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Let's do something we haven't done here at The Lex Files for a while: Friday Fun!

Today's Friday Fun is written by Ginmar, who did a tour in Iraq with the Army ("The big question about humvees in my mind, is precisely how many miles does it take for you to get your internal organs so rearranged you're incapable of reproduction?") and worships all manner of monster movies ("I don't know about you, but one thing I look for in my movies about the living, walking dead is a documentary approach"). Her essay on what makes a good movie, although some of the language is NSFW, is the finest piece of film criticism since Pauline Kael died.

Cole Campbell, who was AME here at the News & Record when I began work here in April 1987, died earlier today of injuries from a wreck. I just happened to see the story on the wire while here at home testing a new Web interface for Associated Press material.

Cole was the smartest person I've ever worked with, in or out of newspapers. And that's saying something. He was always looking over the horizon, and he frequently could see what was out there sooner and better than anyone else.

He also was an incredibly nice guy, at least to me.

He left the N&R in '89 for a Knight fellowship at Stanford. Following that, he worked for our mothership in Norfolk, then at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. I kind of lost touch with him for a few years after that, but then I heard from him a couple of years ago. He had become dean of the journalism school at Nevada-Reno. We exchanged e-mails during my work with the N&R's citizen-journalism initiative. His gifts were a big part of what our hidebound industry needed, and as bad as I feel for his family, I also feel bad for the students, and other faculty, at Nevada-Reno who won't be able to benefit from working with him.

Damn. What a shame.

Greetings from the sick room.

Back in October, I reviewed Salon writer Michelle Goldberg's book "Kingdom Come: The Rise of Christian Nationalism in America." My review attracted some criticism of its thesis, which I supported: that there is a subset of evangelical Christians bent on turning this country into a Mosaic theocracy. Some commenters insisted that the premise was absurd. I know better, based on my reporting, but there's no convincing some people.

Goldberg isn't the only person who thinks so. Chris Hedges, the author of "War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning" (highly recommended), the son of a Presbyterian minister and a graduate of Harvard Divinity School, takes the same position. I haven't read his new book, so I won't assess it here. But I will say that, on the basis of this article, his approach appears to differ from Goldberg's in an important respect. Goldberg, who describes herself as a nonpracticing Jew, expresses primarily political/civic outrage at the trend she documents. Hedges appears to be expressing theological outrage. (I expressed both in my review of Goldberg's book, but, necessarily, in very little detail.) I look forward to seeing to what extent, if any, Hedges' book corroborates Goldberg's.

UPDATE: I've received one comment suggesting that holding American leaders accountable is nowhere near as important as trying to hold accountable more evil but much less powerful leaders in other countries over which we have no control. No, seriously.

For the 23 years I've been in newspaper journalism, I've tried very hard to be accurate, and not just in reporting. Following my late father's advice, I've tried to avoid prediction completely. When that wasn't possible, I tried to base any predictions on incontrovertible facts and as rational an interpretation of those facts as possible. And when that wasn't possible, I predicted as conservatively as possible, so that if I was going to be wrong, at least it wouldn't be by much.

Dad's advice has worked for me. I sleep well, I can look at myself in the mirror without flinching about anything but my complexion, and I am able to live a comfortable middle-class lifestyle.

Unfortunately, however, I'm going to have to un-inurn my dad and beat him over the ashes that used to be his head with this article. Because following his advice turns out to have been precisely the wrong approach.

Somebody had probably better tell JR, too. But break it to him gently, OK?

COROLLARY: (courtesy Athenae): "Everything important in the last six years has been discussed entirely by crazy people."

My colleague Joe Killian had an excellent story in Friday's paper on the arrest of antiwar protesters Thursday evening. He followed it with an even better post on his blog.

As I said in his comments, and several local bloggers have said as well, I wish we ran more blog posts like that in the N&R. I almost said, "wish there were a way we could run more blog posts like that," but the fact is that we could start doing it tomorrow.

That's not a criticism of JR. (When he wants my criticism, he can, and no doubt will, beat it out of me.) It is, rather, an acknowledgment that the quality of the writing isn't the only factor that must be considered in running blog posts of this type. Such decisions, to put it a slightly different way, aren't made in a vacuum. Having been an editor, I know a lot of the factors that must be considered. But not having been an editor lately, I wouldn't dare presume I know them all.

