1. It’s Monday, March 30, 2015. One week from today, it will be baseball season and the world will be right again.

2.   Sunday’s New York Post had a front page that got a lot of attention on social media. Over the headline “VILLAGE IDIOTS,” the Post showed a picture of seven young women using a selfie stick to take a picture of themselves — at the site of last week’s explosion in New York’s East Village that killed two people.

I can’t take issue with the idea that taking a selfie at the scene of a tragedy is pretty clueless

But I take more issue with the way the Post treated this.

These women are not public figures. And, as inappropriate as it seems, taking a selfie at the site of a tragedy is not a crime.

And yet, these young women are being held up as figures to scorn. They’ve been held in contempt by a publication that at least a million have read or seen online. And they’ve been singled out from among dozens of others who might have done the same thing.

What most people when they take these selfies is post them online. And what one of their thoughtful friends will do is send them a private message on Facebook or Twitter and say, hey, that’s not really appropriate. And the person who posted the picture will think about it a second and say, hey, maybe you’re right. That’s the civilized way to deal with something inappropriate.

The Post has its catchy headline and the buzz. It has aroused the anger of people who think there’s a generation of self-centered oafs coming of age. It can go on to belittling President Obama or whoever else doesn’t align with its editorial policy.

But now these young women, who somebody is going to recognize, are stuck with this ignominy for a day or a few days or however long the lifespan of this controversy.  Why were they singled out? Were they told where their picture would appear when it was being taken? Were they even told their picture was being taken?

Mass circulation newspapers, even ones as disreputable as The New York Post, have an awesome power. They have a responsibility to use it responsibly. In this case, again, the Post did not.

3.   If you want to talk about village idiots, there’s the governor of Indiana.

The reports on Saturday indicated that he was upset with the firestorm that followed his signing legislation that allowed businesses in the state to deny service to same-sex couples, citing religious reasons. So he was going to go on the Sunday talk shows and clear up the misunderstanding.

Instead, in his appearance on ABC’s “This Week” he said that the law would not change and insisted it did not promote discrimination. But he couldn’t say why it didn’t, and he didn’t think there’s a need for legislation that protects same-sex couples from discrimination. 

His explanation was so bad that two of the miscreants who promoted the garbage legislation announced today that the legislature would consider some kind of clarifying measure. But, they too, can’t say what the clarification would be, saying only that the governor didn’t do a good job of explaining things on TV.

This is what to expect when you try to dis people. It always bites you back. These people all deserve each other — and the contempt that they’ve brought upon themselves.

4.   Some of those upset by the Indiana debacle are suggesting that the NCAA men’s basketball championships scheduled for next weekend in Indianapolis be moved.

I understand the sentiment, but it’s not a reasonable thing to do at this point.

You can’t just move an event as big as the tournament that quickly. Hotel rooms are booked, travel plans are made, time off from work is granted and lots of temporary jobs — of people who might well be just as opposed to what Indiana’s so-called leaders have done — are at stake. 

I would, however, strongly urge the NCAA to make absolutely certain that any invitation to the governor or state legislators to attend tournament-related events be rescinded. Revoke their tickets, if they have them, saying the tournament is not an event for their benefit.

If they squawk, just cite the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. It’s against your religion to suffer fools gladly.

1. It’s Friday, March 27, 2015.

2. It’s either one, eight or ten days until Kentucky’s undefeated season comes crashing down. I believe. If it can’t be Notre Dame tomorrow, I really want it to be Wisconsin on April 4.

3. To: Gov. Mike Pence, Governor’s Mansion, Indianapolis

MIKE:

Later this year, my son and I will be driving from our home in New York to Evanston, Ill., and back.           

Unfortunately, that means I have to drive through your state — which, thanks to the “X” I imagine you used to “sign” your name, now has a law allowing businesses to refuse service to same-sex couples.

I would avoid Indiana if I could. Really.

But since I can’t, I’m establishing some ground rules for our trip.

First, I will make certain that I purchase gasoline for my vehicle in either Ohio or Illinois. I will not pay gasoline taxes that could go toward the salaries of the miscreants who support your stupid law.

Second, I will make sure that my son and I have cold drinks in the car, because there’s no way in Hell (aka your future home) I’m going to spend even two cents in Indiana. I even refuse to use a water fountain, because I might catch whatever illness you and your fellow morons contracted that enabled this travesty.

