Where can you find a sweeping editorial drawn from the least appropriate examples of a brand, genre or institution? Two spots in PC Magazine, apparently. The latest print issue's "Backspace" humor column is a cheap shot at bloggers: "Is blogging really the new journalism?" goes the set-up line, followed by a cymbal-crash non sequitur of thirteen mundane entries plucked from personal — not political — weblogs. Disgraced CBS anchor Dan Rather and former Senate Republican Majority Leader Trent Lott know exactly how potent the blogosphere can be. But no one on the PC staff looked into their respective dramas. Wouldn't one of the world's premier personal technology magazines be less cynical about the world's premier personal technology? Not when it means a collective competitor working in every time zone.

John Dvorak, who's enjoyable to read when he's not taking lousy aim at the White House or weblogs, betrays the limits of his legendary snap-judgment with this terminal diagnosis for the video gaming market. The Doom series doesn't define the height or breadth of the video gaming industry so much as it does the tastes of players who would happily spend their off-hours boring through sixteen thousand cubic meters of liver sausage with a dull twist drill. The latest installment, Doom 3, is as morbid, repetitive and simplistic as its predecessors: evil incarnate has crawled into this dimension and must be put down with an indiscriminate use of firearms. In pitch darkness. Unfortunately, one game is enough for Dvorak's generalization.

A better bellwether is the Xbox sci-fi action game Halo 2 by Microsoft subcontractor Bungie Software. Released last November, the sequel to Xbox's 2001 flagship product included a fairly satisfying traditional single-player campaign but exceeded nearly all expectations — including my own — with its creative twist on multiplayer gaming. As a frequent participant in "capture the flag" and other team games, I'm accompanied by friends and mutually interested players on Bungie's "party system," what's known as the "virtual couch"; set against randomly selected, equally skilled players and parties. Teams move through games just as they would an evening of intramural basketball. The appeal is akin to a sport's — the grand, worn game with nuance to last for eternity. Halo 2 hardly feels six months old, and now a new set of playing fields are being released over the next few months. The gaming business has taken thoughtful notice of Bungie's success in reinventing the online multiplayer experience. Surely Dvorak could, too. And Halo 2 is just one concept done right.

I don't expect to put PC down, but is this the sort of work one should henceforth expect from a hi-tech magazine still printed on paper?

Another moment in history:

Appointed as Prime Minister, Ibrahim Jaafari and his cabinet received [a] vote of confidence earlier today [from] the Iraqi National Assembly. He said, "This is the first step towards the reconstruction of Iraq."

Mohammed watched the event on live television, and offers his thoughts.

HELPFUL: CNN's provided a cabinet roster.

Freedom House has released results of its latest survey on global press freedom, "Freedom of the Press 2004," and in line with my speculation on the institution's judgment of broader Iraqi liberties, Freedom House concluded that terrorist disruption and political transition kept the state of Iraqi journalism in the category of "Not Free." Placed in perspective, however, Iraqi press freedom immediately followed liberalizing neighbors Kuwait, Qatar, Morocco, Algeria and Jordan; the first, third and fifth of which were considered "Partly Free" in Freedom House's 2004 study of human liberty. Iraq tied with Lebanon, known for its public forum's resilience to Syrian repression. Numerically, the liberated country scored slightly higher than the Ukraine, eclipsing in two years what the embattled, former Soviet satellite has just consolidated after fifteen years with the Orange Revolution. Finally, a reasonably balanced report by researcher Brian Katulis stressed Iraq's considerable forward momentum, following a candid account on Saddam Hussein's constriction of speech and press freedoms. In establishing a historical perspective, Katulis made two mistakes — first, too great a reliance on the presence of the Coalition Provisional Authority and second, excluding events following the failed twin insurrections of April 2004. Katulis' chronology is positioned rather early in Iraq's two years of reconstruction, and it seems that the country's appraisal might have suffered. And there's this puzzling statement:

Many of the new media outlets were set up by new political groups and parties, and their reporting was biased in favor in favor of promoting their parties' and achievements rather than objectively reporting on events.

If Katulis values press freedom strictly on a standard of purported "objectivity," he should reconsider. American journalism sprang from the movable type of political organizations for whom exaggeration and caviling were principal. Britain's newspapers are still classified by party loyalty — and arguably present themselves more sincerely than most American media agencies, print and television, which claim independence while grossly distorting news for political purposes. A better evaluation would qualify the work of news outlets with their reputation among Iraqis themselves. One step further, an Iraqi assessment of their ability to speak, debate and publish would be a welcome addition to an essay whose concerns tilt slightly to the academy.

