AUSTIN, Texas -- We're having a splendid political primary season here in Texas, featuring several loopier-than-usual players and one total gooney bird named John Worldpeace.

On the Democratic side for U.S. Senate, the two heavy-hitting, well-financed contenders are Mayor Ron Kirk of Dallas and Rep. Ken Bentsen of Houston. So, of course, a high-school civics teacher who's never been elected to anything named Victor Morales is in the lead in that race.

Meanwhile, just to further confuse everybody, another Morales, former attorney general Dan, is running for governor, which might cinch the Hispanic vote for him, except his opponent is Tony Sanchez, a rich banker from Laredo. Worldpeace (he had his name legally changed) is also in that race, and his idea of contributing to his namesake seems to be spreading as much nastiness about Sanchez as he possibly can. Voters keep getting unidentified calls that turn out to be financed by Worldpeace asking them, approximately, "Did you know that Tony Sanchez is a blue-bellied, full-blooded liar, thief and child molester who runs on all fours and has

AUSTIN, Texas -- "Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of today." -- Theodore Roosevelt.

It's hard to think how this could be any clearer: The headlines are "Bush Proposing Policy Changes on Toxic Sites: Taxpayers Would Bear Most Cleanup Costs." "Bush to Shift Toxic Cleanups to Taxpayers."

Katherine Seelye of The New York Times reports the Superfund was founded in 1980 under the slogan, "The polluter pays." Industry was to clean up its own messes, and special corporate taxes were used to fund clean-ups at "orphan sites, where the responsible party could not be identified or could not pay. The taxes were reauthorized under President Ronald Reagan and again under Mr. Bush's father. They expired in 1995, and while President Bill Clinton sought to have them reinstated, the House of Representatives, by then under Republican control, refused."

The Office of Strategic Influence went from obscurity to infamy to oblivion during a spin cycle that lasted just seven days in late February. Coming to terms with a week of negative coverage after news broke that the Pentagon office might purposely deceive foreign media, a somber defense secretary announced: "It is being closed down." But for Donald Rumsfeld and his colleagues along the Potomac, the inky cloud of bad publicity has a big silver lining.

Orders to shut the controversial office came a day after President Bush proclaimed zero tolerance for lies from U.S. officials. "We'll tell the American people the truth," he vowed.

Would the Defense Department try to deceive journalists? The question in the air was distasteful, and the answer from Rumsfeld could only offer

Thomas Friedman has achieved another media triumph with the debut of "Tom's Journal" on the "NewsHour with Jim Lehrer." The feature will be a "one-on-one debriefing of Friedman by Lehrer or one of the program's senior correspondents," says a news release from the influential PBS program. Friedman will appear perhaps a dozen times per year -- whenever he comes back from a major trip abroad.

Specializing in foreign affairs, Friedman reaches millions of readers with his syndicated New York Times column. And he's often on television -- especially these days. "In the post-9/11 environment, the talk shows can't get enough of Friedman," a Washington Post profile noted. He appears as a guest on "Meet the Press," "Face the Nation," "Washington Week in Review" and plenty of other TV venues. He even went over big on David Letterman's show.

A passage from Friedman's 1999 book "The Lexus and the Olive Tree" sums up his overarching global perspective: "The hidden hand of the market will never work without a hidden fist. McDonald's cannot flourish without McDonnell Douglas, the designer of the U.S. Air Force F-15. And the hidden fist that

AUSTIN, Texas -- In response to President George W. Bush's call to all Americans to give service to our country, some are enlisting in the Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, Senior Corps or the armed services. Others have begun putting in their suggested 4,000 hours at a variety of charitable endeavors, through everything from the volunteer fire department to mentoring programs. And still other Americans are moving their companies to Bermuda and the Cayman Islands to avoid paying taxes. Isn't that special?

The New York Times reports a "megatrend" among American companies to incorporate in Bermuda in order to sharply reduce their taxes. Assorted financial advisers are encouraging these "moves," which involve nothing more than setting up a mail drop and paying a few fees. It's not necessary to have an office or to hold meetings there. One tax partner with Ernst & Young did cite patriotism as "the only potentially troubling issue," according to the Times, but concluded that profits trump patriotism. "We are working through a lot of companies who feel that it is (the right time to