At the risk of sounding superficial (more than usual, anyway), one news image showed me all I need to see. CNN International showed a group of older Chinese spending their days crowded around a board flashing updated share prices. It looked (frankly) like U.S. retirees cheering on a horse race at a sports book in a slightly less glitzy part of Nevada.

So I ask, when (not if) this particular bubble bursts, do we think it will burst other bubbles as well? (especially considering the Dems seem poised for a big win next year and the end in Iraq might be in sight, doubleplusbad for the Dow); and ShannonR, why Feb. 2008?

Glenn G. says: "[And while I have Joe Klein: Can you or someone at Time please ask Rick Stengel why he thinks he is entitled to go on national television and make factually and demonstrably false statements (see Update) about what Americans think and not retract, correct or clarify what he has said once he realizes it is false? Ana Marie Cox linked to that discussion and said she passed it on to him, yet he has never corrected his falsehoods. He's Time's Managing Editor. Why is nobody at Time bothered by that behavior?]"

Umm, Glenn, please remember to whom you are speaking. Since you didn't, let me point out for the benefit of Mr. Klein that the blue font in Glenn's text is called a link. Click on a link with your mouse, and you will be transported via the innertubes to what the lawyers call "support" and what in your profession might at one time have been called a "source." As in evidence n' facts n' stuff. It's a bit trickier than the chairman of the RNC just calling you up and feeding you gossip; but that's why we (i.e. we the folks who were right about Bush-Cheney and right about Iraq from Day 1) are here at Salon and not reading TIME.

Just in case TIME's token "liberal" or the Dean of East Egg are having an intern read these letters (looking for further proof of low-rent blogo-vitriol, no doubt), let me add that the problem is NOT that Beltway folk need to be more "partisan" or aggressive. We really don't want to see David Gregory ask Bush Jr. if he's "galactically stupid." (Well, maybe a little.)

What we want is for you to not rely on the RNC and the White House for all your stories. White House press briefings should sound like this: "Any comment on the report by XYZ News that the Vice President lied about that meeting in Prague?" and "The Daily Planet has learned the lies about WMD came from neocons in the Pentagon basement; well?"

There has been exactly one real news story in the last six years: the Walter Reed scandal. Granted, it probably arose from a soldier or his (or her) family calling in the press; but still, at some point somebody from the media had to actually go out and look for themselves.

Right now, there's too damn much of this: "Mr. President, how's the war in Iraq going? Great? Well, OK then; good enough for us! See you at the Correspondents' Dinner!"

Dick Cheney: "Our mission is to do everything we can to prevail on what is now, we believe, a global conflict . . . against one of the most evil opponents we've ever faced."

Everything, that is, except catch the terrorists actually responsible for 9/11. Who, by the way, have attacked the U.S.'s allies one by one (Australia in Bali, Madrid, London etc.); so to claim that "we" haven't been attacked since 9/11 ain't 'zactly true either. What a Dick.

Thanks to this discussion, I think I now see the disconnect. People like Klein and Broder are taken aback by criticism from what they see as the "left" blogosphere because they think of themselves and their employers as center-left. And within their Beltway power structure -- within (and only within) the heart of the military-industrial complex -- they probably ARE center-left; but the result is their distorted world-view, at odds with reality.

In the world outside the Beltway, however, the Kleins and Broders, and more importantly the TIME's, the WaPo's, and the GE/NBC's, are firmly center-right. They've been battered for the last 20 years by the wack-jobs on the extreme right; but now, because of the rise of the blogosphere, they've discovered that Blue America ain't exactly thrilled with them either, especially with their panty raid on the Clinton White House and their cheerleading for a stupid war based on lies and their general failure to hold Bush-Cheney accountable.

In short, their whole world-view is collapsing around them, as if they just swallowed the red pill in 'The Matrix'. In short, thanks to the innertubes, Blue America now has a voice for the first time in our memory; and it's a hard reality for the Beltway Gang to swallow.

I realize "tarmac" has a narrow technical definition (and, incidentally, Shelby Foote in his great work mentions macadamed roads as early as the U.S. Civil War). However, I think this might be one of those words that takes on new life well beyond its original meaning; especially as no other word works as well (apron? ramp? bah). Plus, it's a cool word.

On airline-speak redundancy, I imagine the need to make sure drowsy passengers get the message has something to do with it; yet I have a hunch lawyers have also lent a hand, as in: "Sure, my client TAMPERED with the smoke detector, but in no way did he DISABLE or DESTROY it; and since the airline's warning did not expressly mention "tamper" . . .

Now, what are The Pilot's favorite takeoff, in-flight, and landing videos on YouTube?