sam's notes

2006-07-24T08:53:00.000-07:00

....I've moved. Please update blogrolls.

I was playing around with inserting images, so some of the posts don't have much to do with anything. But I'll leave them up anyway.

2006-07-22T15:53:00.000-07:00

....When it's your time.......

"......A 42-year-old woman on her way to Mexico for a vacation was killed about 5 a.m. today when her SUV was struck by an unattended tractor trailer that rolled onto Interstate 85.

"The truck rolled more than 1,000 feet down Cox Road, crossed the off ramp, then went down an embankment before breaking through a guard rail and entering southbound traffic. Maria Raquel Alvarez Gallardo of Cameron in Harnett County died at the scene, police said...."

.......it's your time

....."A man who is legally blind accidentally shot and killed his wife while trying to balance a plate of fried chicken and a pistol, authorities said......."

2006-07-21T16:16:00.000-07:00

....They don't know what they've missed.....But there's still time, because tomorrow's time trial will decide the Tour de Fance, although there's a slim chance Sunday's ceremonial stage could have the final say.

Interesting that the article on the Tour's ratings without Armstrong note the decline in France, where an average audience of 37.7 percent watched the race in the first 15 days of the tour compared with 44.7 percent a year earlier.

We know damn well the French weren't tuning in to pull for Armstrong. Must have been like watching the Yankees in the playoffs. We watch and pray they lose.

2006-07-21T15:16:00.000-07:00

........Interesting discussion over at Cone’s on North Carolina’s now-unconstitutional cohabitation law. Guarino’s getting his two cents’ worth in. I’d rush to his defense, but he does pretty good by himself.

Thing is, there’s a law forbidding just about every other personal choice in this country, with only more to come. Mind you, the TRC hasn’t come right out and said there ought to be a law requiring every Greensboro citizen to read the report, but they probably don't think it's a bad idea, either.

The fundamental debate over any law governing personal choice is over whom the law does or doesn’t impact. Motorcycle and seat belt laws are perfect examples. Opponents say it’s their business if they kill themselves; proponents argue that when opponents don’t finish the job, society’s stuck with the medical bills. (Although I’m sure Big Ben picked up his tab.)

Guarino’s simply arguing that cohabitation does, in many cases, harm innocent third parties: kids. It’s a reasonable argument, and who in their right mind wouldn’t support any measure to protect kids, even if it technically infringes on the rights of the childless?

My girlfriend certainly would. I’ve never actually heard Dr. Laura advocate for cohabitation laws. She just preaches that cohabitation is the poorest personal choice a woman can make, especially when children are involved. It just comes naturally after taking hundreds and hundreds of calls from women wondering why their kids are messed up while they’re all shacked up with some strange dude.

2006-07-20T09:41:00.000-07:00

.....A nice spread, cold beer, pretty ladies, Rep. Harrison.

Looks like a good time.

2006-07-20T09:17:00.000-07:00

.....Why Wal-Mart works.......

Federal judge Frederick Motz overturns Maryland law requiring the retailer to spend 8 percent of its payroll on employee health care costs.

Great quote, from Terry Lierman, chairman of the Maryland Democratic Party:

"Judge Fred Motz is clearly more worried about Wal-Mart's bottom line than the bottom line of average working families in Maryland."

Somehow I think Judge Motz has more to worry about than Wal-Mart's bottom line.

2006-07-19T18:22:00.000-07:00

....Correction..... this the man who was wearing the yellow jersey......

2006-07-19T10:19:00.000-07:00

......I think this guy forgot something: Support for the arts. Everyone knows liberals support artists while conservatives are constantly censoring them through cuts in funding.

As it turns out, the N.Y. Times addressed the issue of conservative artists with a look at documentary filmmakers.

As it turns out, there a few conservative documentaries out there to counter the many liberal documentaries that have been released in recent years.

But why aren't there more?

Director Wash Westmoreland:

“The origin of the word conservative is about not changing, accepting what is. And that’s never a very interesting thing to make a film about. The thing that drives you to make a documentary is seeing it as a way to social change. Societies with little conflict tend not to make interesting art.”

But the article goes on......

"The notion that conservatism is essentially static would probably come as a surprise to some of the exuberant right-leaning thinkers who have upended the talk-radio world......"

True. And it's been working to a great degree as conservatives gradually have been countering the mainstream media message that our country is constantly going to hell. I know there are filmmakers out there who aren't content with accepting what is......

2006-07-19T09:38:00.000-07:00

.....This is the man wearing the yellow jersey:

"..... Landis is slow. He walks with a limp. He sits as often as possible and cannot cross his right leg over his left. He takes elevators instead of stairs, valet-parks at the shopping mall and sometimes has difficulty sleeping. Running is out of the question. Like many of the 216,000 Americans who will receive hip replacements this year, his life is defined by chronic, debilitating pain."

2006-07-18T10:56:00.000-07:00

....Kruk said the Braves should go ahead and deal John Smoltz.

2006-07-17T22:39:00.000-07:00

......Yet another hiatus....What can I say, I've had projects to finish and places to be.....Longer days mean more time spent outside, which in turns means I don't have much to say when it's all over.

And what's to say? Hoggard had it right over at Guarino's when he told the fellas to carry on the horn-locking over various functions of the anus and the mouth.

Hey, we're on the verge of World War III anyway, so that matter might come up before a higher court real soon. And if all that's not bad enough, we're not far away from another November 3 in Greensboro.

Speaking of courts, gay marriage has taken a hit in the courts recently, most notably Nebraska's ban, which was approved by 70 percent of voters in 2000.

James Dobson said it best:

"This ruling is a textbook example of how courts should discharge their duties to interpret laws, not make them. The judges showed respect for the will of the 70 percent of Nebraskans who voted six years ago to keep marriage defined as the union of one man and one woman, noting in their decision that they were `highly deferential' to those who approved the amendment."

Other notes:

The N&R could use more articles and columns about family life.....

I'm damn glad I watched the replay World Cup final given everything that's been written about the Zadane head-butt. I would have felt left out....

The great Mel Allen spent some of his childhood here in Greensboro, according to a 1962 Sports Illustrated piece that's part of this collection......

The Reds may have fixed their bullpen problems. But now the Cardinals are playing well, though they stumbled tonight against the Braves....

2006-07-12T08:44:00.000-07:00

Major league shake-up in postseason baseball telecasts……

Fox announced yesterday that it would likely carry only one League Championship Series in 2007, slashing its annual rights fee from $417 million to $257 million.

The reason? Fox is tired of having to delay its fall primetime lineup to televise baseball:

“Fox’s new deal is a reflection of its growing success in prime time, where the network has finished No. 1 the last two seasons among adults 18 to 49. It shed the division series, and at best, will have a part of the other L.C.S., giving Fox’s prime time more nights to showcase its fall season.”

Who would televise the other LCS? TBS, home of the Braves:

“TBS, the onetime superstation created by Ted Turner, might swoop in to buy the second L.C.S., the first time that one of baseball’s semifinals would not appear on broadcast television, but negotiations have not ended.”

Here’s the future, baseball fans:

“With more postseason games going to cable and the prospect of an L.C.S. leaving broadcast television, baseball appears to be following the model of the National Basketball Association, which increased its rights fees by shifting more of its games to cable in 2002. Cable networks like ESPN and TNT, which share N.B.A. rights, have revenue streams from cable subscribers and advertisers, giving them a major advantage over ad-supported broadcasters.”

Is it possible that, one day, the World Series will be not televised by a major network?

2006-07-11T09:09:00.000-07:00

......Quite the cultured denial from an uncultured futbol player...

Marco Materazzi on the comments that prompted Zinedine Zidane's head-butt:

"I did insult him, it's true. But I categorically did not call him a terrorist. I'm not cultured and I don't even know what an Islamic terrorist is."

If he says so.

2006-07-10T09:21:00.000-07:00

.....No money in Tanglewood:

"The expenses at Tanglewood Park are expected to exceed its revenues by nearly $2 million this year, according to the 2006-07 budget that the Forsyth County Board of Commissioners approved last month.

"That deficit would be its largest since the county took over the park's operations in 2000....

"Doug Joldersma, the park's general manager, defended Tanglewood and said it is unreasonable to expect a park to be profitable. Tanglewood generates more revenue than many other state and county parks.....

"The emphasis of the park should be on providing services to the community, not on financial profitability, Joldersma said."

I guess some things just aren't meant to generate a profit...parks, bus systems.....

2006-07-09T18:34:00.000-07:00

....Beaufort County in spotlight of Voting Rights Act debate, says the N&O:

"...A provision known as Section 5 expires in 2007. Its extension faces opposition from some Southern Republicans in the House of Representatives.

"Section 5 requires some Southern jurisdictions -- including 40 counties in North Carolina -- to get special approval from the U.S. Department of Justice before making any election changes. Those include everything from moving polling places to redrawing lines for school board or congressional districts. The requirement results in reams of paperwork that some officials say is burdensome and others see as necessary to ensure minority representation.

"The act helps determine how elections are conducted, whether districts are drawn to favor minority candidates, and where voters will cast their ballots......

"Beaufort County exemplifies the effects of the law and the continuing questions about minority voting rights. Of 66 local elected officials in the county, 11 are black (17 percent of the total). Blacks account for about 28 percent of the county population, according to a 2005 Census Bureau estimate."

My gut reaction is releasing the electoral system from the stranglehold of the federal bureaucracy will not restrict voter accessibilty but will improve it. Opinion Journal makes the same case in reaction to race-baiting in the N. Y. 11th District:

"Ironically, such rhetoric is one reason so few minorities are able to seek and win higher office. Once you're appealing to people on completely racial grounds in order to win a House seat, you have a hard time making the broader appeals necessary to win statewide.

"But don't expect any of this to matter as Congress ramrods through another extension of the provisions that feed these bad outcomes. A House vote is due any day, and the Senate is expected to follow sometime prior to the July 4 recess. Congress has never let balkanization of the electorate get in the way of protecting its own political hide, especially when it can claim to be siding with the 'voting rights' angels. "

2006-07-08T09:18:00.000-07:00

......Brief hiatus......Went to the dentist, packed little people off to Charlotte, had a big night at Fisher's, watched President Bush's news conference, saw The Break-Up (definitely a rental), took a few dips in Floyd Stuart's pool, watched the Reds break their losing streak, drank some beer.......

