The Times was ahead of its time three years ago, when an editorial predicting the imminent demise of the SUV included a list of useful suggestions on what people could do with the gas-guzzling behemoths now that nobody wanted to drive them anymore (sample: Sink them offshore as artificial reefs). Reports of the SUV's demise were premature, but then gas prices started their astonishing climb. If the SUV hasn't quite flatlined, it's got a roomful of worried auto makers gathered around its bed while their stock analysts are calling for a priest. Unfortunately, though, the steel-and-rubber corpses aren't going to get a decent burial as artificial reefs. They're going to end up spreading pollution and inflating gasoline prices in the developing world.

Reuters is reporting that General Motors is in talks with Indian auto maker Mahindra & Mahindra, as well as other companies in Russia and China, about unloading its disastrous Hummer brand. In places like China where gasoline is subsidized, it's not unreasonable to think the nouveau riche might appreciate a tank-sized symbol of excess like the Hummer. But what happens to carbon emissions and oil prices when a big percentage of the 2.45 billion people in China and India start driving? Especially if they're driving 15-mile-per-gallon monstrosities? It's little wonder that speculators are excited about oil futures, because even as high prices prompt Americans to conserve gas and reduce demand, newly wealthy populations in Russia and China are shielded from rising prices by the government and have less reason to cut back. Hence GM might find a buyer for a brand that nobody in the industrialized world would touch.

There may have once been a time when what was good for GM was good for the country. But if selling Hummer to China or an Indian manufacturer is good for GM, it's bad for everybody on Earth. Better to turn those old Hummers into planter boxes, or, as The Times suggested in 2005, make them into "hot tubs with comfortable seating."

*Photo: Carolyn Kaster / Associated Press

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sen. Dianne Feinstein prod state lawmakers today to act on their proposal for a comprehensive (read: $9.3 billion) bond issue to modernize and expand the state's water supplies. You won't find many specifics in their piece, but it offers plenty of reasons for the Legislature to pick up the pace on this issue:

Put simply, our water supply is in jeopardy. We are experiencing the second year of drought, and 2008 had the driest spring ever recorded in the northern Sierra and other parts of Northern California. If the dry conditions continue into next year, we could be facing the worst drought in California history.

Columnist Rosa Brooks opines, with evident dismay, that the chance of prosecuting Bush administration officials for possible war crimes and other misdeeds is pretty much nil.

As far back as 2001, administration lawyers were crafting legal opinions designed to shelter their bosses from any future criminal liability, and much evidence has since been hidden and destroyed. Then in 2006, the GOP-dominated Congress amended the War Crimes Act -- with retroactive effect -- to make future prosecutions almost impossible.

Yeah, that one's going to generate some comments. Elsewhere on the Op-Ed page, another of the Bush administration's, umm, greatest admirers, the New Republic's Jonathan Chait, urges Barack Obama to go negative on John McCain (because heaven knows, the Obama campaign would never do so on its own accord). And KFI host Joe Hicks, vice president of Community Associates Inc., berates the Los Angeles City Council for trying to micromanage diets in selected L.A. neighborhoods by temporarily banning new fast-food restaurants.

It is not the role of government to intervene in the personal food choices of individuals, and it is not appropriate for city officials to manage what businesses can serve L.A.'s communities. Unlike the argument made against the proliferation of liquor stores some years ago, fast-food restaurants do not produce the kind of harmful side effects, such as crime and public drunkenness, that might justify City Council action.

The Times' editorial board takes a page from the Sammy Hagar songbook and blasts a proposal for lower highway speed limits. It also welcomes reports that the FCC will tell Comcast -- and other broadband ISPs -- not to use discriminatory and surreptitious techniques to battle congestion online.

November 2008 election? That is so last month. March 2009 city election? Boring! Let’s move directly to 2010 and the race to be the next governor. In a shocking surprise to no one, Arnold Schwarzenegger’s understudy, Lt. Gov. John Garamendi, makes it official today: He wants the job. Still.

Garamendi is instantly the most experienced candidate, meaning he has more experience running for the office than anyone else. He tried in 1982 and 1994, but until today he had yet to log in for the 2000s, unless you count his ever-so-brief candidacy in the 2003 Gray Davis recall. That puts him ahead of even Jerry Brown, although Brown actually won the two times he ran (so far).

Garamendi has been defeated by a who’s-who of California’s Democratic political establishment: Tom Bradley aced him out of the 1982 gubernatorial primary, Davis beat him for controller in 1986, Kathleen Brown (Jerry's sister) beat him for governor in the 1994 primary.

But he was a strong, consumer-oriented insurance commissioner twice – the state’s first elected commissioner in 1991 and, restoring order after the rocky and abbreviated tenure of Chuck Quackenbush, in 2003. He’s widely considered a hero to consumer advocates and the bane of the auto insurance industry.

