En Passant

No gays in Iran?

All in all, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has done himself a lot more harm than good.

Today, the Federal Reserve

made a lot of wealthy people wealthier.

Has there ever been a more obnoxious commercial

than the one in which the heroine dances while singing, "I'm cleaning the litterbox!"?

The impending IPO of Classmates.com has the potential

of becoming the next Vonage.

Regardless of what one thinks about MoveOn.org's 'General Betray Us' ad,

The New York Times had every right to publish it.

With our nation at war, with terrorists threatening terrorism,

why are Minnesota police officers sitting in bathroom stalls waiting for men in neighboring stalls to tap their feet suggestively?

It was awfully uncomfortable today seeing pit traders cheer

as oil hit $80 a barrel.  Do they all view money as more important than our national security?

Six years later: Who'd a thunk?

Just six years ago today, the southern tip of Manhattan island was devastated.  Today, six years later, baby carriages fill the sidewalks and no part of New York City is hotter.  There are $2,000-a-square-foot condos under construction and retailers, like BMW and Tiffany, are opening.  The area surrounding Ground Zero has come back, in spades.

It took Amy 19 years to choose her alma mater.

"A report on Oct. 24, 1988, about the marriage of Amy Levine and David Abrams, misstated where the bride received her undergraduate degree.  She graduated from Brown University, not Boston University.  Amy Abrams only recently called attention to the error." -- from today's New York Times.

A big story on the front page of the Metro section of today's New York Times

features Stone Street, a little-known street in lower Manhattan.  There's a big photo of Stone Street, and the story focuses on the transformation of Stone Street into Manhattan's South Beach.  Accompanying the story is a map of lower Manhattan, on which are named about half a dozen streets, but not Stone Street.