How Do You Spell Chutzpah?

C-L-I-N-T-O-N? The former president asserts that had it not been for those evil, cash-and-carry Congressional Republicans, the business and accounting reforms that he championed would have prevented everything that has happened from happening. Those of you who do not recall Clinton's championing of business and accounting reform probably don't remember all that he did to combat terrorism as well.

Korean Multiplicity

Matt Drudge links to a Pravda story saying that a Korean woman will give birth next year to the first human clone.

One Reason Not to Short The New York Times

Bob Herbert's column today about the theivery at SG Cowen and Lehman Brothers is superb and astonishing.

Nutty Quote of the Week

And the winner is: Paul Weyrich. Here we go:

"A lot of the social conservatives appreciate the stands he (Attorney General John Ashcroft) has taken on child pornography and the Second Amendment and a number of social issues. But there is suddenly a great concern that what was passed in the wake of 9-11 were things that had little to do with catching terrorists but a lot to do with increasing the strength of government to infiltrate and spy on conservative organizations."

Is it possible he was misquoted?

Donahue on the Ropes

It took all of one week for Phil Donahue's ratings to collapse. He now trails Connie Chung, whose ratings didn't collapse because they could hardly be worse. America's News Network is now stuck with one very expensive turkey. Justice triumphs again.

Legacy of Misery

More evidence that The New York Times is a stock to short can be found here. When I first saw this "photo essay," I figured some prankster had hacked the NYT site. But it is indeed New York Times content and of the most offensive kind.

The accompanying article is, if anything, even more offensive, since it is badly sourced and slanders the Special Forces people on the ground who are there for the express purpose of minimizing civilian casualties. They risk their lives to do that. To minimize Afghan civilian deaths.

Their targetting, if one need edit, has resulted in the fewest number of civilian casualties in any war (covering a territory as large as Afghanistan) in human history, despite the fact that the US brought to bear overwhelming and extraordinarily lethal force.

A-O-Hell

Reports from inside AOL Time Warner have been ugly ever since the "merger" was first announced. But today's report in The New York Observer kind of sums it all up. It's so bad you almost feel sorry for Bob Pittman. Almost.

Hollywood Hackers

This story, from CNET.com, is almost unbelievable. Except it's true. Following are the lead graphs:

Congress is about to consider an entertainment industry proposal that would authorize copyright holders to disable PCs used for illicit file trading. A draft bill seen by CNET News.com marks the boldest political effort to date by record labels and movie studios to disrupt peer-to-peer networks that they view as an increasingly dire threat to their bottom line.

Sponsored by Reps. Howard Berman, D-Calif., and Howard Coble, R-N.C., the measure would permit copyright holders to perform nearly unchecked electronic hacking if they have a "reasonable basis" to believe that piracy is taking place. Berman and Coble plan to introduce the 10-page bill this week.

I have a column in the new issue of Fast Company that touches on this very subject. You can read it by clicking here.

And Now For Some Good News

In case you missed this item from the Friday Financial Times:

The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries said yesterday it was prepared for a price war unless Russia took steps to curb its rapidly growing production. A senior Opec official said the cartel, which supplies about a third of the world's oil, was becoming frustrated by Russia's improving relationship with the US and its growing share of the world market.

"The Russians are playing a dirty political game with Opec and it is becoming very hard to trust them. If they are keen on having a price war, so be it. It is time we abandoned the soft approach and became more aggressive," said the official.

The comments mark an escalation in the tension that has been building between Opec and Moscow over the past six months.

Cramer on the Market

Jim Cramer is many things, but at his core he is a great trader. Here's his take on current market conditions:

"All I can say is that this is the worst market I have ever seen. I think that there are great buys from (sic) the long term developing, but not without a whole lot of pain. I still expect the market to sink some more so I am reluctant to buy stocks that don't have some sort of buyback or dividend protection, as you shall see from my ratings. How can I justify owning anything here? Because stocks are so oversold, because earnings estimates have come down dramatically and because most of these companies -- and all of the Ones -- are doing incredibly well or have great yield support while I await a turnaround."

Ernie!

1. What is it with Frenchmen at The Open Championship. Thomas Levet was one-up going to the fourth and final play-off hole and he takes out the driver? I thought Curtis Strange was going to have a stroke. Of course he jerks it into the bunker, has to come out sideways, scrapes his third shot onto the green and misses the 40-odd footer. Bogey. All he had to do was hit 2-iron, 3-iron and he's around the front of the green (if not on the front of the green) in two. But noooooooooooooooooo!. Gimme the driver there Jacques! It must be the Gitanes.

2. What is up with (New York Times golf reporter) Clifton Brown's front page dispatch on Sunday? The fact that Tiger Woods shot a very bad round (81, 10-over) on Saturday sent Brown into a metaphor frenzy (Woods was "like a piano falling down the stairs") that seemed almost gleeful about Tiger's misfortune.

3. Hats off to Tiger for his great Sunday round. He never quit and almost made it back into red numbers.

4. Hats off to Ernie Els, whose Saturday round (+1, in the midst of a monsoon) was astonishing. Els is the only golfer out there who can compete at Tiger's level. It's good to have him back in the winner's circle.