Lightning round

Colin McNickle of The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review goes to the lightning round in his latest column to ask some pertinent questions and offer some insightful observations about what's going on in the news.

From his column, A few points of order:

Item: Black Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr., repeatedly alleging racism and being otherwise belligerent when Cambridge, Mass., police responded to a report of a break-in at his home, is arrested for disorderly conduct.

Shouldn't race-baiting be a hate crime?

Item: President Obama, a friend of Mr. Gates, calls the action of police "stupid." On Friday, he backtracked.

Nonetheless, shouldn't his original comments forever preclude the president from declining comment on any matter that remains "under investigation" and "likely headed for litigation"?

Item: Headline from The Hill newspaper on the Democrat-controlled Congress' failure to pass health-care "reform" before the August recess -- "Dems demand more coordination from leaders."

Shouldn't the headline have read, "Unherdable asses spare the masses (for now)"?

Item: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sums up the lower chamber's health-care "reform" plan as a "cap on your costs -- no cap on your benefits."

Shouldn't someone of her supposed intelligence understand that price ceilings create shortages?

Item: President Obama intimates that "doctors" are removing kids' healthy tonsils to earn a higher insurance reimbursement rate.

Shouldn't someone challenge the president to name those "doctors" so their supposed tonsil-removal factories can be shut down?

Item: Gov. Ed Rendell has spent $15,000 in political donations on an Internet campaign to push his budget proposal which, of course, includes a plan to raise taxes.

Shouldn't that money have gone to some fund or organization that actually helps "the children," a cause for which the governor professes to be so concerned?

Read the full column at the newspaper's Web site.