|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Previous week • Other date • About iLind.net • Search • Contact us |
|
|
|||
Last chance to let me know what you're doing here. I really would like to know. So, please, take a minute or two and fill out a little survey that I've prepared. If enough folks fill it out, I'll have a better sense of the meaning of life. Well, perhaps that's an overstatement, but at least I'll know a bit more about what you're looking for. Click here for the survey.
In the news war, now there are rumblings that Gannett wants to follow the Star-Bulletin's lead with its own round of layoffs at the Advertiser.And in Kaaawa, Bob M., who lives next door, is in the wrong line of work. He really is a writer, working incognito in a federal Dept of Agriculture job. After spotting a story earlier this week ("Irish Prefer Pub to Church, Survey Says"), he forwarded the link along with this commentary:
mind shattering research here
my Irish ancestors would be shockedi think i should join the research team
how would this work
go into a pub ... "wouldn't you rather be in church?"
researcher punched in face
go to a church ... " wouldn't you rather be drinking a beer right now?"
researcher goes broke as the Irish insist he invited themAnd for a good source of such headline stories, you might want to check out Internet Infidels New Wire, which bills itself as "news for freethinkers". Lots of interesting stuff there from around the world.
The Advertiser's Jim Dooley scored again yesterday with a nice little story on the personal reference written by UH football coach June Jones in support of Sukamto Sia, the Indonesian businessman awaiting sentencing after being convicted of bankruptcy fraud. Jim's folo today on the university's reaction reports:Jones said yesterday he didn't know the letter would be "public domain."It was included in a large sheaf of material Sia's lawyers submitted to Ezra in arguing for a reduced sentence.
Dooley proves once again what every investigative reporter knows: it's documents, documents, documents.
There's a question left hanging--what is the high profile coach doing getting buddy-buddy with "SS", the high profile gambler? Any relation to the gambling by other Athletic Department folks that no one wants to talk about publicly? This must all be giving UH administrators the cold sweats.
The Star-Bulletin's Rick Daysog also deserves a nod for his continuing tracking of the state's probe of illegal campaign contributions. In a story on Wednesday, he relied on court records to provide details of how one engineering firm used a separate bank account to shuffle funds intended for contributions through third parties.
It's 5:25 a.m. and I'm sitting here with Ms. Wally curled up in my lap and Ms. Lizzie sleeping next to the computer monitor, just a couple of hours after she appeared and rousted me for some fresh cat food. Not a bad morning.
The Star-Bulletin newsroom has been buzzing over layoff notices sent to two newsroom staffers, the first layoffs to hit employees covered by The Newspaper Guild contract. The layoffs are happening despite the voluntary pay cuts originally agreed to in order to avoid layoffs. The two involved are clerks, one at the city desk and the other in the sports department, according to newsroom sources. The layoffs followed an apparent dispute over implementation of a 2 percent across the board salary increase due members of the Guild bargaining unit beginning March 15. Folks have got to be worrying whether more cuts will follow.Needless to say, there's a lot of unhappiness over at the Black Star-Bulletin right now. Some staffers say management's decisions and, perhaps more importantly, underlying values, have made it impossible for the Star-Bulletin to excel, and that the internal drive for excellence has waned as a result. I can't say whether that view is widespread, but it would certainly be understandable.
On a cheerier note, here's another shot of the little Siamese now stashed "temporarily" at my office.
She really is sweet, and would mightily appreciate a permanent home, before or after her kittens arrive.
"Did you want kittens," our vet asked the other day. Well, no. I'm not at all prepared for kittens, but in the scheme of things it's no disaster, as they're always easier to find homes for than adult cats.
So it goes.
Siamese
While looking for something else, I ran across an press conference statement back in January by Common Cause national president Scott Harshbarger blasting an airline industry junket that took key congressional leaders to the Hapuna Beach Prince Hotel on the Big Island while action was still pending on parts of the multibillion dollar airline bailout legislation. The extended comments were pretty hard hitting. Airlines and junkets in the same breath as Hawaii should have piqued the interest of local news editors. But the Star-Bulletin ran only a bland business brief which failed to catch any of the flavor of Harshbarger's message, and my subsequent search failed to discover any mention in the Advertiser.Blaine, former S-B webmaster, said he forgot about Starbulletin.com's birthday on Monday while spending half the day in meetings and half working on a Kamehameha web site. "Guess I don't work there anymore," was his low key comment.
The wet and windy weather continued through yesterday, with only the barest hint of dawn making it through the thick clouds.
But at least it didn't rain on us during the walk, which was quite a relief since our little umbrellas wouldn't do much good in that kind of wind.
And on the cat front things got quite a bit more complicated yesterday afternoon when I took the little Siamese cat for a recheck by our vet.Siamese been stashed at my little office during this two week isolation period, after which we hope to find a new family for her.
With antibiotics, her respiratory infection has cleared up nicely.
Vet says she sounds good, no more gurgling or wheezing. Looking good.
And good food has made a difference. She went from six to eight pounds in a couple of weeks.
But her belly is still swollen. We have been quite worried about the possibility that a dangerous feline disease could be the cause.
After quite a bit more exploratory squeezing and probing, up and down her abdomen, presumably checking for tumors and other things, our vet looks up at me and said: "Did you want kittens?"Ooops. Nothing could be felt on March 1, when another vet pronounced that she wasn't pregnant following an initial exam. But today there's something that doesn't feel like a bowel, Dr. Lee Loy said.
