Dunce Cap

Clearly stung, Lynn Yeakel's campaign for U.S. Senate is fighting to divert attention from a hard-hitting Arlen Specter TV ad portraying Yeakel as stupid. Yeakel aide Bob McCarson yesterday held news conferences here and in Philadelphia to slam the ad and to blunt its likely impact. McCarson compared it to the famous GOP Willie Horton ad of 1988 and said Specter "crossed the line" of decency. "He's trying to belittle Lynn Yeakel the way he belittled Anita Hill," McCarson said.

Pennsylvanians shouldn't fret too much about that grade of "F" for "fiscal recklessness" that Gov. Rendell got from the Cato Institute. The biennial rating of governors by the libertarian think tank focuses on whether a state raised taxes and cut spending. Cato gives few points for raising revenues fairly or spending it wisely on investments in education, roads and human services. Rendell led the push to raise one of the nation's lowest state income tax rates so Pennsylvania could climb out of the lower echelon of states in terms of investment in public education.

In 1775, the citizens of Upper Germantown built a school in an empty corner of a cemetery on Germantown Avenue. Jacob Knorr, whose carpentry shop was next to the school, made the desks. The school's charter called for a meeting every "Whitmonday" to pick the board of trustees. More than two centuries later, the little one-room schoolhouse is still there. So is the cemetery, which includes the graves of 25 Revolutionary War soldiers. The desks are still there, and the carpentry shop - which specialized in coffins - is still in business next door as the Kirk & Nice Funeral Home.

They heard enough horror stories to make them gape and gasp, but none stunned City Council more than Assistant District Attorney Sarah Vandenbraak's looking-glass history of Philadelphia's prison cap. Most of the witnesses at Council's hearing on the cap yesterday excoriated the federal court consent decrees in the jail overcrowding case, which limit prison population to 3,750 inmates and which have forced the release of thousands of criminal defendants...

Unlike their peers who attended school in colonial times, 27 fourth graders from the Culbertson Elementary School eagerly awaited their turn to wear the dunce cap in a special two-hour school session held at the one-room Hood Octagonal Schoolhouse at Dunwoody Village, Newtown Square. Giggling and sometimes struggling to keep the tall, pointed cap in place, the boys and girls - some in colonial-style dress - took turns sitting in the front of the room last week. Isabel Snyder, a local historian and retired teacher who spent 22 of her 36 years teaching in the Marple Newtown school district, conducted the day's lessons in reading, ciphering, history, spelling, English and games.

Adam Smith, author of The Wealth of Nations and father of modern economics, said about people in general and businessmen in particular, "By pursuing his own interest, he frequently promotes that of society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. " That's a lesson lost in today's rhetoric of "giving something back," "feeling another's pain" and caring. High school and college students are routinely fed leftist propaganda about businessmen's greed. Quite often, the lesson begins with one of the "robber barons," such as John D. Rockefeller.

DIGGING UP A WEALTH OF NEW INFORMATION ON CATHEDRAL Canterbury Cathedral, the 900-year-old spiritual home of Anglicans worldwide, was built on the foundations of a huge Anglo-Saxon church, archaeologists said Friday. They said digging to redo the 200-year-old floor of the cathedral revealed an Anglo-Saxon nave as wide and as long as the present one. The Anglo-Saxon cathedral burned down in 1067, and Norman Archbishop LanFranc, who journeyed from France with William the Conqueror, had the present cathedral built on the site.

"The Sleep of Reason," a play by Antonio Buero-Vallejo; English version by Marion Peter Holt. Directed by Blanka Zizka, set by M.R. Daniels, costumes and masks by Pamela Keech, projection design by Jeff Brown, original music and sound design by Adam Wernick, lighting by James Leitner. Presented by the Wilma Theater at 2030 Sansom St. through Nov. 23. When all is said and done, what I think I will remember about "The Sleep of Reason," a play written at the turn of the '70s by a popular Spanish dramatist and now being seen here in its regional premiere, is Jane Ives' cheekbones.

Here's the problem: My 1986 Volvo station wagon, which is six months younger than my son, did not clunk - officially, that is. Which means I am ineligible for the "Cash for Clunkers" program, freshly bloated with cash. I suspect that the government is peering through rose-colored glasses, because 15 miles per gallon is the best my Volvo has ever gotten in the city; 18 on the highway. Or maybe my big, red renegade is simply a deviant from its peers, which are said to be getting 20 m.p.g.

Lynch-mob mentality I was appalled to read about the mob beating of Jose Carrasquillo in Kensington ("Attack on suspect is quandary to officials," Thursday). I agree that the savage attack on an 11-year-old girl was despicable. I can understand the rage people felt about it. Given his rap sheet, I might even find it difficult to say anything good about Carrasquillo. However, what was done to this man - who was not even charged at the time - was contemptible. This is the type of mentality that led to lynching in the South.

