British Intelligence Confirms Angelina Jolie Is Not Pregnant

I hate to make light of tragedy, but continuous cable television of today’s bombings in London had its limits. When the news first came out this morning, it would have been intellectually more honest if the announcers had simply said “we have received reports of bombings in London. All we know is: there were explosions, followed by smoke.” For the next half hour, the news reporters sought to see how many different ways they could say this limited bit of information. Cameras began interviewing witnesses, the first who stated he heard an explosion, and then saw smoke. Another witness confirmed he, too, heard an explosion followed by smoke. Eventually, someone stated he heard an explosion, to which the interviewer could do a follow-up question “was there also smoke?”

About a half hour later, news reports added that there had been pandemonium. Witnesses were found who confirmed that, yes, there had been pandemonium. One cable network actually found an expert in pandemonium, who explained that, in attacks such as these, pandemonium indeed was an expected reaction. I wonder how one gets to be such an expert. Oh, and, the expert was able to confirm: there was also smoke.

President Bush responded immediately, and made a Freudian slip, stating he this would let the terrorists get to him. He did quickly correct himself and stated this would not let the terrorists give to him. Perhaps the smoke had gotten to him.

Breaking news included reports that Israeli intelligence learned about these attacks after they occurred, and not before. Indeed, I suspect even the CIA learned about these attacks after they occurred, although I have not seen confirmation of this.

But the top news items of the day is the major, breaking news: Angelina Jolie is still not pregnant.