Civility

RECENTLY, A friend engaged in a rather lively debate concerning Don Imus and the consequences of his stereotyping remarks. My friend wasn't trying to defend Imus' tasteless commentary, but he has constantly been exclaiming, "Foul - there is a double standard. " He claims that African-Americans are allowed to make statements that non-African-Americans are not allowed to, and he then continues to bellow on about rap music. Of course, I responded. "There is no double standard here, and what does rap music have to do with anything?"

Stephen Carter, author of Civility: Manners, Morals, and the Etiquette of Democracy and a professor of law at Yale University, will be the speaker at a community forum 7 p.m. Sunday at Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church, 625 Montgomery Ave. Carter will speak on "Civility and Morals. " Beth David Reform Congregation, 1130 Vaughans Lane, Gladwyne, will host a scholar-in-residence program the weekend of April 23. Ellen Umansky, professor of Judaica studies at Fairfield University, will speak at evening services April 23 on "Reform Judaism in the 21st Century: Where Are We Heading?"

Good evening. I'm Peter Lemmings. Tonight we bring you an exclusive report from the closed-door congressional retreat held last weekend in Hershey, Pa. The retreat was billed as a private chance for bipartisan fellowship, not open to the press or public. But our crackerjack reporter, Barbara Blah-Blah, posed as a Food Lion catering employee to penetrate the secret world of congressional collegiality. What happens when political adversaries spend a weekend playing golf and eating chocolate?

IPRETTY MUCH disagree with almost all of Christine Flowers' beliefs. That said, I found her July 1 column disheartening, not because of the ideas she expressed but because of the emails she says she regularly gets from readers calling her, in her words, a "rhymes-with-witch," "rhymes-with-punt" or "rhymes-with-trucker. " I've had numerous email exchanges with Ms. Flowers. She has always been polite in responding. In one of our first, she thanked me for expressing my views without resorting to name-calling.

Can we be candid here? The public is a bunch of rude, obnoxious jerks. OK, so I overstate. A little. Yes, there are exceptions. I'm not such a bad guy, and you, of course, are a paragon of civility. But the rest of them? A cavalcade of boors, boobs, bums, bozos, and troglodytes. So it is small wonder the tale of Steven Slater has hit a nerve. Reports say Slater, a flight attendant for JetBlue, got into it with a woman who cursed him when he asked her not to stand up to retrieve her bags while the plane was still taxiing.

For the first-time visitor to this pear-shaped paradise in the southeast corner of the Caribbean, the process of getting to Barbados may appear to be a you-can't-get-there-from-here exercise. But once you set foot on this island, after what can amount to nearly a full day of flights, it becomes clear that the arduous journey was worth the effort. It is not for nothing that they call Barbados "the pearl of the Caribbean. " It would, in fact, be difficult to hype the island's assets: endless white-sand beaches, rolling hills and jagged highlands, waving cane fields, quaint fishing villages, all set amid azure waters in a climate that varies little from perfection the year round.

The morning after the election, I received a powerful reminder of why so many of us choose public service as our life's work. While walking into my office, I ran into a group of schoolchildren who had come to visit the Capitol. Talking with them reminded me of the solemn responsibility each generation has to the ones that follow. Their enthusiasm and energy spoke more powerfully than any words could that they are inheritors of the future we choose to build today. This year, voters elected Democratic candidates from every region of our country, giving Democrats the majority in both the House of Representatives and the Senate, and entrusting us with a great deal of responsibility for building that future.

This is an edited excerpt from Michael Smerconish's new book, "Morning Drive: Things I Wish I Knew Before I Started Talking," published on Monday by Globe Pequot Press. It's a political manifesto and an inside look at today's split-screen cable TV and talk-radio world. On Saturday, Michael will be at the Jenkintown Barnes & Noble (10 a.m.) and the Exton Barnes & Noble (2 p.m.) for book signings. Visit www.smerconish.com for more on the book and upcoming signings. THE Pennsylvania Society dates from a time when Philadelphia was the center of the universe.

Perhaps it could happen only at a time when the public seems to have had its fill of scandal. While music blared from parties at a dormitory next door, students packed into Olin Auditorium at Ursinus College in Collegeville on Friday night to hear local congressional representatives discuss a program titled "Civility and Comity in National Legislative Affairs. " Transmitted live to a cable audience from Harrisburg to Atlantic City, the program sponsored by Suburban Cable drew more than 250 students and local residents.

The land of the free. The home of the angry. I've just returned from an eight-city tour promoting a book - and let me tell you: A trip like that really can open your eyes to the mood of people across the country. I didn't like what I saw. People are angry. They walk the big cities and the airport terminals tense and unfriendly, eyes unwilling to make contact. Everywhere I went, it was 1968 all over again. That year, for those of you who don't remember, was one of the most hateful in our history, with people taking sides for or against the Vietnam War and the civil rights struggle.

