The Frank Stare charge: two persons are lying

According to news reports by WCLT and the Advocate, Newark Law Director Doug Sassen has been accused by Frank Stare's former legal counsel, Mike King, of admitting the political implications for charging Stare with solicitation a week before last November's election, in which Stare ran unsuccessfully for city council.

According to the WCLT report, "Sassen allegedly told King that his own political future could be affected by the decision." Sassen denied that, but, according to the Advocate report, "he accused King of trying to talk him out of moving ahead with the case because of the upcoming vote."

King is Democratic Party chairman and Sassen was coming up for election to a judgeship earlier this month, but was defeated.

The conflict is more than just a he-said-he-said between attorneys dissecting the he-said-she-said wrangle in which Stare is now ensnared. One of the two attorneys is lying, if these reports are accurate, and one of the parties to the Stare accusation is lying.

Stare's present legal counsel has declared in a court motion that "at least the appearance of impropriety was rampant in the investigation and the decision to file (the solicitation charge) one week before the Nov. 6 election," according to the Advocate's report.

Local government likely has been affected by this charge against Stare. It is fitting, then, that the liars involved - whomever they are - get plenty of media attention.

War death count

Every morning I have the self-imposed unpleasant duty of checking the number of war casualties and updating the little box at right entitled "They died for you and me."

I hope every visitor checks it religiously and just pauses a moment to reflect on what it means, and I hope they occasionally visit the two links in that box - "see the faces ..." and "the voice of ..." because those visits will intensify your realization of what's happening with Bush's warS.

It isn't just Iraq; it's also Afghanistan. They are virtually the same, yet national media today are reporting deaths over there as having surpassed 4,000 when in fact the total is much higher.