MMMM #132 -- about PBS

Last Week, Ken Burns wrote passionately in the Washington Post about the need for a Public Broadcasting system:

"...we have never needed them more..."

     Burns made both a name for himself and a good deal of money by producing documentaries broadcast on PBS, programs that he argues rightly would never have made it in the world of commercial TV.
     His comments come as the GOP Majority U.S. House votes to remove all federal funding for the publicasters.

     As mentioned earlier on this blog, the Alabama network that carries PBS programs is facing a double threat. If the spending cutters have their way, funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting will dry up, and the state GOP, with super majorities in both the Alabama House and Senate, may have their eyes on that funding too.

     At least APT is under the Education Budget, not the General Fund, which is going to virtually kill some agencies because The Departments of Corrections and Medicaid are being protected from cuts, deepening the reductions for everyone else.
     When I first spotted the headline of the Burns column in the Post, I thought it read "Public broadcasting, a 'luxury' we can do without"...and I had virtually written this post in my mind before I blinked and saw it was "can't do without."
     He makes a good argument, but when the choice is between dinner or a new Television..and that's where Alabama's budgets are headed.
     I also have a great Ken Burns story to tell...but we'll save that for later.

[Photo: The last For The Record, two years ago this Month.]

Photo

     I hated the fact that I didn't have my camera with me a couple of week ago when I toured the old auditorium inside Montgomery City hall for a CBS-8 story. But I did take this rather blurry cell phone shot from the balcony looking down to the stage, which is packed with shelves of old records. An eerie place for sure!.

    The City is fixin'---not quite restoring---the old place and the City Council will be meeting there, probably starting in 2012.

I did have my camera with me for a walk this afternoon, and captured this view of the Trinity Presbyterian Church on Hull Street, Senior Executive Editor Jay C. suggested it be posted, and when the SEP says do it...

The flowers are on a Tulip Tree, usually the first to bloom each year here in Montgomery.

48 Hours Till The Legislative New World Order Begins

     Alabama's 2011 Regular Legislative Session is 48 hours away as I write this, and Republicans will be in control of both the State Senate and the State House for the first time in over a century, with a super majority, meaning if they can keep party discipline, they can pass any legislation they want. (Of course the last Republicans to run things were more politically aligned with the modern Democrats, but that's another story for another time.)
     Don't expect any battles over state employee unions like is happening in Wisconsin. There are no real unions, just AEA and The ASEA, and neither of them have the power of "collective bargaining".     
     That's also true in other Southern States.
     Despite that weakness, Alabama Republicans have tried to destroy the groups. especially AEA, for years.
     AEA was a target during last year's election cycle, as it had been many times before. There was even a "special session" called late last year in which one of the measures was to block the employee groups from having dues voluntarily deducted from state paychecks.
     I was thinking about the Democratic initiatives of recent years that were rejected over and over again....issues like eliminating the sales tax on food, calling a Constitutional Convention to rewrite the state's 1901 document, and adding sexual orientation to the existing state Hate Crime law. If issues like those couldn't be approved with Democrats running both houses, they are truly dead now.

     Sixty-five bills have been prefiled by legislators. Some are longtime Republican initiatives like requiring a photo ID to vote and eliminating the "DROP" law that pays some state employees to continue working rather than retire early.

    Democratic Rep. Chris England of Tuscaloosa has pre-filed a bill to allow some convicted felons to receive food stamps and welfare under certain circumstances. Good luck with that.
    And perhaps most significantly of all, legislative district lines will be redrawn in 2011.
   The best Democrats can hope for is limiting damage.
   And even for that, they'll need GOP approval.
    

Finally!

     I've been complaining about the BIG NAME of the Agriculture Commissioner on gas pump inspection stickers for over a decade....I blogged about it in 2009 and recounted asking then Commissioner (and future Senate puncher) Charles Bishop about it. His answer was a lame "so people know who to call".
     I suggested the toll-free phone number might be a better large-typeface item than the free publicity for an elected official who would be running for office.

Anyway, I am delighted to report that the new Commissioner---Republican John McMillan--- is having the name removed and the word "inspected" put in its place/

Now let's make sure there isn't a candidate taking advantage of that for the 2010 elections. Elect Pete Inspected Ag Commissioner!

