THE MORNING PAPERS

A couple of good stories from the weekend papers.

First is this from the Daily Mail in London, reporting that the knucklehead British defense ministry was cooking up a returned-hostages phony publicity campaign even as the Hollywood Hostages were still in the hands of the wily Iranians.

And I recommend Peter Applebome's column in today's Times, which has a lot to say about politically correct hostility toward the innocent Duke University lacrosse players. Especially impressive are the comments near the end by English professor Dr. Houston A . Baker Jr., who continues to refer to the totally exonerated young men as a "scummy bunch of white males" and "farm animals."

Incidentally, I was fascinated by how anyone employed as a professor at an actual college could be ... well, so damned thick. So I looked up the learned Doctor Baker on Amazon.com.

He's the author of a book, "Black Studies, Rap and the Academy," and refers to gangsta rap as a means "to provide sometimes stunning territorial confrontations between black urban expressivity and white law-and-order," and describes it as "a profitable, agential resource for an alternative American legality." Yes, you read that right: "... an alternative American legality."

Whoa, the perfect Santa stocking-stuffer for that impressionable English student of yours (ho-ho-ho).

Shortly after the incident early last year, and before any criminal charges were filed against the young men by the now-discredited district attorney, Duke University canceled the lacrosse season. Even then, the alleged rape victim's story was changing with some frequency and beginning to fall apart under examination.

Still, the Professor saw fit back then to denounce the university president, Richard H. Brodhead, for exhibiting "timorous piety" and "sentimental legalism" in failing to impose harsher penalties on the not-yet-accused students.

Professor Baker left Duke and now graces the faculty at Vanderbilt University.

...And finally, you might want to have a look at this story, on deadly mercenary security guards in Iraq, from today's Washington Post.

Later -- As the much-hyped nor'easter hits the Northeast, will the controversial and hugely expensive taxpayer funded beach restoration along New Jersey's (mostly-inaccessible-to-the-general public) seashore survive the weekend? Or will the coastal scientists and geologists who scoffed at the boondoggle be saying "Told you so?"

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