Extradite! Extradite! Read All About It!

Noriega's a man. A plan, if final: Panama's age iron.*

* I don't see why age iron can't be Panamanian slang for the big house.

Gonzales Goes Down

DEM: Alberto Got Re-Blamed

Atlas Shrugged

Grab a bomb, real or prop, board a Turkish plane and demand to be taken to Iran. Sounds like a good plan for getting a little international attention and possibly killing a few people on the way. Not, however, if the pilots are smart enough (and you're dumb enough) for them to pretend to land in Iran, but actually touch down in another Turkish city. And if the passengers themselves are all hardened criminals with a mystic or two on board, your plans are oft to go awry. When a recent AtlasJet flight was diverted in this manner the hijackers decided to let the women and children leave while holding back what they thought were a few manageable persons for further negotiation. One of the released women, before stepping out the door and sliding down the emergency chute, turned to the remaining captives and offered this sound advice:

• I go, yes. Use gats, oh hostages, use yogi.

Point Counter Point

Potential terrorists currently held behind bars have been debating for some time what best to plead when their cases come up. Having been caught before they had a chance to act, some hold that, like Zacarias Moussaoui, the best they can do for the old jihad is to keep to the faith and admit to the world exactly what they had planned and why. Another group thinks that pleading innocent, as a recent suspect did, gives them the chance, however slight, of someday regaining their freedom and thereby another opportunity to destroy other actually innocent people. The prison cells of your once potential terrorist are, of course, bugged and two such individuals were recently recorded hashing out their arguments. And so one obstinate suspect said to the other:

• Now, a Jose Padilla's all I'd ape, so jaw on.