Editorial for July 5, 2007 edition:


They do it their way

From the standpoint of political ideology, President George Walker Bush and Mayor John Franklin Street have little in common, but one thing’s for sure: Neither one gives much of a darn about public image.
Take Mr. Street (please). The electronics guru-in-chief and chief executive of Philadelphia was happy to spend nearly 15 hours one day last week — 3:30 in the morning to 6 at night — waiting for a chance to purchase his very own, overrated, overstated, overpriced iPhone.
It’s great that the mayor wants to be a gadget geek, but sitting in a line of folks eager to blow 600 bucks on a toy was a colossal waste of the mayor’s precious time. If he were as clever as people thought he was, he would have made his big brother Milton wait in line for him.
As for Mr. Bush, another politician who sometimes lets ego and obstinacy prevail over reason and wisdom, few Americans should be surprised by his decision Monday to give his pal I. Lewis "Scooter the Liar" Libby a "stay out of jail free" card. In commuting the prison sentence of Vice President Dick Cheney’s former chief of staff, who was convicted of lying to federal investigators about his role in the leak of the name of a CIA agent, Mr. Bush exhibited the ethics of a Bill Clinton.

• • •

Give Mr. Bush credit, though, for naming John G. Roberts to the U.S. Supreme Court. In the court’s 5-4 ruling last week that outlaws the use of skin color as a sole factor in allowing school desegregation, the chief justice got it exactly right when he said, "The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race." Politically correct, bleeding-heart liberals may think racial injustice is OK if it happens to white students, but it’s not.
Two wrongs don’t make a right, whether you’re the leader of America’s sixth-largest city or the leader of the free world. ••

Respond to this editorial . . .

Letters to the Editor . . .