We have previously discussed how many families, including my own, have abandoned football stadiums to rowdies who have turned games into a contest of obnoxious drinking, swearing, and fighting. Games are now viewed as a license what is becoming the American version of Soccer hooligans. That element was on display this week with the video below of a New York Jets fan punching a woman in a Patriots jersey. According to reports, the man is Kurt Paschke, who was previously found guilty of negligent homicide in a stabbing death outside of a pizzeria in 1992. However, the Patriots fans come off as no better in the video, including the woman, identified as Jaclyn Nugent, 26, who is seen as hitting Paschke before he hits her.
We have followed the environmental meltdown in China which only recently moved to deal with a myriad of pollutants that have created cancer spikes and suffocating health conditions. Air pollution is the most obvious area of neglect and average Chinese are beginning to complain about pollution that continues to set records for unhealthy levels. I have previously discussed how my trips to China through the years have found horrendous levels of pollution where one is unable to see beyond half a block on some days in cities like Beijing. For decades, the authoritarian government posted false readings that became increasing comical, but sites like the one at the U.S. embassy has forced officials to admit to the alarming levels — as if the lack of line of sight vision did not already confirm the prior misrepresentations. This week, one regional capital, Harbin, has effectively shutdown due to levels of particulate pollution that would be considered unimaginable in many areas. Parts of Harbin are reporting levels of more than 1,000 PM2.5 — the level considered hazardous is 300. Thus, the city is over 300 percent higher than the hazardous level for human health.
No it is not the latest rock band. Fat Leonard is the nickname for the rotund contractor named Leonard Glenn Francis, chief executive of Glenn Defense Marine. The Asian company is accused of greasing the skids in the Navy with bribes ranging from prostitutes to luxury hotels to tickets to Lady Gaga concerts. Snared in the scandal are an array of top Navy officials, including an official at the Naval Criminal Investigative Service and a Navy Commander known “Little Bro” to Fat Leonard. Fat Leonard was well known in Naval circles and was given his nickname because he dressed out at 6-3 and 350 pounds.
Officer James Harris in DeLand, Florida has been fired after he ran over a man who was fleeing police. Marlon Robert Brown, 38, was being pulled over for a seatbelt violation when he fled. He won’t do that again. The video shows Harris pursuing Brown in his car and when Brown trips, running over the man.
Joel T. Jackson, 50, of Manchester has a curious defense after he shot and killed a one-year dog named Chincee because he has an abnormal fear of dogs. His counsel added that “He was surprised a BB gun would have that kind of effect.” He could receive as much as six months for the killing. Notably, however, the intentional shooting of a family pet remains only a misdemeanor — given less protection than breaking into a shed and stealing property.
Former Kansas Attorney General and current Liberty University law professor Phill Kline is now indefinitely suspended from the practice of law due to his investigation of abortion clinics run by the late George Tiller and by Planned Parenthood. Tiller was murdered in 2009 while attending church in Wichita with his wife. While opting not to disbar Kline, the Kansas Supreme Court found “clear and convincing evidence” of professional misconduct (including the violation of 11 rules) to warrant indefinite suspension.
The Taliban has long personified the ignorance and intolerance found among religious extremists. Indeed, they first attracted international attention with their destruction of the famous giant Buddhas of Bamiyan. However, it is always impressive to see the degree to which its Islamic beliefs seem to produce uniformly harmful impacts on the populations under its cruel control. A report last week documented how there is a serious polio outbreak that is threatening global progress against the disease. The Taliban has denounced vaccinations as a Western plot and threatened anyone who receives one. It is a tragic irony since the disease has long been the scourge of the Middle East going back to ancient times, as this Egyptian tablet from the 18th Dynasty (1403–1365 BC) reflects. The ancient populations could only dream of a cure but, now that one is available, the Taliban again seeks to force its areas back into the dark ages.
A couple years ago, the family went through a toll booth in Illinois by mistake without paying: we mistook an automatic lane for a cash lane. We spent the rest of the day trying to reach someone to pay the toll only to be told that it would not be necessary. I thought of that experience today after reading about Ronny Williams and Cora Lewis of Pflugerville, Texas who have racked up $236,026.32 in unpaid tolls and fines. We are obviously on opposing ends of a guilt spectrum. By the way, Mandy and Stephen Dyment of Hutto were not far behind with $217,619.79 in unpaid tolls and fines.
Submitted by Charlton Stanley (Otteray Scribe) Guest Blogger
“Nobody is in charge.”
“Low and middle level bureaucrats have no power to make anything happen. The only way they can have any sense of personal worth and power comes from their ability to obstruct.”
– Dr. Dwight W. Allen, Dean Emeritus, College of Education, University of Mass., Amherst.
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In 1971, I was having lunch with Dr. Dwight Allen. The conversation was wide ranging, but he has strong views on educational institutions, school boards, why irate parents are irate and making institutions more accountable. At that time the Vietnam war was dragging on, and his views on entrenched power structures applied to our difficulty extricating ourselves from that as well. He co-authored American Schools: The $100 Billion Challenge, with one of his former doctoral students, Dr. William H. Cosby. You may have heard of Dr. Cosby.
Some people use the term “bureaucrat” as an epithet. When George Wallace ran for President in 1972, he railed against “bureaucrats,” saying he was going to take all their briefcases and throw them into the Potomac. Wallace conveniently ignored the fact as Governor of Alabama, he was in charge of a huge bureaucracy that had exactly the same problems he said he was going to fix.