Third, I’m bringing empty water bottles just in case we have to relieve ourselves. Unless, of course, you can guarantee that a facsimile of the so-called “Religious Freedom Restoration Act” is on one of those discs that go into urinals.

Fourth, I will keep my car window open in case I feel like spitting.

Fifth, as much as I would like to drive at 100 mph to be out of your state as fast as possible, I will obey all posted speed limits and safety regulations.

Sixth, despite my indifference toward religion, I will fear for what passes for your soul. I suspect the God that you think you pray to isn’t going to be too pleased with what you and your fellow sinners have wrought upon people whose offense — in your squinted, virtually blind eyes — is to love who they love.

So that’s my Religious Freedom Restoration Act. God, or whoever, have mercy on you.

1. Today is Thursday, March 26, 2015. It is six days until April Fool’s Day.

2. So that can’t explain today’s op-ed piece in The New York Times by Bush-era U.N. Ambassador John Bolton. Although the piece does read like a sick joke: Bolton says the only way to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons is for the United States (or Israel, in a pinch) to bomb Iran.                       

Bolton’s argument is that letting Iran continue to develop its nuclear capabilities will encourage other Middle Eastern states — Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Turkey — to do so as well. And that, as a result, President Obama’s legacy will be a region armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons. 

There’s more than a couple of problems here.

First off, while Bolton admits that this is something Obama inherited rather than created, it will be all his fault anyway. Obama’s insistence on solving this problem peacefully is a mistake — in the view of one of the pom-pom boys of the biggest foreign policy disaster in American history, the invasion of Iraq.

Secondly, Bolton dismisses the idea that hey, wait a minute, Israel has nuclear capability. But Bolton comically says that the nations in the region understand that Israel only has the capability as a deterrent. That it would never use it as an offensive weapon. That’s plain silly. If these people want nukes, they’ll especially want them if Israel has them – I can’t imagine that Benjamin Netanyahu impresses his neighbors as Mr. Reasonable, especially after that last election.

Finally, the casualness with which Bolton describes what would happen if the United States attacked Iran is breath-taking. First of all, of course, we should be able to knock out their capabilities pretty quickly, according to Bolton. We’ll set them back three to five years. It’s going to be a piece of cake to this guy who, again, rallied ‘round the Iraq debacle.

And, of course, Bolton says the U.S. should couple this attack with support for dissident groups in Iran. Because when tens or hundreds of Iranians are killed in an American missile attack or aerial bombing, being perceived as having American support will be a popular death sentence. Either that or, even more likely, you’re no longer a dissident — everyone throws their support behind their embattled nation.

Give Bolton credit — when Netanyahu spoke to Congress, he was too afraid to say what Bolton said. But that was because he knew what Bolton hasn’t figured out: the American people are not the least bit interested or inclined to start a horrific war in the Persian Gulf. And Johnny, it’s not because we’re afraid and it’s not because our military isn’t amazing.

It’s because we’re not warmongers. We don’t kill because it seems like a better solution than talking. That’s what murderers do, Mr. Bolton.

3.   The idea that a co-pilot could deliberately take down a passenger jet with 150 people aboard is horrific. 

It’s impressive that authorities have found out so much in such a short time. It’s important that they answer all the questions about the German Wings crash in France as soon as possible. Because flying scares some people enough.

1. It’s Tuesday, March 24, 2015. It’s starting to warm up a little in New York. Maybe the worst is over. Maybe.

2. Having three of my potential Final Four teams knocked out, I’m not going to win the pool I’ve entered (although Wisconsin, my pick to win it all, remains alive). But I still don’t want Kentucky to run the table.

3. Here’s what I told my news editing class yesterday: In any career you have, your success is shaped by mentors — people who’ve been there and show you not only how to do your job, but how to enjoy what you do and conduct yourself as a professional.

I’ve had several, but one of the most important was Marv Schneider, whose memorial service I attended yesterday.

Marv was with The Associated Press for more than 40 years. I met him when I joined the AP’s broadcast wire — a newswire written specifically for radio and TV stations — in 1976.

Marv was the main night sports writer. Eventually, I was his No. 2. We spent eight hours together four nights a week, and talked about everything as we waited for the first East Coast night games to end. Sports, of course, because that was our job. But family life, food, politics, personalities and our jobs.