2006-07-05T10:40:00.000-07:00

....I spent some of July 4th holiday reading this:

"There was a period in this country, from the 30's through the 70's, in which government caring seemed to ease away some of the muck. We think of it as the Great Society, and we recall people and politicians who voiced hope for it without irony. It's clearer now that the middle class — the great force that made Dickens's England more benevolent — is in retreat. We are getting back to them and us, in a country that has earned little but shame in its foreign affairs. We are not liked, we are not trusted, we are not respected — and all those shortcomings are eroding our domestic souls. Katrina, that gust of nature, was the rehearsal for the revelation that 'they' now have neither the means nor the intent of looking after us. We are on our own, and we may need to find our on Sinclairs...."

......and this:

"James Carroll....sees the American half-century from the end of World War II to the fall of the Soviet Union not as a tale of hard-won triumph over an evil foe but as a nightmarish, paranoia-fueled sleepwalk from which we were darn lucky to have emerged in one piece."

Didn't let it ruin the party, though. I'm still cleaning up.

2006-07-04T10:35:00.000-07:00

.......I’m a little late on the Ann Coulter controversy….Still, there was an interesting discussion on O’Reilly about Coulter’s personal attacks on the Jersey Girls.

O’Reilly dismissed Coulter’s attacks, saying she was out of line to call the four 9/11 widows the “Witches of East Brunswick.” But he also noted that Coulter has some valid points that are being undermined by her shrill tone.

I didn’t know what to make of the Jersey Girls when they first started making the rounds on the TV news shows, mostly the Today Show, where Katie Couric, herself a widow, was more than sympathetic. But how can you not feel sympathy for the Jersey Girls? Their husbands went to work on what was supposed to be an average ordinary day and didn’t come home.

Grief is a very powerful motivator. But the tricky part, as we’ve seen right in Greensboro with the TRC, is when that motivation not only crosses into the political arena, but seeks accountability from people other than those directly responsible accountable for the catastrophic events responsible for that grief. That’s where the Jersey Girls opened themselves up for criticism.

Coulter can’t understand what makes the Jersey Girls so special when women are widowed every day in less spectacular fashion. Granted, the demise of your average American male doesn’t spark a worldwide war on terror. But mind you, the left made the point that dying in a terrorist attack is nothing special during the 2004 election, when the Bush administration was supposedly running a “campaign of fear.”

Here’s the bottom line: When you’re dead, you’re dead.

2006-07-03T09:02:00.000-07:00

.....NYT and me, part II.....

So I spent the weekend doing yardwork for my mother, getting up Sunday morning and driving back just in time to make it to my Sunday shift. But I was already looking ahead to the evening's activity: drinking a cold beer and reading the Times' sports section.

But when I got home, I noticed the the clear plastic covers that wrap the N&R, but the blue NYT bag was missing. I searched the porch and found nothing. My evening would be ruined. I hurriedly changed clothes, dug up the Times' customer service number, hopped in the car and began running through the options on my cell phone.

The last prompt informed me that no replacement paper would be available. I took a deep breath and figured the carrier had quit. That stuff happens.

Then I get home and start reading through the N&R. On Saturday's editorial page, Cal Thomas reamed the Times:

"Let the administration refuse to speak with Times reporters on grounds they cannot be trusted. For too long, the Bush administration has tried to play cozy with the media elites. It has gained them nothing. Times reporters should be publicly ridiculed and verbally flogged because they richly deserve it for giving aid and comfort to America's terrorist enemies."

Boy, would I have felt silly if I'd wrecked my car on the way to work.

2006-06-30T08:53:00.000-07:00

.....This N.Y. Times piece got me thinking about who this 'we' is......

I recently had an interesting discussion with my neighbor, who was discussing her 3-year-old son’s behavioral problems.

“And all this killing that’s going on, how they’re always talking on NPR about killing Zarqawi when you’re riding in the car. It’s not good for kids.”

“How about the kids who are not only hearing it on the radio but hearing their father in the front seat cheering that we finally got that bastard?” I asked.

She got the joke. But as I thought later about my reply, I realized that “we” didn’t do anything. “They,” being our soldiers in Iraq, took care of Zarqawi. “I” didn’t do anything.

Still later I was still bothered by one comment thread where a couple of bloggers were going at it over the war. On a couple of different occasions, the war opponent questioned the supporter on whether or not he had ever worn our country’s uniform. The supporter indeed said he had.

But that’s not the point. What bothered me is the implication that dissent can be unqualified but support can only legitimately come from veterans. But all citizens can choose to oppose or support our leader’s policies, right?

But the collective “we” extends to other matters of goody-goody public policy and social change. The biggest example, of course, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission report. They’ve done their jobs and produced a fine product that will hopefully be studied by many interested scholars. But many insist that “we” will learn much from the report, that “we” will deal with the Klan-Nazi killings. But just as “I” didn’t help take care of Zarqawi, “I” don’t need to deal with something that happened 25 years ago.

2006-06-29T09:10:00.000-07:00

....Reason's Jacob Sullum disputes the surgeon general's report on secondhand smoke here and here:

"Because the doses absorbed by non-smokers exposed to secondhand smoke are much smaller than those absorbed by smokers, any health risks would be so small that it is difficult to confirm them in studies comparing, say, the spouses of smokers with the spouses of non-smokers. The weak, statistically insignificant associations typically found in such studies are consistent with a low-level risk.....

"Whether secondhand smoke is a health hazard or merely a nuisance, people who want to avoid it can do so by avoiding businesses that allow smoking. A free society that respects diversity should make room for people with different preferences."

I'm not a cigarette smoker, but I'm never bothered by people smoking in my presence. I've never figured out how secondhand smoke is so dangerous when "firsthand" smoke doesn't even kill everyone. Look around and you see a lot of geriatrics still puffing away.

2006-06-28T10:11:00.000-07:00

..It was Jeff Torborg....

I've noticed these days that just about every major-league catcher (with the exception of Mike Piazza) leave their masks on when taking a throw from the field. When I was a kid, catchers tossed the mask to ready up for a plate at the plate.

I'd always wondered how the trend got started. I also noticed while watching the CWS that it didn't extend to college catchers. So why were they less worried about getting their faces smashed than major league catchers, who have the money for plastic surgery?

So I'm watching the Yankees- Braves game and there's a play at the plate. The Yankees' Jorge Posada is one of those guys who leaves his mask on. The throw got away from him, and Marcus Giles scored.

During the replay, Torborg noted that Posada had left his mask on.

"I taught that," Torborg said. You're supposed to see pitches with the mask on, anyway, why not throws from the field, he reasoned.

But when I played catcher, I was easier to keep an eye on the runner barreling down the third base line with the mask off.

Not that I'm saying I know more about catching than Jeff Torborg. I knows a thing or two. He only caught one of the best-pitched games in baseball history.

I guess catching Koufax would make a backstop aware that the mask isn't necessarily a tool of ignorance.

2006-06-27T10:13:00.000-07:00

....The Today Show interviewed a psychologist to find out what makes men grumpy.

The three major factors:

Too much work..

Getting old...

Not enough sex.

Brilliant.

2006-06-27T08:15:00.000-07:00

......Surprise....Rocker says MLB's sensitivity training is just a bunch of Jay Mariotti.......

2006-06-26T10:41:00.000-07:00

......Timothy Leary's Dead.....

Two reviews of the new biography on LSD guru, one from Reason's Nick Gillespie and the other from Luc Sante in the NYT.

Sante concludes his review with a less-than-glamorous perspective on The Sixties:

"....the book provides a crash course in several aspects of 60's culture: its often gaseous rhetoric, its reliance on mahatmas and soothsayers, its endless bail-fund benefits and sometimes dubious appeals to conscience, its thriving population of informers, its contribution to the well-being of lawyers, its candyland expectations and obstinate denials of reality, its fatal avoidance of critical thinking, its squalid death by its own hand. That still leaves many meritorious elements largely outside Leary's sphere: civil rights, the antiwar movement, music and art, the impulse toward communitarianism, to name a few. In part because of Leary, however, ideals and delusions were encouraged to interbreed, their living progeny being avid consumerism and toothless dissent."

2006-06-26T09:23:00.000-07:00

......Which is the real Friar's Club?

"Two once-related branches of the century-old fraternal organization of entertainers, a group that has counted as members the most famous jokesters ever, from Milton Berle to Whoopi Goldberg, from Will Rogers to Robin Williams, are locked in a bitter legal and financial battle rivaling the infamous bicoastal rap war of a decade ago, except this one is being fought with roast-quality insults and expensive lawyers instead of rap songs and bullets."

The West Coast posse says that when a club roasts a guy like Jerry Lewis, as the N.Y. Friar's Club recently did, then it's definitely passed its prime.

Still, a good rim shot from Jeffrey Ross:

"Why are so so bloated? You look like you drowned four days ago."

Yeah, I know Lewis recently had a heart attack. And that's the point, says Jack Carter, veteran comedian and L.A. Friar:

"You're in trouble when you have to roast a guy who's going to have a heart attack on the way home."

2006-06-24T08:26:00.000-07:00

....RIP Aaron Spelling, a true American success story:

"Mr. Spelling himself, though a self-effacing and extremely shy man in private, put his own vast wealth on display in the late 1980's when he and his wife, Candy, supervised the construction of their home in the Holmby Hills section of Los Angeles. The structure, which like his shows drew mostly scathing reviews, eventually contained 123 rooms over about 56,000 square feet. It was said to include a bowling alley, an ice rink and an entire wing devoted to his wife's wardrobe.

"He defended the ostentation by saying he had worked hard for his success and had risen from truly dire conditions....."

My favorite Spelling episode? Without a doubt, the two-hour season-opener of Charlie's Angels when the angels go to Hawaii to rescue Charlie. No explanation necessary.

Then there's the episode of The Love Boat when Doc befriends a geriatric couple. The old lady falls down stairs and Doc has to perform emergency surgery right there on the boat. I won't ruin the ending....

2006-06-24T07:26:00.000-07:00

....Guarino on the Miami seven:

"This episode....illustrates that our enemies do not care about the amount of time that has elapsed since 9/11. Patience and persistence on their part will inevitably lead to some major disruptive terrorist attacks on our soil, unless we possess enough political fortitude to prevent it."

2006-06-23T17:18:00.000-07:00

.....Bush is a Communist......

I don't know why I even bother listening NPR. Hannity wasn't on, not that I think he's that great, anyway. So I switched over to NPR just to prove tomyself that I'm an open-minded individual.

