Whenever The Scrapbook finds the word “conscience” employed by a journalist, we feel obliged to plug in the old you-know-what detector and examine the specimen in some scientific detail. It’s a genuinely distasteful job—mucking through the mounds of insufferable piety and wading through the cesspools of dishonesty and hysteria—but somebody has to do it. 

New York governor David Paterson, beset by charges of witness tampering in the case of a close aide accused of assaulting an ex-girlfriend, has spoken of legalizing ultimate fighting as a revenue raiser to help close the state’s $8 billion plus budget gap. But New Yorkers looking for brawling entertainment need look no further than the Democratic caucus of the state senate where Paterson had been a member for 20 years.