He’s a vigorous Californian in the old-school image – born in the Mother Lode country. Cattle rancher. Environmentalist. He was deputy U.S. secretary of the interior. He has famous barbecues at his Sacramento delta spread. He’s got a Vise-Grips handshake and a flashing smile that are simultaneously comforting and intimidating. But with all that, is he just a little too, well, you know – boring – when stacked next to the likes of colorful mayors, current and ex, like Brown, Gavin Newsom and Antonio Villaraigosa?

By the way, everyone knows that Villaraigosa and Brown have filed to run – except they haven’t. Not yet, anyway.

On this last day of July, here's a recap of the month's developments in the 2010 race to succeed Schwarzenegger. Democrats first, since we're already on their case.

Noting the housing bill that House and Senate negotiators were rushing to complete last week, my colleague and intellectual superior Tim Cavanaugh asked in a recent post why taxpayers should foot the bill for bailing out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. President Bush signed the measure this morning, so there's no turning back now. But I thought I'd try to answer Tim by saying he asked the wrong question.

Fannie and Freddie were created by Washington to serve a mission dictated by Washington with policies largely dictated by Washington. They operated with the implicit backing of the federal government. It's wildly unrealistic to think that either institution could run into financial trouble without the feds rushing to the rescue. So when Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke announced their proposal to extend bigger credit lines to the companies and possibly buy some of their shares, they were merely making explicit a promise long understood by investors (and policymakers).

Rather than debating the merits of propping up Fannie and Freddie, we're better off figuring out how to get them through the downturn intact. Then we can debate what role they should play, if any, in the future. The panicky run on their shares reflect investors' fear of dilution (as Fannie and Freddie sell huge numbers of shares to raise capital) or nationalization (in the event of a government rescue) more than any worries about insolvency. Yes, their capital reserves are low in comparison to their exposure. Yet it would take a huge wave of foreclosures to burn through those funds. By stopping the run on the companies' stocks, the actions by Treasury, the Fed and Congress should make it easier for them to raise more capital and gird against larger losses. Oh and yes, the bill includes important and overdue improvements in the feds' oversight of Fannie and Freddie.

So, Tim, as much as I'd like your every wish to come true, I don't think we're watching "the U.S. government commit collective suicide." Well, not on this issue, at least. But the housing mess hasn't hit bottom yet, and Congress just raised the FHA's potential exposure by hundreds of billions of dollars. So don't give up hope.

Photo courtesy of AP/Manuel Balce Ceneta

A wobbled editorial board hopes that yesterday's quake will shake local officials and residents out of their complacency about emergency preparedness. It also wonders how much of the $4 billion that Congress approved for local groups to purchase repossessed properties will actually be used to combat blight in the hardest-hit neighborhoods. And if state lawmakers solve this year's budget problems by diverting money earmarked for city and county governments, the board says, there's this consolation: Unlike the previous go-arounds, the state would have to pay the locals back.

A state money grab would throw the city off its schedule for resurfacing streets, and that's a big deal -- but not as big a deal as slashing school funding, healthcare reimbursements or any of the other state programs needed by the same people who want their streets paved.

On the Op-Ed page, environmental attorney Al Meyerhoff worries that lax pesticide controls will endanger honeybees and threaten California's farm industry. Meanwhile, Variety critic (and former LA Times TV scribe) Brian Lowry writes about the debilitating splits within the community of film and TV actors, which he warns are likely to prolong the stalemate in contract talks between the Screen Actors Guild and the Hollywood studios.

Much like in professional sports, stars draw mind-boggling salaries and journeymen fill out rosters. This widening gap among the haves, have-nots and have-nothing-to-lose has complicated the Screen Actors Guild's protracted efforts to settle on a new contract with the major Hollywood studios.

Times Columnist Tim Rutten opines about the internal Justice Department report that, shockingly, found casino gambling improprieties in the appointments of prosecutors and other employees, as well as new writings by New Yorker scribe Jane Mayer about the Bush administration's approach to interrogating and prosecuting suspected terrorists. These dispatches did not make Rutten any more fond of the current denizens of the White House:

When the next administration and Congress begin the urgent work of sorting out precisely how and why the Bush-Cheney regime systematically undermined the rule of law, there are a couple of things that ought to be kept in mind.  One is that their efforts were essentially ideological rather than partisan.

Our readers weigh in about the presidential campaign (and in particular, Barack Obama's recent jaunt overseas), gender's influence on math skills, and the public service performed by those bearing the honorary badge of the Orange County Sheriff Department's professional service responder team.

