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Wednesday, December 26, 2001

The Shoe Dupe: After several long day's of second rate reporting from understaffed news groups this much we know: "Richard Reid" the guy who tried to blow up his feet and everyone else on American Airlines 93 apparently really is a Brit and not the sharpest knife in the drawer. Here, the Times of London, suggests that he was an expendable terrorist bomb tester sent up to see if exploding sneakers would do the job. They didn't

Getting To Be A Habit: Under the headline: Manhunt Uncovers No Trace of bin Laden," the Washington Post tells us once again the man is gone, either dead or disappeared. Now that he has joined Judge Crater, D.B. Cooper, Jimmy Hoffa and Elvis. Perhaps they should just set up a countdown box somewhere and stop writing full length stories until something happens.

Got 'Cha: CNN puts out a year ender in the form of a list of Internet hoaxes. The thread off this story is far more fun than the story itself. We want to thank Ldot Poster Segway for the hilarious graphic. Check it out.

Not So Cozy: Eric Umansky at Slate looks into the Taliban caves around Tora Bora (where Geraldo made his now infamous walk on "hallowed ground") and suggests they might not have been as fabulous as the media suggested. This brings up the question of where the London Times got that detailed drawing, widely reprinted, of bin Laden's main redoubt. Did it even exist?

Dick Took Notes: Last week Clinton held a pity party in his Harlem hide-away whining that "they are trying to pin bin Laden on us." Not difficult to do if one reads Dick Morris' column today. One wonders how we would ever know precisely what went on in the Clinton White House if Morris had not escaped to tell the tales. Okay, so he was pushed, whatever. Here he gives us a chilling tick-tock on measures offered to fight terrorism that were ignored. (There's another tiny detail in the original Berke story in the Times concerning that meeting: Anyone notice Maggie Williams is back and in place as Clinton's Chief of Staff? Wonder if she has a direct tie-line directly to Hillary or does she just dial her up with hourly reports?)

Go easy on yourself this day after all the work you did is now spread all over the house. Let the garbage wait, leave the dishes in the sink, rent a good movie and chill. You've earned it. Click back here when you want to know what's going on.

-Your On-The-Job LComStaff

-- Anonymous, December 26, 2001