|
January 24, 2004 - Saturday
It appears that Rob Perez's "Raising Cane" column is a thing of the past. I haven't seen the column since around the end of November. At first I assumed Rob was on vacation, but then his byline started appearing outside of the "Raising Cane" venue. I finally got around to checking. Rob confirmed this week that "Raising Cane is history," saying it was his decision to end it, but he declined to go into the reasons for the move.
During Raising Cane's successful run, Rob did a good job of finding and explaining bureaucratic foibles and official misconduct in an entertaining way. I'll miss the column, and will just have to hope that Rob can continue digging into similar cases without the constraints of such a frequent publishing schedule.
Can it be true? The Jerusalem Post, citing Jane's Intelligence Digest, reports that Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld may be planning an attack in Lebanon intended to provoke a war with Syria, further taxing the already thin DOD resources and provoking another round of anti-Americanism through the Arab world. It is a scary but unfortunately a politically plausible scenario also aimed at further polarizing this country in the months before the presidential election.
| Harriet continues her recovery from that injury to her tongue.
We still have no idea what happened, but it has altered her behavior. She's staying closer to home, spending more time indoors, and returning from her outside adventures on her own volition. Previously I often had to walk down into the empty 4-acre parcel makai of our house and call until she finally appeared. Now she arrives and the door and announces herself with a meow or a good scratch on the screen. That's progress.
|
Ms. Harriet (a.k.a. Harry) |
January 23, 2004 - Friday
The power was out again in Kaaawa for most of the night, finally coming back on around 5:30 a.m., although most of the storm missed our part of the island.
The student newspaper at the University of Texas at Arlington is again reporting that UTA Science Dean Neal Smatresk could be named UH vice chancellor for academic affairs when the Board of Regents meets on February 19.
According to The Shorthorn newspaper: "Kitty Lagareta, vice chair of the regents, confirmed that the board discussed the candidates behind closed doors and chose a nominee at their Jan. 15 meeting."
MoveOn.org reports that CBS has refused to air the winning "Bush in 60 seconds" ad during the Super Bowl although a White House ad will appear, effectively censoring the viewpoints available to the American people. At the same time as it defends the Bush administration from criticism, the network is expected to be one of the big winners in the Republican move to restore FCC rules allowing continued consolidation of corporate control of the media.
Former Star-Bulletin owner Rupert Phillips has named a new publisher of his Journal Newspapers, displacing son Ryan. The Journal papers have shifted to free distribution in Northern Virginia and appear ready to start similar free distribution in the Maryland suburbs of Washington, according to the Washington Post.
A colleague at UH commented that the arrival of the Chinese Year of the :Monkey yesterday meant that billions of people were celebrating on Meda's birthday. It added a bit of spice to her day.
January 22, 2004 - Thursday
Happy Birthday, Ms. Meda! I slept an extra hour this a.m. in honor of the occasion and now find little time to finish today's entry.
| Yesterday morning it was cloudy and threatening. Today it is likely to be raining (although it's not raining right at this moment and it's still too dark to see what's going on outside). It did rain, or at least drizzle, much of the night and more of the same is forecast for today. |
 |
The Washington Post reports that Hawaii is one of the test sites for an experimental Internet voting system that is already drawing security concerns.
A reader comments on a Jan. 16 Star-Bulletin editorial (scroll down to the second editorial) which supports the UH mascot and reads as if the editorial writer never got around to reading Rob Perez's piercing story.
The reader comments: "Perez sticks his neck out to bring up a topic that most media have been too intimidated to mention, and what does the S–B do?" Short answer: they cop-out.
January 21, 2004 - Wednesday
Here we go again. Gannett announced on Friday that its Cincinnati Enquirer will pull out of the Joint Operating Agreement with Scripps' Cincinnati Post when the deal comes up for renewal at the end of 2007.
I haven't been able to log on to the Post this morning to see what they're saying about the paper's future. But according to a Scripps press release:
"Scripps intends to continue publishing the Post newspapers Monday through Saturday afternoons for the duration of the joint operating agreement while actively exploring all options for the future of The Post."
The release also notes: "Paid circulation of The Cincinnati Post and The Kentucky Post, at about 188,000 when the JOA was established (in 1977), has continued to decline. The Post’s circulation in September 2003 stood at 42,219 daily and 57,543 on Saturday."
The Cincinnati Business Courier, a sister publication of Hawaii's Pacific Business News, reported on a possible sale of the paper:
In recent years, local media watchers have speculated that Cox Newspapers Inc., parent of the Dayton Daily News, might buy the Post to compete against Gannett in Cincinnati. Cox's Dayton newspaper shares content with the Post, and Cox built a new printing and distribution facility south of Dayton several years ago. Boehne wouldn't comment on the potential of a sale, except to say Scripps officials like having a newspaper in the company's hometown.