Besides that, Joe's blog is a personal one, not affiliated with the N&R. I haven't discussed this issue with him, but for all I know, he likes it that way because it gives him a kind of freedom that he wouldn't have here (and I'm not just talking about dropping the F-bomb).

I'm not sure there's any larger point here, other than that I continue to marvel at what an outstanding hire he has been and how much he adds to the paper and Web site.

UPDATE: Joe, having read some of the same comments I have, has some thoughts on the subject of getting blog-style writing into print that are worth reading. And just as some of us have been wrestling with these questions for a while, so has he -- literally from the day he came to work for us.

I covered a League of Women Voters luncheon yesterday at Holy Trinity Episcopal at which the now-disbanded Greensboro Truth and Reconciliation Commission's report on the Nov. 3, 1979, killings in Greensboro was discussed.

In that incident, Klansmen and Nazis were led by an undercover police informant to the spot at which union organizers, including communists, were preparing a "Death to the Klan!" march and rally. The Klansmen opened fire, killing five. The shooters were acquitted of all charges after long trials in state and federal courts. They and the city were found liable in a civil trial.

Flyers for the event titled it, "The Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission: Does It Matter?" But all three speakers and, so far as I could tell, the entire audience appeared to take that question as settled. As I've said before, I see that as a significant flaw in the T&R process and one I hope is addressed for the next Town Hall meeting on the report, being held in March at the main library.

One subject on which the group at large did have a little to say was what kind of apology the city of Greensboro owes the victims and the larger community hurt by the events of Nov. 3. Even if I knew the answer, and I'm not sure there is one correct answer, it's not the kind of thing I could say much about in my current professional role -- with one exception: When you're found civilly liable for wrongful death, and the consensus of folks examining your conduct is that it's not clear whether you were conspiring with a bunch of killers or just grossly inept, then a silent shrug is not, at least from a public-relations standpoint, a particularly good idea.

Yesterday's question about apologies ties into some issues we Americans have been struggling with for the entire history of this country -- in particular, how we see our government and what we tell ourselves about our government versus how it actually works.

We're quite fond of Abraham Lincoln's description of American government as being of the people, by the people and for the people. But that's a vulnerable frame, for reasons you've heard discussed many times.

And what we wrestle with goes beyond those well-known issues of basic rights, extending into issues of who does and who does not have the power to get things done at any level of government, irrespective of the number of citizens for or against it. It extends into questions of how much and what kind of government involvement in the economy is appropriate.

Complicating these questions is the fact that many of us tend to think of the government not as some faceless institution up the road or up the coast, but as "us," in a theoretical sense but also in the sense that my neighbor Joe's a state trooper and my co-worker Donna is married to a public-school teacher and my nephew Kevin is a Marine and so on.

In real life, this notion probably is most nearly true at the level of New England town meetings, but many of us like to think of it as true at all levels of government. The Gettysburg Address suggests that Lincoln did.

If that's the case, then, what does it say about government-as-us when a government entity refuses to apologize for judicially ascertained wrongdoing committed against some of its own people?

Does it mean that one part of "us" is wronging another part of "us"? If so, is that OK? If it's not OK, what should happen?

Or does it mean that government is not really "us" after all? If so, is that OK? If it's not OK, what should happen?

I'm skeptical that the report will ever be instrumental in helping Greensboro achieve true reconciliation over the events of Nov. 3, 1979. I'm not certain it won't, but I'm skeptical.

But maybe that was never in the cards. Maybe that report is destined to serve a different, if related, purpose.

What if the report were to help this community arrive at some consensus on the answers to some of the questions I just raised -- questions also raised by Nov. 3, 1979, but not defined strictly in terms of the personalities and organizations involved in the events of that day? That might be a good start.

Supporters of the truth-and-reconciliation process have said that the issues raised by that day have a larger meaning and tie into other related issues, some of more recent vintage. If so, then maybe the way forward toward any reconciliation we might ever achieve over Nov. 3 is hashing out those issues, rather than the issues tied so specifically to Nov. 3.

I don't know that. I don't necessarily even think that. But the possibility occurred to me, and I throw it out for whatever comments you might have.

Remember that warrantless domestic wiretapping plan that the President said was so essential to protecting us from terrorism?

