat or not to eat; that is the question. Guerilla warfare never tasted so good.

But do we really want to Americanize the world? Is it the moral thing to do? It certainly is for George Bush, although I reserve the right to disagree that he receives his mandates from God. If the neocons have their way, we will one day look into the eyes of someone halfway around the world and say, “We have seen the enemy, and he is us.” If it has to happen, however, I’d rather see it done with ice cream than bullets. In the long run, it’s easier to write prescriptions for Plavix than to dig graves and establish permanent military bases.

(Picture: Public Domain)

A Morning at Starbucks: Sociology 101

The Starbucks logo has become iconic. From Yuma to New York, you can get your brain brewing by getting a mocha latte—and coughing up a few bucks. Waking up ain't cheap anymore. It’s rather lamentable that we’ve abandoned our own kitchens in favor of enacting time-honored morning rituals at a store among strangers, but maybe there’s an upside to this exotic bean trend. Perhaps Starbucks is engendering a sense of community among its patrons in a world where people pass each other on the sidewalk with scowls on their faces.

A visit to Starbucks reveals vignettes of life in modern America. There are the quiet web surfers and e-mailers in the corner, sipping coffee as they type on their laptops. Others read the latest bestseller or work the New York Times crossword puzzle. These scenes are snapshots, like little snippets from McCartney’s “Penny Lane”: a nurse selling poppies from a tray; a fireman with an hourglass; a banker waiting for a trim. Ordinary life that we take for granted.

And then there are the Starbucks coffee baristas, a term used for those who serve espresso. The word is derived from the Italian baristi, or bartender. They’re generally an agreeable lot who seem to know their arabica beans from their robusta.

It’s mind-boggling to think of how 300 million Americans might function on any given morning without caffeine jazzing up the synapses of their brains, but Starbucks ensures that we can’t travel more than a few blocks without the opportunity to jump-start our neurotransmitters. At present, the coffee chain is frequented mostly by those who like a trendy, upscale atmosphere. I wonder if grandparents will, in fifty years or so, reminisce about those quaint old coffee bars that represented “the good old days.” They might say, "Look--that's where we met and fell in love!" The times, they always are a-changin’.

The next time you go out, take a look around and click your brain-shutter. Nothing stays the same for very long. Whether that’s good or not—well, you tell me. (Picture: Public Domain)

From Harry to Hillary: Prophylactic Politics

The last president who worked without a net, who governed in a world with no spin and no handlers, was “Give ‘em Hell” Harry Truman. He had the cojones to fire General Douglas MacArthur for gross insubordination even though this was tantamount to political suicide for Truman.

As far as I know, the above firing was the last major political orgasm on record. Today, candidates have become “condomized” so that we are protected from their full positions on any given issue. The electorate doesn’t get the satisfaction—pardon the pun—of finding out what lies beneath the talking points, the scripted answers, the prepared statements.

It was disclosed this past week that Hillary was lobbed a “softball question” during a recent town hall meeting, a student having been fed a question for the senator by a Clinton campaign staffer. Boo. Hiss.

The truth is that stacking the Q&A has been practiced by candidates for years as modern campaign machines fine-tune the art of political theater. Unfortunately, this represents a major disconnect between campaigning and governing. A president has to be able to react in a nanosecond to global crises—no script, no political latex. In a nuclear world, there's no time for rehearsal.

Today’s Slick Fish Award goes to political spin doctors who shield us from their candidates. Kudos, however, to Dennis Kucinich, who introduced a bill to Congress asking for the impeachment of Bulldog Cheney. Kucinich won’t get the nomination, but he speaks his mind. He goes after what he wants in a forthright way. Maybe that’s why he smooched up his gorgeous young wife on the debate stage last week. (Picture: Public Domain).

Who Shot JFK: The History Channel as Possible Accomplice

I’ll give the History Channel this much: it hasn’t sold out as far delivering their stock-in-trade, namely history. They have great documentaries, as well as standard fare on pyramids, UFOs, ghosts, Nostradamus, and the Bermuda Triangle. While Discovery and TLC still have their moments, they’ve prostituted themselves by scaling back info in favor of reality programming. It’s not all bad, but why not have TLC Reality—a separate channel? But pardon me. I digress.

Here’s the rub: five years ago, the History Channel did a five-part series called “The Men Who Killed Kennedy,” directed by Nigel Turner. It was so popular that five new episodes were added the following year. The show’s thesis was that the CIA and the mob "tag-teamed it" in order to bring an end to Camelot. Eyewitnesses claimed to have clearly seen gunfire coming from the infamous grassy knoll.

In the past two years, the History Channel only airs “The Kennedy Assassination: Beyond Conspiracy,” a doc that allegedly debunks all conspiracy theories (held by a whopping 75% of the population, btw). So much for Nigel Turner’s insightful and professional investigative reporting, hosted by the avuncular and respected Roger Mudd, formerly of NBC.

