Coverage of the President's "major address" is the surest
indication of the decline of the office, or at least of the
deference the big boys now feel they must pay. None of the major
broadcast networks carried it. Martha Stewart held forth unassailed
on ABC. Even Fox's local, channel 5, ignored it. Some cable outfits
carried it and Mr. Bush held forth up in a corner of the
quadri-sected Bloomberg report.
What if he really did have something new to say? Ten new terror
attempts, with three aimed at the U.S. but thwarted, is new. Now
the scramble begins to find out what they were, when, etc.
It was not what he had to say, but what the big boys said by
ignoring him, that makes news, ominous news.