Not so much:

President George W. Bush has decided not to reauthorize the controversial domestic warrantless surveillance program for terrorism suspects and to put it under the authority of a secret special court, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said on Wednesday.

"The president has determined not to reauthorize the Terrorist Surveillance Program when the current authorization expires," Gonzales wrote in a letter to Senate leaders.

"Any electronic surveillance that was occurring as part of the Terrorist Surveillance Program will now be conducted subject to the approval of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court," Gonzales said.

The program, adopted after the September 11 attacks, allowed the government to eavesdrop on the international phone calls and e-mails of U.S. citizens without obtaining a warrant, if those wiretaps are made to track suspected al Qaeda operatives.

Critics have said the program violated the U.S. Constitution and a 1978 law, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which made it illegal to spy on U.S. citizens in the United States without the approval of the special court.

The president insisted in 2004 that a wiretap of Americans in this country requires a court order. Then, after the New York Times disclosed the existence of his illegal program, he insisted that even if the program did violate FISA, he had the right to run it anyway, an argument based on no existing constitutional principle, statute or regulation and pretty much already rejected 50 years ago in the Supreme Court's Youngstown case.

It would be tempting to think the president declined to reauthorize his program because he finally had come to the conclusion that it was illegal and wrong. And it would be downright awesome to think there was a basis for believing that he was declining to reauthorize now because the threat of terrorism had greatly subsided.

But I see no evidence that either is true.

I have a guess -- that the substance and timing of this decision has to do with the Democratic takeover of Congress and some promised hearings -- but that's only a guess.

Whatever the reason, and notwithstanding the fact that this program never should have been authorized in the first place, this is excellent news. With it, the country takes a big step back toward the rule of law.

Everyone who has ever had to put up with an uninformed (or lying) bureaucrat to try to get public records, anyone who has ever had to twiddle her thumbs through the litigation of a public-records lawsuit whose resolution comes long after the records' news value has evaporated, will get at least a mild kick out of the luck involved in this story.

(Hat tip: John McCarthy at Florida Today, via the NICAR-L listserv.)

The Pew Internet and American Life Project released a report Wednesday on how Americans use the Internet to get election news. Not only did it find that the proportion of Americans doing so more than doubled, from 7% in the last midterm election in 2002 to 15% in the most recent midterm, it also found significant numbers of people using the Internet not just to get information but also to get it out -- everything from original reporting and video production to simply forwarding e-mails or sending Web links to friends.

It's cool, and the ramifications extend well beyond politics.

I've interviewed some local folks to get their thoughts. As I type this, the story is scheduled to run Monday, although that could change. (Yeah, that's a bit late, but the added value of our reporting -- local folks' insights, including some from folks who don't use the Internet as described -- is exclusive, so I'm not losing a lot of sleep over that.) In the meantime, the full text of the report is online here.
Feel free to discuss away.

My article on the opening of the free legal clinic for veterans at N.C. Central University's law school ran Saturday. Rather than link to the article, which will disappear soon behind the pay firewall, I'll just republish the mailing address here:

Veterans Law Project
N.C. Central University Legal Clinic
1512 S. Alston Ave.
Durham, N.C. 27707

The phone number is (919) 530-7166. Voice mail was supposed to be up and running earlier today, but I've been too swamped to check and see whether it is.

The clinic is set up primarily to help veterans here in North Carolina, but any U.S. veteran is welcome to get in touch and seek help.

This clinic is focusing primarily on issues related to VA disability compensation and pension. But Central's law school has eight other free legal clinics, and this clinic is referring veterans who might need help in other areas (family law or estate planning, say) to the appropriate clinic when it can.

A reader referred me to One Veteran of Iraqi Freedom, a blog claiming to be written by, you guessed it, one veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Other than confirming that the blog exists and appears to address what the reader said it addressed, I haven't read it, but I put this out for whatever it might be worth.

Our treatment of local reaction to the president's State of the Union address in Wednesday's paper looks -- according to the version I'm now seeing in the system, shortly before we go to press -- really, really good.

And the quotes from the folks who graciously agreed to review the issues and the speech and give us their insights are -- again, according to the version I'm now seeing in the system, shortly before we go to press -- really, really short.

Frequently that's just a fact of life in print.

But that's why we have the Internet!! It gives us theoretically unlimited space!

