Category: News

Boy Scouts rescue toddler in river:

A troop of Boy Scouts on a camping trip saved an 18-month-old girl who had fallen in a river upstream from them and was floating face down, officials said.

James Taranto of Best of the Web Today reminds us:

The ACLU describes the Boy Scouts as “an organization that will go the way of the Daughters of the American Revolution in losing its place in American life if it does not end its discriminatory practices.”

If the ACLU had its way, the intolerant organization wouldn’t exist, and that little girl would be dead.

I suppose some secularists and nontraditionalists would say that something would arise to take the Boy Scouts place and to teach young men to love and respect themselves and nature and embraces homosexuality, but I’m not so optimistic. One thing’s for sure, though; the Boy Scouts were prepared when they needed to be in this instance (and, no doubt, in many others). Fortunately for the little girl, her family, and for the future people she’ll touch in her wonderful life.

We’ve known it for a long time, but why is the St. Louis Post-Dispatch now running as its Sunday headline, page one, above the fold, Missiles may be next big threat to U.S. airliners?

The nation’s airline industry is a shoulder-launched missile attack away from plunging into a financial tailspin, one that could trigger $1 trillion-plus in financial losses in this country.

Five years after the devastating attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, U.S. passenger jets still have no response to a shoulder-launched missile that can be purchased on the black market for as little as $5,000 and can hit a target more than a mile away. If beefed-up airline security continues to keep terrorists and their bombs off commercial flights, shoulder-launched missile attacks pose a likely alternative, experts say.

“Terrorists are a lot like electricity: They take the path of least resistance,” said Jack Pledger, an executive at defense contractor Northrop Grumman Corp. “Instead of working out elaborate methods, terrorists go to the next-easiest thing. If you take out these easy things, you drive them to using” a shoulder-launched missile.

Pledger is director of business development for Northrop Grumman’s infrared-countermeasure program, which is testing a system that disrupts a shoulder-launched missile’s guidance system. The cost of the system would be less than $1 million for each plane if Northrop were to receive enough orders to warrant high-rate production.

Such a deal! But the government and the airlines are not willing to choke up the million dollars’ plus that Northrop Grumman charges for the solution. Ergo, it’s time to gin up some outrage so The People force the airlines, hardly awash in slush funds, or the government, too awash in taxpayer slush, to bolster its bottom line.

Man falls into vat of chocolate, lives:

An ordinary night’s work at the chocolate company turned dangerous for Darmin Garcia early Friday after he fell into a vat of the molten goo and was trapped for more than two hours.

“I was pushing the chocolate down into the vat because it was stuck,” said Garcia, 21. “It came loose, and I just slid down the hopper into the chocolate.”

With a picture that shows a dark-haired, bare-chested, 21-year-old muscular man more than waist deep in chocolate. Did I say Almost a punchline? I mean Every woman’s fantasy.

Measure could force pet shops to keep better records; Bill also calls for stricter rules on exercise and care:

Lawmakers will vote today on a bill that could require pet shops to abide by stricter regulations like keeping detailed records on the animals they sell and providing toys and exercise wheels for small animals like rats, hamsters, mice and guinea pigs.

Face it, citizens, our civilization has peaked. The amount of civil liberties that citizens enjoy has reached its high water mark and is ebbing. Our government is now taking rights from us and giving them to animals.

Say what you will about the totalitarian nature of the Chinese regime, but at least it’s using its totalitarianism to the ends of a human society and not the gerbil society.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch lowers the bar on criminal masterminds in this story:

A cigarette thief is taking great pains not to get caught as he makes his getaway from Madison County stores, authorities said Tuesday.

Those great pains?

He uses duct tape to cover the registration number on the temporary Illinois tag on the back of his black Saturn, which has no front plate.

Because apparently the great pains don’t include obscuring his face, since there’s a full facial shot of him accompanying the story.

Mehlville agency will seek lower tax rate:

The Mehlville Fire Protection District will propose yet another reduction in its property tax rate at next week’s tax rate hearing.

The Board of Directors will propose a tax rate of 69.8 cents per $100 assessed valuation for 2007, Chairman Aaron Hilmer said.

“The reason we lowered it even further than we originally intended was (that) as we looked at the amount of reserves that we had, they were just stunning . . . what we built up in the last 18 months,” Hilmer said. “This is in addition to building a new firehouse, buying a new fire truck, ordering another one, getting three new ambulances, new staff cars, upgrading medical, etcetera. So we looked and saw we were projecting eight to nine million dollars in reserves, in addition to new taxes we’re bringing in, and that’s why we decided to lower it even more.”

I’m writing in the name Aaron Hilmer for 3rd District Congressional Representative this year.