Libya, Home of Human Rights

      Twice this past week I heard stories that gave me pause.
     The first involved the daughter of Moammar Gadhafi  being stripped of her Goodwill Ambassador status by the U.N.
     The second story reported on the U.N. removing Libya from that international organization's Human Rights Commission.
     Gee, what happened in Libya to change the mind of the United Nations community? Was Libya something of a Human Rights crusader before its people suddenly revolted?

Textiles = gone gone gone

     According to a story in the Wall Street Journal Tuesday, the high cost of cotton is killing what's left of the sock industry in Northeast Alabama, especially in Fort Payne.

 
      It reminded me of an NPR story some years back about Wal-Mart and socks. The reporter was in Fort Payne and visited the local Wal-Mart, where lots of Ft. Payne citizens were buying socks...made in (fill in the blank overseas country where folks make .15 a day)...instead of the products made in their own backyard..the point being that the locals didn't make the connection between the jobs dying at the local factory and their own purchasing.
    
     The entire textile industry is pretty much gone from Alabama these days...leaving behind empty old mill buildings and unemployed mill workers. It was the subject of an old "For The Record" I produced on APT in 2005.

     Yes, there is a new sheriff in town, and Governor Robert Bentley this week declared a moratorium on any new landfills in Alabama.
     Did you know Alabama imports five times as much trash as the state produces?
     Just as a deceptively named dump called "Connecuh Woods" entered  the permitting pipeline, Bentley has pulled the rug out. Would that ever have happened under the previous administration? There is some question about the impact of the Executive order on that project.
     The Governor says he issued the moratorium because permits were being granted by ADEM and others without any consideration for the people living near the dumps.
     Republicans have to be asking themselves (not for the first time) what kind of a Governor did we nominate and elect? Or is Bentley a sheep in wolf's clothing?

The Wisconsin Front

"Gov. Scott Walker ('s)...attack on unions has nothing to do with the budget. In fact, those unions have already indicated their willingness to make substantial financial concessions — an offer the governor has rejected. "

                                         Paul Krugman in a NT Times column

Government Anger. Angry Government.

 

   Reading this story in today's NY Times, I couldn't help but think that actions like the one described contribute mightily to the anti-government fever in the country.
    Please read it and comment! If Mr. Heicklen is trying to convince jurors to obey their conscience, what could be more American!
     Your thoughts?

The New Montgomery Chief

Montgomery Public Safety Director Chris Murphy watches as newly named Montgomery Police Chief Kevin Murphy (no relation) speaks during the media conference in which he was named Thursday afternoon.

      Chief Murphy says he always wanted to be chief. He's been on the force for over 26 years.
     The former chief, Art Baylor, was appointed U.S. Marshal by the Obama Administration.

The SPLC's Hate List--Can't we all just, you know, get along?

     The Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery is out with it's list of hate groups in America, and there's been a steady increase in the total since 2000...from 602 to 1,002.
     On top of that, the number of "patriot" groups has jumped sharply since 2009, when President Obama was elected.

     Last week Frank Rich wrote about an outbreak (OK, a mini-outbreak) of civility after the Tuscon Shootings.
     Add in the attempt to kill the Live Oaks at Toomer's corner and there couldn't be a much better time for an event I've been invited to take part in next month.
     I've been invited to sit on a panel discussing civility on March 25th at the Alabama Department of Archives and History.
     The event is co-sponsored by the David Mathews Center for Civic Life (mathewscenter.org) and the Alabama Humanities Foundation (ahf.net). People like Dr. Harvey Jackson of Anniston and Shelly Stewart of Birmingham radio fame are also on the panel, giving me the feeling that my invitation was an accident. Pretty high cotton, I'd say.
    But I'll be willing to bet nobody will lose their cool.

Just a thought...

     Are some of the people who say we shouldn't play the "blame game", the same people who call for accepting responsibility?

MMMM #131 -- Civil War Media

     From Sunday's Montgomery Advertiser story about the 150th anniversary reenactment of Jefferson Davis' swearing-in as President of the Confederacy:

When stating the reasons for celebrating the Confederacy, ( SCV Lt. Commander in Chief Kelley) Barrow asked if those in the crowd would rather hear from those in attendance than organizations such as MSNBC or USA Today, whose names received a chorus of boos from the crowd.

