Olio

• A Bloomington mosque was set on fire with an incendiary device Saturday. So far, big-league bloggers Michelle Malkin and the Powerline boys do not seem to think this reaches the level of an Indiana pie attack.

• Al Roker on MSNBC, in fully-rattled combat mode six hours before Hurricane Dennis was scheduled to make landfall:

"If history is any indicator, and it not always is..."

• I'd like to remind the cable nets that this is the beginning of hurricane season. I'm inured by now to the week-long slow-motion 20 mph chases of major-storm-like graphics across thousands of miles of ocean blue. I realize that any impact on Caribbean islands that does not involve American tourists will be treated as footnotes. We in the Midwest are well aware that California and Florida are the Beyoncé and Brittany of weather, while we are, at best, Dido; half the Mississippi Valley was underwater for two months in 1993 before anybody but NPR even noticed. But if you persist in sending your parka-clad minions (one guy looked like he was dressed for an assault on K-2) out into the height of the storm, sticking microphones into the faces of any other idiots who pass by, they will, by Hurricane Fred at the latest, be surrounded by people holding up "Hi Mom" and "John 3:16" signs.

• And the result of all that was that CNN spent the entire time Dennis was making landfall with Anderson Cooper describing what was going on in the parking lot of his Ramada.

• If this behavior will end only when somebody is bisected on air by a flying stop sign, I pray it will be one of the "talent" and not some poor cameraman.

• On the other hand, to whatever Indianapolis Star editor assigned the July 5 "Hey, kids, fireworks are all on sale at tremendous savings!" feature: I have a bag of marshmallows in storage waiting for the day they set your house ablaze. Marshmallows have a long shelf life, but I'm hoping for sooner than later.