Wrong Man

Why would anyone wish to become President of the United States? The responsibility of leading a nation of over 330 million souls, the burden of sending our brave and finest into harms way, the fortitude to withstand the barbs of the opposition are but a few items in the job description. With this in mind in the current election cycle, I have observed President Barack Obama and his all-but-certain opponent Gov. Mitt Romney, their utterances and their body language while on the stump throughout the nation.

You have to wonder what kind of fun Vatican mystery writer Dan Brown would have with the startling resignation of Pope Benedict XVI. As would be the case when any well-known CEO suddenly steps down "for health reasons," we are immediately suspicious. Was he, like the last pope to step down voluntarily more than 700 years ago, simply the wrong man for the job? A shy and aging scholar overwhelmed by the demands of guiding the church through the scandals of sex abuse and money laundering, who was happier in the library than on the balcony at St. Peter's?

The complaint that those of us who frequently refer to the nation's breathtaking disparity in wealth and income and to its 46 million poor are engaging in "class warfare" usually comes from people, like Mitt Romney, who live in the highest end of American class structure. They always throw the red flags. "I think it's dangerous, this class warfare," Mr. Romney said of the Occupy Wall Street protests last fall. Campaigning toward yesterday's presidential primary in South Carolina, he accused Newt Gingrich, a fellow multimillionaire, of sowing "class warfare" with his criticisms of Mr. Romney's legacy at Bain Capital.

Why would anyone wish to become President of the United States? The responsibility of leading a nation of over 330 million souls, the burden of sending our brave and finest into harms way, the fortitude to withstand the barbs of the opposition are but a few items in the job description. With this in mind in the current election cycle, I have observed President Barack Obama and his all-but-certain opponent Gov. Mitt Romney, their utterances and their body language while on the stump throughout the nation.

The carefully planned robbery and beating were supposed to be payback for stealing pills and cash from a drug dealer. But there was a glitch. When police apprehended the first of four men charged in the Severna Park ambush, he admitted that they'd robbed the wrong man, said Anne Arundel County prosecutor Michael J. Dunty. On Tuesday, Brian Keith Andrzejewski, 35, pleaded guilty to robbery. Circuit Judge Paul A. Hackner sentenced him to four years in prison, followed by five years of supervised probation, while the victim, a community college student, and his family, watched.

Two weeks after arresting a Virginia man in a December killing in North Laurel, police acknowledged yesterday that the wrong man was charged, and they are looking for a new suspect, who they believe used the Virginia man's name as an alias. Officials had charged Dwayne West Williams, 28, of Portsmouth with first-degree murder in the Dec. 10 death of Donald Ray Mitchell, 43, of Columbia, who was visiting friends in North Laurel. Mitchell was shot once in the chest during an argument.

Continuing to insist that federal agents and a federal jury had nailed the wrong man, a Nigerian was sentenced yesterday to 40 years in prison for his conviction on drug smuggling charges.The man sobbed and flailed his arms as he begged U.S. District Judge John R. Hargrove to believe that his was a case of mistaken identity. The Nigerian insisted that he is Charles Onwauzombe, and not Ebele Onwuazor, who federal prosecutors say conspired to ship millions of dollars worth of heroin into the United States.

An attorney for an 18-year-old man charged with attempted murder in one of two shootings that stunned Harper's Choice in September said yesterday that the state arrested the wrong man.In opening statements, the prosecution said Robert Joseph Manning fired a sawed-off shotgun and seriously wounded John Gordon Jackson, 38, just before 2 a.m. Sept. 21 near Jackson's apartment on Harpers Farm Road. Defense attorney Richard Bernhardt said another man was the shooter.Jackson, a disabled Army veteran, was shot about 24 hours after a 17-year-old boy was robbed and shot in the abdomen a block and a half away.

An attorney for an 18-year-old man charged with attempted murder in one of two shootings that stunned Harper's Choice last September said yesterday the state arrested the wrong man.In opening statements, the prosecution said Robert Joseph Manning fired a sawed-off shotgun and seriously wounded John Gordon Jackson, 38, just before 2 a.m. on Sept. 21 near Jackson's apartment on Harpers Farm Road. But defense attorney Richard Bernhardt named another man as the shooter.Jackson, a disabled Army veteran, was shot about 24 hours after a 17-year-old boy was robbed and shot in the abdomen a block and a half away -- a crime for which another defendant is scheduled to go on trial.

WASHINGTON - President Bush tapped John R. Bolton, a blunt-talking administration conservative who has been sharply critical of the United Nations, yesterday as the next U.S. ambassador to the world body. Democrats quickly reacted against the nomination, saying Bolton was the wrong man for the U.N. post at a time when the United States was seeking to mend fences with longtime allies after a period of disaffection resulting from the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq and other disagreements. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced the selection at a brief State Department ceremony, calling Bolton "a tough-minded diplomat" with a proven track record of success, and comparing him to two of the more colorful and outspoken Americans who have held the U.N. post, Jeanne J. Kirkpatrick and the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan.