     I wanted to go to the parade downtown for photographic reasons, but other events got in the way. That's apparently what happened to every elected official in the Heart of Dixie. I've scoured reports about the event, and have yet to find a single one who was present, much less actually taking part. Contrast that with the 100th anniversary, when the Governor and lots of others attended and took part. If course that was in 1961, the early years of the Civil Rights Movement, and those elected official found the event a way to show  how pro-white they were.
     This time around there was nothing to be gained, and much potentially to be lost, by showing up.
     Now the Alabama Republican Party, made up of the political ancestors of the Confederates, controls (with super-majorities!) both the Alabama House and The Alabama Senate. Who needs a parade?
     The Advertiser story linked above said there were more reenactors than people watching.

     When the 200th Anniversary comes around in 2061 the event may be relegated to a mention in a "This Day in History" story and to that era's trivia games. He was elected President in Alabama in 1861...for $7,000......ding! Who was Jefferson Davis!

     

The (Still) Oily Gulf

AP reports a scientist has found lots of oil still on the bottom, and lots of dead sea life.

"...the oil isn't degrading as hoped and has decimated life on parts of the sea floor."

National Media Montgomery Mentions

     Bill Maher's RealTime show on HBO included a mocking commentary about tomorrow's parade on Dexter Avenue in Montgomery commemorating the 150th anniversary of Jefferson Davis' swearing-in as the first president of The Confederacy.
     They'll also reenact the swearing-in on the steps of the Capitol, where a brass star marks the spot where Davis is believed to have stood.
     It will be interesting so see how many elected officials come within miles of the event.
     Rep. Alvin Holmes was planning a protest.
     Montgomery Mayor Todd Strange told me he and his family will be out of town because of the three-day weekend (Monday is President's Day).
     Strange says The L.A. Times was in town recently for a story, and I'm sure the anniversary was the hook.
     But in today's NY Times, a positively glowing story about the Hyundai plant that can't seem to pump out enough vehicles to meet the widespread demand.
     Ying and yang, up and down. Usually the best way to change perceptions about a place is to have people come visit.

[UPDATE: The L.A. Times story does deal with the parade. Here's a link to it. And as I predicted, few if any politicains are attending.]

[PLUS: The New York Times uses an AP story to cover the event, though it contains one factual error. It identified Rep. Alvin Holmes (D-Montgomery) as the longest serving black member of the Alabama Legislature. While that is true, he is also the longest serving member regardless of race.]

[AND ALSO: USA Today published a thorough story before today's events that examined the reasons the Civil War is such a controversial issue.]

M (F) MMM -- Killing Content

     OK, let me see if I understand this. In Europe, Apple wants newspapers and magazines to pay 30% of their subscription fees to Apple if the subscription is made to an iPad or iPhone? Really?
     I say the TV manufacturing industry needs to get on that game fast! They can start requiring a cut of the TV commercials sold by the stations and networks, since the ads would never be seen without their sets...and radio, ditto. Same goes for cable channels!
     As a matter of fact, how about people who own a TV or radio demanding a per-centage of the ad revenue from to the people sending content to the sets?

[The Monday--and sometimes Friday---Morning Media Memo is a regular feature of this blog.]

Crime City USA

     Orlando and Birmingham tie for the 3rd most dangerous cities in the USA, according to an analysis of crime stats by US News & World Report.

Nearby Atlanta is number one.

TGFSD

......Here's another entry in the book of state laws that could have been proposed in Alabama, but, thankfully, were not. (See the Utah Veggie law below.)
      South Dakota legislators won't be considering a bill to make the killing of doctors who perform abortion "justifiable  homocide".

Outdoors

THE R.S. GUYS---Ron Sparks and Ray Scott at a news conference this morning in Montgomery. They were discussing an effort to market the Alabama Black Belt at an Outdoor Expo in North Carolina this weekend.

Pete Eckert. The Blind Photographer

Florida no? Alabama yes!

     The Governor of Florida is rejecting two billion dollars in federal money toward an Orlando to Tampa high speed rail.

     Let's see, that's about 88 miles or so, isn't it a shame there aren't two of Alabama's larger cities that about that far apart, where people would benefit greatly from being able to hop on  train and be in the other city in 20 minutes? If only there were such cities, our congressional delegation could ask the White House to send US the money!
     Such a shame.

You can have my pole beans when you pry them....

     Utah residents apparently are afraid the Feds are going to make it illegal for them to grow veggies in their backyards, so reports the Salt Lake Tribune.
      Is there something in the water out there?
     Doncha think the Obama Administration has enough problems on its hands without trying to prevent those folks in Utah from growing squash?
     American paranoia runs awfully deep in some places these days.