My open-mindedness was rewarded with a 10-minute story bashing President Bush. It led with a discussion on Bush's speech in Hungary, which made mention of the 1956 uprising:

"The desire for liberty is universal. In 1956, the Hungarian people suffered under a Communist dictatorship and domination by a foreign power. They called for an end to dictatorship, to censorship, and to the secret police."

But Bush's speech didn't impress Charles Gati, professor of European studies at Johns Hopkins. Something was missing from the president's speech: an apology. For what? The United States' inaction 50 years ago as Soviet tanks rolled through Budapest. Seems like I've heard this before.

Then there was commentary from Peter Klein, who compared insurgents in Hungary to insurgents in — you guessed it — Iraq. So logic dictates that if insurgents in Iraq are like insurgents in Hungary, then the U.S. is like the Soviet Union.

This is the Dixie Chicks in reverse. Natalie Maines criticized Bush while she was on foreign soil. This time the president was on foreign soil and Gati was criticizing him from home.

Is it too much to ask that we support our leader while he's abroad? Is it not remotely possible he was in Hungary to help make the world a better place?

2006-06-23T06:54:00.000-07:00

....MLB sentences Ozzie Guillen to sensitivity training.

Somehow I doubt this is the first time a manager or ballplayer has called a sportswriter a fag. Surely Jay Mariotti knew this, considering the fact that he freely chose to immerse himself in a hyper-masculine culture. What did he expect when he decided to spend his life hanging out with rich, half-naked jocks?

Still, the sports media are enraged.

Mariotti colleague Greg Couch writes "What matters is the man who most stands for this organization is throwing around such nasty and hurtful homophobic terms. The issue here is not Mariotti," while ESPN's Mark Kriedler writes "Go get him, Chicago. Drag him out of the dugout if you have to. Call it an intervention if it makes you feel better. But get it done."

But ESPN's Gene Wojciechowski adds some insight into the attitudes many sportswriters carry into the clubhouse:

"Two seasons ago I saw Guillen take a seat on the dugout bench, only to discover he was sitting on a local newspaper, with the page opened to the mug shot of a female columnist. Guillen cracked wise about the location of his rear end and her mug shot. I remember wincing. There were a few forced chuckles, but nobody wrote about it."

OK, while that might not be "funny ha-ha," it wouldn't make me wince, either, and I consider myself a relatively normal, sensitive guy. So the way I see it, when politically-correct sportswriters not only interact with ballplayers but criticize them, inevitiably the ballplayers will fight back with some not-so-fancy words. We are talking ballplayers here, not President Bush, who has also used choice words when describing members of the media.

Adding fuel to the fire is the fact that Mariotti criticizes the White Sox but doesn't interact with them. A major spark was Mariotti's column blaming A.J. Pierzynski for the crosstown brawl, when anyone watching on TV could clearly see Pierzynski made a clean play and Michael Barrett was the instigator. (Every link I've tried on Mariotti's column kick me to yesterday's.) Pierzynski addressed the issue on Pardon the Interruption, noting that he's never seen Mariotti in the clubhouse.

For what it's worth, the Chicago Sports Review's Chris Sprow uses some Shelby Steele to put the issue into perspective:

"In his illuminating book 'White Guilt', Shelby Steele discussed the nature of evolving social morality. He uses two examples. In the first, he wonders why Bill Clinton had no trouble in the approval ratings when he had his unzipped run-in with Monica Lewinsky. As a contrast, when Steele was growing up in Chicago, he recalls a common assumption that President Eisenhower had used the word 'nigger' in an unflattering manner with friends or aides. Ike of course served out two terms successfully, just like Clinton.

"How did these seemingly horrific decisions not cripple either politician?

"Steele comess to the conclusion that Eisenhower could never possibly survive admitted sexual infidelity in the White House during the 1950's, but a common slip of the tongue with racist overtones was widely accepted during that time. It was an age of racism. Further, Bill Clinton could survive the sexual infidelity in the 90's -- a time of growing sexual proliferation and acceptance -- but if the man had ever uttered the 'n' word, he wouldn't have survived the fallout.

"As Steele writes, 'So it was the good luck of each president to sin into the moral relativism of his era … Race simply replaced sex as the primary focus of America's moral seriousness.'

"And as much as the use of the term 'fag' to address somebody has long-since fallen under the headings of derogatory and not politically correct, Ozzie Guillen is sinning into the moral relativism of his era. In fact, he's sinning into the moral relativism of any era."

2006-06-22T11:10:00.000-07:00

.....Strange bedfellows.....

I finaly got around to reading up the Supreme Court's recent decision regarding the Army Corps of Engineers' enforcement of the Clean Water Act.

I believe that the ruling, which neither upheld nor rolled back the Corps' authority in issuing development permits, will lead to a more common-sense, case-by-case approach in defining exactly what a wetland is. A left-leaning friend of mine who develops property has expressed frustration at having to obtain permits from the Corps for "wetlands" that haven't held a drop of water in years.

But here are two very interesting paragraphs:

"The landmark 1972 environmental legislation gave federal regulators the power to control the discharge of pollutants into "navigable waters." On the theory that what gets dumped upstream eventually winds up downstream, the government has interpreted that term to include not only large lakes and rivers but also their smaller tributaries, including some ditches or stream beds that are dry for all or most of the year and wetlands near those tributaries.

"The Bush administration, backed by environmental organizations and more than 30 state governments, told the court that any narrower interpretation would cripple the Clean Water Act."

I repeat: "The Bush adminstration, backed by environmental groups........"

2006-06-20T10:40:00.000-07:00

....More coverage than you can handle of the Canes' Stanley Cup victory...

What impressed me was the way the fans remained standing throughout the game. Now that's getting involved. I've never understood paying good money for a sporting event or a concert only to sit on your ass for two hours. I can do that at home...

....Meanwhile, SI's Michael Farber breaks down the game most controversial play, the non-goal, non-penalty shot late in the first period:

"Oilers defenseman Steve Staios appeared to cover the puck with his body after it was in the net; an NBC replay during the intermission, blown up better than an Antonioni film, showed the puck clearly over the line. But league officials backed the official version of events, promulgated by director of officiating Stephen Walkom, that the play was dead when Staios deliberately batted the puck into the crease because a delayed penalty had been called down the ice on the Oilers' Ethan Moreau.

"Now maybe the situation would have seemed less muddled if referee Brad Watson didn't appear to signal for a penalty shot on the play, a Gordian knot -- or is that a Gordie Howe knot? -- that the league's replay gang unraveled to the satisfaction of basically no one except the Edmonton Oilers. If viewers flick the remote when NFL refs are under the hood for 90 seconds watching a peep-show style replay, the lengthy delay could have been a knee to the groin for a league that didn't need all that dead air. If viewers want to see someone talking on the phone interminably, they will check on their teenage daughter."

But if I understood NBC's John Davidson correctly, Staios covered the puck illegally in the net — which would normally result in a penalty shot. So the Canes got screwed on that call. No matter, though.

2006-06-19T09:50:00.000-07:00

.....Very interesting N.Y. Times article on air pollution in China resulting from its continued reliance on coal-fired power plants.

Most interesting is what the article says about air quality standards in the United States:

"...China is generating such enormous quantities of pollution that the effects are felt farther downwind than usual. Sulfur and ash that make breathing a hazard are being carried by the wind to South Korea, Japan and beyond.

"Not enough of the Chinese emissions reach the United States to have an appreciable effect on acid rain yet. But, they are already having an effect in the mountains in West Coast states. These particles are dense enough that, at maximum levels during the spring, they account at higher altitudes for a fifth or more of the maximum levels of particles allowed by the latest federal air quality standards. Over the course of a year, Chinese pollution averages 10 to 15 percent of allowable levels of particles. The amounts are smaller for lower-lying cities, like Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles.

"Unless Chinese regulators become much more aggressive over the next few years, considerably more emissions could reach the United States. Chinese pollution is already starting to make it harder and more expensive for West Coast cities to meet stringent air quality standards, said Professor (Steven) Cliff of the University of California, slowing four decades of progress toward cleaner air."

That said, a little Chinese coal dust is still better than a North Korean missle.

2006-06-18T21:21:00.000-07:00

.....As you know, I use humor (often unsuccessfully, many might argue) to mock the issues of the week. Just today, I was talking about how lucky it was that Ben Roethlisberger's face took the brunt of his motorcycle accident, as opposed to his knees or his throwing arm. He's not the most handsome gentleman in the NFL, anyway.

OK, that's not funny. But I heard something today onthe radio that had hundreds of audience members howling. But I couldn't see the humor.

It was the closing portion of NPR's of Wait Wait....Don't Tell Me!. To tell the truth, I like the show, because it lets me know if I'm monitoring the news as closely as I think I am. It even clues me on a thing or two I missed.

As the program closes, host Peter Segal picks a topic and asks members of the panel to comment quickly on what they think will happen. The topic was "Al Qaeda's" recent change in management." What policies would the new Al Qaeda management put forth?

I heard answers like (paraphrasing) 'a bring your daughter to work in a birka' would be created' and the 'position of spiritual adviser would be eliminated.' Again, the audience howled.

OK, I cheered Dr.Sanity on when she rounded up the buzzkills. But that was in reaction to the left's skeptical reaction to Zarqawi's death.

But if you remember, President Bush reacted with caution to Zarqawi's death. And I realize that the panel members on Wait...Wait probably felt like they were trying use humor to add some levity to what has been a difficult time for our country. But the way I see it, to joke about the demise of a gut like Zarqawi is far less a sin than casting Al Qaeda's "management style" in a humorous light. To do so shows a lack of sensibilty to the fact that they're our mortal enemy.

2006-06-16T21:33:00.000-07:00

.....So the past two nights, I'm hanging out on my sidewalk and I see a 1977 International Scout pulling down my street. The driver looks like this guy, only 30 years younger. Nice-looking girls riding along, too.

2006-06-16T10:33:00.000-07:00

.....Mushroom clouds....

Floyd Stuart highlights a theme I'm seeing among liberals these days. It makes wonder if they really think about what they're saying as they desperately search for a candidate that can win in 2008.

Graydon Carter, longing for an Al Gore run, in this month's Vanity Fair:

"For the aspiring presidential candidate, I offer the following big idea gratis. Announce a 21st-century Manhattan Project-like program, a sweeping initiative government, business, and academia, with a single goal: to invent a replacement for the internal-combustion engine."

So what did the Manhattan Project invent? The bomb.

