How Convenient

..as the Church Lady used to say.

The good Doctor Bloor reports that Dr. Lester Crawford, who took the reins at the FDA as a spring chicken of (depending on when his birthday falls) 66 or 67 years young a mere three months ago, is retiring because "it is time at the age of 67 to step aside."

He also informs us that Senate Majority Leader and admitted cat vivisectionist Dr. Bill Frist is blinking into the SEC's klieg lights over a recent Martha Stewart-ish stock sale. As reported elsewhere, Dr. Frist's sold his Hospital Corporation of America stock, which was worth perhaps $5 to $25 million, and which he had presumably held since his father founded the company in 1968. The reason he suddenly sold? No, not the looming announcement of poor results, which sent the stock skidding, and which, utterly by coincidence, was announced less than two weeks after the sale. As Frist's spokesperson explained, ''To avoid any appearance of a conflict of interest, Senator Frist went beyond what ethics requires and sold the stock."

Since both men are doctors, and the Hypocritical Hippocratic Oath is commonly understood (though as it turns out, not in so many words) to require that physicians "first do no harm," logic compels us to conclude that it is the view of Republican doctors that lying through your ass does no harm. Which, when you think about it, explains a great deal.