Getting the Story Straight, the Trials for the Al Qaeda Captives

And now the most telling two minutes in television, the latest from the political grapevine.

Nearly all traces have now vanished from the Web site of the liberal political journal the Nation of a story that appeared there last week on George W. Bush, Enron and baseball. The story first claimed that, "When George W. Bush co-owned the Houston Astros and construction began on a new stadium, Kenneth Lay (Enron's chairman) agreed to spend $100 million over 30 years for rights to name the park after Enron." The trouble was, as both the Wall Street Journal and the Weekly Standard noted: Bush never co-owned the Houston Astros. He co-owned the Texas Rangers. So the Nation changed its story to say that Enron had paid up for the right to name that team's stadium. But that wasn't true either. The Nation had the part about  which stadium Enron paid the money for correct the first time. It was the Houston Astros. What the magazine could not seem to get right was that neither George W. Bush nor his ball team, had anything to do with it.

There will be a hearing in federal court in Los Angeles tomorrow on a petition brought by a coalition of Americans demanding that those Al Qaeda captives being held in Cuba be brought before an American court to hear the charges against them. The habeas corpus petition is backed by, among others, onetime Attorney General Ramsey Clark, who was least seen helping former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic defend himself against war-crimes charges. The judge hearing the case will have to determine whether he has any jurisdiction over the prisoners, who are being held in Cuban territory leased to the United States.

The latest from the world of American learning is that Pennsylvania education officials are concerned because between one third and one half of prospective math and science teachers in the state failed their certification tests last year. The Pittsburgh Post Gazette reports that the failure rate on the math test was particularly worrisome since the state has a shortage of math teachers. The paper quoted the state's bureau of certification, Frank Meehan, as saying the state is considering making the test easier so that more applicants can pass it.