Lament & Laurels

A weekly parody of a weekly editorial.

The Washington Post had an interesting four-part series this week about the role that Vice President Cheney has played in the Bush administration. While the Vice President has taken heat from some on the left for his megalomaniacal style, paranoid secrecy, power-grabbing legal obfuscation, his role as puppet-master to Bush the sock-puppet, helping Scooter Libby out Plame and obstruct justice, shooting an old man in the face and his hypocritical proud-grandfather gay-bashing, we think he might be getting a bad rap. With the world changing after 9/11, we think Cheney may have been just the person to help President Bush guide the ship of state in uncharted waters. Or not.

Ann Coulter, the leggy agent-provocateur of the conservative movement, may want to take a step back from her tough language when discussing the sexual proclivities of a certain Democratic presidential candidate. Although she often entertains us with her colorful challenges to the political status quo, she may have crossed a line when she said on a cable show this week that John Edwards and his ailing wife, Elizabeth, hosted weekly meetings of a satanic swingers club in their palatial home. She did not make things better when – after Mrs. Edwards called the show to complain that the couple’s weekly bridge club was, at least, misunderstood – Coulter accused the Edwards of using the memory of their tragically dead son to distract the other bridge players for unfair advantage. We can only hope that Coulter would take better advantage of her still-unexplained media access in the future to poison the national political debate with, perhaps, a little less vinegar.

Alderman Michael McGee Jr. had the bail on his state criminal charges reduced and eventually posted by community supporters this week. This is good. After being transferred to federal court, it was determined that he would be held without bail. This is good. He is being held in the same place (the Milwaukee County Jail) that he was before his state bail was posted. It is hard to argue with this, as it is with the fact that he made bail on the state case. The bottom line is that he will be held, or not held, as appropriate. It seems this would go without saying, but it doesn’t, since we just said it. We wish both McGee and his prosecutors the best, and we’re sure each of them knows what that is. The wheels of justice turn, well-oiled by the citizenry that has greased the gears with the blood of patriots. We wish both sides well, except the side that is eventually proven wrong. Shame on them.

Summerfest celebrates its 40th anniversary this week with another fun-filled 11 days of music on the lakefront. Since this paper has spent an incredible amount of (multi-colored) ink and killed thousands of trees promoting it and has sponsored the event every year since it’s inception, we don’t have to tell you that we think the festival is just peachy. In fact, we have decided to mail this one in. Knowing that many of our readers doze off at about this point in this editorial every Saturday morning, we will pad the rest of this paragraph with phrases from other L&Ls...Again, the music unites us...Good things do come to those who wait...They all merit applause...Good show, [insert name of current or former Summerfest director here]...Sounds as though they deserve a plaque...And the rest, as they say, is history.