AND THE WINDOWS DON'T OPEN!

Romney’s wife, Ann, was in attendance, and the candidate spoke of the concern he had for her when her plane had to make an emergency landing Friday en route to Santa Monica because of an electrical malfunction. “I appreciate the fact that she is on the ground, safe and sound. And I don’t think she knows just how worried some of us were,” Romney said. “When you have a fire in an aircraft, there’s no place to go, exactly, there’s no — and you can’t find any oxygen from outside the aircraft to get in the aircraft, because the windows don’t open. I don’t know why they don’t do that. It’s a real problem. So it’s very dangerous. And she was choking and rubbing her eyes. Fortunately, there was enough oxygen for the pilot and copilot to make a safe landing in Denver. But she’s safe and sound.

Of course, Mitt was concerned. And why, why does the FAA permit planes to fly full of passengers with windows that won't open? If Mitt becomes president, he will see to it that all planes are equipped with windows that roll down.

OK, I wasn't first with the news of this egregious lapse on the part of plane manufacturers and the government agencies who regulate flights and flying, but I was not altogether negligent in reporting. 

ANN ROMNEY'S RAFALCA IN THE OLYMPICS

Never for a second during her seven-minute performance did a hoof stray dangerously mouthwards, nor did she do anything at all to offend or upset the host nation. From the moment she entered the Greenwich Park equestrian arena at 12.15 on Thursday afternoon, the most famous political horse since Caligula toyed with making a consul of Incitatus seemed in her element.

She bowed her neatly plaited head on cue, trotted diagonally across the sand, did the jogging-on-the-spot thing, the skipping thing, the rhythmic boogying thing, the controlled trotting thing: in short, Rafalca did everything that the occasion and the peculiar rules of the dressage demanded of her.

Rafalca didn't win a medal, but she entered into the spirit of the occasion with poise and éclat, in contrast to the spouse of her owner.  She's a beautiful horse with splendid markings.

Her part-owner seemed equally delighted. Ann Romney, who was in the VIP section of the equestrian arena, rose to give Rafalca a standing ovation and a wave. "She was consistent and elegant," said Mrs Romney. "She did not disappoint. She thrilled me to death."

Is Ann prouder of Rafalca's performance in England than of Mitt's?  I expect so, but she'd never say.

Update: Mitt Romney deducted $70,000 from his tax bill for Rafalca.