*Cartoon: Nick Anderson / Houston Chronicle

That's the buzz in the blogosphere today. Politico reports:

Kaine, an early Obama supporter whose biography nicely dovetails with the Illinois senator’s, "ranks very, very high on the short list," said a source who has spoken recently to senior Obama aides about Kaine.

Kaine "is getting a critical examination," the source said.

Kaine, however, isn't talking:

It's "flattering to be mentioned" as a potential vice presidential candidate, Kaine said. "My mom loves it. She calls when she sees it. But that's for the campaign to decide. And the campaign has made very good decisions thus far and I think, however they decide, they are going to make a very good decision."

Want to see how the VP hopeful stacks up against other Democratic contenders, including Hillary Clinton and Al Gore? Check out our Obama Veepstakes chart, and then take our poll:

Post your own Dem veepstakes suggestions below, and check out the GOP race here.

Was former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales unfairly blamed for destroying the image of the Department of Justice and riddling its hallways with political holes? Or was it all the work of dulcet-toned blondie Monica Goodling, former Justice Department appointee?

The department's inspector general seems to think so. Gonzales certainly came off as a bit of a bumbling idiot at his hearing last year in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee — and hey, given that she was certainly smart enough to get herself immunity, Goodling may well have masterminded Operation EvilJustice.

Then again, she did ask the following questions of candidates, according to TPMMuckraker:

Tell us about your political philosophy. There are different groups of conservatives, by way of example: Social Conservative, Fiscal Conservative, Law & Order Republican.

[W]hat is it about George W. Bush that makes you want to serve him?

Aside from the President, give us an example of someone currently or recently in public service who you admire.

And, on occasion — in case the subtext hadn't been hammered home yet:

Why are you a Republican?

Okay, I've got to ask:

Post your own question suggestions below.

At the L.A. Times it often seems that the only kind of colleagues we have are former colleagues, so it's nice to see them turn up in the legitimate media. I couldn't decide whether the most accurate news story of the past month was The Onion's "Recession-Plagued Nation Demands New Bubble To Invest In" or The Onion's "'Time' Publishes Definitive Obama Puff Piece." But I've got to give the nod to the Obama media-crit article, because its roundup of journalistic talking heads includes one of our many former editors:

"The sheer breadth of fluff in this story is something to be marveled at," New York Times Washington bureau chief Dean Baquet said. "It's all here. Favorite books, movies, meals, and seasons of the year ranked one through four. Sure, we asked Obama what his favorite ice cream was, but Time did us one better and asked, 'What's your favorite ice cream, really?'"

Whole article. The Onion is a satirical newspaper, even though it is all true.

Former House majority leader Dick Armey has an Op/Ed in the Wall Street Journal asking why the responsible majority has been pushed aside in the rush to "do something" about the misbehavior of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, the lenders they guaranteed and the borrowers who are now defaulting. Armey notes, as did I, that a substantial majority of Americans are opposed to the bailout plan that is about to become law, and highlights a fun wrinkle: A veto-sustaining bloc of House Republicans "voted against the bill on the very same day that the Bush administration caved." But he holds out hope that the House-Senate reconciliation process could still turn into a fight. The play-by-play:

Actions by Fannie and Freddie management and their regulators this year precipitated the current crisis. Under pressure from the Democrat-controlled Congress, the Bush administration lifted Fannie and Freddie's portfolio caps in February and reduced their capital reserve requirements in March. In this year's stimulus bill, Congress went further and nearly doubled the size of the loans that Fannie and Freddie can purchase or guarantee.

As a result of this reckless expansion, the government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) now touch nearly 70% of all new mortgages. At the same time, they are insolvent by most measures. The ostensible purpose of Fannie and Freddie is to provide liquidity to America's housing markets. In practice, they are the source of systemic risk and instability in a time of need.

What is needed now is an orderly restructuring that protects taxpayers from such financial exposure in the future, such as the plan proposed by Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R., Texas). Mr. Hensarling's legislation would phase out the charter of either GSE over a five-year period if they access credit lines from the Federal Reserve or Treasury. It also provides a receivership option if the GSEs continue to stumble. Instead, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson offered the beleaguered GSEs and their patrons in Congress a blank check signed by the taxpayers, promising potentially unlimited funds to backstop the lenders. Not surprisingly, House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank and Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd accepted.

Whole article. All I can say is people must have a lot of confidence in Hank Paulson. That federal guarantee is potentially ruinous, not least for the Foundation question that informs so many public policy crises: Aren't we better off not trying to prevent the collapse, and instead just getting it over with as fast as possible?

Suppose all the doomsaying on Fannie and Freddie is right, that the GSEs will take the rest of us down with them when they sink. Interest rates will soar, real estate will plummet, blah blah blah. Why would this not happen anyway with a guarantee from a heavily indebted government? Does Uncle Sam have $5 trillion lying around that nobody knows about? Aren't the worst-case scenarios about the death of the dollar and irreperable damage to the government's good faith and credit more rather than less likely to come true under the bailout plan?