Vultures of the media and intellectual feather have been circling for weeks over the Iraqi National Assembly's deliberate inauguration of the country's first democratically elected and obligated government. The Bush administration and some military officials recently confirmed reports that Washington had made overtures to Baghdad to speed the process, and members of the leftist press added to that equation whatever was necessary for implying political negotiation made terrorists more bloodthirsty — instead of the more sensible explanation that a central authority without clear leadership might be less capable of coordinating law enforcement and military operations. And now, despite the heavy doubt in learned circles, Iraqis are approaching completion of their first representative body. The Daily Star in Lebanon has stepped out in front of most press agencies by generally drawing on the unsubstantiated word of insiders to describe Ibrahim al-Jaafari's cabinet in detail:

Under Jaafari's proposal, Iraq's majority Shiites would get 17 ministries, according to Ali al-Adib and Hadi al-Ameri, two lawmakers from the UIA, which controls 148 seats in Parliament. Eight ministries would go to the alliance's Kurdish allies, six to Sunnis and one to a Christian, the lawmakers said. ...According an earlier report by Al-Iraqiyya television, Roj Nouri Shaways, a Kurd, former Pentagon favorite Ahmad Chalabi, and Sunni MP Saad al-Lehebi were all named as deputy premiers. It also said Saadoun Dulaimi, a Sunni, was named as defense minister. ...Jaafari's list includes several outgoing ministers remaining in their posts, including Hoshyar Zebari, a Kurd, as foreign minister and Nasreen Mustafa Barwari as public works minister. In addition, Sami al-Majoun was named justice minister and Ali Abdel-Amir Allawi finance minister, according to a partial list provided by the television.

Let's assume that this roster is only partly accurate; we can do so, and still remain certain that Jaafari will provide the Iraqi electorate with a mosaic government, whatever the particulars. We could also consider the investment made by Jaafari and his party counterparts to deliver pluralist democracy with startling fidelity. Some few thousand miles away, the oldest democratic republic has had just four consecutive presidential cabinets, out of several score, constructed in deference to a deafening political expectation that leadership posts should be manned with men — and women — whose appearance and heritage are representative of the country's population. An administration that would "look like America," as President Clinton put it, who appointed four women and several minorities over two terms in office. President Bush has appointed the first black Secretaries of State, Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice; the first hispanic Attorney General and Secretary of Commerce in Alberto Gonzalez and Carlos Gutierrez.

Should we quibble over who assigned who based on aesthetics rather than a happy medium of life story and professional commensuration? It's well known that the Democratic Party issues quotas of every attribute for its national conventions; Republicans don't, and yet minorities readily scale that party's echelon. Methodology aside, people notice their face, faintly, looking back at them from high places. Inclusion has a value, even if it is more emotional than arithmetic. And it seems likely that merit will eventually win over style, so no one need believe his accolades are a crass or empathetic product.

Maybe the better point is that allotment based on a sharply abstract concept of fairness is never easy; and yet the nation whose founders invented the modern democratic constitution has after two centuries just embraced what a country which spent all of five thousand years under one dominion after another will have carefully entered into before four months' time.

Perception versus application:

Consumer confidence declined in April for the third consecutive month, signaling Americans' concerns that economic growth is leveling off. But one area of the economy is still white hot: the government said sales of new homes shot up 12.2 percent last month to the highest level in history.

...[T]he Commerce Department said new single-family homes were sold at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.43 million units in March, confounding the consensus forecast of a small decline in sales in March, a month when mortgage rates had been inching higher. Instead, sales climbed past the old all-time high of 1.3 million units at an annual rate set last October.

In fact, more than one sector of the market is strong. However widely an impression may be prevailing, what is it worth when it reflects behavior so poorly?

A confidence that's inspiring:

The National Association of Realtors reported that existing home sales rose to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 6.89 million units last month, up from a February sales pace of 6.82 million units. The increase was far above the tiny 0.1 percent gain that economists had been expecting, indicating that the modest increase in mortgage rates so far this year has not put a damper on home sales.

We may carp, but we don't submit.

The Chairman of the Democratic National Committee:

Between a speech he delivered without notes and a question-answer session, [Howard] Dean regaled an appreciative audience for nearly 90 minutes without once raising his voice, as he did after last year's Iowa primary election. But he did draw howls of laughter by mimicking a drug-snorting Rush Limbaugh.