Here's the problem: My 1986 Volvo station wagon, which is six months younger than my son, did not clunk - officially, that is. Which means I am ineligible for the "Cash for Clunkers" program, freshly bloated with cash. I suspect that the government is peering through rose-colored glasses, because 15 miles per gallon is the best my Volvo has ever gotten in the city; 18 on the highway. Or maybe my big, red renegade is simply a deviant from its peers, which are said to be getting 20 m.p.g.

Lynch-mob mentality I was appalled to read about the mob beating of Jose Carrasquillo in Kensington ("Attack on suspect is quandary to officials," Thursday). I agree that the savage attack on an 11-year-old girl was despicable. I can understand the rage people felt about it. Given his rap sheet, I might even find it difficult to say anything good about Carrasquillo. However, what was done to this man - who was not even charged at the time - was contemptible. This is the type of mentality that led to lynching in the South.

Seven weeks ago, Eboni Wilson suffered a public disgrace the likes of which few people endure. The 28-year-old principal of Chester High School - credited with bringing order and leadership to the troubled school - was accused of twice having sex with a 16-year-old student in the school auditorium. He was charged with four misdemeanors and placed on administrative leave. Now Wilson is a free man. All the charges were dropped Tuesday for insufficient evidence, said Delaware County District Attorney G. Michael Green.

Pennsylvanians shouldn't fret too much about that grade of "F" for "fiscal recklessness" that Gov. Rendell got from the Cato Institute. The biennial rating of governors by the libertarian think tank focuses on whether a state raised taxes and cut spending. Cato gives few points for raising revenues fairly or spending it wisely on investments in education, roads and human services. Rendell led the push to raise one of the nation's lowest state income tax rates so Pennsylvania could climb out of the lower echelon of states in terms of investment in public education.

While some athletes go on a four-year victory lap after winning Olympic gold, the nucleus of the 1998 U.S. women's hockey team celebrated the medal it won at the Nagano games by getting better. And better. Now, another Olympiad has arrived, and the U.S. women find themselves overwhelming favorites to repeat as gold medalists. Anything less will be a colossal failure. Even a silver medal. "We've got a lot on the line," captain Cammi Granato said yesterday. "There's no doubt about that.

The scene: Vice Principal Mary Wise's office. The time: Tomorrow, 10 a.m. WISE: Oh, there you are, you two. Come in; sit down. Mark, sit there. John, turn off the cell phone. OK, you know why you're here. Name-calling, eye-gouging and obscene gestures are all detrimental to the learning environment. Right? MARK and JOHN (Sullen): Right. WISE: You two are like teenage boys on testosterone overload, butting heads, yelling incoherently. This is no way for the governor of Pennsylvania and mayor of Philadelphia to act, is it?

Driving by a modest home on a busy road in Cherry Hill, you can't help but notice the Dalmatian statuary atop gate posts, the large metallic-golden foo dogs on the lawn, and the bright-green sculpture of a square watermelon. There's also a vintage fire engine parked on the grass. Those who attended a fund-raising party for area animal shelters there recently know that behind these and other unusual pieces are a man and his dog. The man is Bob Sheets, president of Pennsauken's Flower World.

Adam Smith, author of The Wealth of Nations and father of modern economics, said about people in general and businessmen in particular, "By pursuing his own interest, he frequently promotes that of society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. " That's a lesson lost in today's rhetoric of "giving something back," "feeling another's pain" and caring. High school and college students are routinely fed leftist propaganda about businessmen's greed. Quite often, the lesson begins with one of the "robber barons," such as John D. Rockefeller.

The $33 billion federal crime bill is a rotten legislative oyster, but it contains this precious pearl of a provision: "A federal court shall not hold prison or jail crowding unconstitutional" unless an "individual plaintiff inmate proves that the crowding" inflicts "cruel and unusual punishment (Eighth Amendment violations)" on him. Relief in such cases "shall extend no further than necessary to remove the conditions that" afflict the particular inmate plaintiff. A "federal court shall not place a ceiling on the inmate population of any federal, state or local detention facility" as a remedy for Eighth Amendment violations unless "crowding is inflicting cruel and unusual punishment on particular identified prisoners.

They heard enough horror stories to make them gape and gasp, but none stunned City Council more than Assistant District Attorney Sarah Vandenbraak's looking-glass history of Philadelphia's prison cap. Most of the witnesses at Council's hearing on the cap yesterday excoriated the federal court consent decrees in the jail overcrowding case, which limit prison population to 3,750 inmates and which have forced the release of thousands of criminal defendants...