Decades ago, Dr. Laurence Peter pointed out that all organizations with a hierarchical management structure are bureaucracies. Dr. Peter analyzed those structures, and reported many of the same issues Dr. Allen shared with me over lunch. He coined the term, “Peter Principle” to describe how otherwise competent people rise through the ranks until they achieve their “level of incompetence.”
Recently, we see those observations applying to people who are caught up in a Kafkaesque drama at city hall and municipal traffic courts. Public officials and offices are not the only culprits. There are countless tales of woe from people trying to deal with big banks, mortgage companies and faceless collection agencies. Those are problems likely to have more direct effect on us personally than global events in Washington, London or Kabul.
Let’s take the case of Capt. Dave. Dave Petrich, of West Seattle, WA mostly navigates boats around the Puget Sound area rather than vehicles with wheels; hence’ his nickname, “Capt. Dave.” The good captain restores old wooden schooners and runs maritime-history tours. As he put it, “I like to put old boats back to work.”
On a recent show of Soul to Soul, Oprah interviewed Diana Nyad, the long distance swimmer who, at age 64, swam from Havana to Key West. During the interview Oprah mentions that Nyad told the producers that she (Nyad) is “not a God person.” Nyad responds: “I’m an atheist.” Oprah responds incredulously: “But you’re in the awe.” Oprah just can’t believe that an atheist could feel awe. While atheists often use reason to understand reality, they have the same emotions exhibited by non-atheists. Atheists just don’t feel the need to affix the “God” label to their feelings. Continue reading “Oprah’s Bias Against Atheists”→
Public parks and protected lands belong to us all as our collective natural heritage. By preserving and acting as stewards of these natural treasures, we aim to preserve them for the enjoyment their majesty and beauty brings for us and for our children’s children. One of these parks is Goblin Valley State Park in Utah. Since 1974, the unusual rock formations there known as goblins or hoodoos have enriched the lives of many thousands of visitors. These formations of sandstone, siltstone and shale are caused by differential rates of erosion and are a great example of the stark beauty of the high desert. Some of these formations are 200 million years old.
So naturally, it would be fun to push one down.
Even a young one that’s only about 20 million years old.
It has always seemed to me that the use of nuclear energy is a bad idea given the current technology. My opinion is perhaps formed because I was in school during the 1950’s and due to the “Cold War” and the bomb tests, there developed in most of us, a deep fear of nuclear annihilation. I can remember watching in fascinated fear, in 1952, as they exploded a Hydrogen Bomb at Eniwetok, one of the Marshall Islands. The blast was covered on TV as I guess a reassurance to the American People of the power and might of our government and to give us a feeling of safety from those “Commies” in the USSR. Being eight years old at the time this demonstration of US power was not comforting in the slightest. We had “duck and cover” exercises in Elementary School, where we would go under our desks and cover our eyes in case of a nuclear attack. Given the actual nuclear explosions I had witnessed on TV, the idea that “duck and cover” would save me cast a skeptical suspicion in my eight year old mind.
As I grew I learned that beyond the immediate effect of a nuclear blast, the subsequent radiation was even more dangerous. Radiation poisoning could maim you and it could kill you in a slow, lingering death. The Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombings did more than just kill many people. Beyond the maiming of the immediate victims who survived, we learned about the rates of cancer which were off the charts, especially in the infants of pregnant women. As the threat of nuclear destruction faded, the idea of radiation poisoning was nevertheless present as the United States began using nuclear power and a large industry sprang up around it. The industry was fostered by the then named Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), which was soon in thrall of the industry it was supposed to regulate. As with cigarette smoking the stories of rising cancer rates were downplayed by the AEC and the “nuclear industry. The AEC has now become the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) because the AEC had developed the reputation as an industry shill, rather than regulator. This is hardly a surprise because it seems that all government regulation today is in the hands of industry lobbyists and an exchange program where the regulators find jobs with the industry they regulate. The “revolving door”. Continue reading “Nuclear Musings”→
There are times when our discussion of recent stories touching on the law and policy can hit too close to home. This is one such tragic circumstance. George Washington biomedical engineering student Rahul Gupta (left), has been charged with the killing of a Georgetown University law student, Mark Edward Waugh. Both men came from McLean, where I live, and attended one of the two high schools here, Langley. Gupta’s defense will be made more difficult by incriminating statements made upon his first encounter with police.
There is an interesting story out of Washington state where a Washington state psychologist has been suspended from practice after a prostitute took off with his laptop containing files on 652 clients. Dr. Sunil Kakar, 46, reportedly left his computer with the prostitute while he ran out to an ATM machine. The computer was reportedly left as “collateral” for payment for the prostitute.
We have previously discussed how many families, including my own, have abandoned football stadiums to rowdies who have turned games into a contest of obnoxious drinking, swearing, and fighting. Games are now viewed as a license what is becoming the American version of Soccer hooligans. That element was on display this week with the video below of a New York Jets fan punching a woman in a Patriots jersey. According to reports, the man is Kurt Paschke, who was previously found guilty of negligent homicide in a stabbing death outside of a pizzeria in 1992. However, the Patriots fans come off as no better in the video, including the woman, identified as Jaclyn Nugent, 26, who is seen as hitting Paschke before he hits her.
