The winners and the losers

• Winner: It's been about a decade since Utahns felt like celebrating being No. 2. Unlike watching the Jazz lose to the Chicago Bulls in the finals, however, this week's Forbes.com report ranking Utah second in the nation for business didn't leave anyone feeling bitter or depressed.

And, just as with the Jazz in the late '90s, this second-place ranking has come two years in a row. If second place really does mean, as Avis used to say, that we try harder, then Utahns have good reason to be bullish about the future.

• Loser: An attack this week on a Kearns boy using a four-sided medieval battle ax raises all sorts of questions. The victim needed about 300 stitches and is in critical condition. Police say he's lucky he wasn't decapitated.

The good news is police arrested two men they believe were responsible for the crime. The bad news? For starters, how about the reality that some people along the Wasatch Front carry medieval weapons?

• Winner: We doubt the first human visitors to this part of the world were as happy to discover ice, as NASA was this week on Mars. That's especially true if they also discovered an inversion.

The spacecraft's name, Phoenix, is a bit ironic, as well. Any Martian visitors who happened upon a place by that name on this planet wouldn't be able to make a similar find, unless they checked the ice box by the pool.

But this discovery certainly is intriguing, and it ought to regenerate excitement for the nation's space program.

• Loser: It's bad enough that the Salt Lake County Jail has begun releasing serious criminals because of overcrowding, but the news this week that a paperwork error caused authorities to release a man who rammed a police car and had numerous outstanding warrants is simply unacceptable.

Apparently, each unit involved in the arrest thought the other would file formal charges, but none did. Now they have a new warrant and are looking for him again. We hope they catch him before his rap sheet grows any longer.

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