Quick Hits

Because I'm too busy and too tired to write a proper post.

• Sometime Talk Talk Talk Talk Talk commenter Chuck G fell back on 20th-century methods of expressing his opinion and wrote a letter to the Chicago Sun-Times (scroll all the way to the bottom) to disagree with this column by John O'Sullivan, in which O'Sullivan called Augusto Pinochet "the most successful dictator of the 20th century." Summing up O'Sullivan's argument, Chuck wrote, "Apparently, economic success trumps all other deeds." Unfortunately, as we've been discussing, John O'Sullivan isn't the only one who seems to think so. Way to go, Chuck!

• Speaking of the 20th century (and the 19th before it), digital ones and zeros did not make up the first binary communication language. Samuel Morse devised his eponymous code to send messages along the telegraph wires, and it was quickly adopted by that newfangled wireless contraption. For years, knowledge of Morse code was necessary to get a ham radio license in the United States, but the FCC has announced that it is rescinding the requirement. With the variety of communication options, Morse code is not as necessary as it once was, and the FCC wants to make ham broadcasting viable for those who don't know it. My grandfather was a railroad man in Western Canada, and for some part of his career he was a telegrapher. My father fondly remembers that he could receive a message by telegraph and carry on a conversation at the same time. Although my grandfather would no doubt recognize that technology moves inevitably forward, I can't help but imagine he'd be a bit wistful to see the decline of Morse code.

• I was going to make some cheap comment about the metaphorical appropriateness of Miss USA going to rehab, but then I read David Segal's write-up of the Donald Trump/Miss USA press conference, and I had to share it with you.

Conner listened in a seat next to Trump, fighting tears, then losing that fight, then fighting some more. The day after her 21st birthday, she looked chastened and grateful and primped to a fare-thee-well in a navy pinstriped suit as Trump called her a woman who'd "made some very very bad choices, some very foolish choices." He had expected, he went on, to terminate Conner's reign when the two met in the morning, but she impressed him with her sincerity and contriteness and the story of her humble origins in Kentucky and the way that New York City had swept her into its vortex of wickedness and sin.

"She was telling me that she got caught up in the whirlwind of New York. It's a story that has happened many times to many women and men that came to the Big Apple," Trump intoned. "They wanted their slice of the Big Apple and they found out it wasn't so easy."

Ah, the Manhattan defense. It wasn't me. It was the Meatpacking District!

Conner, he went on, agreed to go into rehab and knows that if she slips up even once, she's toast. Or words to that effect.

"I believe that she can set a great example for troubled people -- and she's troubled -- throughout the country, throughout lots of countries, that have problems with alcohol, that have problems with life. I believe she will be an amazing, amazing example."

Then Trump stepped aside and introduced Conner, which is when this event went from superb publicity stunt with cleavage and pathos to sublime publicity stunt with cleavage and pathos. Conner inched to the microphone and praised her benefactor, describing him not with words befitting the leering, profit-motivated owner of a televised boobiefest, but with words befitting a saint.

"I've had a very big blessing bestowed upon me," she said moistly. "And you'll never know how much I appreciate Mr. Trump for saving me on this one. It truly takes someone with a heart of gold and blessed soul."

Yeah, that or a man with a genius for self-deification. Who but Trump could have orchestrated this? There we are, sitting near a bar that bears his name (Trump Bar), beside a buffet that bears his name (Trump Buffet) and an ice cream parlor that bears his name (Trump's Ice Cream Parlor), amid Trump-branded chocolate bars, jelly beans, ties, cuff links, shirts and sweaters and somehow the subject is what a selfless sweetie Trump is.

Segal regrets that the meeting between Trump, Miss USA Tara Conner, and the unnamed president of the Miss USA pageant, which he calls a "yahoo Yalta," weren't televised--or at least recorded in some way. Maybe we'll get a transcript, or at least a description from one of the participants, before it's all over. It would be a true shame if the details of such a momentous event were lost to posterity.