George W. Bush has ginned up the fake “air terror” alert to make it inconvenient for you to fly. So you’ll have to drive to your destinations and will have to buy gas at Big Oil’s gouge–nay, plunge router!–prices.

You silly fools who think it’s all about influencing an election… you’ve forgotten It’s All About Oiiiil!

Hard to think how this could be taken pejoratively:

“This is a bunch of good kids from Fulton,” said Weiser’s lawyer, Carter Collins Law. “As far as I can tell, they’re a bunch of little country mice. And I don’t mean that in a … pejorative way at all,” she said.

From what children’s story book did this condescending attorney pluck did this particular bunch? The Little Country Mice Who Chewed Through MoneyGram International’s Wires Accidentally And Got a Lot of Cheese Nationwide?

I don’t know if I ever want an attorney defending me to try the Forrest Gump defense. I mean, who does this attorney think is more naive, her clients or anyone listening?

Federal appeals court rules against workplace PC privacy:

If you think the Web sites you access on your workplace computer are nobody else’s business, think again.

That was the message today from the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, which upheld a Montana man’s conviction for receiving obscene material that his employer found on his computer during a late-night raid.

“Social norms suggest that employees are not entitled to privacy in the use of workplace computers, which belong to their employers and pose significant dangers in terms of diminished productivity and even employer liability,” said Judge Diarmuid O’Scannlain in the 3-0 ruling.

He said other courts have consistently ruled that employers are entitled to monitor their workers’ use of computers as long as they had disclosed that policy to their workforce.

Unlike some respected legal minds, I don’t think this is a defeat for privacy rights; instead, it’s a victory for property rights. Because even though some people would phrase it this way:

If you think the Web sites you access on your workplace computer are nobody else’s business, think again.

Because let’s not forget, it’s not your computer, it’s your employer’s. It’s not your Internet connection at work, it’s your employers. And anyone who would give you rights over that property which you don’t own takes rights away from the actual owner.

Apparently, this runs counter to established case law regarding searches and seizures and where arbitrary edges of the invented right to privacy lies. Friends, this strikes me, like much law does, as to arguing what sort of pin angels can dance upon. From the distant, forest sort of view, it doesn’t matter whether the gumdrop trees are green or blue because it’s still a candy forest in a child’s imagination. But I haven’t finished law school.

I suspect that throwing computers into the story has triggered automatic responses from the digitally-inclined libertarians amongst us. After all, information wants to be free, unless it wants to hide in the shadows of privacy’s billowing petticoats. Because it’s computers, it’s different and twenty-first century.

But it looks to me, simply, that once you’ve established that the employee has certain rights to use the employer’s facilities and materiel as the employee wants, we cannot stop easily at the compter namespace. No, the employee then should have certain privacy rights to be free from monitoring, from both the employer and the government, in other facilities or with other employer-provided mechanisms for communicating and productivity.

Conference rooms become cones of silence, in which you can conduct personal business without fear of eviction for actual meetings. Why not plan your family reunion? Letterhead and printed envelopes become diplomatic pouches, wherein you should expect everything you write, type, or print upon them to be private, for the addressee only. Don’t forget the 900 numbers on your phone system. The Man blocking them surely infringes upon your privacy and its emanated right to a psychic reading.

No, the 9th District here accidentally protected the rights of property holders from those who would virtually squat upon those items. Regardless of search, seizure, or illegal activity, the computers belong to the employers, and the employees have no right to their network connections, memory, or hard disk space for personal use.

Sherman Parker or someone at his campaign has sent me the complete statement he issued after his recent arrest:

Below is the fulll text of a statement I sent to the Post Dispatch regarding the story that is in today’s (Saturday) paper about my unfortunate incident this week:

On Monday, July 31, 2006, after erecting campaign signs in St. Charles County, I was pulled over on Highway 40 and detained by a Missouri State Highway trooper. I was not initially stopped for a traffic violation or any violation of the law. I did not receive a ticket for this stop. After checking my driving record, the trooper later determined that a bench warrant had been issued for my arrest for missing a court date for a speeding violation in Chesterfield.

I had previously written the court a letter requesting to reschedule my court date since this date was during the legislative session. In the course of the ensuing weeks, with the session winding down and attempting to get my congressional campaign into full gear, I neglected to follow up with the court, and thus a bench warrant was issued without my knowledge. Prior to this incident, I had never been arrested by any law enforcement officer anywhere.

At the present time, all my fines have been paid, and I now want to put this embarrassing matter behind me. I apologize and I understand, that as an elected official, no one person is above the law. I must strive everyday to set a higher example. I very much regret that this incident may detract, in these last few days, from the issues I have been stressing in this campaign such as: improving healthcare, economic development, and the rising cost of energy.