This kind of thing makes me sad, but more in a no-more-worlds-to-conquer way than a there-goes-my-money way. Most of my adult life I've longed to see the U.S. government commit collective suicide. Now that it's actually happening I feel strangely empty.

Politicians lose certain (read: most) rights to privacy when they aspire to public office, but this particular breach makes me shudder a little. From the Guardian:

The rabbi of Jerusalem's Western Wall criticised an Israeli newspaper today after it published a private prayer written by Barack Obama and taken from the sacred site after he visited the city earlier this week.

It is a tradition for the millions of visitors to the Western Wall, one of the holiest locations in Judaism, to place inside the cracks in the stone written prayers or requests to God. The rabbi in charge of the wall collects the notes periodically and buries them on the Mount of Olives.

Yes, the underbelly of journalism involves chasing politicians out of seedy hotels in the dark of night, taping conversations and nosing through quasi-personal records, but it should most definitely not involve stealing personal appeals to higher powers. Political Machine even refuses to publish Obama's prayer, opting for its own rendition: "Dad, things are great here. Please send more money. Love, Barack":

It may seem paradoxical to make a joke about the prayer, then refuse to reprint, but there are two principles at work here. In comedy, nothing is sacred. In a democracy, privacy is sacred.

But, because you'll ask, and because I don't have such high standards:

"Lord—Protect my family and me. Forgive me my sins, and help me guard against pride and despair. Give me the wisdom to do what is right and just. And make me an instrument of your will."   

Beliefnet submits its line-by-line breakdown, and commenters wonder if Obama expected it to be made public. Reason, which calls the prayer pilfering "warrantless wiretapping on a phone call to God," raises this question:

What if the same note had come from George Bush's pen? One can only imagine the headlines: President Sees Self as "Instrument" of God's Will! 

To which I respond: private prayer, people! What he writes to his maker is his business and — in an ideal world — should be inadmissable in the court of public scrutiny. Besides, I'm willing to bet everyone secretly thinks they're at the center of the universe. Obama at least has the evidence on his side. 

Early reports say that government officials are hands-off, leaving it to Australian airline Qantas to investigate this "explosive decompression" that poked a gaping hole in its fuselage and forced an emergency landing in Manila. Guess it's understandable if the Manila officials dont want to get involved. But wouldn't aviation authorities in England, where the plane took off, and Australia be flying investigators to the site, with orders for Qantas to keep hands off?

If this was crime-related, should amateurs be messing with the scene? If it was a maintenance problem or airplane malfunction, should the people with a vested interest be messing with the scene?

The editorial board doesn't think copyright law should apply so bluntly to a YouTube video of a toddler dancing to Prince. The board also chastises Trabuco Hills High School for teaching kids a bad lesson -- "when in trouble, sue." Finally, the board criticizes Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's plan to cut state worker wages until a budget is passed:

As for Schwarzenegger -- who cares? He's so rich he doesn't even take his state salary. Puny matters like paychecks and bills mean little to him. His staff isn't getting paid either, but they'll pull through. But while the governor and legislative leaders dicker over the budget ("Reform!" argues the governor; "Taxes!" argue the Democrats; "Cuts!" argue the Republicans), they have called no moratorium on raking in the stuff that really matters to them -- political cash.

State employees who keep schools open or process health payments or do any of the other work that, like it or not, keeps California functioning are not to blame for the Legislature's failure to do its job or the governor's inability to focus lawmakers' attention in a timely fashion. It's unfair to drop the burden of state officials' failure onto them.

On the Op-Ed page, Bruce Ackerman and Oona Hathaway, law professors at Yale and Berkeley, argue that Bush's latest move in Iraq could harm troops and his successor. Miriam Aroni Krinsky says Congress is finally paying attention to a fix for foster care. And Joel Stein thinks a Tour de France without dope is no fun to watch:

The reason this year's Tour is miserably boring is that the race's organizers have severely cracked down on doping. So before you argue that your favorite sport -- baseball, football, horse racing, anything at the Olympics -- has to get tough about performance-enhancing drugs, know that if it does, you're about to endure years of slow, amateurish, uninspired athleticism. Your sport will be as exciting as guys racing bicycles.

On the letters page, readers disagree on The Times' campaign coverage. Banning's Nick Klaus thinks we're too easy on Obama, and San Bernardino's Thomas McGovern thinks we're too easy on McCain.