The complaint that those of us who frequently refer to the nation's breathtaking disparity in wealth and income and to its 46 million poor are engaging in "class warfare" usually comes from people, like Mitt Romney, who live in the highest end of American class structure. They always throw the red flags. "I think it's dangerous, this class warfare," Mr. Romney said of the Occupy Wall Street protests last fall. Campaigning toward yesterday's presidential primary in South Carolina, he accused Newt Gingrich, a fellow multimillionaire, of sowing "class warfare" with his criticisms of Mr. Romney's legacy at Bain Capital.

The carefully planned robbery and beating were supposed to be payback for stealing pills and cash from a drug dealer. But there was a glitch. When police apprehended the first of four men charged in the Severna Park ambush, he admitted that they'd robbed the wrong man, said Anne Arundel County prosecutor Michael J. Dunty. On Tuesday, Brian Keith Andrzejewski, 35, pleaded guilty to robbery. Circuit Judge Paul A. Hackner sentenced him to four years in prison, followed by five years of supervised probation, while the victim, a community college student, and his family, watched.

Rush Limbaugh has once again found himself the subject of national attention, this time for his failed bid to become a part owner of the National Football League's St. Louis Rams. After the world was reminded of Mr. Limbaugh's history of racially charged commentary, the group trying to buy the team rightly realized that Mr. Limbaugh's involvement in the effort could cripple their chances. Rush was dropped - which is exactly how he should be treated by the Miss America Pageant. Mr. Limbaugh is slated to be a Miss America judge in 2010, in spite of the deep-seated misogyny that he has broadcast nationwide throughout his career.

A Northeast Baltimore man was convicted yesterday of attempting to murder another man he believed cheated him of $2 during a craps game. A Baltimore jury convicted Jamal Smith, 20, of the 1800 block of E. Federal St. of shooting Clinton Anderson, 38, in the head from about two feet away in the early morning of June 7, 2007. Clinton is in a vegetative state at Johns Hopkins Hospital and is not expected to recover, Assistant State's Attorney Tonya LaPolla said. The case took several twists worthy of a TV crime drama before Smith was convicted.

3 teens pick wrong victim; one is seized, two sought Three teenagers picked the wrong man to rob Monday night in an alley in West Baltimore. One was arrested, and police were seeking the other two. Police said the man was sitting in his parked car in the 100 block of S. Mount St. when he was approached by three teenage boys who talked to him about drugs and asked the man to meet them in an alley behind nearby Lemmon Street. There, police said, one of the boys brandished what appeared to be a small-caliber handgun and demanded the man's money.

washington -- The Supreme Court is set to decide as early as tomorrow whether the government can invoke the doctrine of "state secrets" to quash a legal claim from an apparently innocent victim of bungling by the CIA that resulted in his being abducted, imprisoned and tortured. Only after five months of such treatment did CIA agents seem to realize that the man in custody, Khaled el-Masri, a German citizen of Lebanese descent, was not the wanted terrorist Khalid al-Masri. The case has attracted wide public attention in Europe, but el-Masri has been unable to gain a court hearing in the United States because, at least so far, the government has successfully invoked the argument that it cannot be taken to court when doing so might expose "state secrets."

* ''Deceived'' A mystery thriller with Goldie Hawn as a woman who may have married the wrong man. John Heard is the man she weds.

Elisabeth Brooks, 46, an actress seen on television shows such as "The Rockford Files" and "Hart to Hart" but perhaps best-remembered as the villainess in "The Howling," died of cancer Sept. 7 in Palm Springs, Calif.Roger Frey, 84, a close aide to Gen. Charles de Gaulle who as interior minister crushed a revolt by French settlers opposed to Algerian independence, died Saturday in Paris of a stroke.Will Hare, 81, a founding member of the Actors Studio who appeared on Broadway, in television and in movies over a four-decade career, died of a heart attack Aug. 31 in New York.

A Baltimore gang member who was improperly cajoled by a federal judge into pleading guilty in the middle of a drug conspiracy trial was resentenced yesterday to a prison term of about 21 years, far less than the 60-year sentence he originally received. A year ago, a federal appeals court threw out convictions that sent three Baltimore gang members to prison for decades, saying the trial judge had wrongly immersed himself into negotiations with the defendants and improperly encouraged them to enter guilty pleas.

Disabled and poor, 60-year-old Frank Brown returned from a medical appointment one day last June to find the picked-over remains of his belongings on the curb outside his public housing apartment. Even his little dog was gone. He had been evicted wrongly, and officials at the Annapolis Housing Authority soon apologized. "They told me they would make it good," he said. The authority, which offered him $6,000 and a two-bedroom apartment in its three-year-old Bloomsbury Square complex if he didn't sue, pulled the offer off the table after Brown retained a lawyer.