As I’d hoped, it’s straightforward and doesn’t avoid blame for a procedural error leading to his bench warrant and doesn’t go off on the cop who arrested him. No indignation, no racial overtones, just a statement about what happened.

On a side note, aren’t bench warrants neat things? Personally, I wonder sometimes if there’s a bench warrant out for me. I mean, a speed zone or red light camera ticket mailed to the wrong address, and suddenly I could be calling my wife to bail me out of jail. One wonders if this is a good mechanism for minor law enforcement, but then again, if one is like this one (me), one knows that it’s not about law enforcement as getting revenue and asserting authority.

Akin rival arrested on traffic warrants:

On Monday night, Parker had just finished staking campaign signs on private property near Highway 40 in St. Charles County when he was pulled over by a state trooper who questioned what Parker was doing near the road.

When the officer later did a check on the candidate’s drivers license, he discovered that Parker had two arrest warrants for unresolved traffic violations in St. Louis County. Parker was briefly taken into police custody and released after paying a pair of $100 bonds, according to court documents.

So this has all the trappings of a racial profiling sort of stop, and the Post-Dispatch‘s activism is muted. Because the target is a Republican, or because the target himself is avoiding the obvious?

Parker, already considered a long shot to unseat Akin, issued an apologetic statement after being asked about the arrest on Friday.

“I very much regret that this incident may detract, in these last few days, from the issues I have been stressing in this campaign,” Parker said in a statement.

And:

“I understand, that as an elected official, no one person is above the law,” Parker said.

Sounds like the reasoned response of someone we’d want to elect. I haven’t seen the full statement (it’s not on his Web site), but I hope it’s as apologetic and appropriate as the paper makes it sound. Not accusatory, not avoiding responsibility, just explanatory and humble.

UPDATE: Representative Parker has sent me his complete statement, posted here.

Parents of woman killed in sky-diver plane crash file suit:

The parents of a would-be skydiver who died along with five others in a plane crash Saturday [July 29] filed a lawsuit today [August 2] claiming negligence caused the aircraft’s engine to fail.

Vivian and Susan Delacroix of Kent, England, brought suit against the engine manufacturer, skydiving club and others claiming they are responsible for the death of their daughter, Victoria Delacroix, 22.

“Our initial investigation points to a right engine failure just after takeoff,” said Gary C. Robb, a Kansas City attorney representing the family.

Congratulations to the proud attorney who pursued the pursuit of justice to England and probably got the lawsuit file before the body was buried. Not only is he quick, but he’s aggressive with the defendants:

The maker of the PT6A turbo prop engine in the DeHavilland DHC-6 airplane that crashed after taking off from the Sullivan Regional Airport. The manufacturer was Pratt & Whitney, which is owned by United Technologies.

Annick Laberge, a spokesman for Pratt & Whitney Canada division, declined comment today.

“It is our corporate policy not to discuss incidents under investigation,” she said.

The suit also names the Quantum Leap Skydiving Center, which operated the skydiving club; the airport, which serviced and maintained the plane; Adventure Aviation, which owned the plane; and pilot Scott Cowan, who also perished in the crash.

Suing the estate of another victim of the crash. That, my friends, is pluck with a capital F.

Although we at MfBJN wonder how they couldn’t work Thomas Miskel, Bourbeuse River Hauling, and Six Flags into the suit somehow. Perhaps it’s only a matter of time.

(I post this with the plantiffs’ attorney’s name in here understanding that this attorney will find this post–hi there!– next time he or a member of his staff uses Google to find his ‘fan base,’ but the last I heard, calling someone plucky is not actually libelous.)

Woman sues over son’s drowning death during church outing:

The mother of one of the five children who drowned last month during a church outing to an eastern Missouri state park has sued the church and Joyce Meyer Ministries, claiming negligence and inadequate supervision.

The wrongful death lawsuit, filed Tuesday in St. Louis Circuit Court, also said the ministries and its St. Louis Dream Center church did not have parents’ permission to take 50 children to Castlewood State Park in St. Louis County on July 9.

Litigation compounds a tragedy by ensuring that other depressed youth won’t get the opportunity to go to church picnics in the future.

The old man and the six-toed cats: Hemingway home in dispute:

The caretakers of Ernest Hemingway’s Key West home want a federal judge to intervene in their dispute with the U.S. Department of Agriculture over the six-toed cats that roam the property.

More than 50 descendants of a multi-toed cat the novelist received as a gift in 1935 wander the grounds of the home, where Hemingway lived for more than 10 years and wrote “A Farewell to Arms” and “To Have and Have Not.”

The Ernest Hemingway Home and Museum disputes the USDA’s claim that it is an “exhibitor” of cats and needs to have a USDA Animal Welfare License, according to a complaint filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Miami.