*Cartoon by Lisa Benson, Washington Post

Can we ever get enough of mature women sex tourists on Viagra? I didn't think so! Commenter Jeannette Belliveau (I just hear that name and I'm already hooked) hipped us yesterday to her book "Romance on the Road," that describes female sex travel "as a qualified victory for feminism." The brief excerpt available on her site is terrific, in particular the "Sexual Geography" world maps, which feature fat and skinny arrows pointing all over the place and look like the rise-and-fall-of-the-Axis endpapers they used to have in histories of World War II. But Belliveau's world conquerors are even more impressive. Dig these feats from the sex travellers Hall of Fame:

In Jamaica, a tourist woman in one night took three lovers page 47

In the Dominican Republic, in 14 days a German woman took 18 lovers page 100 

Hot stuff! And as demonstrated in this hilarious blog post detailing the nearly total fabrication of an interview with the Daily Mail, she's an effective critic of that weird combination of sweaty-palmed leering and pleasure-hating moralism with which the mainstream media always treat matters of lust. Check out her site.

  ...and immediately starts proselytizing. From a Spiegel Online article titled, "No. 44 has spoken":

Anyone who saw Barack Obama at Berlin's Siegessäule on Thursday could recognize that this man will become the 44th president of the United States. He is more than ambitious -- he wants to lay claim to become the president of the world.

And that's probably not even the most googly-eyed German out there. Just in case you don't remember, Deutschland: he's ours.

The Nation also oozes praise, but makes an interesting point on political semantics:

When George W. Bush talks about "freedom," Europe groans. When Barack Obama invokes the same word, Berlin cheers.

To much of the world, Bush's talk of freedom is code for messianism, arrogance and empire. Obama reframed the debate--and reclaimed the word--with his spectacular speech in Berlin today, when he spoke of "the dream of freedom" as something both Americans and Europeans shared and could be proud of.

Whatever happened to the presumptive Democratic nominee's "unity" theme? Maybe he's still smarting over his flub on Jerusalem.

The Corner ribs Obama for not giving the U.S. enough historical credit:

Obama came to Berlin to build up his image on national security.  If only appearances matter, then he did himself some good.  The substance of his remarks was different.  He credited the 1948 Berlin Airlift to international cooperation.  “It was this spirit that led airlift planes to appear in the sky above our heads,” he said, as if some global vibe called aircraft from the vasty deep.  Actually, it was Harry Truman.  As Elizabeth Spalding recounts in The First Cold Warrior, “At first, Truman was almost alone in thinking that an airlift would work as an effective response to the Soviets.”

Truman made a tough, risky decision.  That’s what presidents do.  Obama did not acknowledge this point.  He didn’t even mention Truman’s name.

Reason has a more forward-looking take:

Most of our foreign policy debate has focused on Iraq, in part because that's where John McCain wants it to focus, in part because that's where our forces are at the moment. I definitely agree with Andrew Bacevich that an Obama victory discredits the Iraq project, while a McCain victory validates it. But McCain and Obama want the same thing, for Americans to be proud of their country again vis-a-vis its engagement in foreign conflicts. Put another way: I don't think an Obama victory discredits neoconservatism. He's offering neoconservatism with a human face.

McCain rips Obama for not sticking to native soil before making it to the White House, but MSNBC notes:

However, on June 20, McCain himself gave a speech in Canada -- to the Economic Club of Canada -- in which he applauded NAFTA's successes. An implicit message behind that speech was that Obama had been critical of the trade accord. Also, McCain's trip to Canada was paid for by the campaign.

Poor McCain. As his latest video shows, he's just jealous.

Question for you:

So after hundreds of millions of dollars lost in the tomato industry, now it's jalapeno peppers that are being jerked off the market shelves as a possible source of the Salmonella Saintpaul outbreak that's sickened more than 1,200 people. What's going on?

This time, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has the bug — which is to say, its investigators found the actual strain of the bacterium causing all the grief in jalapenos that come from a Mexican farm, via a Texas distributor. It's unclear so far whether the problem is the farm or the Texas operation, but at least this is progress. In the red, round tomato case, no one was ever able to pin a germ on an actual tomato. The tomato warning was issued because so many afflicted people remembered eating them. There might also have been a bit of questioning bias in there. Tomatoes have been prone to salmonella contamination, enough for the FDA to have started a "Tomato Safety Initiative" last year. Ever notice how investigators tend to find what they were looking for in the first place?

In any case, clearly not that many people remembered eating jalapenos or salsa — or we're not talking about one outbreak, but rather a series of outbreaks that look like one. Though the FDA has given tomatoes the green light, it's not ruling out that the possibility of contaminated tomatoes earlier on.

So why, a colleague asked me, did the FDA do all that damage to the tomato industry without a single poison tomato in hand? Take into account the alternative and then decide. The FDA hears that most victims remember eating tomatoes. It sits on the information for weeks while tomato after tomato is tested — and while hundreds more are sickened. Then let's say it did find a bad tomato. What would the public say?