MMMM #129 -- Piecework in the Sweatshop

     L.A. Times columnist Tim Rutten writing the Huffington Post/AOL merger last week, says it will result in very little journalism, but a lot of

"...content...which is what journalism becomes when it's adulterated into a mere commodity."

     He points our that employees will be required to produce five to ten stories a day.
    
    That's a statistic I can relate to.
    
     There are some days when I can offer up ten story ideas in a single day. Then again, there are days when the well is dry. And probably half of the ideas I generate won't go anywhere for any number of reasons.
     I say cut to the chase and pay those HuffPoAOL journalists by the word. Really. Just like a sock factory in China or South America or wherever it is all of those Northeast Alabama sock jobs are now being performed.

     Remember the shock in 2007 when a California website hired a writer in India to "cover" it's city council meetings and other city government events? The outrage the move generated seems positively quaint right now. These days it may be unemployed American reporters looking to cover news in India!
    That reporter for the Pasadena website was required to come up with two stories a day from six-thousand miles away.
    
  James Macpherson, Editor and Publisher of  Pasadena Now, tells me the system is still in place today, and, as a matter of fact, has expanded to the administrative and sales departments. He says various journalilsts in India have filled the reporter's position in the four years since it started.
     There are 1,445 words in this posting. If I pay myself a penny a word, I've paid for a nice breakfast. Now about that mortgage payment....

[The Monday Morning Media Memo is a regular feature of this blog.]

Public Broadcasting = $0

     PBS and NPR have long been targets of conservatives because of what they perceive to be a liberal slant.

     Now in control of the House, the GOP members have proposed a budget that includes this broadside to funding for public radio and TV:

The amounts included under the heading ‘‘Corporation for Public Broadcasting’’ in division D of Public Law 111–117 shall be applied to funds appropriated by this division as follows: by substituting ‘‘$0’’ for ‘‘$86,000,000’’; by substituting ‘‘$0’’ for ‘‘$25,000,000’’; by substituting ‘‘$0’’ for ‘‘$36,000,000’’; and by substituting ‘‘$0’’ for ‘‘$25,000,000’’.

     Ouch. And when you consider the deep cuts in Alabama state spending that are ahead, my friends at APT are facing some very difficult times indeed. Maybe I just carried my ties out of the building a touch early?
     Then again, the Democrats still control the U.S. Senate.

&^$!!#HG5562$!!!!!!!!!

Mobile, Alabama will be ground zero for a stop-cursing movement tomorrow. According to a story in the NY Times.

By The Sea, By The Sea, By The Beautiful Sea...

     I've never been on a cruise...not on a "small" cruise ship or a larger one.
     Still, I read an article about The Allure, one of the two largest cruise ships in the world, with interest this morning.
     This picture shows the ship passing under a bridge with less than a foot difference....possible only in calm seas and by lowering the telescoping funnels of the mammoth vessel.

   The story is in the Times today, written by a woman who goes on the cruise with her Aunt. Like the old tree in the forest question, if you go on a cruise and never feel the movement of the ocean, did you really go cruising?

The Old Auditorium

    

 The funeral for Hank Williams Sr. was held in an auditorium in Montgomery City Hall in January of 1953. When the Montgomery Civic Center was built in 1975, the hall fell into disuse. Eventually modern offices were built on the floor level of the municipal auditorium, and the stage and wings were used to records storage.

     I went along on a tour of the old hall this week, which had all but disappeared from view inside the 1930's building. A stimulus-money funded renovation is going to bring the auditorium back into use as a place for city council meetings
 
   . Here's the report I filed on CBS-8 on Thursday.

Gas Price$

     Wasn't it just the other day we were hearing prediction of gas at the $4 a gallon level in 2011?
Now an economist in Montgomery is using the even more shocking $5 a gallon figure this Summer.
     AUM Economist Jeff Bates says the unrest in Egypt is responsible....even though Egypt is not an oil producer. It's the control of the Suez Canal that's problematic.
     Want to ensure a "double dip recession"?...seems to me $5 gas would do it.
     I wrote the above earlier this week but never posted it...SO glad to hear Mubarak has stepped down, even if for a very self-serving reason like lower gas prices.

Eating Us

Warning: this post is about some horrible events that occurred during times of human despair, in Ireland and in the former Soviet Union.