There are currently just 12 JOA's remaining, including the threatened agreement in Seattle and the one in Cincinnati.
According to an article in the Post on Saturday, "employees were informed at a staff meeting Friday afternoon in The Post newsroom."
Doesn't this bring back that old, familiar feeling? Anyone who was close to the Star-Bulletin at the time of the 1999 announcement will know what I mean.
January 20, 2004 - Tuesday
The New York Times recognized the anniversary of the 1893 Hawaiian "Revolution" with a reprint of its original report of the events of the day.
I see that Time Warner is now offering telecom services to the Sheraton Maui hotel, continuing the convergence of data and voice and raising questions about the relation between the company's regulated cable television business and its unregulated telecom services.
Also noted: Friday's UH Board of Regents meeting apparently produced no announcement regarding the position of vice chancellor for academic affairs. Although the search was completed months ago and an offer has reportedly been made and accepted, the whole thing appears to have gone into limbo, but still no comment from the dailies.
Message to John Kerry: You've got some great ideas about creating service opportunities and rewards for those who devote time to the public interest. Go with those and dump your ill conceived plan to revive the draft with a mandatory system for service by high school students. Conscription defeats the whole goal of service, turns "public interest" into a negative form of Big Brother, and will generate resentment and resistance instead of willing participation. Now that your campaign has hit its stride, it's time to fine tune the message. Dumping the draft is a good opening step.
And here's a good one from down under....
January 19, 2004 - Monday
My vote for the best Michelle Wie headline goes to the Star-Bulletin's "Wow, Wie!" on the front page of Saturday's edition.
It was depressing to read S-B writer Richard Borreca's Sunday "On Politics" column, little more than another uncritical dig at public employee unions while negotiations are under way. I like Richard and sat next to him for years at the Star-Bulletin, and I know he's a good writer with a wealth of political knowledge, but now it's as if he has tethered himself intellectually to the Lingle administration with quite a short leash.
Public workers' salaries are a significant expense in state and local budgets. That's a no brainer. But does it follow that those same public employees should never see another raise if it would boost the state's costs? I think not. But that appears to be the sum total of Borreca's argument. He doesn't bother to seek out a union perspective nor to garner any data to support his case. He doesn't examine what factors an arbitrator might consider in considering the HGEA contract. We don't learn anything about the arbitration process from the column.
And Borreca again throws out the often-repeated claim that public employers have never "won" in arbitration. The only problem is that the claim is wrong, according to Bill Puette, director of UH's Center for Labor Education and Research. Appearing on a panel sponsored by the UH Public Policy Center, Puette said he was the labor-appointed member of an arbitration panel called in during the firefighter negotiations. In that case, the arbitrators accepted the employers' position, but the counties later attacked the contract as if their position had been rejected. So the mayors could get their way in private, and then claim political points by bashing the unions anyway. And since reporters never seem to read the actual arbitration decision, the public is none the wiser.
It's especially depressing because Borreca and other reporters at Honolulu's two daily newspapers benefit from strong union contracts and enjoy the benefits, including good salaries, those unions have delivered. I guess the anti-labor reporting it falls into that category of biting the hand that feeds you.
| I finally got around to wrapping up the last sunrise photos of 2003 with a December batch. The storms don't appear in these images of the early a.m. experience in Kaaawa, but I suppose that's just as well. Just click on this photo to see the full December batch. |
 |
January 18, 2004 - Sunday
The controversy over the UH athletic department mascot made international news this week, but you wouldn't know it if your news comes from the Honolulu Advertiser. OK, the story originally appeared on the pages of rival Star-Bulletin, but the mostly negative national and international spotlight on the university would seem to have become a separate story worth at least a nod from the state's largest newspaper.
Here are a couple of stories from a quick morning browse through various papers. The Financial Times, not your left-wing rag, details how the Bush administration disregarded expert advise in order to peddle a rosy pre-war fantasy of Iraq reconstruction paid for by Iraqi oil.
One person quoted puts it this way: "Like other aspects of Iraq, those making policy believed what they wanted to believe about oil, without reference to the facts." That just about sums it up.
And now the Bushies stand accused of undermining progress towards another international accord, this time blocking the World Health Organization's attempt to press an international war on obesity.
| And here's a photo of Ms. Harry, apparently well on her way to a full recovery from her recent injuries. Yesterday she was able to eat and drink without much hesitation for the first time, and felt good enough to dig a few catnip toys out of the basket for a bit of fun. We've been very concerned, so this is a great relief. |
|
Previous week • Other
Search this site,
courtesy of the folks at
|
