The QT: Donald Trump's political flirtations, Obama's Keystone indecision, and more
A veteran journalist, tongue firmly in cheek, riffs on the latest headlines
News Headline: "Trump's Iowa trip sparks speculation on presidential bid"
You can be forgiven if you greet the news with disbelief.
Then will come anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.
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News Headline: "Supreme Court guts Voting Rights Act"
And the court doesn't want to hear a lot of whining.
Who do these would-be voters think they are, corporations?
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The Case for Zero Tolerance of Modern School Administrators:
A primary school in Aveley, England, will ban parents from a children's sports day because the presence of onlookers might prove "stressful" for the children.
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News Headline: "Pelosi booed for defending NSA surveillance"
Yet another overreaction to scare talk about a surveillance society.
And do the people who booed realize how it will look in their dossiers?
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+ G.K., a Channahon, Ill., reader, regarding Kim Kardashian and Kanye West naming their baby girl North, writes:
"Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt should name their next child Gravel."
+ Mike Oelrich, a Chicago reader, writes:
"Should NeNe Leakes have named her son Wiki?"
Stop it.
Stop it now.
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News Headline: "Obama hints at Keystone approval"
News Headline: "Obama hints that Keystone XL may be rejected"
Say this about our president: Like him or not, you know where he stands.
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News Item: "Beijing police have recently started cracking down on a prohibition against 'large and vicious dogs' — a ban that includes breeds such as golden retrievers, Labradors, and Dalmatians."
Not a surprise from a government that likes to keep 1.3 billion humans in a sit-stay.
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News Headline: "Man found running naked, screaming"
As reasonable response as any to the news of the day.
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QT Grammar R Us Seminar on the English Language:
Bob Crystal, a Rochester, N.Y., reader, regarding another reader's mention that Roman Catholic bishops often put a + in front of their names, writes:
"Episcopalians also indicate ordination with a + added to the name, and we do it with women, too."
QT has been talking with church officials.
It comes down to this:
Roman Catholics bishops may put a + in front of their names, while Episcopalians put a + after a name as a sign of ordination and a + in front of a name for bishops, while presiding bishops rate a ++ before their names.
Q+T will take all this under advisement.
There is always a "the" in front of Rev., as in the Rev. John Jones, by the way.
Just as there is always a "the" in front of the Mahatma Gandhi.
While we are at it.
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Write to QT at zaysmith.qt@gmail.com
QT appears Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
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Zay N. Smith is a Chicago writer. Before starting the QT column he worked at the Chicago Sun-Times as a reporter, foreign correspondent and writer of major features. He has also worked as a bartender, having played a key role in the 1978 Mirage Tavern investigation, in which the newspaper operated an undercover bar to document the breaking of many laws by many officials.
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