     During the process of obtaining my dual citizenship with Ireland, I naturally found myself reading more and more about Irish history. One book about the Potato Famine told of cannibalism. It quoted court records about a man arrested for stealing food for his wife. He was set free after testimony that he had walked in on his wife as she ate parts of their son, who had died of hunger.
     Now, an article in Slate tells of similar events during Stalin's WWII Soviet Union. One story tells of a group of children eating one of their own who was still alive, a boy who joined them in eating his own flesh. The Slate article is a review of a new book about Stalin's activities during the war, and presents the argument that the U.S. became allies with Stalin, the monster leader of Russia, to defeat another monster, Germany's Hitler.
     Just imagine the forces at work that would put someone in a place where they would eat their own flesh to survive.

The Way Forward

     A two-part story I produced is airing and is online this week.

     It's called The Way Forward, and it examined where some of the out-of-office politicians might be headed next.

    Part two airs on CBS-8 in Montgomery at 6pm tonight and again tomorrow morning on CBS-8 This Morning. (A somewhat abbreviated version of Part 2 will air tonight at 10pm).

   Part one is online now here...part two will be added to the WAKA website overnight.

Federal Dollars

     The White House is going to propose a plan to help states that are headed toward financial default, and of course, the GOP critics are out with the long knives to do it in even before it is proposed.
     Shouldn't they feel the same way about virtually every local street paving, infrastructure project underway today? It's all being paid for with Federal stimulus dollars, after all.
     Meanwhile, The Times is examining the downside of the elimination of earmarks. Lots of very worthy projects are going unfunded.
     Used to be that one of the best investments Alabama could make was to send Federal taxes to Washington...we always got back a significantly larger sum than we sent (unlike investments in Wall Street). But I wonder how that always-steady return will be impacted by the end of the cash-stream our congressional delegation sent back home.
    

Driven to Distraction

     One of the features of Alabama Graduated Driver's License keeps teens from driving with more than one friend along for the ride.
     During the second of the three levels, the driver:

"Must not have more than one passenger in the vehicle other than parents, legal guardians or family members."

     It's the state's attempt to reduce distracted driving as much as possible.The use of electronic devices is also banned.
    Now a study has confirmed that keeping friends out of the car is a good idea, but it should keep ALL fellow teen passengers out. The teen brain is apparently wired to show-off for friends...especially boys and especially for other male teen friends.
    Alabama is one of five Southern States identified as especially dangerous for teen drivers in a 2008 Allstate study...and the Birmingham-Hoover area was further selected as a national hotspot for teen deaths.

Poor Puck's Plight

     The statue of Puck at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival in Montgomery is missing some fingers...intentional or accidental damage to a statue that had already suffered a more official slight,according to a story in today's The Montgomery Advertiser:

It was moved out of the foyer (of the theater) because there were complaints about how little clothing Puck has on.

     It seems that even when we here in the Deep South rise above our humble roots and manage to create a facility as absolutely world-class as ASF, we have to act like rubes when skin---even on a statue!--- is exposed.

Punishment

     How do you correct a misbehaving child?
     Thousands of books have been written advising parents on that question.
     And the subject of how schools may punish kids is a hot topic too.
     But cold showers and squirting hot sauce in the child's mouth probably isn't recommended in many of them.
     Nonetheless, that's what an Alaska mother is accused of doing when her adopted Russian son would not behave. She even videotaped it so the audience on Dr. Phil could see it.
     The tape is a big hit in Russia, reports today's NY Times.

Health Care Reform

      So now it's 2 and 2...two Federal Judges have ruled against the legislation, and two for it. The Supreme Court will have the final say.
      The main objection seems to be that it is wrong for the Government to force us to buy a product, namely, insurance.
     Then why it OK for the states to force their residents to buy car insurance?
     Is it somehow OK for the states to crush their people under oppressive regulation, but not for the Feds?
     Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange says the same kind of legal rationale that went into the law would allow the feds to force people to "drink a particular kind of coffee".
     And he's a lawyer, so he should know.

High praise for The Alabama-Made Sonata

.....the made-in-Alabama Sonata is a thumping bound to the front of its class.... this is the first car Hyundai has sold in America that’s so good and so keenly priced that any buyer shopping in its market segment must seriously consider it. It’s the first unavoidable Hyundai.

Great review of the new model in today's NY Times.