It makes you wonder: why the philosophical shift in programming by a channel that positively loves to re-air its shows ad nauseum, both old and new? Was the original series on the assassination buried like certain information the Warren Commission sealed for seventy-five years, reasons unknown? Turner’s series is even buried in the History Channel’s “search” feature. If the series is there, it must be on page 112, because a search on the actual title just doesn’t pop. It sounds to NewsDive like the original series made someone very uncomfortable. Paranoia, you say? Anyone who doesn’t believe there’s a “government within the government” should watch PBS’s Frontline series on Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, and George W. Very illuminating for the inquiring mind.

Today’s Slick Fish Award goes to the History Channel. (Picture: Public Domain)

Does the World Have Borderline Personality Disorder?

In a word: yes. Planet earth, please lie on the couch.

Consider the symptoms as established by the DSM-IV, the bible of psychiatry. People with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) compensate for their emptiness by causing chaos in the lives of those around them. They are prone to rapid mood swings and outbursts of physical violence. They are anxious, irritable, and have trouble managing their emotions. Their anger is expressed inappropriately, and they often feel spacey and out of control. The Borderline Personality is characterized by binge eating, binge spending, suicidal feelings, substance abuse, and self-mutilation. Borderlines are sexually promiscuous and verbally abusive. They are also reluctant to admit mistakes and are willing to re-shuffle the old “reality deck” whenever it suits them. Because they must always be right, they constantly project their own feelings and faults onto others. In short, they are master controllers and manipulators.

From where I sit, Planet Earth needs to see a shrink ASAP and take a Prozac capsule the size of Manhattan Island. It is a violent place where few countries accept culpability for anything. There’s no consistent dialogue among nations of the earth, just name-calling and blame—massive projection of faults onto other populations as we wage our age-old real estate wars. To say that world’s anger and violence is out of control is an understatement. When it comes to rapid mood swings, regimes and the views of leaders morph like the proverbial shifting sands of time. As for self-mutilation and suicide, we’re doing a bang-up job of screwing up the environment. According to Gore et. al., if we don’t start reversing global warming within ten years, it’s lights out for Planet Earth by the latter part of the century. Most of the world’s population is addicted to sex, booze, drugs, technology, and food in order to fill its emptiness. And on any given day, reality is whatever “the man” says it is.

Unfortunately, BPD is rarely treated successfully since a majority of patients are in massive denial. Sure sounds like Planet Earth to me. The world is marching to the slaughterhouse, whistling all the way, but then we've always loved our diseases, haven't we? The United Nations was supposed to be the therapist in charge of controlling our insecurities and aggressive behaviors, but the third planet from the sun has been missing quite a few appointments lately. As they say in the south, “We in a heap of trouble.” Today’s Slick Fish Award goes to world leaders and grand high muckety-mucks everywhere who intensify our collective mental aberrations for the sake of their own welfare.

(On a personal note, if you live with someone with this disorder, or suspect that you do, get help. Living with a Borderline Personality can cause the nervous system to shift into overdrive, with stress ultimately causing serious health problems. The best place to scoop up info is BPD Central at www.bpdcentral.com/index.php.)

(Picture: Public Domain)

I'm Not an Actor, but I Play One on TV

I had the title of this post stenciled on the back of a T-shirt a few years ago. Few people caught the error in logic implied by the phrase, but I’m not surprised. I taught college (and a few years of high school) for quite a while, and I think our national collective intelligence is essentially an elevator in freefall. Woe unto us. But I’m not going to blame video games or text messaging. Au contraire. The fault lies within the educational system itself.

Consider this for starters: we’re teaching the same curriculum that was taught over eighty years ago, one based on the philosophical assumption of ancient times that a student could learn all that was knowable. Hence, the basic subjects were put on the menu and have remained there, like mystery meat and chicken strips during lunch period. (Newsdiver, aka Billy—sometimes Eric Clapton—has a Masters in both English and Education, so he knows whereof he speaks.)

Making matters worse, we conduct the daily schedule at most schools with a supermarket mentality. The students go down one aisle for a few minutes and grab some frozen English, then turn and put a little math in their brain-baskets … and so forth throughout the day.

And then there was Sputnik. (“Huh?” you say.) In 1957, America went bozo because the Russkies launched the famous satellite, and our country thought it was woefully behind in technology. (I think we’ve caught up, don’t you? Jeez.) Ever since, we hear candidates expound on the importance of math and science. Wrong! The problem is basic literacy, folks. The average kiddo can’t read or write very well! Hence, he or she can’t think, can’t analyze.

Alas, we’re not likely to see any change in the status quo, for school principals are reluctant to alter the menu of classroom meat and potatoes since parents want an academic babysitter that looks traditional. It gives them comfort. Meanwhile, critical thinking has been added to the curriculum as “enrichment.” Yeah, right. Were we going to war in Iraq A) to fight terrorism, B) WMD, C) to depose Saddham, D) oil, E) because God told George Bush to do so, F) all of the above, G) some of the above, E) none of the above, F) what's Iraq?