He was a devoted union man, partly because he wanted to get provide for his family as well as possible, but also because he saw it as a way to help the people he cared about, his colleagues in the newsroom.

Marv was also the unlikely radio voice of AP Sports in New York. Unlikely because there was nothing about Marv’s booming, New York-accented voice that said radio newsman in that day and age. And yet, he was amazing — he gave the AP a presence that stood out from every other news organization, and his voice was known across the United States.

I hadn’t seen him in many years — that, alas, is also something that happens. People shuffle jobs – I worked in six different places after I left the AP in 1983, with the 16 years I spent at CNN the longest and last stop. I moved out of the city and was involved in bringing up two children. But Facebook, for all its drawbacks, was where you could still keep in touch with people, and Marv, even in his 80s, was on there.

I’m saddened by his departure. But I smile when I think of all our conversations, all the kindnesses he showed me.

I still believe good people don’t really die. They live in those whose lives they touch — in a word or phrase they use that they wouldn’t otherwise, in the way they think about their jobs and the people in their lives. In that way, Marv is a part of hundreds of news professionals who worked with him, as well as his family and friends. That’s another reason to smile.

1. Today is Thursday, March 19, 2015. For Italians, and especially those with Sicilian roots, it’s St. Joseph’s Day. So buona festa di San Giuseppe!

2. It will come as a complete shock to anyone living on the I-95 corridor from Philadelphia northward. But this, according to the National Climactic Data Center, was the warmest winter since record-keeping began. That’s despite the fact that the snow cover last month was well above average. Living in New York is supposed to have its advantages — clearly that wasn’t the case this winter. 

3. I’m a fan of President Obama. But I’m disappointed in him today. Picking unbeaten Kentucky to win the NCAA men’s basketball tournament has no distinction — it’s front-running and will be totally unsatisfying should, in fact, Kentucky win the tournament.                                          

If you’re from Kentucky or went to the school, I understand picking the Wildcats. Otherwise, why? Face it, you really want someone else to win. If enough of us believe in someone else, I’m convinced someone else will win.

Since Northwestern remains unable to crack this tournament, I’m picking fellow Big Ten school Wisconsin for national champ. And I think my daughter’s alma mater, Maryland, will celebrate its first Big Ten season with the giant-killing victory over Kentucky.

4. There apparently are more fans of President Obama than you might have thought. A new CNN/ORC poll shows that 50% of Americans believe his time in office has been a success. The percentage thinking it’s been a failure is 47 — seemingly, Republicans’ favorite number, as in Mitt Romney’s infamous speech and the senators who signed that dopey letter to Iran.

If anything, I think history will be kinder. The forces working against this man have been overwhelming. And yet, he has been undaunted. 

5.   The president is floating the idea of mandatory voting. Many countries have that. My first thought is that it wouldn’t work in the United States because of the nature of the people who don’t vote. They don’t know much, and are proud of it. So I suspect that if people were required to vote, we’d see a lot of votes for cartoon characters such as Mickey Mouse, Goofy and Donald Trump. 

1. It’s Wednesday, March 18, 2015.

2. The first full day of spring is Saturday. However, it’s a cold, blustery day here in the New York area, and there’s a chance of measurable snow this weekend. I’m sure winter will end someday. Hopefully before next winter starts.

3. When people vote, whether it’s here in the United States or in a country such as Israel, they can do it one of two ways: they can vote their hopes or they can voted their fears.

“Hope” seems to be a word alien to Benjamin Netanyahu, except when he hopes for his own political survival. There was not a trace of hope in his speech to the U.S. Congress warning that any deal President Obama makes to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons will be a bad one.        

And in the election campaign just concluded, he offered no hope that Israel will find the peace it deserves. Instead, he reneged on his pledge to consider some form of self-government for Palestinians, and told his countrymen that Arab citizens of Israel were conspiring against him.

This might explain some of the animosity between Netanyahu and President Obama: The American president sees problems to be solved. The Israeli prime minister sees solutions to be feared.

A plurality of Israelis voted their fears and not their hopes on Tuesday, just as Americans voted their fears in November when they let meatballs such as Tom Cotton have a voice in the U.S. Senate. That’s sad, but it’s how these things work.

Those of us who hope can only hope for the best — that the United States and the group of five nations reach an acceptable agreement with Iran, and those who are afraid that such an agreement is a better alternative than a war.

