Massachusetts: Ted Kennedy

--As I wrote at the time, Menino -- still known here as Mayor McChicken, since he still hasn't declared his candidacy for re-election -- really put a lot on the line with his wage-freeze proposal; I thought it was politically brilliant as long as he got the unions to agree to it. That hasn't really gone so well, which leaves him open to charges of: Where was your Plan B? Did you really put all the city's eggs in Stutman, Kelly and Nee's basket?

--Queen Elizabeth II is giving Ted Kennedy an honorary knighthood, according to the Washington Post, which somehow reported it without a single Camelot reference.

My post last weekend on the Globe's comments section generated, amusingly, 138 comments.  Apparently, bloggers and blog readers like to talk about nothing so much as blogging!

Anyway, here's an interesting postscript to the whole topic.  The Globe is right now running an in-depth seven-part series on Ted Kennedy, from his childhood to (this Sunday) the present day.  Today's installment: Chappaquiddick.  One can only imagine what the commentariat at the Globe would be saying about that.

But indeed, one can only imagine.  Because the Globe is not allowing comments on any of the Kennedy stories.  Why?  Because the Kennedy stories are not "news," but rather a retrospective?  But why should matter?  Because they're afraid that the comments will be overwhelmingly negative?  But surely that would defeat the purpose of allowing comments in the first place.

WASHINGTON -- Ted Kennedy is available to deliver a crucial Democratic vote on the stimulus bill making its way through the Senate, a colleague said tonight. "He's here in town," said New Jersey Senator Frank Lautenberg....

U.S. Sen. Ted Kennedy was taken to the hospital around 5 p.m. today from his Cape Cod home, the Associated Press is reporting.