No wonder people couldn’t figure out my T-shirt . . . or that we’re now led by sound bytes and fear. Today, the educational system gets the Slick Fish Award.

(Picture: Public Domain)

The Big Easy's Toxic Bouillabaisse: An Untold Story

People are still dying, but no one is saying much about it.

The Big Easy. People here are still trying to figure out what Dennis Quaid said in the movie of the same name (a moniker that was never used in the city until the movie was released). He tried to combine a Cajun accent with a southern drawl. In reality, the only accent in New Orleans is a Brooklyn accent out in the burbs. “Hey dawlin! Where yat?” Hollywood gets it wrong every time. The EPA is also quite blind to what's going on in the city, along with municipal and state leaders.

As everyone knows, the levees were breached by a cocky young bitch named Katrina. For years, the city and state requested funds from the feds to shore up levees, but municipal and state leaders were too interested in bringing gambling casinos to the area. Never mind the fact that forecasters had predicted that the city—a large bowl below sea level—would be treading water one day. It was only a matter of time. Our leaders just laughed and went to Mardi Gras and Bourbon Street and chanted, “Eat, drink, and be merry, for verily, we are a party town!” Lay much of the blame for this governmental myopia at the feet of convicted felon and ex-governor Edwin Edwards, who said that the only way he was going to get kicked out of office for racketeering was if he was found in bed with a dead girl or a live boy. He represented Huey’s good ole boy network dressed up and modernized. After twenty years of probes, the feds finally nailed his ass. Too bad, Eddy. You get today’s Slick Fish Award.

Well, the bitch nearly washed us away, as Randy Newman sang, and the greatest under-reported story of the storm is that cancer rates are soaring. The water that swirled in the streets and flooded homes was a toxic soup, full of gasoline, motor oil, industrial chemicals, pesticides, and every damn household cleaner found under the kitchen sink. And where did this poisonous bouillabaisse go, you ask? When the water subsided, much of it sank into the ground—the lawns, the trees, the shrubs—and is now functioning like demonic fertilizer. The toxic water was also absorbed by the walls and insulation of those homes left standing. In short, the residue is almost everywhere. The EPA, however, stopped talking about this very serious health threat in October of 2005. Pitiful. And you won’t hear many civic leaders talking about the problem because it might torpedo the tourist industry of a crippled town.

NewsDiver knew several people in the last year who suddenly developed advanced stages of cancer. Within a matter of weeks, they were dead. Meanwhile, the federal government is still withholding untold billions in financial aid for the Crescent City.

Ah well, we still have Mardi Gras, right?

(Photo Source: Public Domain)

Rudy Giuliani's Bug-eyed Bid for the Presidency

After four years of George’s “shoulder-shake” when he guffaws at something inappropriate, such as death and war, it is disconcerting to think of popeyed Rudy taking the oath of office. He opens his eyes wide every fifteen to thirty seconds when making a point, as if his ocular orbs might pop forth like ping-pong balls. But here’s the ten-thousand-dollar question: For all his increased powers of optometric magnification, can he really see any better than the rest of the candidates?

As for as his platform that he ran New York City like the “flagship city” of the country, especially after 9/11, several New Yorkers have told me that he lowered the crime rate through brutal police tactics. He got the job done, but at what price? Will this mentality carry over into foreign policy? Will the bug-eyed mayor step up water-boarding in the name of mom, apple pie, and the Christian Coalition?

He claims to have met New York City’s payroll. Big whoop. If that’s a qualification, then Myron Mandelbaum over at American Widget should be able to step into the oval office with no trouble. But maybe Giuliani’s silver dollar eyes don’t see that balancing a national budget is different than making sure the meter maids and garbage collectors are paid on time.

And what if President Rudy pops the eyeball while talking with foreign dignitaries and heads of state? They might well think that the leader of the free world is a two-bit carny or hypnotist pressed into service from the great Manhattan Midway. The United States needs a leader who is free of facial tics and grimaces, one who looks like a statesman. When it comes to bad body language and contorted facial expressions, it’s a case of “been there, done that.”

Rudy Giuliani is a one-trick pony. He was a mayor who put on a fire helmet at the right time, but many of the city’s rescue workers are suffering from lung diseases and even now can’t get proper healthcare. He’s the worst kind of slick fish that NewsDive encounters: an opportunist. But that should come as no surprise regarding a man who got into bed with Pat Robertson last week. Ugh—there’s a picture I don’t want impressed on my cerebral cortex!

So here’s my advice, Mayor Giuliani: Stop the William F. Buckley impression. You’ve had your fifteen minutes of fame, so go home and write a memoir. Joe Biden was correct. You’re the least qualified person in the field. Even Myron Mandelbaum has you beat.

You’re no fresh-catch-of-the-day, Mr. Mayor. For attempting to trade in on one of America’s worst tragedies, you get NewsDive’s Slick Fish Award.