Then, as Floyd points out, there's Peter Beinhart, who holds up Harry Truman as the model Democrats should follow, according to Joe Klein's N.Y. Times review of The Good Fight:

"The need for American restraint and humility was at the heart of Truman's liberalism. It was the most significant difference between cold war liberalism and conservatism — and it is the most difficult part of Beinart's agenda to sell to the American public today. "

But what did Truman do? He dropped the fucking bomb. He also committed U.S. troops to a foreign war that lasted as long as the war Iraq, but with a significantly higher casualty rate.

Maybe it's just me, but these are very odd analogies borne from a sense of confusion.

2006-06-15T18:23:00.000-07:00

...North Dakota will sue the NCAA over the use of the Fighting Sioux nickname and Indian head logo:

"Following a 90-minute, closed meeting with Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem, the board voted 8-0 Thursday to authorize the lawsuit. Its motion specifies that the lawsuit be financed by privately raised funds rather than taxpayer money.

The NCAA has concluded that the Fighting Sioux nickname and Indian head logo are hostile and abusive to American Indians. UND may not use them during NCAA postseason tournaments, and it may not host a tournament if it continues using them, the NCAA has said.

Stenehjem described the decision as an edict delivered by an NCAA committee that used constantly changing standards in deciding which colleges could continue using nicknames of American Indian origin, and which could not.

The NCAA's constitution requires that major decisions be approved by two-thirds of its college membership, and no vote was ever taken, Stenehjem said."

The NCAA wouldn't think much of the state's highway markers, either.

2006-06-15T08:12:00.000-07:00

Hugh Hewitt blogger Mary Katherine Ham discusses her conversion from print work to blogging:

"After college, I covered news for a couple of years. There were things I loved and hated about it. I loved hard deadlines, watching sports for a living, writing every day, learning all about a new town, meeting its people and learning its quirks.

"I hated that the first-ever AP seminar I went to included a long discussion on when to change quotes, accounting for the political position, race and economic status of your subject. I was just waiting for someone to pull out some sort of slide-rule of political correctitude to help us make such decisions.

"I hated that one of the young reporters at the seminar lamented working in rural North Carolina and asked, unabashedly, 'What do you do when the people you cover are just, like, stupid?'

"It was this contempt the press has for its subjects and its readers that really turned me off. That contempt, in my experience, is amplified when reporters are dealing with political conservatives, but it tends to extend to everyone who’s not a trained journalist."

When I encountered liberal bias while working at a business newspaper, of all things, I knew it was real.

2006-06-14T11:37:00.000-07:00

.....N.Y. Times review of 'A/K/A Tommy Chong,' the documentary chronicling Tommy Chong's litigious battle of the bong.

The film "tells the depressing, often ridiculous and generally enraging story of how and why Mr. Chong, an extremely laid-back and genial camera presence, ended up doing time in the minimum-security Taft Correctional Institution in Taft, Calif. Written and directed by Josh Gilbert, a friend of the comedian, the 78-minute film taps a number of experts and supporters to fill out the larger story, including Eric Schlosser, the author of 'Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs, and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market.' Mr. Schlosser provides the film a much-needed dollop of historical and political context, while friends and colleagues like Lou Adler, the music impresario who directed Cheech and Chong's 1978 film 'Up in Smoke,' along with Bill Maher and Jay Leno, lend more emotional and outraged support."

I loved the scene in 'That 70s Show' when Hyde goes to work for Leo in the video store. If things went well enough, Hyde predicted, then Leo would soon be working for him.

"Hey man, can I have Saturday night off?" Leo asked.

2006-06-14T08:23:00.000-07:00

.....I watched with interest President Bush's news conference.

I initially thought the dumbest question regarded the message the president was sending to the Iraqi government by taking such extreme security measures before and during the trip to Baghdad.

But then a reporter stood and actually asked this question:

"Do you see any parallels between and Iraq and Viet Nam?"

What an angle.

2006-06-13T10:54:00.000-07:00

.....You don't know how bad I wanted last night's game, not so much for the Canes but to give myself some shred of credibility following my sweep prediction.

While watching the second period, I was worried the Canes were themselves being caned — coming up against a goalie who refused to anything through. The rushes, the stickwork and the passing were awesome, but Oilers goalie Jussi Markkanen kept making awesome saves. The fear, of course, was that the Oilers would get another bullshit goal like they did in Game 3.

But the stickwork finally prevailed.....ESPN Lindsay Berra breaks down the winning goal.

2006-06-12T08:32:00.000-07:00

.....OK, no sweep.

N&O:

"It is impossible to underestimate the difference between going down 3-0 and winning to keep it 2-1. The Oilers arrived at the rink Sunday feeling light and loose, the Hurricanes still steaming over the way they played, and a bunch of guys with Stanley Cup rings smiling from the rafters and hanging around the arena...."

2006-06-11T11:17:00.000-07:00

.....Perfect example..... The N&R's Ed Hardin psychoanalyzes soccer.

I don't need anybody to tell me why I hate soccer, especially the World Cup. It's a physical response for me. While watching the finals of the '94 Cup, I got drunker than I've ever been in my life. The mere sight of guys kicking a ball up and down the field recalls the next morning's hangover. It was late July, too, so you can imagine how I felt.

But I think I'm over it. I plan on watching the games with an open mind and a full stomach.

2006-06-09T14:20:00.000-07:00

....No doubt the King archives are priceless:

"....7,000 items in Dr. King's own hand, including a draft of his Nobel Prize acceptance speech, an annotated copy of "Letter From Birmingham Jail" and a program from the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta on which Dr. King scribbled notes for a speech about John F. Kennedy's assassination.

A blue spiral notebook contains a statement read to an Atlanta judge about why Dr. King chose to stay in jail after his arrest during a sit-in, and a note to the women arrested with him praising them for their faith in nonviolent methods, according to a news release from Sotheby's. "

Not to mention....

"....the papers considered the most interesting by scholars, including a trove of handwritten sermons, were found in Mrs. King's basement and have not been widely studied."

But everything has a price, and the $15-$30 million range is a bit steep.

ARL's Brian Schottlaender:

"I would be stunned if they could command that sort of price, and I would be even more stunned if they command that from a library."

But....

"How do you value the Martin Luther King papers? Good Lord, he was such a significant figure."

2006-06-09T10:06:00.000-07:00

......This month's sports biography: Jane Leavy's Sandy Koufax.

At the height of his career, Koufax encountered a new phenomenon: the liberal-touchy-feely sports media.

"In time, the excess of one era was replaced by another. Purple prose, underwritten by free food and free booze, gave way to sports page psychoanalysis. Sportswriters became interested as much in how players felt as in what they did.

"For athletes of Koufax's generation, the rules changed mid-game. Everything became fair game: adoption, divorce, marriage; remarriage, wife-swapping, wife-beating. Suddenly, ballgames were just not events but media events; and thanks to the Game of the Week and postseason play, ballplayers were TV stars, especially telegenic ones like Koufax."

2006-06-09T08:49:00.000-07:00

.....Dr. Sanity rounds up the buzzkills.

Add the N&R's Rosemary Roberts, who writes

"Except for the slaying of the Iraqi terrorist leader, it's been another lousy week for President Bush. American casualties in Iraq mounted, gas prices soared, the stock market slumped and his poll ratings plummeted."

Then there was the absolutely funereal music following NPR's coverage. I was expecting 'Stars and Stripes Forever.'

2006-06-08T08:25:00.000-07:00

.....Very busy Thursday....

2006-06-07T10:10:00.000-07:00

....Along with my excitement over the Canes' Stanley Cup hopes comes the Reds' six-game winning streak against their toughest division opponents, the Astros and the Cardinals.

Last night, the Reds got a great performance from Eric Milton. Note Milton's 2005 stats: 8-15, whopping 6.47 ERA, even-more-whopping 40 home runs allowed.

Milton's 2006 numbers (4-2, 4.14 ERA) are, needless to say, a vast improvement. But there's this perspective from Cardinals Jadier Molina, who knows a thing or two about pitchers:

"I think every time we were looking for a fastball he threw a changeup, and every time we were looking for a changeup, he threw a fastball. He's a great pitcher, one of the best in the National League."

This is very encouraging.

2006-06-07T09:55:00.000-07:00

....Via RantingProfs......Hitchens on Hadditha.....No, it's not My Lai........

Interesting perspective in this paragraph:

"Even before the fall of Baghdad in 2003, Saddam's foreign minister, Naji Sabry, wrote a memo about how to combat the increasing fraternization between advancing Americans and Iraqi civilians. Send some suicide bombers to the scene, he recommended, and force a wedge between the two. The Americans would then learn to distrust anyone who approached. As with the foul policy above, the awful thing about this charming policy is that it works. Which leads us to one very important conclusion: Any coalition soldier who relieves his rage by discharging a clip is by definition doing Zarqawi's work for him, and even in a way obeying his orders. If anything justifies a court-martial, then surely that does."

Hitchens concludes:

"There is no respectable way of having this both ways. Those who say that the rioters in Baghdad in the early days should have been put down more forcefully are accepting the chance that a mob might have had to be fired on to protect the National Museum. Those who now wish there had been more troops are also demanding that there should have been more targets and thus more body bags. The lawyers at Centcom who refused to give permission to strike Mullah Omar's fleeing convoy in Afghanistan—lest it by any chance be the wrong convoy of SUVs speeding from Kabul to Kandahar under cover of night—are partly responsible for the deaths of dozens of Afghan teachers and international aid workers who have since been murdered by those who were allowed to get away. If Iraq had been stuffed with WMD warehouses and stiff with al-Qaida training camps, there would still have been an Abu Ghraib. Only pacifists—not those who compare the Iraqi killers to the Minutemen—have the right to object to every casualty of war. And if the pacifists had been heeded, then Slobodan Milosevic, the Taliban, and Saddam Hussein would all still be in power—hardly a humanitarian outcome."

2006-06-06T10:34:00.000-07:00

....Claire Holmes' letter to the editor in this morning's N&R emphasizes my point regarding the GTA Task Force and SCAT.

Holmes writes:

"The task force wants regular bus riders to absorb a 10-cent increase per ride and SCAT riders to absorb $1.62 per ride? This is a rate-hike tsunami. The monthly cost of someone riding 60 times per month would increase from $35 to $132."

Exactly. The rate hike should be the other way around. Then GTA might make some money.

