Fire in the Hills, Firing in the Vatican

Fire Line: A 500-acre wildfire has forced the evacuation of as many as 5,000 people in the Los Angeles suburb of Calabasas west of the city. The fire started when a pickup truck hit a power pole, knocking it down and causing the transformer to explode.

It’s become the cliché to say the California fire season runs all year, but a big fire this early in the summer is a bad indication.

You’re Fired: Pope Francis announced yesterday in a Papal decree that he will fire bishops who ignore or bungle cases of sexual abuse in the church. It’s a response to Catholic activists who for years have demanded that bishops be held responsible for what happens on their watch. Church law already allows for the removal of bishops for “grave reasons,” but the Pope said, “I intend to specify that among these so-called ‘serious reasons’ is the negligence of bishops in the exercise of their functions, especially in cases of sexual abuse of minors or vulnerable adults.”

Chicawgo: In an examination of gun violence in Chicago, The NY Times counted 64 shootings in the city, six of them fatal, over the Memorial Day weekend. The shootings are fed by gang wars and a ready supply of guns. The paper quotes one woman who watches a neighbor grieve for her dead son expressing relief that her own son is in jail: “He was bound to be shot this summer.”

Rio: American bicycle racer Tejay van Garderen dropped out of consideration for the Rio Olympics for fear of the Zika virus. His wife is pregnant.

The Front Page: Paul Waldman writes in The Washington Post that the press appears to have reached a turning point in coverage of Donald Trump that his candidacy might not survive. Waldman says that, after the dustup over Trump’s fundraising for veterans, his attacks on a federal judge, attacks on the press, and his utterance of serial lies, the press has stopped covering Trump as an entertaining spectacle and begun to everything he says and does.

Waldman says, “it is perhaps ironic that after all this time of wondering how to cover this most unusual candidate, Trump has shown the press that the best way to do it is to cover him like every candidate should be covered. That means not just planting a camera at his rallies and marveling at how nuts it all is, but doing the work to fully vet his background, correcting his lies as swiftly and surely as they can, exploring what a Trump presidency would actually mean, and generally doing their jobs without letting him intimidate them.

If they can keep doing that, they’ll bring honor to their profession — and I doubt Trump’s candidacy could survive it.”

In His Own Words: Journalists in the last 24 hours have poured out hundreds of thousands of words describing and praising the late boxer Muhammad Ali. But few people had quite the way with words as the poetic puncher himself:

-“Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. His hands can’t hit what his eyes can’t see.” Before beating Sonny Liston in 1964.

– “Braggin’ is when a person says something and can’t do it. I do what I say.”

-“Shoot them for what? They never called me nigger. They never lynched me.” Refusing to be drafted to fight in Vietnam.

-“I hospitalized a rock. I beat up a brick. I’m so bad I make medicine sick.”

-“My name is Muhammad Ali and you will announce it right there in center of that ring.” To Ernie Terrell who kept calling him Cassius Clay after he changed his name.

-“ It’s just a job. Grass grows, birds fly, waves pound the sand. I beat people up.”

-“I have wrestled with a alligator. I done tussled with a whale. I done handcuffed lightning, throwed thunder in jail.” Before fighting George Foreman in the “Rumble in the Jungle.”

-And, after beating George Foreman; “I told you all, I was the greatest of all time.”

-30-

Monday, December 23, 2024

Page Two

Subscribe and Read

Thursday, October 31, 2024

The Most Corrupt Justice

Monday, October 2, 2023

Democracy and Video in the Dark

Sunday, February 26, 2023

Page Two: Do the Right Thing

Tuesday, February 1, 2022

Page Two: Sound Recall

Monday, September 13, 2021

Page Two: Cuomo Must Go

Friday, August 13, 2021

Trump and the Truth

Tuesday, November 3, 2020

The “Great” President

Monday, March 30, 2020

It's Been Said

"Christians, get out and vote, just this time. You won't have to do it anymore. Four more years, you know what, it will be fixed, it will be fine, you won't have to vote anymore, my beautiful Christians. I love you Christians. I'm a Christian. I love you, get out, you gotta get out and vote. In four years, you don't have to vote again, we'll have it fixed so good you're not going to have to vote."

  • Donald Trump courting the vote of the Christian right

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *