the commish gets on his soapbox (one in a continuing series)

Before this "fact" becomes ingrained in the public consciousness, let the commish just say for the record that John McCain did NOT claim to have invented the BlackBerry. Nor did Al Gore claim to have invented the Internet.

When asked Tuesday about McCain's expertise on financial markets and matters, his chief economic adviser held up a BlackBerry and said, and I quote: "He did this. Telecommunications of the United States is a premier innovation in the past 15 years -- comes right through the Commerce Committee -- so you're looking at the miracle John McCain helped create, and that's what he did."

Now as to Gore. Here is what he said in 1999, and I quote: "During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet. I took the initiative in moving forward a whole range of initiatives that have proven to be important to our country's economic growth and environmental protection, improvements in our educational system." (For more on this, click here .)

By now you may be asking yourself, "Why are you ranting at us, commish?" Here's why -- while neither of these are shining examples of well-chosen words, there are so many serious issues facing this country that talking about who "invented" what is a completely needless distraction. Furthermore, given the commish's livelihood, it galls him to no end to see some members of the media play along in keeping such half-truths going.

End of tirade.