Washington Whispers

Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas says he's shocked when he sees judges reading editorials. "I think that our job is not to be influenced by the media," he says. He isn't. "It is rare, extremely rare, that I ever read about anything that we do in the media," says Thomas, who was roughed up during his 1991 confirmation hearings. "I don't think it is a requirement to do the job," he says. "Your role is to be a judge."

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GOP presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee says he knows the trick to beating Sen. Hillary Clinton. It's the experience of taking on the Clinton political machine back home in Arkansas, where he was governor for more than a decade. "That means something," he tells us. "To do that as a Republican in a very Democrat state that had been dominated by their political machinery is even more significant than playing against it in the national realm," he says. The lesson of those battles: "They are never going to make the same mistake twice. They are going to be ruthless."

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This is how bad the news industry is getting. On some complicated beats, like education, newbies have to learn on the job because big-city papers have axed the older, and higher-paid, specialists. So how's a new kid supposed to get up to speed? The National Education Writers Association has a plan: Hire a coach. With some foundation money, the association has created a "public editor," who coaches rookies on the phone. "In the thrashing around underway as papers downsize and reorganize," says Association President Richard Whitmire of USA Today, scribes "now report to an editor who knows little or nothing about education, which means no help in choosing or executing stories. Here, the public editor can help."

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"Jesus was too smart to ever run for public office, Anderson. That's what Jesus would do."

Mike Huckabee, the GOP presidential hopeful, asked by host Anderson Cooper in the CNN/YouTube debate what Jesus would do about the death penalty

"Madam president of the United States...it's an extraordinary thought."

Barbra Streisand, the singer, announcing support for presidential candidate Sen. Hillary Clinton

"I reject the kind of naive, wishful thinking that makes every delinquent a victim of society and every riot a social problem."

Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, reacting to Paris riots and demands that money be poured into the trouble areas

"She's a little concerned that reindeer can't land anywhere."

Jackie Dodd, wife of Democratic presidential candidate Chris Dodd, on their 6-year-old daughter's worry that Santa won't find them in Iowa

Sources: CNN, Washington Post (2), AP

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