2006-06-06T10:00:00.000-07:00

....So why was Ty Conklin behind the net last night?

Hardin called it inexplicable, but OLN's John Davidson, a former NHL goaltender, said Conklin was right to clear the puck behind the net. He just blew the pass. And Rod Brind'Amour just has a knack for being in the right place at the right time.

I'm calling Canes sweep. I posted last week that the Oilers would be a worthy opponent, and obviously they are.

But I've watched a lot of seven-game series in my life, and trends indicate that when a team totally dominates Game 1 but lets it slip away, it sets a demoralizing tone for the rest of the series.

Dwayne Roloson's injury doesn't help the Oilers' cause, either. Then again, hot goalies come out of nowhere. Nobody's proved that more than the Canes.

2006-06-05T09:57:00.000-07:00

Mary Karr disses Updike and the Sinclairs:

".... I'm always astonished by the devotion to Updike. I think it's just from seeing his name in the New Yorker so relentlessly. I mean, no writer I know really values those books except the first one, "Rabbit Run," which I think is terrific. After that it became dilution. He certainly does make immaculate sentences, but so did Upton Sinclair and Sinclair Lewis, two mediocre novelists who are not a patch on Hemingway or Fitzgerald or Ralph Ellison."

The N&O's J. Peder Zane defends Lewis:

"Lewis may not inspire many contemporary writers or provide lecture material for college professors, but people still read 'Babbitt,' 'Elmer Gantry,' 'Main Street,' 'It Can't Happen Here' and so many other of Lewis' gems because they tell great stories about historic periods."

But how many novels since "Babbitt" have presented a main character disillusioned with modern life? The times change and the professions change, but the theme is the same: No matter what we've got, we're never happy.

2006-06-05T09:06:00.000-07:00

.......Carolina Hurricanes vs. Houston Oilers for the Stanley Cup.....

NYT profile on the Edmonton Oilers.

The Oilers, unlike the former Harford Whalers, resisted the Southern hockey migration, in the process weathering tough times north of the border before Cal Nichols stepped in:

"Fans in Edmonton knew what was happening. In 1995, the Quebec Nordiques became the Colorado Avalanche. In 1996, the Winnipeg Jets became the Phoenix Coyotes. Edmonton appeared to be next, and the season-ticket base fell to a low of 6,200.

"The league tried to prop up the remaining Canadian teams by offering millions of dollars of assistance if franchises could increase season-ticket sales to 13,000, among other requirements. That is when Nichols, a plain-talking, self-made millionaire from Saskatchewan, who had founded a chain of gas stations called Gasland, threw his business acumen, and part of his fortune, behind the franchise. He steered the successful ticket drive......

"Still, the Oilers were a tough sell, at least until a Houston businessman made an offer to buy the team and move it to Texas. That provided the necessary urgency....."

2006-06-02T15:51:00.000-07:00

.....Final thoughts on the TRC......

The commission did its job. It created a permanent historical record, in as objective a manner as possible, for the public to consume and apply as it wishes. It very plainly and clearly stated their suggestions for what now needs to happen. They're placing those suggestions in the hands of the government bureaucracy, which means they have at least a 50-50 chance of happening. I'd say the GCS contract for the curriculum provider to teach the shootings to elementary school students stands about a 75 percent chance, knowing our school board.

I find the reaction of the elected officials very interesting. I think Keith Holliday deserves due respect for saying straight up there's not going to be an apology. Would we rather have someone leading our city who's going to knuckle under to the requests of a special interest group?

Of course, Tom Phillips' comment that he had better things to do with his time was mentioned in this morning's N&R article by commission member Muktha Jost, who replied:

"In a democratic process, everyone has to read it for themselves to understand the conclusions and the findings we reached. The executive summary just kind of lists (them); the report itself is how we got there."

You get the feeling, the stated recommendations aside, the commission expects something else to happen. But what? Exactly how is the Greensboro community going to "become a leader in the Southeast, if not the nation, in dealing with what has been a major human relations issue"?

Getting both government and community to embrace a collective mentality might be asking a bit much, considering the fact that the community, especially individuals within the community, is what keeps government in check.

2006-06-02T12:11:00.000-07:00

......After the Canes game, something caught my eye on the TV above the bar at Fisher's.....Of all things, women's softball, specifically the Alabama-Northwestern game.

Here's what did it: Northwestern had a left-handed catcher behind the plate.

Go Jamie Dotson. In your honor, I'll dust off my catcher's mitt, a mere 25 years after my illustrious career came to a close.

2006-06-02T08:48:00.000-07:00

.....N&O:

"For the hockey diehards lucky enough to witness the electric madness of Game 7 in person, there were scores of jolting little deaths and sudden revivals.

"With every mad rush up the ice by the Canes or Sabres, hopes and fears would rise with the hammering pace of a fan's heartbeat.

"With every furious scramble in front of a wide-mouthed goal, anticipation or dread would flood the brain, frozen by slow-moving seconds of blurred ice action and a long-held breath.

"Every body-slamming hit brought a roar of delight or indignation.

"Every red light and horn blast signaled Armageddon or salvation, doom or rapture.

"And when that final horn sounded, only Caniacs felt the renewal of victory, the flush of the Eastern Conference championship and the fresh, bright chance of winning Lord Stanley's battered cup."

The go-ahead goal was indeed a thing of beauty. From my bar stool vantage point, I could see the puck lingering outside the crease. You knew someone in a red jersey was going to streak in and put the puck in the net. How fitting that it was Brind'Amour.

Hardin says the Canes will be favored over Edmonton. No argument there. But a word of caution. The Oilers are an eight seed on a mission.

2006-06-01T08:11:00.000-07:00

......Thomas Sowell has some facts and figures to support his argument that liberals didn't save the world.

But first, he gets in a little dig:

"For those liberals who lived through the 1960s, that was often also the springtime of their youth, increasingly treasured as a memory, as the grim realities of old age settle down upon them today. It is expecting an awful lot to expect them to consider any alternative vision of the world, especially one that shatters the beautiful picture of themselves as wise and compassionate saviors of society."

2006-05-31T10:30:00.000-07:00

.....Meanwhile, the N&R's Doug Clark has some thoughts on the TRC executive summary:

"Political........Especially the recommendations, which borrow heavily from the vocabulary of 'progressive' politics: grass-roots organizers, economic justice, reparations, living wage, anti-racism training, cross-cultural trust, capital, labor, race, poverty, oppression, privilege......

"I'm for mourning and memorializing the dead -- but no one with any responsibility for that day's bloody blunders deserves to be made a martyr.

"Yet the commission wants to give them a legacy: reparations paid to "organizations advocating for civil and workers rights and other economic justice initiatives"; a "living wage" for public employees and contract workers; increased funds for social services and public health; a police review board with subpoena and enforcement power; a community justice center; jurors selected from welfare rolls if they're not on the registered voter lists; anti-racism training for just about everyone; and, of course, an official apology."

I'll add that part of that legacy would be a greatly expanded governmental and educational bureaucracy. Among the "institutional reforms" suggested:

"All city and county employees should be paid a living wage, and all city and county subcontactors should be required to pay workers a living wage....

"All city and county employees should engage in anti-racism training....

"The proposed public monument honoring those killed and wounded on Nov. 3, 1979 would be planned and funded under the auspices of the city's Human Relations Commission.....

"The Guilford County Board of Commissioners should commit to addressing the need for increasing funding to Departments of Social Services and Public Health....

"Citizens as well as city and state officials should push for enabling legislation, if necessary, to create a community justice center in Greensboro, then make sure its existence is well-publicized."

I saved the best for last:

"The Commission recommends that the Guilford County Schools contract with an appropriate curriculum development provider to create a curriculum for elementary and secondary schools about the context, causes, context and sequence and consequences of Nov. 3, 1979."

Clark writes "the commission embraced the social and political aspirations of the Communist Workers Party participants and turned its wrath on the city of Greensboro."

I'd say so. And probably with not a lot of thought about who's going to pay for those social and political aspirations.

2006-05-31T09:42:00.000-07:00

.....The N&R (unposted) reports that students at the new Elon University law school will park at the Duke Power property on the corner of Friendly Avenue and Church Street.

I had to laugh at this paragraph:

"From car door to class door, the distance measures three blocks or three-tenths of a mile. That may seem like an easy stroll, but the first block from Church to Davie Street is all uphill. Plus, students will be lugging backpacks and satchels filled with thick legal tomes."

At least they won't get fat. The three-block haul will help offset the long hours of sitting involved while studying law.

2006-05-30T11:49:00.000-07:00

Pin me.

I read with interest the executive summary of the TRC report. I encourage average citizens to read it, because it answers many questions that articles and editorial positions by local media don't.

What caught my attention was the report's analysis of the media's role in covering the event and its aftermath:

"The media played an important role in the community's response to this tragedy. While newspapers fulfilled their duty to report the basic facts of the event, in general we find the mainstream newspapers failed to provide in-depth coverage of the context of the shooting. There was little coverage of why the conflict happened in Greensboro or of police involvement. Rather, the daily coverage tended to focus blame on the two 'outsider extremist' sides: the CWP and Klan/Nazis. On the other hand, we found the weekly African-American-owned Carolina Peacemaker with a predominantly African-American readership provided more in-depth contextual coverage, better allowing its readers to decide for themselves the meaning of the event."

But notice the list of in-kind donors at the end of the report. In-kind donations include "gifts for our volunteers, hosting our website, providing images, and text from newspaper coverage, meeting space, food, assistance with security for our events, technical services and equipment for our public hearings and television programs."

Every local print outlet is listed as an in-kind donor: The N&R, the Peacemaker, Yes! Weekly and, somewhat surprisingly, The Rhinoceros Times.

OK, I realize that the publications' participation is probably limited to "text and images from newspaper coverage."

But does that participation, on whatever level, compromise objectivity when covering and analyzing the report?

2006-05-30T09:41:00.000-07:00

.....Rick Martinez is confused. So am I.

Martinez recently took a little trip to Davidson.

"If there is a prettier town in North Carolina than Davidson, I haven't come across it. Every house I saw as I drove through town looked freshly painted. I couldn't find a blade of grass out of place. Downtown is clean, even bright, and it bustles with paying customers, instead of Lookie-Lou tourists. The hometown of Davidson College could easily be mistaken for a movie set.

"The serenity that settled into my bones as I crossed into the city limits last week shattered once I entered town hall. Staring down at me like a stalker was an impressive, big-time award from the Environmental Protection Agency for excellence in -- and this really hurts -- Smart Growth.

