Interesting thing about this page — the top three stories are the very different takes on the Syria story, from three major news outlets. Each is the lede story at that paper’s site. You don’t often get such widely varying, blind-men-describing-the-elephant descriptions of a major news story to this extent. But this is a particularly complex story, that’s rapidly developing in many important directions:
- U.S. and Allies to Explore U.N. Path to Secure Chemical Arms (NYT) — So, the main thing to know is that we’re working toward consensus.
- Syria Admits It Possesses Chemical Weapons (WSJ) — Yeah, that would definitely be the clear lede, if all this other stuff weren’t going on. Meanwhile, you might want to read the sidebar, about how Syria views the latest diplomatic developments as a “victory.”
- Russia balks at French plan for U.N. resolution (WashPost) — Wow. A whole other story from the other two. As I said, you don’t often see editors go in this many directions.
- Group backing strong-mayor vote says it has the signatures (thestate.com) — I mentioned this earlier.
- Four convicted for Delhi gang rape (BBC) — Good. Now let’s see what kind of sentence they get.
- Apple Unveils New iPhones — One Innovative, One Cheap (NPR) — I can’t wait to see ’em. No, really — I can’t wait. Gimme. One for each hand. 🙂
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This is my favorite current story:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/09/robert-f-kennedy-jr-diary_n_3893948.html?ir=Politics
Robert Kennedy Jr. kept a diary which has found his way into the press. It shows just how much of a lying , philandering weasel he is — and his true feelings about Al Sharpton and Jesse jackson. Too bad he wasn’t man enough to overcome his liberal facade to make those feelings known.
From the NY Post:
The Revs. Jackson and Sharpton “give me the creeps,” Kennedy writes in a July 5 entry.
“Al Sharpton has done more damage to the black cause than [segregationist Alabama Gov.] George Wallace. He has suffocated the decent black leaders in New York,” he says. “His transparent venal blackmail and extortion schemes taint all black leadership.”
Rev. Al Sharpton gave Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “the creeps,” he wrote in his diary.
He goes on to call Sharpton a “buffoon” who has never escaped the “stench” of his advocacy for Tawana Brawley, the black Dutchess County teen who fabricated a story about six white men raping her in 1987. Kennedy said that he couldn’t forget the Brawley episode.
He writes that Jesse Jackson has “a desperate and destructive addiction to publicity.”
He recalls that Jackson, at labor leader Cesar Chavez’s funeral, pushed “Cesar’s friends and family out of the way to make himself lead pall bearer.”
“I feel like with Jesse, it’s all about Jesse,” Kennedy writes.
“His love affair with [Nation of Islam leader] Louis Farrakhan and his Jewish xenophobia are also unforgivable,” Kennedy adds.
“I feel dirty around him, and I feel like I’m being used. I feel like with Jesse, it’s all about Jesse.”
Today Kennedy would be labeled a racist.
If Assad did what the White House is claiming he did, how can they do anything BUT do everything to take him out? How does he get a “Get Out Of Jail” free card courtesy of Putin?
Indeed. We most assuredly should take him out. This current diplomatic initiative is great, if all we care about is the chemical weapons. But it still leaves in power a guy who’s oppressing his people. It still leaves 100,000 people dead, and more to come.
Not our problem. If we intervene, and they retaliate and do harm in the United States it suddenly becomes our problem. We have enough problems in this country without going and looking for more. It’s a civil war, it’s for them to fight. Sucker punching them and running away (which is what Obama wants to do) does nothing more than get us involved.
“a guy who’s oppressing his people”— I think it would be more accurate to say he’s oppressing “some” of his people. There is a significant swath of Syrian society that supports the Assad regime, or at least prefers it to the alternative. It’s always important to remember that this is a civil war, not just between Assad the person and the forces opposed to him, but between multiple factions in Syrian society. “Taking him out” might satisfy our quest for a kind of justice for his horrible crimes, but would not change the realities of the divisions in the society.
The City of Columbia to spend $751 million to upgrade the city’s sewer system. Get ready folks, you’re water bill is about to double.
FP – but yet they continue to siphon off water & sewer “profits” to fund other city activities. Makes you wonder if those were actually profits at all.
There are no “profits”, there are only slush funds.
I wonder if the heavy rains this summer have reduced revenues for the water department? I know my bill for August was $100 less than last year due to reduced need for watering the lawn.
reduced revenues = another rate increase for users.