I'm not insensitive - okay well maybe I am. But am I the only one that thinks the latest advice given to the pope is not really bad news? A pope who can't speak? We may be on to something here.

Gonzo journalist commits suicide. He was one of a kind really. Generation of Swine and F & L on the Campaign Trail are two of my favorite books. What a waste.

Tough week. Attended the funeral of an old family friend, Rich Haley, this past Wednesday. Though our families were connected through school and church, we only had sporadic contact with many of them post college. It was so amazing to walk back into a building, see so many familiar faces and lose all track of time. My friend LuAnn summed it up when she said "I feel like I'm 16 again." It was a good moment in an otherwise sad day.

Finally, there's some disclosure about the air traffic situation in NYC.

If you don't believe it's this bad, take a drive over the Throgs Neck or Whitestone Bridges in early evening. The close proximity of so many in airplanes in such small air space is truly a frightening thing to see.

What's even scarier however is that none of this would likely have come to light without anonymous tips to FAA. How fucked up is that? This NYT article ends with an interesting tidbit about the Tracon manager, who is black, and complaints from a.t.c's (mainly white males). Wonder if there'll be more on that dynamic in the coming weeks.

Been following the Carly Fiorina firing. I agree with Susan Estrich that it's Too bad no one pays attention to gender now. But if I understand the severance package she got - millions upon millions - it's hard to muster much sympathy for these guys -- I mean CEOs in general of course.

The aftermath of the elections in Iraq reminds me of that great movie "The Candidate" with Robert Redford and Peter Boyle (I think). The campaign ends, he's won and Redford - a pretty boy and political lightweight - turns and say's "What do we do now?"

Okay - so I'm two weeks late on this outrage. But that's the great thing about outrage. There's no statute of limitations. As long as I'm outraged - I'm right on time.

When a conservative shill gets press credentials and veteran journalists are threatened with revocation (let's not forget how they bounced NYT's Suskind from Cheney's campaign plane), why shouldn't a good portion of young people hold the First Amendment in contempt? Our current monarchy so obviously does.

Is Lynne Stewart a terrorist or a lawyer? Or should I say terrorist and a lawyer. There is more to this story than we're being told. And I may not agree with Stewart's actions but if she thought it was in the best interest of her client, what's next? She may be guilty of something - but terrorist? Pulleeze.

Need to come up with a new word - outrage doesn't cover this one for me. How is it that the FAA alerts are being discussed now - rather than in September when the commission report was first released. How in god's name can any one say they are safer under Bush II's watch and keep a straight face? It's maddening.

I have to say I know a little bit about this. For the first few months after Kevin's death, I had a pain in my shoulder and would get light-headed. I have no doubt it was some kind of sympathic thing, given the fact that those were the two things Kevin complained of - before his first heart attack and his last.

But I'm taking bets on what will be the eventual name of this broken heart syndrome - and that it will have the word "hysterical" in there somewhere.

I'm teaching a journalism class - just one - at St. John's University. I found the column to be right on target. While it's focus is high school journalism, there's definitely a connection to what's happening on any given college campus as well.

Email is about as basic as it gets in the IT business. If the FBI can't get this right, they've got bigger problems than an email security breach to worry about. And I know how complex email is when you dive down into it - but this isn't brand new technology we're talking about. You either get it -- or you don't.

Maybe I'm a little slow but I can't help but wonder: what took NIH so long to impose Tighter Ethics Rules. Sounds like a no-brainer to me.

Boy oh boy, as if the Fourth Estate wasn't in enough trouble already. The results of this survey are downright scarey. I wonder why the headline used "disturbing" as the catch word, when the quotee clearly felt they were "dangerous" as well. Headline writers probably don't get the respect they deserve. Good headline writers I mean.

A whole lotta outrage evident on this list of the Ten Worst Corporations of 2004, courtesy of Multinational Monitor On-Line.