It's not the super-insect that Panama's more sensational media were screaming about until a more bizarre story came along, but the recently arrived Asian Tiger Mosquito is yet another pestilential health hazard who gives us another reason to clean up our surroundings. Read all about it on the Science page.

The other story that knocked the "super-mosquito" off of the nation's front pages is best read with music playing in the background. The optimum is the 1960s Johnny Rivers recording of "Secret Agent Man," but a James Bond or Mission Impossible soundtrack will also do quite nicely. Secret agents "El Pintor" and "Oficial Renco" have discovered "ideological falsity" and a plot to destabilize Panama, and Mireya and her National Security Council don't understand why people are laughing at them instead of demanding stern punishment for the evil deviationists. It's our lead news story, and also the subject of commentary in our Spanish-language Opiniones section and our English-language Opinions. Am I politically incorrect to snicker? Maybe people will notice and let me join the deviationist conspiracy too.

Because November has five Fridays, there will be a three-week interval before the next issue of The Panama News appears on December 15. I could use the breather.

It turns out that we have a bit more content than usual for this three-week hiatus. Our Business section gets into the new challenges that multi-modal transport poses for Customs and glimpses at the lottery biz and the government's publicity budget. We have larger than usual Arts and Community sections. The Dining page takes us to two restaurants and a city market this time. The Review section took me back to high school to talk about variations on the English language and its literature.

You want sensationalism? The News Briefs have a reference to cannibalism, while the Business & Economy Briefs refer to headhunters. But alas, these are not like they would seem at first glance.

First impressions do tend to mislead these days. Although the daily papers and the TV stations made leading stories out of some wiretapping allegations that smelled fishy at first whiff and my first instinct was to ignore them, the Moscoso administration managed to blunder into a major political disaster. That, not another garden variety suspect claim, became the big story when all was said and done. Except maybe all has not been said and done. The arrests and trials may be coming, but either way, this is comedy rather than high drama.

It's the height of rainy season, and we're well into Panama's prolonged holiday season. This year American Thanksgiving and the anniversary of Panama's independence from Spain coincide, and before the next issue appears Panamanian Mothers Day (December 8) will have come and gone.

Our business, like the Panamanian economy as a whole, limps along. The free fall seems to be over, and in November we may set another readership record, but we won't be back into print just yet.

But despite the clouds and the seasonal gloom, and the sight of the government embarrassing itself in grand fashion, this is a time to laugh and count blessings. Dry season's coming, better times are ahead. Happy Thanksgiving and Panamanian Mothers Day to all, and I thank those of you who have helped The Panama News, and who will do so with your Christmas book orders, from the bottom of my heart.

Eric Jackson
the editor

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