Given what we know now, which was the better solution? What should the FDA have done?

Just in case you thought this country had finally decided to teach science according to the precepts of science, here comes Louisiana with another stab at wedging creationism/intelligent design/teachers' own random thoughts into the mix.

According to Education Week, Gov. Bobby Jindal signed the misnamed Louisiana Science Education Act, which says that teachers must use the material from standard science textbooks — but should feel free, at the same time, to "supplement" those with self-chosen materials that examine scientific theories "in an objective manner," objective meaning something like, "Here's what's wrong with evolution." The law, by not mandating the instruction of creationism, might prove more difficult to challenge in court, at least until some teacher's idea of objective supplemental material clashes with a parent's demand for straight, unadulterated science instruction.

Considering Louisiana schools' low performance on national tests, which makes California look not so bad by comparison, you'd think legislators would be worrying about getting these kids ready for jobs and college instead of monkeying around with science instruction.

Click here for Slate's chart of Bush Administration folks who could be charged with crimes. Anti-Bush types shouldn't get their hopes up too much, however:

In general, we doubt that we'll see a host of criminal prosecutions anytime soon, but we are also waiting on criminal investigations, several key inspector general's reports, and still-classified documents. Who knows—maybe this diagram will change shape over the coming months or years.

All in all, a pretty interesting thought experiment, to say the least.

Barack Obama delivered his long-awaited speech in Berlin today, after a whirlwind tour of the Middle East. The candidate for leader of the free world praised Berliners:

The odds were stacked against success.  In the winter, a heavy fog filled the sky above, and many planes were forced to turn back without dropping off the needed supplies. The streets where we stand were filled with hungry families who had no comfort from the cold. 

But in the darkest hours, the people of Berlin kept the flame of hope burning. The people of Berlin refused to give up. And on one fall day, hundreds of thousands of Berliners came here, to the Tiergarten, and heard the city’s mayor implore the world not to give up on freedom. “There is only one possibility,” he said.  “For us to stand together united until this battle is won…The people of Berlin have spoken.  We have done our duty, and we will keep on doing our duty. People of the world: now do your duty…People of the world, look at Berlin!”

People of the world – look at Berlin!

Look at Berlin, where Germans and Americans learned to work together and trust each other less than three years after facing each other on the field of battle.

The full text of his prepared remarks is available here, see The Times' story here, and we'll post a round-up of reactions soon. Meanwhile, leave your comments below.

UPDATE: Check out the roundup here.

Because The New Yorker hates the future, it will not allow you to read online a wonderful blast from the past: Charles Van Doren's version of his role in the "Twenty One" scandal.

You may know of the scandal around this and other early-TV game shows (as I mostly do) from Robert Redford's highly entertaining anti-television film "Quiz Show." (For scenes of Van Doren's and Herbert Stempel's actual performance on "Twenty One," click here, here and here.)

Titled "PERSONAL HISTORY: All the Answers: The quiz-show scandals — and the aftermath," the piece is worth...well, I don't know if it's worth the $4.50 cover price of The New Yorker, but it's worth a Starbucks paper-wastebasket dive or a trip to a not-distant library.

Most interestingly, Van Doren introduces a note of media ambition that may have been driving several of the central players. Van Doren's abortive post-"Twenty One" career at NBC included straightforward journalistic work such as an interview with Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and a job doing high-culture segments for Dave Garroway. Manhattan Assistant D.A. Joseph Stone, who eventually nailed Van Doren and nine others on second-degree perjury charges, ended up trying to get Van Doren's help for a book on the affair in the 1990s. The ambitions of Richard Goodwin, the House Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce investigator who brought Van Doren to testify before Congress, are obvious even through Redford's smoke and mirrors: He went on to serve both Kennedy brothers and collaborated on the film.

But the best new wrinkle for me was one hidden in plain sight: Although Van Doren and Stempel had both finished their respective runs on the show by March 11, 1957, Redford opens his film with a pre-credit sequence involving the launch of Sputnik, which took place seven months later, on October 4 of that year. I remember because this witty scene was what informed my decision to like the movie. It's a harmless chronological distortion (one of many in the movie), but this new reminder of how Redford and screenwriter Paul Attanasio forefronted the anti-capitalist ironies of the material (the scene balances the supposed national emergency of the USSR satellite launch against a sequence of the actor playing Goodwin shopping for a fancy car) had me shouting out anew: Why was the quiz-show scandal ever considered a matter that demanded state attention? If the Hollywood Ten are considered martyrs to a shameful episode in our country's history, why should the quiz-show villains be any less sympathetic?

Read, for example, Van Doren's description of his initial interrogation by district attorney Stone:

    Mission Viejo has gone on record with its Social Host law.