(Well, that's why *I* have the Internet. I don't know why you have the Internet, and until your lawyer gets here you really don't need to tell me.)

I don't need unlimited space, but because our volunteers were so gracious, I did want to post ... well, their titles and a complete sentence or two, anyway.

EDUCATION/NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND: Essentially, I think most educators and Americans would agree the intent of the No Child Left Behind law is commendable and support its goals -- highly qualified teachers, high standards, and an accountability system with the hope of educating all children. The issue with the legislation is not its intent but its implementation. As currently implemented, the legislation becomes nothing more than unfunded political rhetoric. Congress and the Senate are proposing major cuts to the legislation which further complicates its implementation. While facing these cuts, we have young children struggling to grow academically, and teachers and administrators trying their very best to meet the standards without the resources they need to do so. The NCLB accountability system will hold students, teachers, and administrators responsible for not meeting standards but conveniently exclude politicians and legislators for not providing the funds and resources necessary to help children learn. If we are going to use an assessment and evaluation process with our students then we must use the same process in the evaluation of the implementation of the legislation to determine where the gaps and flaws lie rather than simply pointing to the "easy-to-target" scapegoats (i.e., students, teachers, administrators).

Certain parts of the legislation are also extremely flawed. In theory, having a struggling student move from a "bad" school to a school that meets AYP seemingly solves the problem. However, there are social and economic issues for which the legislation does not account. Who says these students who move to new schools will be provided the quality instruction necessary to achieve? Who says these students will be met with "open arms" by their new teachers, administrators, or peers? The legislation does not account for transitioning issues. Moreover, what happens to those teachers and the administration in the "bad" schools? Do they migrate to the schools meeting AYP and how does this migration impact these schools? Rather than correcting the problem, the legislation seems to approve running from it. In essence, we treat the symptoms but not the disease, which is apparently systemic.

Parents and taxpayers should demand more focus be placed on student learning, which is not promised by an emphasis on testing. The legislation places too much emphasis on one testing measurement each year, which is a small snapshot of a student's ability on a given day. From these results, monumental decisions regarding a child's livelihood are made. Focusing on one measurement violates principles of assessment where we know we must triangulate data to draw sound inferences. These are the types of arguments parents, educators, and taxpayers must make as the No Child Left Behind legislation moves forward.

-- Anthony Graham, assistant professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, N.C. A&T School of Education.

I do, however, think the focus on accountability is very important! And I agree with Mr. Bush that we need more funding for educational programs. Low performing students need more resources and quality educational options. They need master teachers and skilled administrators. Simply moving students in "failing" schools to other schools rarely solves the problem.

In my opinion, the most important action we need to take was not mentioned by Mr. Bush. I believe we need to return respect and support to our classroom teachers. We need to let them do what they were trained to do and we need to hold them responsible for their actions.

-- Betty Epanchin, Professor and Associate Dean for Teacher Education and School Relationships and Director, The Teachers Academy; UNCG

I like the idea of having the lofty goal of making sure that all children get a proper education. I'm still not sure (President Bush is) prepared to back it up with concrete proposals that will strengthen the public school system. What I heard was talk about more money, and I think funding is important if you're going set this goal, but in the same context I heard him talking about, or at least hinting around about, vouchers, which I think tend to undermine public school system. ...

I think there's a lot of things that could be done with funding by the government to help retain good teachers because teacher retention is a problem. If you're going to keep kids engaged, you need good teachers, and too many teachers leave school because (of low pay). ... I've never heard anyone at the national level suggest providing tax cuts or tax credits for teachers that might make it more (financially) attractive to them. And generally, school districts all over the country ... have a lot of infrastructure needs that need to be met. You can see that right here in Guilford county. If you're going to really make an effort to educate all these children ... you need to pump more money in. That's inconsistent with the goal of trying to balance the budget, but you've got to have priorities and I think this would be one of them.

-- Richard Rawls, American Government and Civics teacher (and former trial lawyer), Dudley High School, Greensboro

ENERGY: I think (reducing gasoline usage via alternative fuels is) highly unrealistic for a number of reasons. You need to have corporate investment into infrastructure for production and delivery of needed fuel. We do know that capital budgets and decisions take a great deal of time. The oil industry and other related energy vendors have to put needed resources in place in order to create this delivery system. ...

