Improving Efficiency

AUGUST 8, 2006: Ned Lamont defeats longtime incumbent Senator Joe Lieberman in tight Connecticut Democratic primary, striking a blow to the so-called “Bush agenda” and to the appeasement politics of Lieberman and the Democratic Leadership Council.

AUGUST 10, 2006: Pakistan arrests the brother of a terrorist suspect, forcing a British operation to prematurely close on a terror investigation.* In “response,” U.S. officials tighten up security at airports nationwide, banning deadly Clairol products from carry-on luggage.

RESULT: No more news coverage of Ned Lamont.

PROBLEM/SOLUTION RESPONSE TIME: approx. 2 days.

AUGUST 17, 2006: President Bush is ordered to cease the NSA wiretapping program by a federal judge, who declares it unconstitutional. From the judge’s statement: "It was never the intent of the (constitutional) framers to give the president such unfettered control, particularly when his actions blatantly disregard the parameters clearly enumerated in the Bill of Rights.”

AUGUST 17, 2006: American expat schoolteacher and clear looney tune Mark Karr is arrested in Bangkok for the 10-year-old murder of JonBenet Ramsey. Karr is inexplicably extradited to the U.S. in custody of the Department of Homeland Security, which has no jurisidiction over ordinary domestic murder cases.

RESULT: No more news coverage of NSA wiretap judgment.

PROBLEM/SOLUTION RESPONSE TIME: less than three hours.

* There’s some evidence that American officials were trying to force the British to make the arrests the preceding week -- which would have driven the Lieberman/Lamont race off the radar before the election. But clearly, as the President said this week in New Orleans, “a government…fell short of its responsibilities.”