Still Pretty Bad...

...on this end, so this will have to be a quickie.

First, the fact that Peter Jennings died does not help. Only news anchor I trusted after Cronkite retired. Mainly because he always had this look in his eye, as the news became more distorted and propogandized and fluffed over the years, as if he was saying to us, "Can you believe the ridiculous s*** that I'm about to say--I mean, can you believe these people?" Nothing over the top, but it was enough to let you know that he was in on the joke, and you felt better knowing that yes, this was an orchestrated circus, and you weren't going mad. I also think John Stewart--who now is possibly the only other news anchor I trust, and isn't that sad--studied Jennings a lot before going on-camera. He's come into his own style now, but you watch those early episodes of The Daily Show, and his "set-up" delivery is pure Jennings. And when you've got John Stewart's stamp of approval, you know you're good. I liked Jennings a lot. It sucks, and it sucks that we live in a world where his generation is being replaced by folks like Matt Lauer, as blow-dried a mouth-breather as there ever was...

Second, thank God the Shuttle got down safely. This mission had duct-tape and crossed-fingers written all over it, and I hated listening to every minute of it. They shouldn't have gone up. The Apollo people never would have said, "Eh, she's mostly flight-worthy, let's give her a shot and see what happens." The scientists are not running NASA anymore--this was a publicity stunt by an Adminstration badly in need of distracting the people from its plummeting rating and incipient scandals. Which means they either sent it up after lying about how not-quite-perfect the tiles were so we'd all be scared about a non-existent threat, or--God help them--they sent it up not caring whether it did or didn't come back. I hate these people. Speaking of which--

Third, Robert Novak actually managed to one-up Tom Cruise, calling James Carville's comments "bullsh*t"--which they weren't--they were a cruel but accurate interpretation of Novak's own remarks--on live television, and then pulled a Dan Rather by storming off the set at CNN, which promptly suspended his Gollum-esque ass. Which makes me smile, as he is excrement in human form. If you're gonna be mean, don't be a coward. If you're gonna be a coward, be nice. Be both, and you just become someone the world is better off without. So we'll be seeing less of Bob for a while, which is good, and which is what I'll end on.