Then Again, He Could Lose His Shirt

The following is an excerpt from OpinionJournal.com’s “Best of the Web” written by the editor, James Taranto. 

Then Again, He Could Lose His Shirt
“Chicago Gambler Could Get $1 Million From East Coast Suit”–headline, ChicagoBreakingNews.com, Feb. 26

News You Can Use

• “When Flying, Keep an Eye on Your Stuff”–headline, Pantagraph (Bloomington, Ill.), Feb. 28
• “Advice: Don’t Bring Your Kids, Your Mom to a Job Interview”–headline, Chicago Sun-Times, March 1

Great Moments in Socialized Medicine
“Freed from his life sentence, the Lockerbie bomber was sent home by the Scots on compassionate grounds because he had ‘just three months’ to live,” London’s Daily Mail reports:

But six months later, Abdelbaset Ali Mohamed al-Megrahi is still living–and doing it in the lap of luxury.

Yesterday, his elderly father even held out the prospect of him beating the prostate cancer that doctors said would kill him by last Christmas. . . .

Megrahi, 57, no longer receives hospital treatment after ending a course of chemotherapy.

Last night, the British cancer specialist who gave the three-month prognosis was forced to defend his prediction.

He insisted that Megrahi remained gravely ill and was not expected to live much longer.

“In Britain, the government itself runs the hospitals and employs the doctors,” claims former Enron adviser Paul Krugman. “We’ve all heard scare stories about how that works in practice; these stories are false.” This defense becomes harder to believe when a cancer patient can get better care by going to Libya.

For more “Best of the Web” click here and look for the “Best of the Web Today” link in the middle column below “Today’s Columnists.