More reporting incompetence at the New York Times

Here's why the public has such a low opinion of the media. While the real estate market was tanking, it was big news. Now, when there's a glimmer of hope--well, it's still bad news.

Notice in the lead paragraph, the writer reports the turn-around in sales, but immediately dismisses it with an unattributed, subjective and perhaps inaccurate comment (i.e., the credit crisis has intensified since those home sales occurred).

If the writer had been paying attention on Friday and earlier, most of the reports and analysis suggested that credit was loosening up. But whether it is or not, the first paragraph is not the place for such an unattributed statement. When I was in journalism school, the professor would have climbed all over me for shoving it into the lead. Or using it at all if I didn't have it attributed to someone.

Judge tosses lawsuit challenging Obama citizenship

This lawsuit has been hot on the Internet, and now we have a conclusion, in which the judge said "any" or "all" voters lack standing to bring this lawsuit because "...any harm from an allegedly ineligible [presidential] candidate was too vague and its effects too attenuated...."

I am puzzled. If a voter (or a citizen) doesn't have standing in such a case, then who does? If the damage done by a violation of the Constitution, in this or any other case, is "too vague" for a citizen to bring a case, then what is the legal remedy to this alleged constitutional violation?

I'm not anxious to see such a case move forward and send our electoral process into a tail-spin, but, like I say, I am puzzled. Perhaps a constitutional lawyer (not Obama) out there can enlighten me.

Here is the story about the suit's dismissal:

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit challenging Barack Obama's qualifications to be president.

U.S. District Judge R. Barclay Surrick on Friday night rejected the suit by attorney Philip J. Berg, who alleged that Obama was not a U.S. citizen and therefore ineligible for the presidency. Berg claimed that Obama is either a citizen of his father's native Kenya or became a citizen of Indonesia after he moved there as a boy.

Obama was born in Hawaii to an American mother and a Kenyan father. His parents divorced and his mother married an Indonesian man.

Internet-fueled conspiracy theories question whether Obama is a "natural-born citizen" as required by the Constitution for a presidential candidate and whether he lost his citizenship while living abroad.

Surrick ruled that Berg lacked standing to bring the case, saying any harm from an allegedly ineligible candidate was "too vague and its effects too attenuated to confer standing on any and all voters."

An Upturn in the Housing Market?

Is it possible that the housing market has turned?

Blamed for just about everything bad that has happened recently to the economy, housing sales, I dare say, are showing signs of picking up. At the risk of being considered a lunatic, I say this for reasons of systematically gathered data, personal experience and common sense.

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