“What they’re comparing the Hemingway house to is a circus or a zoo because there are cats on the premises,” Cara Higgins, the home’s attorney, said Friday. “This is not a traveling circus. These cats have been on the premises forever.”

He would have broken a walking stick over his head is what he would have done. Or shot himself, perhaps; our world does not accommodate men of Papa’s stature and temperment any more. Instead, it allows attorneys and government functionaries to live the lives to which they’ve become accustomed, at our expense and at the expense of our mythology.

If my current gig goes south and I ever get tired of not having a real winter in St. Louis and confuse North Carolina for a real northern state, I could get a job proofreading street signs:

Pity the English teacher out for a drive, passing Raleigh street signs.

Russling Leaf Lane? That’s Rustling.

Sherrif Place? That’s Sheriff.

Chinquoteague Court? Misty lived in Chincoteague!

You can’t even scribble corrections in red spray-paint. The city would just scrub them off.

About a dozen Raleigh street signs display words that are flat-out misspelled.

Who am I kidding? There’s obviously no official sign proofreader position in Raleigh.

(Link seen on Triticale.)

Two stories out of O’Fallon, Missouri, today allude to the failures of top-down community planning and optimistically endorse more top-down community planning.

First, we have the story of how small businesses beamed down into New Urbantopias sometimes fail:

Some businesses are doing well. The customers are flocking to the Listons’ neighborhood-style tavern, patterned after the one they used to run in St. Louis’ Dogtown area.

Nearby residents drop in Curbside Cleaners with not only piles of dry-cleaning but also newsy updates about their families and kids for co-owner Donna Stuart. And at the Churchill Coffee Express inside the local branch of the St. Charles City-County Library, owner Robert Tock says he has a loyal group of sippers lining up at his door at 6:30 a.m.

But for other merchants who rely on foot and car traffic and a bit of impulse buying, it’s been a rocky few years.

Late last year, the Boardwalk suffered a major blow when Dave and Kathy Grabis closed their corner grocery market, to the dismay of many loyal customers who considered the couple the mom and dad of the fledgling neighborhood.

“Dave leaving was definitely a downfall for this area,” said resident Gisell Sterner, as she dropped off clothes at the dry cleaners.

It was the second failed retail endeavor along the one-block strip, following the closure of a Roly Poly lunch shop.

Two other small-town mainstays – the ice cream parlor and the pizza shop – both hit hard times early on, and their original owners sold the business to new entrepreneurs who both have watched the car and foot traffic to their shops dwindle in the aftermath of the grocery’s failure.

In January, things didn’t get easier when WingHaven’s free trolley stopped service because of a lack of ridership.

Never fear, though; the central planners are still at it:

Business owners and residents are now optimistic about negotiations under way between an area convenience store owner and WingHaven’s developer – McEagle Properties – to open a market in the same location as the former grocery.

Because the New Urbanists believe the corner market will trump super Schnucks, Dierbergs, and food-slinging Wal-Marts. Because they say so, they continue to push for it. Because if they will it, the citizens will shop there.

In other news, O’Fallon is going to apply for state money to revitalize its downtown:

If all goes as well, it could be O’Fallon’s dream come true.

The City Council gave staff the OK to apply for Missouri’s DREAM initiative program.

Known as the Downtown Revitalization Economic Assistance for Missouri, the DREAM initiative is a new program created through a partnership between the Missouri’s department of economic development, development finance board and the housing development commission.

The goal of the program is to offer technical and financial assistance for communities to more efficiently and effectively start the downtown revitalization process.

Additionally, the program is supported by professionals who are dedicated to help cities rebuild central business districts and shortens the redevelopment timeline, according to DREAM officials.

“What it does it combine existing incentive packages and brings it all under one umbrella,” said Jim Curran, O’Fallon’s director of economic development. “More cities are taking a look at the program that may not have qualified in the past due to medium income or population.”

Leaving aside that the revitalized downtown will probably cause more of the New Urbantopia businesses in WingHaven to collapse, we’re struck again with an instance of the government or other planners trying to induce demand for a service by providing supply of the service. In the case of both the development and the downtown, there’s no one there who needs a small urban grocery or whatever, but the planners want their kitsch, so they’ll spend their own money or our tax dollars to resuscitate faux urban areas.

The original downtowns sprung up where people crowded together to live for commerce, trade, and security. Since we have better, cheaper mechanisms for travel to and from work and commerce, we don’t need the congested areas any more. Those downtowns and their businesses and their housing emerged because people needed it and demanded it. Not because someone decided that the land needed x density of population and y numbers of businesses within walking distance.

And trying to impose such won’t make it so. But it will waste a lot of money in the process.