Just By Chance: Quick Evening News Reads

Hello!

Minx here…We are still waiting for the modem to come in, I watch for that FedEx truck…even though I know the tracking shows delivery on Saturday or Monday. In an act of desperation, I hooked up the modem that has been causing all this trouble, and it worked. For how long I do not know, if the recent past is any indication, it will go down shortly. So I am taking the opportunity to upload a post, a quick one.

Hopefully these links will be new for you…

I caught this item from Idaho earlier this week, In Gov. Butch Otter’s Cabinet, women make less money than men

Idaho Agriculture Director Celia Gould has been with Gov. Butch Otter from the first day of his administration in 2007, having been a leading figure in his campaign and a respected former legislator.

She is the highest-paid of the women in Otter’s Cabinet but ranks just 16th among all top full-time officials. The median salary for 11 women in the Cabinet is $85,446; the median for the 33 men is $103,002.

“We really do have a glass ceiling in Idaho,” said Rep. Wendy Jaquet of Ketchum, the senior Democrat in the Legislature and a member of the budget committee.

Jaquet compared Gould to Commerce Director Jeffrey Sayer, who was hired in October. Gould oversees 259 employees, Sayer 53. Based on Jan. 1 pay records now searchable at IdahoStatesman.com, Gould makes $106,621. Sayer makes $145,018.

“Director Gould is about $38,000 under the newly employed Jeff Sayer,” Jaquet said. “You can’t argue she doesn’t have as many employees. Our state is no different than the national averages that show women reach a ‘glass ceiling’ for promotion and pay.”

You can read the excuses and responding silence from the Governor’s office at the link up top. It is obvious that Idaho is not the only state which pays its women less than men, but it is quite annoying to see just how high Idaho ranks in the male/female pay gap.

In other state news, a report has just been released that measures states on the strengths of their public corruption and government openness laws…and my state, Georgia came in last, a rank state officials dismissed as a “biased hit job.” Georgia last in public corruption laws

The report, released today, scored states on 330 “corruption risk indicators” including open records law, campaign finance rules, and auditing and budgeting procedures. Georgia received an overall grade of 49 out of 100, an F.

The study was conducted by the Center for Public Integrity and Global Integrity, two Washington-based nonprofits that champion government reform, and Public Radio International, using journalists and academics from across the nation to compile the data. Representatives for the groups said it is the most thorough and wide-ranging study ever done on government accountability.

Georgia officials, who based on previous reports said they were surprised the state did so poorly, questioned the criteria used and the man selected to conduct the initial audit.

The report awarded no A’s, but most states passed the exam. New Jersey received the highest grade.

Let me tell you this, if New Jersey got the highest grade, then those Georgia folks better come up with a better reason to dismiss the findings.

I do not know if this link was brought to your attention this week, it is from The Seattle Times and it regards the medical center which cleared Robert Bales, the soldier who killed 16 Afghan civilians earlier this month.

Local News | 40% of PTSD diagnoses at Madigan were reversed | Seattle Times Newspaper

A Madigan Army Medical Center screening team reversed more than 40 percent of the post-traumatic stress disorder diagnoses of patients under consideration for medical retirement since 2007, according to information released by U.S. Sen. Patty Murray.

That is the first paragraph…please, read the whole thing…there is just too much information to quote bits and pieces from.

And then there is this, which again…is a link from March 19^th, but you may have missed it. It’s Come To This: Watch TSA Agent Pat Down Handicapped Child | Mediaite

Has TSA finally gone too far? A video from 2010 — that just recently surfaced — featuring a young child strapped to a wheelchair being pat down by TSA is taking social media by storm. The incident occurred during the spring of 2010 at Chicago O’Hare International Airport during a family trip to Disney World. The child’s father was enraged by the security check of his son. “I was told I could NOT touch him or come near him during this process. Instead we had to pretend this was ‘OK’ so he didn’t panic,” according to comments on the video purporting to be the child’s father.

The video, which was uploaded March 17, describes the child’s ordeal with the TSA agent:

A toddler in a wheelchair is stopped by the TSA at ORD (O’Hare Airport in Chicago) and forced to into a sequestered area. On his way to a family vacation in Disney, this 3 year old boy is in a body cast for a broken leg. Despite assurances from his father that “everything is ok”, he is physically trembling with fear while he watches his two siblings, mother, father, grandfather and grandmother pass through along with everyone else…only to be singled out.

According to MSNBC.com reporter, Harriet Baskas, the boy’s father, Matt DuBiel, said the video was made in spring 2010 during a family trip to Disney World. “We had a baby five weeks ago, and I was looking at some old family videos on Saturday night, and I got incensed and emotional watching it.”

I have another US crime/court news item to share with you. This one hits home because it is about a family that lived in my town of Banjoville…aka Blairsville, Georgia. My daughter went to school with this little girl, and the murder suicide took place down the road from where we used to live until recently. Topix: Innocent Man’s Life Destroyed by Anonymous Online Poster – ABC News

This article is a preview of the story that will air tomorrow on ABC’s 20/20.

Gene Cooley, of Blairsville, Ga., with his late fiancee, Paulette Harper, and her daughter. In 2008 Harper was murdered by her ex. Harper’s family rejected Cooley based on anonymous gossip posted on Blairsville’s Topix — a website for local news and discussion — forum.

In Blairsville, Ga., as in most American towns, gossip is dished out with the daily special at the local diner. But now there’s a new forum called Topix that spreads gossip as fast as the Internet connection allows. And unlike the diner, where you know the person you’re talking to, Topix uses only screen names.

The combination of small-town familiarity — everyone knows each other — anonymity and instant dissemination compounds the impact when gossip is aimed at a neighbor or small business. Words on a web page — permanent, searchable and bearing the authority of the (digitally) printed word — are different from hearsay that can be forgotten or laughed off. They can ruin someone’s life.

The 20/20 crew filmed this report in early October…and it caused a stir on Topix, the very site that the story is about.

Topix Chief Executive Officer Chris Tolles said the company, started in 2007, was created to bring more news and information to small towns through articles and citizen reporting and open debate among users. The site operates in 5,000 towns and cities, averaging 125,000 posts a day.

Yet in some cases, the site reads less like a local newspaper and more like a graffiti wall. Mixed in with the mundane chitchat and community news are anonymous personal attacks.

I won’t go into the sordid details, they are given a quick mention in the preview article…but if you do get a chance to watch 20/20, please remember the personal lives that were destroyed in a violent murder suicide…and the ensuing hate fest and nasty “feeding frenzy” attack on Cooley from the local residents of my little mountain red-neck town…These are the same folks who pack the First Baptist Church every Wednesday and Sunday.

And lastly, the trailer for Dark Shadows, a movie based on my favorite gothic vampire Barnabas Collins, was released this week. Oh, I can’t wait to see this movie!

Hope this post can get uploaded to the blog…I miss you all very much. Being without the internet has been a terrible experience, it made me realize just how addicted I have become to that thing we call the world wide web.