"I can't stand Smart Growth."

I can't stand Smart Growth, either. But get this — I was begging for a little Smart Growth last Friday as I sat gridlocked in lunchtime Cary traffic, watching the needle on my engine creep steadily toward the red 'H'. How about a little light rail to ease this congestion, I thought to myself, right before the loud bang under the hood let me know my radiator hose had broken.

Everything worked out fine, as a kind Jiffy Lube manager secured a new hose and threw it on. Then the strangest thing happened. As I wound my way through Cary, through downtown Raleigh at 5p., I noticed the traffic had eased considerably. Practically disappeared. Maybe they were already at the beach. Maybe not.

Who needs TTA, I thought to myself.

I'm confused.

2006-05-29T10:54:00.000-07:00

.....Another brief hiatus, due to a busy Memorial Day weekend and a downed Internet connection due to my Vonage router.

Activities planned for today, will be back in full force later.....

2006-05-25T11:35:00.000-07:00

.......I walked up to Fisher's last night to catch the Canes-Sabres game. I usually feel safe jaywalking across Elm Street because there's not much traffic at that hour. But as I cut across the parking lot of First Presbyterian Church, I noticed the brand new pedestrian crosswalk across from the new Magnolia Place condos. I decided to take it, and I honestly felt safer and more secure as I crossed the street. Not such bad things, I thought to myself.

Once safely ensconced in Fisher's, I enjoyed the perfect sports fan's evening. Normally I prefer autumn, when the baseball pennant races and playoffs run merge with football season. But spring's not so bad either. Last night, I enjoyed a fast-paced, extremely physical matchup between two great hockey teams, saw the Yankees get out of a bases-loaded jam in the eighth against the Red Sox, then finished the evening watching Steve Nash take charge.

I feel good today.

2006-05-24T07:27:00.000-07:00

......Yet another interesting discussion over at Cone's, this time on global warming.

I'll start with this post about Gregg Easterbrook's NYT opinion piece. What I found interesting was the fact that after Eastbrook states that he's switching sides on global warming from "skeptic to convert," he offers a free market solution to the problem, offering evidence that such solutions have worked in the past:

"In 1991, Congress created a profit incentive to reduce acid rain: a system of tradable credits that rewards companies that make the fastest reductions. Since 1991 acid rain emissions have declined 36 percent, and the cost has been only 10 percent of what industry originally forecast.

"Today no one can make money by reducing greenhouse gases, so emissions rise unchecked. But a system of tradable greenhouse permits, similar to those for acid rain, would create a profit incentive. Engineers and entrepreneurs would turn to the problem. Someone might even invent something cheap that would spread to the poorer countries, preventing reductions here from being swamped elsewhere. Unlikely? Right now reformulated gasoline and the low-cost catalytic converter, invented here to contain smog, are becoming common in developing nations."

It turns out that's exactly the cap and trade program President Bush announced last year to reduce mercury emissions, which predictably drew fire from environmental groups.

Then there's yesterday's post, which discusses Pete duPont's WSJ op-ed.

Cone writes:

"I do know that the WSJ's position is, in essence, 'our opponents have been correct and effective to date, but don't believe them now.' And that just isn't very convincing."

Obviously, the environmental lobby has been effective over the last 36 years. duPont presents the evidence supporting such effectiveness, as do other air quality experts. But based on the scare tactics on which environmental groups rely, it just doesn't seem like they believe it themselves. And that doesn't make their arguments very convincing right now.

Nor does blatant politicization.

2006-05-23T11:20:00.000-07:00

....More mental health, or lack thereof.....

Michael Hayes could be on the streets this fall.

2006-05-23T10:49:00.000-07:00

......Michael Novak in AEI:

"What I do want to argue is that, after Washington and Lincoln, Bush is the bravest of our presidents. He has faced the most intense fire, hatred, contempt, heavily moneyed and bitterly acidic partisan opposition, underhandedness, betrayal, of any president in the last hundred years. He has faced hostility over a longer time, in possibly the most dangerous period of international warfare in our national history. He has remained constant, firm, decided, and generous (to a fault) with his opponents. "

Stark contrast to this Yes! Weekly editorial which places President Bush's mental clarity on equal footing with that of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad:

"From his first day in office forward, Bush has been exhibiting a scary messiah streak, although Christians are becoming increasingly divided about the president’s authenticity as a professing member of the faith. All we can say to Bush and his neocon circle is, 'That nagging little voice of caution you suppressed during the run-up to Iraq — now is not the time to ignore it.'

'The problem is that the new president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, appears to be a little unhinged himself, judging by his call to have Israel 'wiped off the map.'”

Uh-huh.

2006-05-23T10:17:00.000-07:00

....Of course the war in Iraq will be a major mid-term election issue. So will the Medicare prescription drug benefit, says The Washington Times. But which party will feel the heat?

"Opinion polls in support of the benefit are off the chart. And apparently Democratic strategists are telling candidates to cool their anti-benefit rhetoric. Republican congressmen are planning to run on the issue, and Democratic Party congressional challengers are getting nervous about their aggressive negative stand fed to them to by their party's spinmeisters. And we wouldn't be surprised if Democratic Party challengers will have wished they had not bought into their party's propaganda on this point."

2006-05-22T10:28:00.000-07:00

....Out of Control posts several excerpts from Robert Bruegman's (server down) article on urban sprawl.

My favorite:

"Another misunderstanding grows out of the provincialism of critics living in fast-growing urban areas. Many such people have the impression that the entire country is fast being paved over. But in truth, cities and suburbs occupy only a small percentage of our country's land. The entire urban and suburban population of the United States could fit comfortably into Wisconsin at suburban densities. Moreover, the amount of land set aside permanently for parks and wildlife areas has grown faster than urban land."

I drove to the top of the Bellmeade deck the other day and looked over the western portion of our city. Green, nothing but green.....

2006-05-22T08:16:00.000-07:00

....Forget about steroids. What does it say about the evolution of baseball when Bonds matches Ruth while playing........designated hitter?

2006-05-21T18:13:00.000-07:00

......Interesting Lorraine Ahearn (unposted) column in this morning's N&R....

She does a good job telling us about Paul Corsentino, the guy who jumped off the Bellmeade parking deck. I wondered why the story didn't get bigger coverage from the N&R. I know they can't write about every suicide, but jumping eight stories in the middle of downtown is a pretty public way to whack yourself.

In the end, though, the column gets a bit melodramatic:

"Close the mental hospitals and state programs with the promise of some phantom 'community-based' treatment or 'private providers,' then watch as we fill the prison and the homeless shelter, and, in the worst cases, the graveyard."

Pretty heavy stuff. But then I was confused by the next paragraph:

"The saddest part is, all this misery can be averted. People can live with depression just as they live with diabetes — through medicine, therapy, peer groups and probably some exercise."

And that's exactly the argument behind mental health reform, right? Fewer beds are needed because people are being treated through "medicine, therapy, peer groups and probably someexercise." The only problem is mental officials are finding out that's not exactly the case.

Ahearn points out that Corsentino "was twice hospitalized in the past two months, each time discharged after five days. — a typical stay under managed care."

It's very possible Corsentino needed a bed in a mental hospital and couldn't get one. But is it not possible he just quit taking his meds?

2006-05-20T09:56:00.000-07:00

....I'm just now reading about the captured al Qaeda documents in Cal Thomas' column via the N&R print edition.

How did I miss this important piece of news?

2006-05-20T09:24:00.000-07:00

.....As you can probably imagine, Medved rips Jodie Foster's commencement speech.

I personally think Yakov Smirnoff, with his master's degree in positive psychology, would have been a better choice.

2006-05-20T09:06:00.000-07:00

......OK, I was a little hard on Rasheed the other day. He had a solid game last night, although he bricked a three-pointer and clanged two free throws down the stretch. The Cavs just couldn't get the offensive rebounds.......

I don't see the Pistons losing at home, though I'll be pulling for the upset.

2006-05-19T16:58:00.000-07:00

.....What will be the reaction to Baghdad ER?

"HBO has been promoting the documentary as a tribute to the heroism of the soldiers and medical personnel who are shown working under severe stress. But the producers acknowledge that its harrowing scenes could be interpreted differently."

HBO's Sheila Nevins says this much:

"Anything showing the grim realities of war is, in a sense, antiwar. In that way, the film is a sort of Rorschach test. You see in it what you bring to it."

2006-05-19T16:04:00.000-07:00

.....Interesting discussion over at Cone's regarding the city's SCAT program.

The conversation steers briefly over to the Wachovia Tower, producing this from Roch Smith:

"Ed, the fallacy of your defense of the Carroll building subsidies, indeed everyone's defense of the deal, is that it supposes an all or nothing situation, i.e. either we pony up the tax breaks or the building will not be renovated. It ignores the third possibility that I haven't seen dismissed as unrealistic -- that we do not offer tax breaks, the building gets renovated anyway and local governments get to keep the taxes they are prepared to refund."

I couldn't have summed up the big picture any better myself, although I pointed out the three politicians who voted against incentives for Roy Carroll bent over backward to wish him success.

I think what's bothering me about the SCAT issue is it's being debated in an inverse manner. It seems as though general transit is the given while city officials figure out how to streamline SCAT.

The way I see it, the debate should be the other way around. Funding for SCAT should be the given while the city seriously discusses streamlining service for able-bodied riders, who, let's face it, have more transportation options than the disabled.

2006-05-18T11:37:00.000-07:00

.....McNeil-Lehrer had an interesting discussion on President Bush's border strategy.

Note that Korb and McGinnis disagree on whether 6,000 National Guard troops are enough to do the job.

Korb:

"I mean, it's more symbolic than anything else. I mean, if you really wanted to do this, you would have to put -- and I think I've seen figures, you know, 50,000 to 60,000 people there, if you really wanted to do it right."

McGinnis:

"Six thousand people is doable. Anything he's going to ask the Guard to do I'm sure they're capable of doing. But I think it can be done smarter, and it can be done better if the Border Patrol and the Guard were allowed to collaborate on this, just as we did with issues like this previously and the drug war. So there's a long history here between the Guard -- a good positive history between the Guard and the Border Patrol."

By the way, moderator Judy Woodruff still looks pretty good. But I still can't get over how she was a total bitch while interviewing first lady Barbara Bush at the '92 Republican Convention. Another part of my conservative conversion.....