1. It’s Tuesday, March 17, 2015. It’s St. Patrick’s Day. Spring is four days away. How can any of that be bad?

2. It can be bad if it’s raining and in the 40s. One of these days, the greater New York area is going to have a breakout spring day. The temperature will be in the 60s, the sun will be out and the wind will be manageable. I’m opening a bottle of Champagne when that happens.

3. Happy St. Patrick’s Day to all those who are Irish and celebrate. People of Irish ancestry have a heritage in which they should be proud. Today is a day to recognize it.

4. Israel is voting today. Would love to see Netanyahu lose. Love it. There are people in the world determined to foul it up — he seems like one of them. We’ll know more later in the day. 

5. A new CNN/ORC poll shows that two-thirds of Americans want direct negotiations to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons. Which is why “coward” is a better way to describe the 47 Republicans in the Senate who signed that ridiculous letter. They refuse to say that they’re willing to go to war, using your kids.

The American people are also very trusting — a plurality doesn’t think the Republican letter did any damage to the negotiations. Let’s hope they’re right.

6. People who use their brains to think are lamenting the latest stupidity they’ve seen on Fox News: a discussion about whether a Boston-area school district is using the snowiest winter in history as an excuse to get rid of religious holidays. 

So I have a question for people who use their brains to think: Why would you waste a second of a life that’s too short to begin with watching Fox News? Who do you think you’re saving, or informing, by flagging the flatulence?

You can’t help the people who watch Fox News, because if they were people who use their brains to think, they would watch something more enlightening —a test pattern or static, for instance. The show on which the discussion took place has as its premise the scariness that one man faces when on a set with several women.

Let’s face facts, folks. Fox News is a nether world of fear, conspiracy, anger, and bright flashing red and yellow warning graphics. Those who enter that world usually do so whole heartedly (actually, that’s a bad choice of words, because that’s assuming they have hearts) because they are as scared and angry as the people they see on TV.

You’re not going to change Fox News. And there’s no point in trying. It thrives on your indignation.

So don’t bother. Let people think that there are academic elites in Boston who saw 108 inches of snow as a dream come true to stifle religious liberty. Let people think Barack Obama was born in Kenya and became president to get back at America for whatever reason went through his Muslim-warped mind. Let people think that Christmas is in danger of being — I don’t know what, but someone’s at war with it.

It’s almost spring. Somehow, spring seems like the complete antithesis of Fox News.

1. It’s Monday, March 16, 2015. It’s five days until spring.

2. I’m a sad Mets fan this morning after the news that starting pitcher Zack Wheeler needs Tommy John surgery to repair a tear in his elbow. You would think there’s some way to prevent this injury and the surgery that takes more than a year of recovery. And you would also wonder why this happens so much to the Mets.

I do hope Wheeler, should he go through with the surgery, has a speedy recovery; I’m looking forward to seeing him pitch when the Mets defend their world championship in 2016.

3. The problem with doing NCAA brackets this year is that, if you use your head, there’s no way to pick against Kentucky. The Wildcats are unbeaten. One game went to overtime. Most of the rest were blowouts.

Here’s the problem: I don’t like Kentucky.

Maybe it’s that I’m old enough to remember the Adolph Rupp years, when he would have nothing to do with African-American athletes. Maybe it’s the fact that it’s a basketball factory. Maybe it’s because it wins and it’s not in the Big Ten (although I really don’t like Ohio State, either).

Anyway, every time I do one of the brackets for any of the umpteen contests out there, I keep having Maryland, my daughter’s alma mater and no angel itself, knock off Kentucky in the regional semifinals.

So do I want to throw my $5 away and pick against the team that is, far and away, the odds-on favorite to win? Or do I see casting my dollar vote against the juggernaut as somehow finding a way to stop it from ultimate victory?

Go Terps! And, overall, Go Wisconsin!

4.   Speaking of the NCAAs, John Oliver was back on target last night. As much as I love the basketball tournament, there’s something grossly unfair about the way these athletes are treated.

Oliver pointed out some of the silly restrictions the players face — how, for instance, one student was suspended because a coach bought him a meal prior to a flight for a bereavement trip home. Then, on the other hand, there’s the hypocrisy of a coach getting $3 million a year saying that paying athletes would feed into the entitlement society.