"I'm not very dignified," he said. "But I'm not running for president anymore."

From bottom to top: if you haven't got an argument, you've lost the debate. Had Ed Gillespie worked a crowd with a suggestive pantomime about the foibles of leftist commentator Jerry Springer, waving a personal check, he'd be assigned a custodial cart and asked to enter his old chairman's office at the Republican National Committee only to vacuum and empty the wastebaskets. Senator Hillary Clinton may or may not be pleased that Dean would work towards earning his ouster from party leadership so soon before 2006, for while Clinton intends Dean to remove himself from politics, it can only be accomplished fully if the chairman demonstrates an incapacity not for dignity but gaining what matters to the Democratic Party — Washington and the federal government. On television last night, political analyst Dick Morris spoke briefly about the chairmanship that is worth most to one man's rivals. More on that subject in time.

"Burnout" seems to be the adjective observers want for a description of China's numerically impressive first-quarter expansion of gross domestic product, clocking in at nearly ten percent. But according to the Wall Street Journal, via IP, Beijing's troubles are not limited to market forces:

As the market plumbs six-year lows, China's 60 million retail investors are an embittered lot — sounding a jarring note amid the capitalist changes transforming China's economy. The government once touted the nation's two stock exchanges, started in 1990 and 1991, as founts of opportunity. But they have turned out to be full of rotten companies that relied on political connections to get listed. Regulators have had little success fighting rampant insider trading and poor disclosure. For the ruling Communist Party, the rage of investors who have lost their nest eggs could be toxic. The party has long struggled to keep a lid on social unrest, especially among unemployed workers and overtaxed farmers. Now a big chunk of the middle class is angry, too.

Kleptocracy is profitable only to a small number of people for a short amount of time. And if signs are to be believed, the regime's time is running out.

FROM ALL SIDES: Could the Million Man Army be just as dangerous to Beijing? (Hat tip, IP.)

That Wall Street may end on gains for the second day in far too long, thanks to a spate of healthy earnings reports and the fruits of McDonald's latest master stroke, is good for the market as well as my conscience. Watching the Dow fall about ten percent over two months finally settled like a thorn in my mind: last night I dreamt that I turned to a television screen when Fox News' Shepard Smith announced "a little bit of profit taking" and saw that the Dow Jones had dropped in an afternoon to 900 points. Tomorrow, those few traders who remain alive are sure to take advantage of some of the best deals since 1884!

Wall Street is fickle and too often superficial; but one is led to suspect that a certain party's possession of the White House leads to a general consensus that the economy is never as good as it should be. News audiences hear this; they complain to pollsters who return dismal confidence numbers to reporters and the wheel spins faster. And when corporate earnings are released, how many are willing to blame a bad quarter on mismanagement rather than Washington? Fundamentals seem stable. Industrial production's up, jobless claims are down even further than the record lows through which they've recently dropped. As reports are presented, there's more give than take. Certainly, spending could be lower — but the opposition party has less hay to make of Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan's warning than they may think. If Democrats can obstruct a gamut of Capitol business, they can prevent bloated federal budgets.

Where's the market? Where it should be and, as Larry Kudlow argues smartly, with the correct policy foundation, with quite a lot of vigor to spare.

TWO-OH-OH-MY: Two hundred six points upward in the Dow. May today set a turnaround — and a trend.

BY THE WAY: One should know enough to read entirely through a mainstream article to find what's been buried. Alan Greenspan announced that "activity appears to be expanding at a reasonably good pace," and that, contrary to the misfiring klaxon known as Paul Krugman, "it certainly doesn't seem that" the specter of the late 1970s, "stagflation," can or will return.

Freedom's Argus, Robert Mayer, discovered that Kuwaiti women's suffrage is close to becoming law:

In a first step toward granting women full political rights, Kuwaiti lawmakers agreed yesterday to allow women to vote and run in local council elections, but the measure requires more legislative action before it would become law. The measure was taken on a 26-20 vote for women’s participation with three abstentions. The session was attended by more than three quarters of the 64 lawmakers and Cabinet ministers entitled to vote.

..."Thank God, the first step toward women's rights has been complete...We are waiting for the major step and I am sure it will be approved like this one," Prime Minister Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah said. "I congratulate my sisters for obtaining their rights in municipal elections and they will get their other rights in voting and standing in parliamentary elections," he told reporters after the vote.

In the war against tyranny, the final victory will be at the hands of the common man — and woman.