2006-05-18T11:19:00.000-07:00

....I guess the finals aren't the same as the playoffs......

With Rasheed inexplicably laughing on the bench, the Pistons find themselves at the mercy of the Cavaliers.

In preparation for what could possibly be the greatest upset in playoff history, Sports Illustrated put together a photo gallery of the top 10 greatest playoff upsets.

2006-05-17T07:07:00.000-07:00

......Greensboro mayor Keith Holliday before last night's 9-0 City Council vote to award a $1.1 million development grant for Centerpointe:

"This is so perfect. I think we're going to look back someday at some of the turning points in our downtown and this decision tonight by this council will be a major turning point."

2006-05-16T09:50:00.000-07:00

......The N&O's Ted Vaden does some explaining regarding the photo of Leah Willis accompanying the article on the Canes high stick:

"The picture showed Willis in a bright red Hurricanes jersey picking up tickets at the RBC Center box office. Good picture to go with a good story.

"Problem is: Willis was not unhappy with the price increases, and for good reason. She works for Gale Force Holdings, the RBC Center operator. When the photograph was shot, before the Canes game Monday night against New Jersey, she was not buying but picking up tickets left for her at the window."

Just goes to show that getting the right shot is kind of like, uh, getting the right quote.......

2006-05-16T09:31:00.000-07:00

....Carolina Journal's John Hood has some thoughts on downtown redevelopment.

I'm not the smartest guy in the world, but I think he's being sarcastic......

2006-05-15T10:07:00.000-07:00

.....I just reviewed the tape of the Guilford County commissioners discussion regarding $1 million in economic incentives for Roy Carroll's redevelopment of the Wachovia Building.

I didn't figure the vote would be along strict party lines. Commissioners Linda Shaw and Mike Winstead were "maybes," while Billy Yow and Steve Arnold were definite "nos."

Arnold:

"I have to say that, in my 20 years as an elected official, nothing surprises me more that how quickly, and how easily, elected officials will line up to give money to the most successful and wealthy among us."

Arnold's suggestion for equal justice under the law:

"Anyone who adds to the tax base, anyone who adds to their house, anyone who adds to the ad valorem value to a particular piece of property, should be due the same benefit. That would be equal justice."

But then there's Democrat Kirk Perkins, who voted "no" along with Yow and Arnold.

Perkins has an interesting point of view:

"What the county is doing is giving Mr. Carroll incentives to compete against other projects downtown. I don't think the role of government is to subsidize one company to compete against another. I don't think basic equity and fairness can be abandoned no matter how good the project looks."

In their comments before the vote, Perkins, Yow and Arnold wished Carroll well and thanked him for taking on such a project. After all, you'd have to be some kind of a nut not to wish this project to succeed. But it's a moot point now. The county has signed off on incentives, and there's little doubt the city will do the same.

2006-05-14T14:31:00.000-07:00

....Brief hiatus.....I have to step away from the big picture for a while in order to pay attention to the finer details of life: Helping my neighbor bang some nails, watching an elephant take a crap at the zoo, getting the broken lightbulb out of the ceiling fan light, rubbing and grilling a brisket, finding the perfect Mother's Day card, picking up a new sports biography at the central library...

It's nothing anybody else doesn't have to deal with, but multi-tasking can get out of hand....

2006-05-11T11:51:00.000-07:00

....Left-handed carpenter, figuratively and literally......Took this morning off to help my neighbor bang some nails.....

2006-05-10T10:33:00.000-07:00

....Canes give fans the high stick:

"The team announced late last week that prices for season ticket holders would more than double in the final two rounds. Tickets for each home game in the final two rounds would range from $50 to $200 per seat.

"Prices for people who don't have season tickets are higher still. They haven't been announced for the finals, but in the third round, general admission tickets will be between $70 and $250."

...Proof that hockey in the South is not a blue-collar sport, as evidenced by season ticket holder Jann Meyer:

"Meyer and her husband have spent more than $2,500 on hockey this season, attending 24 games and all the playoff games so far. Before this year, when they lived in the mountains, they often made 400-mile round trips to see the Canes.

"But they say the $1,600 bill they got late last week, for the final two rounds, is too much. If the Hurricanes make it that far, they say, they'll watch the games on TV."

Two questions: What's another $1600 when you've already invested $2500 in the Canes, and how much do they pay state psychologists?

It's like playing the lottery. How much to you want to gamble with the hope of seeing something special live and in person? Fans at the RBC Center Monday night sure got something special, as did fans in attendance for Game 6 of Montreal series, although you'd have to ask Canadiens fans just how special it was, given the outcome.

No matter the outcome, the rush had to be there as shot after shot was stopped on both ends of the ice.....

2006-05-08T22:07:00.000-07:00

......Via Guarino:

David Hartgen's JLF policy report on public transit systems in North Carolina:

"Hartgen’s report recommends that the state cut back state support for local transit systems, while ensuring that riders pay more for transit service. Local transit officials should also rewrite their mission statements and long-range plans to reflect their key role in helping people who need mobility. The report also calls for more privatization of transit systems, and it asks the General Assembly to delay funding for light rail systems in Charlotte, the Triangle, and the Triad until Charlotte’s South Boulevard corridor confirms usage expectations. The 10-mile Charlotte light rail line, currently under construction for $428 million, is expected to open in late 2007."

That's probably a good idea. More:

"Overall, the 10 transit systems studied contribute just 0.28 percent of the overall daily regional travel miles, according to Hartgen’s report. That’s the figure you get when you factor in bus riders who have no cars. Greensboro (0.15 percent) and Winston-Salem (0.19 percent) both fall below the average.......

"While the state and federal transportation bill is growing, the transit systems are not drawing people away from the cars that clog city roads, the report says. A typical trip on a public transit system is slower than a trip by car. Many transit riders are lower-income workers who have no access to cars.

“'Riders use the systems primarily as ‘stepping stones’ for improving personal mobility,' Hartgen said. 'The systems serve less than one-half of 1 percent of regional commuting and impact about one-quarter of 1 percent of regional air pollution or congestion.'”

With the high price of gas, you'd expect city buses to be standing room only. That they're not is evidence that Americans are willing to pay whatever it takes to maintain their "personal mobilty." I think the assumption on the part of many local governments is that if more services are provided, more people will use public transportation.

That's a tough strategy in a market where practically no one rides the bus just because it's there.

2006-05-08T11:04:00.000-07:00

.....I just sat around last night, reading and watching the Phillies-Giants game on TV. Every now and then I would glance up to see if Barry Bonds was coming to bat. I realized this really could be the night that Bonds ties Babe Ruth's home run record. I asked myself if this is something I really wanted to see. What the hell, I told myself. If it happens, it happens.

In my ongoing effort to be an open-minded human being, I asked myself why I don't like Barry Bonds. I don't know him, and I personally don't know whether or not he used performance-enhancing drugs, in spite of the evidence that he did. A big part of it is the fact that I've never really cared for his team.This dislike goes back to the old MLB alignment, when the Giants were the Reds' divisional rivals. It seemed as though the Reds always had a tough time winning in Candlestick Park.

Just looking at Bonds is tough, too. Anybody disagree that Bonds radiates arrogance? Listening to his three-man cheering squad of Jon Miller, Joe Morgan and Peter Gammons talk about how frustrated Bonds has been over fan reaction during the Giants' road trip didn't help matters any. Poor Bonds, I thought to myself.

Fortunately, Michael Sokolove's N.Y. Times review of two books on Bonds helped ease my conscience a bit.

In case you haven't heard, 'Game of Shadows' alleges "that Bonds participated in a sophisticated doping program that resulted in a late-career offensive surge unheard-of in baseball history. Over his first 13 seasons, Bonds hit a home run every 16.1 at-bats; from 1999 through 2004, he hit one every 8.5 at-bats.

"The book is economical in its character study of Bonds, which is wise because what the authors do include just confirms his well-established reputation for boorishness. Its real strength comes in the connections it makes between the baseball doping scandal and the wider culture of drugs in international sports. "

Meanwhile, Jeff Pearlman's 'Love Me, Hate Me' "tracks down Bonds's former teachers, scout leaders, neighbors and teammates from Little League up through the majors — more than 500 people total. The legwork is impressive, but nearly everyone says a version of the same thing — that Bonds is a thoroughly miserable guy. The kind of person who throws sweat socks on the floor just to watch the clubhouse attendant stoop to pick them up."

OK, I feel better. But I hear what you're saying: If it bothers me that much, I should just change the channel.

2006-05-05T10:06:00.000-07:00

......Interesting N&R editorial page this morning.....

Starting off, George Will has a less than flattering perspective on the life and work of John Kenneth Galbraith:

"......The Affluent Society, published in 1958, was a milestone on liberalism's transformation into a doctrine of condescension. And into a minority persuasion.

"In the 1950s, liberals were disconsolate. Voters twice rejected the intelligentsia's pinup, Stevenson, in favor of Dwight Eisenhower, who elicited a new strain in liberalism -- disdain for average Americans. Liberals dismissed the Eisenhower administration as 'the bland leading the bland.' They said New Dealers had been supplanted by car dealers. How to explain the electorate's dereliction of taste? Easy. The masses had been manipulated, mostly by advertising, particularly on television, which by 1958 had become the masses' entertainment.

"Intellectuals, that herd of independent minds, were, as usual, in lock step as they deplored 'conformity.'.........Galbraith brought to the anti-conformity chorus a special verve in depicting Americans as manipulable as clay. Americans were what modern liberalism relishes -- victims, to be treated as wards of a government run by liberals. It never seemed to occur to Galbraith and like-minded liberals that ordinary Americans might resent that depiction and express their resentment with their votes."

Right next door, Clarence Page discusses the poster boy of liberal resentment and condescension, Al Gore:

"If ever there was a time for the author of 'Earth in the Balance,' Gore's powerful 1992 book on global warming and other environmental threats, to say ' tried to warn you,' this is it."

I loved the next line:

"Gore's book drew ridicule from George H.W. Bush, who called Gore 'Ozone Man' in 1992 and in 2000 from George W. Bush, who admitted without embarrassment that he had never read it."

Without embarrassment? OK. Page should know by now that showing embarrassment is not President Bush's strong suit, never mind the implication that 'Earth in the Balance' is required reading.

I guess 'Earth in the Balance,' like 'The Affluent Society' 50 years earlier, is on the list for the enlightened book club. Personally, I'm gleaning quite a bit of enlightenment reading Namath, despite the fact that Broadway Joe's life of booze and broads is in stark contrast to my life of beer and wife.