The “Last Week Tonight” piece makes the NCAA hoopla seem more like a guilty pleasure. But it also makes another point. There’s nothing wrong with the tournament itself; it’s the unfairness of the system around it that’s troublesome. Those things can, and should, be fixed. And they can be fixed without the sacrifice of anything, including the lucrativeness, of the tournament.

5.   I hadn’t really been interested in HBO’s “The Jinx.” But now that I know how it ends, I’m a little curious.

6.   Bob Schieffer seemed really ticked off when he asked the wizard who came up with the Senate Republican letter to Iran, Cotton, if he planned to send letters to North Korea or anybody else. Cotton tried to smile it off. He still managed to look like a doofus.

1. Today is Thursday, March 12, 2015. Winter is 90% over.

2. Two things about e-mail.

First, and this is no apology for Hillary Clinton, but e-mail doesn’t work right. When I worked at CNN, I considered myself on top of things when there were fewer than 1,000 items in my inbox. I know people who have tens of thousands of items in there.

E-mail has been abused, and not just by the spammers trying to sell you Wen and miracle fat blockers. It’s abused by merchants from whom you buy stuff, because not only do they send you e-mail, but they have affiliates who send it out as well. And going through the trouble of unsubscribing to everything is just a hassle, and sometimes leads to even more e-mail.

I don’t know what the solution is. Sometimes, there’s something in there you need. But the amount of time people lose killing e-mail from their inbox could be better used solving real problems.

3.   Second: I know that, as an adjunct professor teaching news editing, I have to abide by AP style. But it’s e-mail, not email. The latter looks like a relative of the snail family, or a title one might see in the Middle East.

1. It’s Wednesday, March 11, 2015. Sorry this is late.

2. If 47 Republican senators had any guts at all, here is the letter they would send to the leaders of Iran:            

Dear Ayatollah Khameini:                                                                                                         

We, the undersigned members of the United States Senate, don’t want to negotiate a deal that keeps you from getting nuclear weapons.

Instead, we’d rather send our military to war against your country than make an agreement with your ilk.

We don’t know what the black guy in the White House is thinking, but he doesn’t speak for us. We’re ready to rumble. Whatcha got?

Regards, Tom Cotton and 46 other morons who are ready to be the first ones, along with our sons and daughters, and grandsons and granddaughters, to fight this holy crusade against you heathens.

Not one of these people who rail against a possible deal with Iran, including Benajmin Netanyahu, has the nerve to say out loud: Let’s use U.S. troops to stop them. It’s easy. Just march into Tehran. Or bomb it — John McCain can sing his little ditty again.

They’re afraid to do that because there’s no support whatsoever for an American military strike on Iran. The American people don’t want war with Iran, and especially if it’s believed there could be a better solution.

A better solution is what President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry are seeking in their negotiations. It’s not going to be perfect. But it’s the best way to prevent a crisis in the region, and to keep Israel safe.

Which leads to the second way these Republicans display their gutlessness. It’s easier to try to block a deal before it’s made than to vote against one. If they did reject it, they would then face voters who would rather not see their sons and daughters die in a Persian desert.

For Americans, the Iranians are not lovable. But going to war isn’t what we do for sport or on impulse. The brazen nature of the Republican letter is a disgrace.

3.    I know I’m going to vote for Hillary Clinton on Nov. 8, 2016. But days such as yesterday don’t help her cause.

And the reason is nailed by Frank Bruni in The New York Times: You just get the sense she’s annoyed by this controversy that she herself created. 

She seemed dismissive of the questions about why she used her personal e-mail account for official State Department business. And the idea that just saying she wanted to carry only one device doesn’t impress someone who used to carry four and didn’t have the entourage that follows the Secretary of State.

If Ms. Clinton wants to put this thing behind her, she would take the advice of my former colleague, Lisa DesJardins of the PBS Newshour, and go full Arnold Vinnick. For those who aren’t “The West Wing” fans, Vinick — played by Alan Alda — was the senator from California who, in one episode, answers every single question a reporter asks him in a news conference. He doesn’t dismiss anything. 

That’s what Chris Christie did, somewhat, when the George Washington Bridge scandal erupted. It put that controversy aside for at least a while.

Mrs. Clinton has been a key American political figure for almost a quarter century. She should know that no one — especially the Republicans — are giving her a free ride to 1600 Pennsylvania. If she wants — if she really wants it — she needs to tackle these things head on, and with gusto.