Eugene David<br>...The One-Minute Pundit

Posted 8:47 AM by Gene

I haven't read it, but it's sure to be Mr. Mark's most CW accomplishment yet. Our cover is the "twenty-fifth anniversary" of AIDS (whatever that means; the virus was around for a long time before that, one suspects), and thus we can be PC to our heart's content, and say we need to spend katrillions more on the disease (Slick and Mrs. Bugmeister are here, so you know they'll say that) when we've already spent katrillions to little effect, and maybe put in a few condescending words to the millions of Africans and Asians who've suffered (not to mention the ghetto people we top editors of newsrags and former presidents take great pains to avoid), and with luck this will be one of Mr. Mark's worst-selling issues in years.

"They think I'm gonna die. You know what, they better not hold their breath," Ryan White once told his mother. Though given six months to live when he was diagnosed with HIV, Ryan lived five and a half years, long enough to prod a nation into joining the fight against AIDS. When he died in 1990 at the age of 18, Congress named a new comprehensive AIDS funding act after him.

...which helped stop the disease. If I had the sheer intestinal fortitude I'd like to go through Mr. Mark's archive and see how his luxury news suite has scribbled on AIDS -- no doubt a mix of PC, panic (AIDS MAY KILL HALF THE WORLD BY 2000!!!!!!!!!!) and pleas for more money. Sorry, Mark, you're part of the problem too.