2006-05-03T21:47:00.000-07:00

....Lots of hand-wringing over the lost generation.....

Hey, I hang out with plenty of disconnected adults right here in tony Fisher Park.They're still intelligent, successful people. For whatever reason, it hasn't made a difference in their lives whether or not they know that the border between North and South Korea is the most fortified in the world. I guess it depends on what you do for a living, too. If you're a plumber making a bunch of money digging through the rich earth of Guilford County, why the hell do you need to find India on a map?

I wouldn't say the questions were all no-brainers, either. OK, you should know Mississippi and Louisiana by fifth grade. Perhaps answering that the U.S.-Mexico border is the most fortified is collective wishful thinking. What's the most widely-spoken native language? Trick question.

Now I did know about the earthquake that killed 70,000 in Pakistan when it happened. But I kind of forgot about it.

2006-05-03T10:41:00.000-07:00

......Cautiously optimistic is one of my favorite terms.......

2006-05-03T10:01:00.000-07:00

.....Council polygraphs off to inauspicious start:

"Concerns about council members' stress levels being raised by questions from reporters before the sessions — and possibly skewing the results — led to the location for the test being switched twice. "

But hey, council members (with the exception of Diane Bellamy-Small, who flips the bird to polygraph tests and local media) set themselves up for elevated stress levels.

This was a bad idea, period. When politicians try to appear honest, they end up looking silly. The best example I can think of is President Clinton's proclamation that he would oversee the "most ethical administration in history." Red flag right there.

That's why I vote Republican: No pretext of honesty whatsoever.

2006-05-02T10:55:00.000-07:00

......Immigrants take to the streets.

Is this not proof that free speech and dissent are alive and well in this country?

2006-05-01T22:13:00.000-07:00

....Red Sox re-acquire Tim Wakefield's personal catcher.

The Times' Jack Curry also provides some insight into what it's like to catch a knuckeball. Let's
put it this way: John Flaherty, a 14-year veteran, so he wouldn't have to catch Wakefield's knuckler:

"It took Flaherty two innings to decide that he could not spend a year chasing those knuckleballs. Two innings in a meaningless spring training game, 20 minutes of feeling vulnerable because he did not know where Wakefield’s next floater would dip or dart.

"Flaherty, who played in 1,047 games, was unnerved by the thought of catching Wakefield with a runner on third at Yankee Stadium."

Though he tries to reassure his catchers, you get the feeling Wakefield is a bit of a sadist:

"If a catcher has difficulty, that is a sign to Wakefield that he has a good knuckleball. If a catcher is not scrambling like a 5-year-old digging for quarters in a sandbox, then Wakefield becomes worried that his knuckleball is ineffective."

I've been watching quite a bit of the Red Sox this season, mainly because ESPN has become Red Sox Network. Is it me, or do the Sox have a more clean-cut look this season? No Mark Bellhorn, no Johnny Damon, no Bronson Arroyo (thank goodness.)

But still Manny Ramirez. My guess is the Red Sox, basically a conservative ballclub, would still get rid of Ramirez of they could because he's not a good image. But they can't, because his contract is too big. Cut your hair or get cut doesn't work if the team has to pay the bill and get nothing in return. Ramirez' paycheck allows him to wear his hair the way he pleases.

Damon's doesn't, though. He's more handsome than I thought, too.

2006-05-01T10:24:00.000-07:00

.....I read with interest yesterday's N&R article on the possible sale of land in the Uwharrie National Forest. As I posted last week, I recently spent some time enjoying Uwharrie's beauty, so I don't take this issue lightly.

Of course, when I saw Jeri Rowe's byline, I expected an emotional plea on behalf of Uwharrie residents not to sell 2,317 acres of forest land. But on the whole, the piece was restrained and contained quite a bit of useful information for citizens to research and decide for themselves how they stand on this issue.

Still, a counter point of view was pretty much missing. There's got to be someone out there besides me and President Bush who don't think this is the worst idea in the world.

Fair enugh, Rowe does point out that "high-priced developments have helped diversify the county's tax base and fund services that would've been hurt by the county's job losses."

But I think the best case to make the deal came from Billy Myrick, owner of Myrick's Produce:

"There's nothing here. We've got no jobs. No textile jobs. And if they do want to come here to North Carolina, they want to go 60 miles up the road.

"And I hear it every day. 'I can't afford to get there.' And when your unemployment checks and jobs run out, what are you going to do?"

With Myrick's comments in mind, is it unreasonable to believe that limited development on former forest land would spur economic growth, especially in the fledgling eco-tourism industry? Is it not a good thing to improve the public's access to Uwharrie by providng them with places to stay and a bit of civilization after a day in the outdoors? Yeah, a lot of people like to fish, hike and mountgain bike. But a good many want a good meal and a soft bed afterwards.

Here's the way I look at it. One of my favorite places is the Creek House, located on the waterway just south of Myrtle Beach, the poster city for unlimited development. I've spent hours sitting on the deck of the Creek House at sunset, enjoying the waterway's natural beauty. Within sight are existing homes and homes under construction. They don't take away one bit from the waterway's beauty. I'm thankful for the access, and I'm glad others want access to such a wonderful place.

2006-04-29T21:39:00.000-07:00

....Interesting N.Y. Times article on former President Clinton and his good buddy Ronald Burkle.

The headline over the jump in the print edition says it all:

"A Friend of Bill Helps Him Help the Poor and Make Money Besides."

"Mr. Clinton's arrangement with Mr. Burkle is an unusual one for a former president, giving him the potential to make tens of millions of dollars without great effort and at virtually no risk, according to Mr. Burkle and advisers to Mr. Clinton.......

"The funds Mr. Clinton advises invest in grocery stores, retail developments and real estate in poor areas, manufacturing and distribution, and minority-owned businesses. Yucaipa has found significant growth opportunities in such areas because of the low cost of land and the relative lack of competition."

OK, so who can be against that, especially when you can make a lot of money doing it?

2006-04-29T09:23:00.000-07:00

..... RIP Steve Howe.

I remember reading a Sports Illustrated piece about Howe several years ago when he was still trying to beat cocaine and break back into the big leagues. He'd moved his family to Montana to get away from the white stuff, but he still found it. Some people just have a nose for the stuff, so to speak.

Howe told the story of how he scored and went into the family bathroom to get high when he turned and saw his wife staring straight at him. Though he knew right then and there that his marriage was on the line, Howe said the urge to bury his nose in the baggie was overwhelming.

He resisted, however, and was able to get his career back on track, spending five years with Yankees from '91 to '96. I can only assume he successfully fought his addiction over the past 10 years. Then he gets rolled in his pickup truck. That's how fragile life is.

2006-04-28T17:03:00.000-07:00

......I read with interest yesterday's N&R article on air quality, or lack therof, in Guilford County.

A buddy of mine and I discussed it later. We generally agree on most issues except air quality. I just don't think the air's that bad here. He says the air's so bad he's thinking about leaving. Then he changed his mind and said he'd get a place elsewhere for red and orange ozone days.

So he'd be gone seven days out of the year. Twenty-two days between 2002-2004 is seven days a year, right? That was lower than the pervious study period, and there's no reason to believe the number will be even lower for the next study period.

But what I found interestinng was the unchallenged scare tactic thrown out by the American Lung Association's Janice Nolen, who said "a bad spike in particle pollution over a four-day period in London killed 150 people in 1952."

Nolen's talking about the Killer Fog of '52, and a hell of a lot more than 150 people died. Some estimate that as many as 4,000 people died, making it a very deadly environmental episode.

The cause was "...a mass of stagnant air had just clamped a lid over London, trapping the smoke from millions of residential coal fires at ground level."

A source told me that particulate levels were tens of times greater than peak levels in North Carolina today. Not only particulate levels were super-high. There was also lots of sulfur dioxide and carbon monoxide, and probably other pollutants as well.

So it was simply a matter of a society, seven years removed from world war, struggling to stay warm. That condition doesn't exist today due to advances in technology. Based on what I read, it's not unreasonable to assume that further advances in technology will foster air quality that was unimaginable during the Killer Fog of '52.

2006-04-27T11:02:00.000-07:00

......Keep knocking them down.......

Floodplain regulations in Charlotte make renovations in the Chantilly neighborhood cost prohibitive:

"Six years ago, Mecklenburg County created a 'future conditions floodplain' affecting about 1,200 homes across the county, including about 60 in Chantilly, off Seventh Street just southeast of uptown. That requires those property owners to raise their floor above the projected flood level if they renovate the home extensively, a requirement property owners say is expensive and likely unnecessary because their homes don't currently flood."

As it stands, the land in Chantilly is worth more than the houses:

"In many cases, the smaller Chantilly houses don't carry high assessed values, according to county records, and residents say that makes the rule easy to trigger. One home in the zone is valued at $89,500, according to county records, while the land is listed at $95,000. On another lot, a single-story home listed at just under 1,100 square feet is valued at $39,500 while the land is valued at $80,000."

So you knock down the houses, like they do in Myers Park. But here's the question: Would more people be priced out of the Chantilly neighborhood with new houses or renovated houses?

2006-04-27T10:26:00.000-07:00

.....The other shoe drops.....Roy Carroll indeed will ask local government for $2.1 million in incentives to redevelop the Wachovia Tower.

But the N&R article leaves out an important detail: For what would the public money be used? Otherwise, it's hard for the average citizen to wonder how the lack of a $2 million investment by local government could break a $37 million deal.

2006-04-26T21:48:00.000-07:00

.....Cone has Tony Snow's views on gun control circa 1980:

"....regulate the sales and distribution of firearms carefully and rigorously."

Hey, I was right there with Tony. Gun control all the way. I even gave a pro-choice speech in my sophomore communications class. But I'm most ashamed of the fact that I believed we shouldn't change leaders during a time of crisis, kind of like FDR during WW II. Thank God I wasn't old enough to vote.

But look at me now. Shit happens. What will be interesting about Snow's appointment is how a member of the media handles the media, especially such a hostile group such as the White House press corps. I would think Snow would know going in that, as one of their own, being less than forthcoming won't work.

But as one who has been critical of President Bush, is there reason to believe Snow would be less than forthcoming? Or is there just too much Fox there for everyone's liking?

2006-04-26T11:19:00.000-07:00

......Saturday's hike was at Birkhead Mountain Wilderness, not Burkhardt.......