I suppose it's too much to hope for weekend indictments.
It's kinda fascinating to watch the public mea culpas and recriminations of The New York Times. Clearly, the Times made a lot of errors and misjudgments on both the Valerie Plame story and all the stories that parroted and/or validated Bush administration claims that got us into the Iraq war. Clearly too, I think, other newspapers made and often make these kinds of mistakes and never admit them, which is less healthy than what the Times does. In many ways, the measure of a newspaper is in not how much they get wrong but in what they do when that's pointed out to them. Today's Maureen Dowd column, which I'd link to if I could find you a free route, basically says that a lot of Judy Miller's headline stories were journalistic malpractice. I wonder how many papers would allow a columnist to say that the people editing the front page screwed up royally. Not many, I'm guessing.
We're thinking only good thoughts for those in the path of Hurricane Wilma. I read somewhere else on the 'net — I forget where — that what with tsunamis and quakes and floods and fires and hurricanes, a certain amount of Disaster Fatigue is settling over people lately. It's almost like, "Ho-hum…another few cities destroyed."
A lot of people have now donated as much money to relief efforts as they can afford for a while. Last week, a man came to my door soliciting donations for a downtown mission. Now, I have a policy: I don't like people coming to my door without an invite. I don't care what you're selling, how much good you're doing. Knock on my door and I won't sign your petition, donate to your cause, vote for your candidate, convert to your religion or buy your Thin Mints. I'm especially firm with regard to charity donations. I make all I can justify to a couple of recognized, established funds that I know do good work with what I send them. Why give money to strangers with no office? Anyway, when I told the mission solicitor that I wouldn't be giving him any cash, he did a little body language that I'm pretty sure meant, "Another one who won't donate" — like he was doing much, much worse than he usually did with these rounds.
It reminded me of an old Jewish joke that, some of you may recall, turns up in Fiddler on the Roof. A beggar asks a man for a handout and the man gives him one coin. The beggar says, "One? Last week, you gave me two." The man says, "I had a bad week" and the beggar says, "Because you had a bad week, I should suffer?" I got the feeling the fellow who came to my door wanted to say, "Because the people of New Orleans had a bad week, my mission should suffer?"