Going Day-Trader
            

            Dear Jodi,

            A personal confession is in order after your vivid portrayal of your normal
Breakfast Table routines aboard the F train. (I trust that you don't actually
partake of food or beverage on the subway, since in Rudy Giuliani's New York
that's a "quality of life" offense that makes you eligible for an
all-expenses-paid night in the lockup on Rikers Island.) Jodi, while you were
luxuriously riding to work in air-conditioned comfort aboard the subway, I was
among the downtrodden scanning the papers in a steamy house on Martha's
Vineyard. (At Conroy's Pharmacy in West Tisbury, I have a reputation as a
wild-and-crazy big spender because I reserve seven papers a day--the New
York 
               Times , Daily News , and Post , the two Boston
papers, plus the Journal and, of course, USA Today , where I hold
a day job as a columnist.)

            I haven't yet read the Washington Post coverage of Hillary's wagging
tongue, though this evening I will be headed to D.C. in quest of the calming
breezes of a window air conditioner. But I suspect that would-be Senator
Clinton had been searching for a nurturing and safe interview in which to
discuss the purported real reasons that she plays "Stand By Your Man."
(Remember, Tina Brown wrote a gushy paean to Bill Clinton's "sex appeal" in
The New Yorker .) I do find it telling that Hillary's latest theory about
Bill's "abuse" as a child is the kind of psychological claptrap that gives
liberalism a bad name. About the only mystery left is the psychological roots
of the president's compulsion to lie under oath.

            As for your bet that the actual Talk interview will prove a
disappointment, it seems so self-evident that I will resist the offer of a free
Talk subscription. After all, as we have learned from years of Clinton
scandals, talk is cheap.

            I too was fascinated by the Journal leader on Mark Barton's day
trading. (Will "going day trader" replace the already dated "going postal" in
our lexicon?) Since the Atlanta murders occurred mid- afternoon Thursday,
today's paper was the Journal's first chance to weigh in with a
comprehensive Barton piece. I loved the small authoritative details like Barton
"hunched in silence over his usual cafeteria-lunch fare of a turkey burger and
fries." (Writing for news magazines is where I learned the trick of detailing
what was eaten during noteworthy meals. Back in the 1980s, there was an
expression on Capitol Hill, "Get out your menus, here comes
Newsweek .)

            Jodi, I think you're a little hard on the Journal's offhanded
admission that Barton's actions don't stem from day trading alone. He was,
after all, a guy who had apparently already murdered his prior wife and family.
The sentence in the Journal story that spoke volumes to me was the one
that read: "About 1990, [Barton] started out focusing on no-load mutual funds
he had selected by doing research in the Wall Street Journal ." That,
alas, is the odyssey that so many Americans have followed in the
glitz-and-greed '90s--abandoning safe investments in the quest for instant
riches.

            What was sorely missing from the Journal recap was the aggressive
stance that Massachusetts has taken in trying to regulate day trading. ( USA
Today stated today, "The state of Massachusetts has emerged as the
industry's nemesis.") And my new hero, Massachusetts Secretary of State William
Galvin, said in Sunday's Boston Globe , "If there's one thing this whole
thing points out, it's that there is a dire need for regulators to clearly
identify this [day trading] as a problem."

            But it's only Monday, so it's early for us to right all the wrongs of a
world gone mad. So with my fingers black with newsprint, this seems like the
perfect moment to take a late-afternoon swim.

            See you at breakfast tomorrow