The Web Site Way

And now the most absorbing two minutes in television, the latest from the wartime grapevine:

If It’s Legal, It's There
An Internet site that provides online videogames is under growing pressure to take down a game called Kaboom!, which opens with a picture of Yasser Arafat. It then shows a cartoon terrorist, with explosives strapped to his chest, as he walks on a public street. A click of the mouse sets off his bomb, strewing bodies all over the street. The game is scored by how many people are killed. Democratic Congresswoman Nita Lowey of New York said the game "trivializes the heinous act of killing and maiming innocent people." A spokesman for the Web site, Newgrounds.com, says, "As long as it's not illegal, we don't take the stuff down."

Peace Proposal Predicament
Former President Clinton disagrees with Dennis Ross, who was his special Mideast negotiator, about why Yasser Arafat turned down that Clinton peace proposal made in the Oval Office in December two years ago. The deal would have given the Palestinians 97 percent of the West Bank and much else, but Arafat rejected it. Ross thinks Arafat simply could not agree to end the conflict with Israel that has been his life. Clinton, though, said this week that "It was mostly short-term political considerations" that kept Arafat from agreeing.

New Policy
Harvard University has come up with a new policy for dealing with complaints of sexual misconduct — it will from now on require at least some corroboration before launching a full investigation.  The Boston Globe notes that this goes against the current campus policy "to allow accusers to press sex assault cases even without concrete evidence." But student Sara Levit Shore, leader of Harvard's Coalition Against Sexual Violence, is not pleased "To throw your hands up in the face of a student who complains about a rape is a very scary thing for the student body."

Sex Discrimination?
Up in Oshawa, in Ontario, Canada, a 17-year-old student is suing his Roman Catholic high school because the school has barred his date from coming to the prom. The problem is that student Marc Hall's date is his 21-year-old boyfriend, and the school says letting them come and dance with each other would violate church teaching against homosexual conduct. Hall's lawyers insist the policy violates laws against sex discrimination. The judge, who will rule next week, says it's the toughest case he's ever had.