Stewardship

The most enjoyable aspect of watching the HMS Hillary take on water is the prospect that Bill - and his cult of personality - will go down with the ship, too. Bill Clinton has been stumping for his wife on the Iowa hustings, framing the election as a referendum on his tenure as president. Last month in Muscatine (during the same speech in which he falsely claimed to have opposed the Iraq war from the beginning), he told the assembled Democrats that HMS Hillary could transport America "back to the future."

IN THE matter of Columbia Association President Deborah O. McCarty, the Columbia Council did the right thing in refusing to fire her forthwith. A motion to terminate, offered in frustration by one of the council members last Thursday evening, was rejected as it should have been. A process for evaluating Ms. McCarty's curious stewardship must be adhered to. Fairness and protection of the city's treasury surely dictate that approach. "What this motion says is `Let's throw out any semblance of fact-gathering and vote up or down like she was a Roman gladiator.

AUSTIN, Tex. -- At his Rose Garden introduction last week as the nation's next defense secretary, Bobby Ray Inman promised to apply the experience he gained in corporate America to the Pentagon in the hopes of bringing what he called the "best business practices" to the government and getting "a dollar value for a dollar spent on defense."But during the 1980s, Mr. Inman presided over a costly business debacle, a leveraged buyout failure that resulted in the bankruptcy of a Fortune 500 military contractor named Tracor Inc., which made submarine and aviation weapons systems.

DOVER, N.H. -- Sen. John Kerry, he of the reputation for aloofness, was doing a lively imitation of Phil Donahue, the old ambulatory television host, here the other evening at a good-sized seacoast rally in the nation's first primary state. After an animated speech that also defied his image as Mr. Cool, Senator Kerry took his wireless microphone and ambled over to folks in the crowd, soliciting their questions, patting the men on the shoulder and hugging the women. When one lady worried about her son in Iraq, he went up to her and said: "Can I give you a hug for your son?"

Siasconset, Mass. -- AMERICANS invented mass marketing and we tend to equate the robustness of our invention with national virtue.Yet we have been deeply ambivalent about the pursuit of goods and services.Our prophets have long railed against unabashed consumerism.Philosophical ambivalence is now being joined by ecological misgivings over the processes and products of consumption that pollute. The idea of over consumption is the result and the idea is being taken up by major institutions.

No one can accuse the Cleveland Indians of lacking a long-term management plan. The club announced yesterday that - effective Nov. 1 - executive vice president and general manager John Hart will move into an advisory role and that Baltimore native Mark Shapiro, 34, will take over the day-to-day operation of the franchise. Shapiro, the son of prominent Baltimore lawyer and player representative Ron Shapiro, has worked his way up through the Indians' organization since joining the team as an assistant in baseball operations in 1992.

TV stations' success helps minorities and the communityI read with interest The Sun's April 18 article "WNUV-TV owner a lightning rod for criticism."The article detailed the successful relationship between television broadcast companies Sinclair and Glencairn in the context of misplaced criticism of Glencairn and its owner, Mr. Edwin Edwards, by the Rev. Jesse Jackson and his Rainbow/PUSH Coalition.Like many Baltimoreans, I grew up watching the three major networks on channels 2, 11 and 13. Today, television viewers have access to cable and satellite programming in addition to Sinclair's WBFF-TV (Fox 45)

NEW YORK -- Conventional wisdom had it that Westinghouse Electric Corp. needed a good thrashing to bring it back into line. Divisions had to be sold, and quickly, while "fat" had to be "trimmed" and management bullwhipped into shape.The problem with that view is that it was wrong, at least according to the company's chairman and chief executive, Michael H. Jordan.Last week, while unveiling Westinghouse's second restructuring in 14 months, the 57-year-old former PepsiCo executive proved to be more of a discrete counselor for the company than the loud-mouthed drill sergeant favored by Wall Street's management mavens.

The expression In vino veritas roughly translates from Latin into "in wine, there is truth. " Pliny the Elder, the Roman author who first turned the phrase, was observing how alcohol can loosen the tongue and cause people to reveal things they might not have intended. One might also note that allegedly independent reports on wine shipping can be revealing too. Comptroller Peter Franchot's lengthy missive on the topic — released last week — reveals not only how nonsensical are many of the objections to direct shipment to Maryland consumers, but also how resistant his own agency is to endorsing needed reforms.

Visiting the Southeast recently, I heard about the state of Alabama's plans for its last 60 acres of pristine, old-growth longleaf pines, many well into their third century.The state plans to push a highway through the ancient grove. Only in Alabama, we laughed ruefully; and then I stopped laughing, because I recalled the Belt Woods in Maryland.Growing improbably within a few miles of the Capital Beltway, they were 90 acres of skyscraping hardwoods, many of the oaks dating back to the time of the Pilgrims.