    Underage drinking and its consequences, at home and at friends' homes, are a problem in the Orange County city, says the sheriff's department.

    Come September, if anyone underage drinks booze at your Mission Viejo house -- whether you are there or not, whether you know about it or not, whether you've locked your liquor cabinet or not -- then you, the adult, are responsible for the consequences. It could cost you a thousand bucks and six months in jail.

     Okay, now, say that if, instead of drinking, a kid shoots himself or another kid on your premises, with your gun, whether you're home or not, whether you knew about them handling the gun or not, whether you've locked up the gun or not -- are you legally responsible for that too?

    Just asking ...

The editorial board urges Inglewood's police chief to answer public concerns about an officer-related shooting, and thinks a state constitutional amendment to ensure special-interest-free judicial races goes too far. The board also notes the end of nipplegate:

You'd think that policymakers would have learned by now that the government runs afoul of the Constitution whenever it substitutes its judgment about offensive content for a parent's choices. Unfortunately, you'd be wrong.

On Monday, the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Federal Communications Commission acted arbitrarily when it fined CBS $550,000 for airing a half-second shot of Janet Jackson's right breast loosed from its studded leather mooring.

Columnist Rosa Brooks says Radovan Karadzic fits right in with a long line of mass murderers before him, all convinced they were healers. Columnist Patt Morrison tells Angelenos to stop being grossed out by so-called toilet-to-tap water. University of Alabama bioethics teacher Gregory Pence notes the 30-year anniversary of in vitro fertilization. And Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa says we should actually want a sales tax increase: 

The political will is now here. We have the opportunity to create a greater Los Angeles no longer chained to its cars and dependent on foreign oil, and where we are making smarter investments to ease traffic congestion and improve our quality of life.

The measure other board members and I are proposing -- which will raise the sales tax from 8.25% to 8.75% -- would bring in $40 billion over 30 years while costing the average Angeleno less than the price of half a tank of gas per year.

On the letters page, readers discuss the impending increase in parking meter rates. Encino's Francine Oschin recalls a song: "Along with the recent series of hikes for trash pickup, this will be a tax way beyond what is reasonable or justifiable. As the song says, 'If you drive a car I'll tax the street ... If you take a walk I'll tax your feet.'"

*Cartoon by Rob Rogers, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

UPDATED: The Times got hold of a draft order (pdf) from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger cutting the pay of state workers until the budget dispute is resolved (so did the Sacramento Bee).

Assembly Speaker Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles) responded twice:

6:18 p.m. --

I don't think the Governor should put public servants in the crossfire of this budget battle. But his action speaks to the need for all us -- including the Governor -- to negotiate a balanced, responsible budget that protects our schools and the safety net before we run out of cash.

Translation: He wouldn't dare!!

6:29 p.m. --

I don't believe the Governor would put public servants in the crossfire of this budget battle. But this action would speak to the need for all us -- including the Governor -- to negotiate a balanced, responsible budget that protects our schools and the safety net before we run out of cash.

Translation: He wouldn't dare.

The Times today has an intriguing article on Viagra's potential for women:

The long search for the female equivalent of Viagra has led researchers to . . . Viagra.

In a small study of 98 women published today, the little blue pill helped women whose sexual performance had flagged as a side effect of taking antidepressants, known as SSRIs -- a very specific finding that could open a new use for the male impotence drug.

For those who believe men and women can't achieve equality without comparable considerations of their sexual needs, this study takes it one step further:

Dr. Irwin Goldstein, director of sexual medicine at Alvarado Hospital in San Diego, who has prescribed Viagra for some of his female patients, said the new research suggests that "however you think about men and women, there are a lot of similarities."

Exactly what those similiarities are, though, has yet to be determined. Which raises the question: Can men and women achieve equality as long as there are two sets of sexual standards and practices?

Swati Pandey wrote about the tricky nature of judging male-female equality by sex. Following Reuter's trip with two sex tourists to Africa -- who happen to be older white women -- she observed:

Responses to the female sex tourism trend vary from disgust to vague unease. No one’s willing to make this out as a victory for feminism, even if it’s a case of women acknowledging sexual desires and having purses of their own to gratify them. (Heidi Fleiss would be proud, and possibly annoyed that her future clientele can find the frisson they seek for cheap overseas.) And it's older women at that—not the ones who are usually chided for "having sex like men." 

Back to Viagra for women:

The New York Times reports recent financial numbers, and they're so horrifying I'm not even sure they're fit to print:

The June performance followed an 11.9 per cent decline in May advertising revenues, and suggested that an already deep erosion in newspaper advertising could be accelerating. Ms Robinson said the company would respond by raising newsstand prices for the New York Times from $1.25 to $1.50 per copy beginning in August, marking the paper’s second increase in a year.

