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Clinton never missed a chance to shed a tear at somebody's funeral. He knew it was grand publicity. Most of us have seen that file posted on the web, autotear.gif, which shows him at Ron Brown's funeral, laughing away and then suddenly pulling out his handkerchief and shedding a tear when he saw that the cameras were on him.

Bush will preside at the memorial because he really believes in duty of a chief executive to honor the heroic dead. Rudy Giuliani did the same thing in NYC, never missing the funeral of a cop or a fireman killed on duty.

But without question it will, as a secondary effect, also help Bush. The press tries everything it can think of to suppress, spin, and muddy his message, so Bush has few opportunities to get his message out directly, or even to present himself directly to the American people. The SOTU was one such opportunity, and this will be another.

If a president USES such opportunities crassly, people will catch on soon enough. I think Bush is genuine when it comes to this sort of thing. But it will certainly help him make contact with the American people, which the press is desperately trying to prevent.

Some events simply sit apart from the poor small ability of men to add or detract from their meaning.

The space shuttle Columbia was doomed within perhaps seconds after liftoff, and its crew members were on borrowed time. There is no conceivable way that any action, even if the situation were known, could have averted the results. Should have, could have, might have, all count for nothing in this cosmic scale. This was a test, a cruel and demanding test, with nothing to measure pass or fail except our determination to learn from the failures, and assure that the same lapse shall not happen twice.

Do you think the shuttle disaster will hurt the Appeasement movement?

Some, but I don't think it makes any difference. The constant din from the liberal media had taken its toll on Bush's support, but the public reaction to the State of the Union address seems to have undone months of work by the Democratic sycophants in the media.

They had probably hoped to use this week to get what digs they could in, before Powell speaks to the UN on Wednesday. They have been blown off the stage by the Columbia tragedy, but I doubt the media could have undermined Bush much in one week anyway.

The media is taking an enormous risk in televising Powell's appearance live. Tens of millions may see it, limiting Dan Rather's ability to dismiss it at 6 p.m. as "no smoking gun, not very persuasive." I'm surprised they are letting that happen.

Bush himself is apparently going to address the country one more time before the fur flies, and that may be only a week or two away. I doubt the media is going to be able to make much headway in the time remaining. Their friends in the Democratic Party are just going to have to pin their hopes on failure.