A few minutes with Andy Rooney.

You know what I hate? News crawls. Those little bits of information marching determinedly across the bottom of every cable news channel broadcast, their steady & never-ending loop endlessly diverting your attention from a feel-good story about a fugitive ex beauty queen who sold her house to clone her beloved dog or a piece on the latest cringe-inducing moment the president has pulled from his seemingly bottomless bag of ineptitude.

Watching Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg introduce her uncle, Ted Kennedy in a triumphant moment, at the Democratic National Convention last night truly tried my patience. Here are some of the things I “learned.”

• Cindy McCain to Georgia (the country, not the state) to “assess the casualties.” She has a history of good work in the international relief arena, but Georgian medical personnel better check their painkiller inventories before she leaves.
• John McCain may announce his VP pick Friday. Please let it be Ridge!
• Tropical Storm Gustav may hit Haiti (it did; it was upgraded to hurrican status and made landfall this afternoon). Really, when you’ve been forced to resort to eating dirt, hurricane force winds might be a welcome change of pace.
• Existing home sales rose 3.1% in July. I had originally thought that perhaps the new built-to-spec McMansion at 432nd & Fallow Field Drive might be losing its luster in light of soaring construction costs and with gas prices continuing to toy with the $4/gal mark. And even though new home sales nudged up a bit last month too, I’m pretty sure I’m still right.

P.S.: Howard Dean is hotter than ever!

P.P.S: MSNBC has apparently positioned all their hosts in some sort of wind tunnel for the duration.