THE TENSION: The Decline and Fall of Western Civ for 18 Oct.

After reading: wash, rinse and repeat.

ABC wastes no time in spinning President Bush's interview with George Stephanopoulos. Bush often warns reporters about taking things out of context but that warning has yet to stop the spin. Stephanopoulos asked whether the president agreed with the opinion of columnist Tom Friedman, who wrote in The New York Times today that the situation in Iraq may be equivalent to the Tet offensive in Vietnam almost 40 years ago.

"He could be right," the president said, before adding, "There's certainly a stepped-up level of violence, and we're heading into an election."
The statement, to ABC News reporter Ed O'Keefe, means Bush accepts the premise that Iraq and Vietnam are comparable conflicts. To unbiased folks it means Bush neither confirmed nor denied the notion. If liberal bias isn't prevalent in the press it must mean we simply need reporters who are smart enough to pay attention.

According to Reuters, Arizona Sen. John McCain, a likely Republican presidential contender in 2008, joked on Wednesday he would "commit suicide" if Democrats win the Senate in November.

"I think I'd just commit suicide," McCain told reporters, to accompanying laughter from Republicans standing with him. "I don't want to face that eventuality because I don't think it's going to happen."

AP reports former President Clinton bemoaned ideologues who describe opponents as "running for office on his or her way to hell" and urged Democrats not to shy from fighting back.

Clinton, criticizing Republicans weeks before the midterm elections, told an audience at Georgetown University on Wednesday that intellectual debate should trump partisan rancor and either-or choices are false. In other words, Clinton,was speaking to Democrats as a party who still has no real plan and are counting on what they perceive as conservative frustration with Republicans as the key to winning elections.

Drudge reports The New York Times is covering a developing a story about the coming chaos on election day. With an unusually large number of tight races and dozens of states shifting to new electronic voting systems, election officials across the country are bracing for long lines and heightened confusion at the polls on Election Day, Nov. 7, the NEW YORK TIMES will front on Thursday.

A website is claiming that seven NFL football stadiums will be hit with radiological dirty bombs this weekend, but the government on Wednesday expressed doubts about the threat according to CBS 13.

The warning, posted Oct. 12, was part of an ongoing Internet conversation titled "New Attack on America Be Afraid." It mentioned NFL stadiums in New York, Miami, Atlanta, Seattle, Houston, Oakland and Cleveland, where games are scheduled to be held this weekend.

"While the credibility of the threat is questionable, we have passed the information on because it has been carried in some open source reporting," said FBI spokesman Richard Kolko. He said the FBI was discussing the threat with the NFL as "part of our routine discussions this week."

WCBS reports airport workers are finding themselves subject to surprise screenings as the government issues new security tactics at airports nationwide. The changes are a direct response to this year's foiled plot to blow-up America-bound airplanes.

Eight soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division were ordered Wednesday to be court-martialed on murder charges stemming from their service in Iraq, and two could get the death penalty for allegedly raping a 14-year-old and killing her and her family, according to AP.

AP reports the fountain of youth apparently does not yet come in a pill. Widely used DHEA supplements and testosterone patches failed to deliver their touted anti-aging benefits in one of the first rigorous studies to test such claims in older men and women.

A study released by the Center for Media and Public Affairs on Wednesday found that the network evening-news programs are covering this year's midterm election campaign three times as heavily as they did in 2002, reports AP.