Nothing more to tell. Given the conditions Ms. Siamese was plucked from, I don't know what shape they will be in, and I didn't have the good sense to ask for a further exam to see if the kittens are alive.
But I guess we'll find out.
I looked up cat gestation time. 58 to 65 days is the normal range.
I guess we might have to give this cat a name.
Yesterday was the 6th birthday of Starbulletin.com, the newspaper's online edition, and Paul Minczer marked the occasion with another wonderful cartoon. Check out yesterday's letters to the editor section and scroll down to Minczer's graphic.I have to say that I overlooked #6 altogether, but was pointed to Minczer's drawing by a regular reader living in Japan.
Any festivities marking this milestone were probably a bit subdued in the face of lingering doubts about the commitment of S-B management to the online effort, and the absence of Starbulletin.com's creator, former webmaster Blaine Fergerstrom, now working at Kamehameha Schools.
There wasn't much new is University of Hawaii President Evan Dobelle's speech yesterday at a Freedom of Information Day gathering sponsored by the Honolulu Community-Media Council, SPJ, and others.
However, Dobelle did explicitly say that his administration intends to be more open than his predecessors.
"Henceforth," Dobelle said, "the University's administration will follow the intent of Hawaii's laws that the provisions requiring open meetings and open records SHALL be liberally construed." The emphasis is in his written text.
I'm sure these words will be put to the test more than once in the months ahead.
A few last minute responses to my readers' survey came in yesterday.
One says: "Cats, cats, and more cats! (This is coming from an avowed dog person.)"Another: "CATS. I love 'em! But me thinks you give them a little too much space."
And this explanation of a first-time visit: "sheer unadulterated boredom. my only other option is to blow out the pilot and close the windows."
My two favorite commercial messages of the weekend.Spotted on the spigot of our regular 7-11 store: "Enjoy Minute Maid Lemonade. *contains 0% juice."And this "FREE" deal at Outpost.com:
Canon Powershot S30 Digital Camera - 3.2 Megapixels $499.99Canon Powershot S30 Digital Camera w/FREE Zio! CompactFlash Card Reader $549.95
(and, strangely, the Zio! card reader sells separately for only $29.99. Go figure.)From a secret observer of Ms. Lizzie:
You keep wondering where Ms. Lizzie is, why she runs from you, why she's always hiding ... Isn't it obvious? She's fleeing from the paparazzi! It's bad enough every little hairball, every nap, every bowel movement ends up on a Web site. Now, everywhere she goes, a former investigative reporter from the Star-Bulletin follows her, tracking her every move, pursuing her with a relentless, almost psychotic determination. "What does he want with me?" she mews helplessly, eyeing the neighborhood from beneath a pile of old car parts in someone's back yard. "Why won't he just let me have my privacy?"Then this note from an astute observer of the local scene:
I'm off now to indulge in my favorite fantasy, picturing the van cam company boys and the airline merger folks tipping back some ale together and wondering what the hell hit 'em. Saying stuff like, "But we wore the silly Reyn Spooner shirts, and let them hang flowers on us ... where did we go wrong?"And, finally, a Jeremy Harris song from cartoonist John Pritchett: Go to: <http://www.pritchettcartoons.com/sorrow.htm>
Yesterday was an unusual morning. The clouds captured and reflected the light, which seemed to ooze from every fold and shadow. Like walking on Golden Pond, Meda observed.
But the day ended with heavy rain and strong winds. Ms. Lizzie showed up sometime overnight. We hadn't seen her since Friday morning, and she didn't respond to my several forays down the hill during the day.
Former S-B writer Pat Bigold made a splash in the Boston Globe with a page A-3 story on St. Patrick's Day in Hawaii. Pat says: "In the print paper it ran on A-3 with a photo in the center of the page. The pic was of Emerald Ball guests having drinks near the Hilton beach before sunset. There were three pipers from the Honolulu police and fire band in the shot taken by former S-B photog Ronen Zilberman." So Pat has a legitimate excuse to celebrate today (as if he needed one).I think Russell told a whopper. Saturday's Star-Bulletin quoted HGEA chief Russell Okata saying the union hasn't failed to cooperate with an audit of public funds received for health benefits. No, it was that insurance company.
"I just wanted to make it abundantly clear," said the HGEA executive director yesterday, "that HGEA has instructed our insurance representatives, which is the Voluntary Employees Benefits Association of Hawaii, to cooperate with the comptroller to conduct an audit."If the state has a problem, it's not with the HGEA, but with our third-party administrator, VEBAH, and I think the suit didn't make that clear to the court."
An arms length transaction? Well, Okata neglects to mention that VEBAH is one of a tangle of entities that make up the Royal State Corporation. And he also forgot to mention that he's served as chairman of the board of Royal State for several years.
VEBAH is also mentioned in the latest indictment of UPW director Gary Rodrigues. The indictment alleges that after my initial story in the Star-Bulletin called attention to payments from the union's health insurance provider (PGMA) to Rodrigues' daughter, these kickbacks were then routed to VEBAH, then to another Royal State company, and finally on to a company owned by Robin Rodrigues Sabatini. Whether an audit of state health fund payments might uncover other questionable transfers isn't known, but under the circumstances VEBAH's failure to open the books becomes grounds for suspicion.
Search this site,
courtesy of the folks at Atomz.com
\*/.
