Omniscience in Midtown:
Cudda, Wudda, Shudda;
Some, Many, Most

In all corners of the globe, the far-flung Times staff can tell us what might have been, what surely might happen. Me, I prefer what did happen.

When I look at a front page filled with that stuff, I find it easy to pass up, and I never compelling.

Here's a roundup, an old newsy term to be sure:

• We are told that's it's a good thing that a deal between the U.S. and Libya in 2003 eliminated the threat of Qaddafi building nuclear weapons. The very notion -- how good it is that a person of Qaddafi's stature doesn't have nukes -- is painfully obvious. I don't know, the only interesting thing in the story is unwritten. If only the U.S. had shown such perspicacity in dealing with Iraq in 2003. But that falls under the sigh-ful category of wishful thinking, and is not the problem at hand.
  
  
• We are told that the Chinese leaders have their own efficiency to thank for averting a democratic upheaval in their country. The story is basically built on two observations: 1. that there were Internet chats urging citizens to rebel, and 2. that Mid East events "have cast doubt on the staying power of all authoritarian governments." I don't know about you, but I have trouble discerning the motives and intentions of the handful of people with whom I am in close contact. A story of this type, with one wave of the hand, pretends to have a crystalline assessments of one billion individuals. Just think for a minute of the hysterical, foolish and anonymous comments that appear on the web, appended to many news stories and blogs. Do they all reveal the minds of all Americans?
  
  
• And we are told, in case we have forgotten the dreaded prospect of a government shutdown, that some Republican congressmen seem willing to shut it down. The story refers to 1995 when the esteemed Republican radicals did just that, saying that was "a memory many hoped to leave behind, along with beepers and episodes of 'Baywatch Nights'". This too cute flourish signals that we are in the presence of literature, but the article quickly devolves into an ordinary collection of quotes by politicians.
  
  
  For some reason, I was struck by the interview with Todd Rokita, a new Republican from a very safe Republican district in Indiana. Todd, it seems, thinks his 70 percent margin in a district that his party usually wins big, means people are clamoring for change. The thoroughly white district snakes around Indianapolis, and so is probably suburban and rural. I suppose he has never tried to apply his logic . If you shrink the government, you are going to throw some people out of work. If you throw someone out of work, he or she is not going to run out to Walmart to celebrate and buy a bunch of stuff. Walmart will, therefore, earn less. If enough people are thrown out of work, Walmart will have to throw some more people out of work, which it will do without nice political considerations. What then, Todd? But despite the hype in the paper, I don't think this shutdown will happen. I think that the more senior members of Congress like their jobs too much.