There is nothing new in this statement of the president. He declared before -- I believe he used the term "addicted to oil" (last year). Programs that could have been put in place last year would have been a very good indication of whether he was serious. ...

(When President Bush took office), total oil imports accounted for 58 percent (of U.S. oil consumption; now, it's 65 to 69 percent. ... There was nothing in his speech last year or in what is coming out today [Tuesday -- Lex] to suggest that this call is realistic or that it could succeed.

-- Dr. Raid Riad Ajami, Charles A. Hayes Distinguished Professor of Business, Bryan School of Business, UNCG

UPDATE: i believe all the proposals related to energy in the President’s speech are socially admirable, technically feasible and politically achievable.

This is one area where the president’s goal and the Democratic Party’s demand are compatible.

Therefore, it is highly possible that the White House could reach a compromise with the congressional leadership to implement these policy objectives.

The easiest way to reduce our dependence on fossil fuel is to conserve energy and increase the energy efficiency of the automobiles we are driving.

For the past 20 years the automobile industry has resisted [efforts] to increase the fuel economy of the vehicles they manufacture.

As a result, Japanese manufacturers have been gradually taking over their markets around the world.

Fossil fuels are not going to be around forever. We need to develop an alternative fuel. The president’s proposal is an excellent one to get us moving in that direction.

The President needs to show some accomplishment for the next two years, either by winning the war in Iraq or by implementing some of his social agenda.

I believe it is more likely that he will be able to implement some these energy policies, if not all. Consequently, the country will benefit from these initiatives.

-- Abolghasem Shahbazi, professor and director, biological engineering program, Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Design, N.C. A&T. (Professor Shahbazi's remarks reached us too late for today's paper.)

HEALTH CARE: The President made two major proposals related to health care reform in his State of the Union Address tonight. The first would change the taxation treatment of health insurance by providing a $15,000 deduction for families and $7,500 for single persons. This would replace the current tax deductibility of premiums for health insurance provided by employers and would make the value of the health insurance provided taxable (so that insurance worth more than $15,000/year would increase the taxes paid by families). Second, federal money currently paid to hospitals will be redirected to the states in the form of grants for insurance programs for the currently uninsured.

My bottom-line assessment is that these are small and largely ineffective proposals from a tired administration that has run out of ideas. There are some potentially beneficial aspects. For instance, individuals will be discouraged from obtaining certain types of overly generous insurance. However, they will not help with the two main problems with our health care system – the large number of uninsured individuals and high and rapidly increasing costs of medical care.

The idea of using tax incentives to increase insurance rates is an old one, but with little evidence that it will be effective. One big issue is that the biggest tax benefits go to those with highest tax rates, generally wealthy individuals who already have insurance. The uninsured tend to be less well-off and have lower tax rates. As a result, they gain less from the subsidy. Depending on the exact details of the program, it could have other undesirable effects. For instance, one interesting feature is that the tax deductibility applies for anyone with insurance, regardless of its cost. Unless carefully structured, this could result in incentives for the uninsured to obtain minimal amounts of insurance just for the tax breaks. In this case, they would still not be covered for most expenses and providers would still probably have to provide large amounts of uncompensated care. The proposal to redirect funds from hospitals to states is harder to evaluate but is likely to face fierce resistance. In any case, it probably would have only small effects.

The U.S. health care system is in need of big changes. Important issues that need to be addressed include the following: Should the government negotiate with pharmaceutical companies to reduce drug prices to the levels paid in other countries? Should the U.S. adopt a single-payer system? If not, how should we institute policies that will lead to universal insurance? How do we decide which kinds of medical treatments are worth the costs? Bold proposals could have been offered for these and other important issues, but the President has not done so in his State of the Union Address.

-- Christopher J. Ruhm, Jefferson-Pilot Excellence Professor of Economics, Bryan School of Business, UNCG

IMMIGRATION: There are two issues: 1) border security and 2) immigration reform. I have toured the U.S.-Mexico border with the U.S. Border Patrol on many occasions, from the Gulf to the Pacific. It is my belief that a fence, regardless of make or features, will not stem the tide of people illegally crossing into the U.S. People currently penetrate fenced and patrolled borders with impunity, day and night. They go under, over and through all our barriers. Do we need to retrofit the physical barriers? Yes. Is it the solution to stopping the surge of people? No! Will virtual fences work? No! As long as people believe there is opportunity in the U.S. they will come. And as long as the benefits of illegal immigration outweigh the punishment people will continue to come.

