Boy, just when you thought the mainstream media were on their deathbeds, with discouraging circulation numbers released and dismal outlooks forecast, Mike Jones – looking like a cross between Ben Affleck and Popeye in his skintight BVDs – rides to the rescue.
As they say back at the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, “Hallelujah! We’ve been reborn.”
Jones’ allegation that he had a three-year “business relationship” providing sex and methamphetamine to the Rev. Ted Haggard, pastor at New Life, president of the National Association of Evangelicals and close buddy to President Bush, is a stunner.
It even overshadowed the news that Bechtel Corp. was pulling up $2.3 billion in taxpayer-financed stakes after three years and fleeing Iraq, leaving somebody – anybody – else to try to rebuild the infrastructure and restore power in the midst of a civil war.
But who cares about the collapse of civilization in Iraq when the country’s most influential evangelical leader and consistent vilifier of homosexuality is rumored to be leading a double life?
Now, that’s news.
Nobody knows what really happened on the massage table in Jones’ Capitol Hill apartment – maybe there is such a thing as an innocent backrub among men after all – but Haggard’s backpedaling since the story broke last week has stoked a mighty curiosity in these final hours of the political campaign.
So did he really buy meth just so he could throw it away? And I wonder if he discussed this public service with the president in his weekly phone calls.
Jones’ allegations probably won’t influence voters – at least not many who weren’t already rethinking their allegian ces after the Mark Foley fiasco. But they surely contribute to the madcap atmos phere during what’s usually a sleepy midterm election season.
I mean, how can anybody consider voting early when the fun’s just starting?
Talk about news. Another reason to buy the paper last week surely was the story about a Harvard University study suggesting that the French may be right: Red wine may be the fountain of youth after all.
Sure, the dosage is a bit intimidating. Mice were fed the active ingredient in wine in amounts equivalent to 100 bottles a day. But there was no arguing with the results.
The roly-poly rodents stayed healthy and fun-loving and lived long lives despite decadent, high-fat diets.
Their teetotaling counterparts, meanwhile, developed signs of early heart disease and diabetes as they dutifully submitted to gluttony on a junk-food diet served daily by the diabolical scientists.
Now if that’s not enough to keep you coming back for more news, here’s a scoop for children everywhere.
The persistent urban legend of the so-called “sugar high” is a big lie.
A whopper.
For 25 years, teachers and parents have been blaming candy for everything from clinical hyperactivity to ordinary healthy children bouncing off the walls on Halloween.
But it’s not the candy.
Study after study has found that sugar simply doesn’t affect behavior.
Going back as early as 1982, physicians at the National Institutes of Health have tried to tell people this.
In scientific tests, parents who think their kids are eating sugar report more hyperactive behavior. Then they find out the scientists gave the children sugar substitutes and they feel stupid.
Again and again, the results have been confirmed and, no matter what, people ignore them.
They prefer to believe sugar is the devil that makes their little angels go bad.
The reality is that it’s normal for kids to get rambunctious now and then, that wine isn’t all bad, and that people – even those who claim to be the holiest among us – aren’t always what they seem to be.
It’s why I’m confident the news business is here to stay.
Because, honestly, nobody could make this stuff up.
Diane Carman’s column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. She can be reached at 303-954-1489 or dcarman@denverpost.com.