That announcement came as the company reported that second-quarter profits fell 82 per cent to $21m, or 15 cents per share, compared with the same period a year ago, when it benefited from a $94m gain from the sale of television stations.

Excluding that and other one-time events, income from continuing operations was down 5.5 per cent for the quarter. Revenue fell 6 per cent to $742m.

We've got plenty of bad news of our own, and no shortage of people willing to beat up on us about it, but I spend most days paging through my stack of eight or 10 local and national papers, and they're all emaciated. Whether we're looking at “some of the worst advertising numbers in the history of the world” I can't say, but I sure wouldn't want to be working in an industry that's looking so...oh wait, never mind.

The American Civil Liberties Union is suing the U.S. for delaying the citizenship application of decorated soldier Julian Polous Al Matchy beyond what's legally allowed (120 days after the applicant passes a citizenship test). Here's more on Polous:

Specialist Polous is a permanent lawful resident of the United States, currently stationed in Fort Riley, Kansas. He is a native and citizen of Iraq. He immigrated to the U.S. in May 2001 and quickly applied for political asylum, which was granted in 2002. In 2005, he became a lawful permanent resident of the United States.

Polous joined the U.S. Army in March 2006 and served, among other duties, as a translator. He was deployed along with his unit to his native country of Iraq. In October 2007, he was seriously wounded when a suicide bomber detonated himself 10 feet from Polous and his fellow soldiers. After partially recovering from his wounds, he agreed to another stint in Iraq until December 2007.

You'd think this is one of those cases Citizenship and Immigration Services would want to speed along, if purely for PR purposes. Or, if it's too controversial to trumpet an Iraqi's decision to become an American citizen, why not stick to the usual timeline for processing a naturalization application? It speaks to the administration's general disregard for Iraqis who've helped the war effort. But mostly it's the backlog -- one that was bad enough before expanded background check requirements, a fee increase, anti-immigrant sentiment, and a historic presidential election prompted a rush of applicants. Fortunately, USCIS is working on the problem by hiring more staff, though it's unclear how much of an effect the increased numbers will have, as the Associated Press reports:

Since October, the agency has added 830 adjudication officers to its ranks, bringing the total working at immigration offices nationwide to 3,775. Another 590 are expected to be trained by the end of the year....

About 1.4 million people applied for naturalization in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2007, nearly double the number of petitions filed the previous year....

Overwhelmed, the agency warned that anyone who had applied after June 1, 2007, would likely wait 15 to 18 months to attain citizenship....

The agency has since said the waits will be shorter, but it won't say by how much.

Got that? The New Yorker's James Surowiecki explains the riddle of contradictions that is the relationship between troubled mortgage-backing giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the federal government (and therefore taxpayers) and millions of home-loan borrowers in the U.S.

Surowiecki's conclusion? A contradiction, of course. Pardon the long-ish excerpts, but wrapping your head around the Fannie and Freddie maladies takes some reading. First, the details and problems:

Fannie and Freddie are the duck-billed platypuses of the financial world. They’re profit-driven corporations, owned by shareholders and, in theory, beholden only to them. But they’re also so-called “government-sponsored enterprises,” set up by the state with the explicit mission of fostering homeownership, by buying and selling home mortgages. Unlike ordinary corporations, they’re exempt from most state and local taxes and certain S.E.C. requirements, and they have access to a government credit line....

The G.S.E.s are curious, because there’s no obvious reason for them to exist in the form they do: instead of creating private companies to do all these jobs, the government could just do them itself. In fact, that’s how Fannie Mae got started, back in 1938: originally, it was a government agency endowed with the authority to buy mortgages, in the hope that this would expand the supply of credit to homeowners. It wasn’t until 1968 that Fannie was privatized. (Freddie Mac was created two years later, and was private from the start.) ....

Making Fannie and Freddie into these weird hybrids may have spruced up the budget, but in the long run it also made it easy for the companies to grow too big, too fast. Because everyone assumed that the government would make good on Fannie’s and Freddie’s debts, they could borrow money more cheaply than their competitors. They used this cheap debt to increase the number of mortgages they bought. Had Fannie and Freddie been ordinary private companies, there would have been a natural check: companies with more debt are usually seen as riskier, and that makes shareholders and bondholders less willing to invest in them.

And, Surowiecki's solution:

Whatever their sins, Fannie and Freddie clearly couldn’t be allowed to fail, but that’s no argument for letting them go on as they are. Either they should be forced to make it as private companies or they should be nationalized. Given that their business depends on the promise of government assistance and that their current state remains woeful (despite an upturn in their fortunes late last week), nationalization seems more sensible. If Fannie and Freddie are going to run up a tab and stick taxpayers with the bill, why should shareholders profit?