"If it ain't broke don't fix it!" Implement the current laws. There are many who feel that current laws offer adequate protections if they are followed. Some also feel that to change the rules to accommodate some penalizes those who abided by the law. Yet another guest worker program rewards illegal immigration.

People on both sides of the aisle don't seem to have the political will to do the correct thing. ...

The rapid growth in our prison population is evidence that we [also] take many working-age Americans out of the working pool. We tolerate this, preferring to spend on average $30,000/year to incarcerate and only $8,500/year to educate(estimates for North Carolina). This labor-pool gap has multiple dimensions. Immigrants, especially illegals, benefit from the disconfiguration of the American labor force. They will work for [less than] minimum wage. If, however, they begin to challenge working conditions and expect more from the American dream, they are replaced, e.g., southeast Asians are now being imported as farm workers in the Pacific states to replace Hispanics.

-- Dr. James Mayes, assistant professor of political science and criminal justice and director of the Criminal Justice Program, N.C. A&T.

One last thing: I'm not gonna name any N.C. congresswomen by name, but kissing a president on the mouth on live TV, even after the children are in bed, is just ... well, not the kind of thing that even the best reporter school in the world can prepare you for, and I really, really hope that's not what I actually saw. Just sayin'.

UPDATE: No, unfortunately, we now have independent confirmation that I saw it. Ew. I'm trying to decide whether the fact that the gentlewoman from Minnesota's mad preznit-clutching skillz apparently trump the preznit-clutching kung fu of the gentlewoman from North Carolina is cause for concern.

UPDATE: I apologize for the font and leading (space-between-lines) weirdness. Even after going through the code, I can't find what's causing it. I'm now going to start beating my computer with a large coffee mug to see if that h

As a result of some recent stories I've done on veterans having problems with the VA, I got a call from an area Vietnam-era Marine. We talked about a number of things related to his case. But the thing he said that will stay with me was this:

"I don't want the drugs. I just want to stop hurting."

I've gotten a couple -- only a couple -- of calls/e-mails from people suggesting that the veterans in the stories I've written are seeking things to which they are not entitled. That's possible, although I've seen no evidence of that. The problem is that in so many of these cases, it's impossible to tell what, exactly, they're entitled to because the VA appears not to have followed its own rules.

But whether their claims are valid or not, here's a Marine who's only asking for the one thing no one on God's earth may be able to give him.

So think about that the next time you're inclined to complain about ... well, about anything. I know I will.

... of nonalcoholic cider or something, since we're still in the office, to N&R reporter Jim Schlosser. Today he celebrates his 40th anniversary with the N&R and its predecessor papers.

More than anyone else here, Jim has held a mirror up to this community, yet he also from time to time shows us how what we have been can point the way to what we could be. His source network here is second to none. His story count would overshadow that of a reporter with 20 years' less experience (although it will dwindle soon as he works on a history of Greensboro pegged to the city's 2008 bicentennial ... or maybe it won't), and his storytelling, full of fun details and quirks, sometimes in the oddest places, is a joy.

I would be saying all this even if his cube wasn't catty-corner from mine, by the way. The only thing that bugs me about him is that I look older than he does.

Just a few minutes ago we had a brief celebration here in the newsroom to mark the occasion. I wish we could have recorded it for a podcast; the stories were hilarious. As it is, this excerpt must suffice:

Regular readers know about Jim's fascination with older buildings, (and architecture and architects in particular). This is not a recent hobby. In his first story here, published on Jan. 30, 1967, his lede, or beginning paragraph, not only reported that a woman had jumped from the Jefferson-Standard (now Lincoln Financial) building downtown, it also named the "renowned architect" who had designed the building.

"That's the most important detail," Jim said today, deadpan, after Margaret Banks read from the clipping. And although he was joking, in so many ways important to Greensboro and the South, he's kind of right.

(UPDATE, 7:26 p.m.: Margaret just strolled in here and disclosed that she totally made that lede up. Shows what happens when you don't check the documentary evidence. And does she apologize? Sort of, if, by "apologize," you mean, "says, 'Well, now you know I am a convincing liar.'")

Congratulations, Jim, and thank you for spending so much time with us.