DENVER - Opponents of same-sex unions rallied at the Colorado Capitol on Tuesday as tensions remained high one day after state House Republicans rejected a proposal to provide gay couples rights similar to marriage. Dozens of people saying they support traditional marriage cheered Republican lawmakers and thanked State House Speaker Frank McNulty, crediting him for the defeat of the heavily debated civil-union legislation. Gay-rights advocates also maintained a presence at the Capitol, as a man with a horn loudly heckled McNulty as he addressed the crowd.

Cardinal Anthony J. Bevilacqua broke civil and church laws when he ordered aides in 1994 to shred a list identifying dozens of Philadelphia-area priests suspected of molesting children, an expert on canon law and clergy sex abuse testified Thursday. "That was like obstructing justice cubed," the Rev. Thomas P. Doyle told a Common Pleas Court jury. "He's got a list of men who may have abused children - and he's going to shred it?" The assertion thrust the late cardinal squarely into the spotlight for the first time in the landmark child-sex-abuse and endangerment trial against his former secretary for clergy, Msgr.

John Payton, 65, a civil rights lawyer who defended the University of Michigan's affirmative-action policy before the Supreme Court and led the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, died Thursday at Johns Hopkins University Hospital in Baltimore after a brief illness. President Obama said in a statement that he and Michelle Obama were saddened to learn that their "dear friend" had died. He was a "true champion of equality," Obama said. "The legal community has lost a legend, and while we mourn John's passing, we will never forget his courage and fierce opposition to discrimination in all its forms.

One in a series of occasional articles on activities and events you may want to add to your itinerary. APPOMATTOX, Va. - Private Jesse H. Hutchins joined the Confederate Army five days after the South bombarded Union-held Fort Sumter in Charleston, S.C. He enlisted on April 15, 1861. His unit, Company A, 5th Alabama Battalion, was initially sent to Florida. It then moved to join Gen. Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia. Hutchins was at virtually every major Civil War battle in the East: Seven Pines, Gaines Mill, Malvern Hill, the second battle of Manassas or Bull Run, Antietam, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, Cold Harbor, Winchester, and Petersburg.

Three sales over the next few days will offer the acquisitions of a Midwest arcade-game collector, a New York antique toy-store proprietor, and a Delaware Civil War prison guard. The arcade-game collector was the late Frank Zygmunt Sr. of Chicago, a trader for 25 years in vintage slot machines, jukeboxes, and similar coin-operated devices. Zygmunt's collection will be offered by Morphy Auctions at a sale beginning at 10 a.m. Saturday at the gallery near Reading. The 415-lot sale also is being conducted online through Morphy's website, www.morphyauctions.com , and at www.LiveAuctioneers.com . Vintage coin-ops have long been collectible, often winding up in residential basement bars.

SAN FRANCISCO - Pacific Gas & Electric Co. has agreed to pay $70 million in restitution to San Bruno for the 2010 pipeline explosion that killed eight people in the San Francisco suburb, company and city officials said Monday. In a joint statement, PG&E and San Bruno said the money would be used to set up a nonprofit organization to help the community recover from the Sept. 9, 2010, blast, which also injured dozens of people and destroyed 38 homes. The funds will help San Bruno "get beyond the tragedy and devastation caused by PG&E's explosion and fire," Mayor Jim Ruane said.

TO PARAPHRASE author Erich Segal in Love Story, being an ass means never having to say you're sorry. Or, at least, it shouldn't. That's because if you truly are an offensive creep who gets your jollies humiliating others (and who believes you are doing it for a higher cause), any apology you might later extend under threat of losing your advertisers or job is insincere and irrelevant. So, Rush Limbaugh's less-than-heartfelt mea culpa to birth-control crusader Sandra Fluke is less notable for its substance than for what it reveals about society.

BEFORE WE DELVE into "John Carter," here's a behind-the-scenes story about the movie's marketing I would like to share with you. "Carter," Disney's $250 million 3-D sci-fi extravaganza, originally carried the title "John Carter From Mars. " "Mars" was deleted because folks at the studio were traumatized by the March 2010 failure of "Mars Needs Moms. " So traumatized they believed that anything with the word "Mars" in the title was forever tainted. You can see how much worse this could have been.

Allegheny College has cursed the darkness, with its researchers documenting in a series of polls the decline of civility in American politics and the risk that rising nastiness poses to self-government. Tuesday, the college plans to light a candle. Pundits David Brooks and Mark Shields are to receive the inaugural Allegheny College Prize for Civility in Public Life in Washington, honoring them for the elevated tone of their regular debates on PBS's NewsHour . "People talk so much in America about those who are not civil.