Musings from Brian J. Noggle

Via the Ranting Professor, I came across a bit in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel (registration required, but go ahead and tell them you’re Bud Selig) about how the coastal upperclass media types view members of their audiences who are not from those silly little states across which you can drive in an hour.

Yummy bits:

Questions are not being asked. Meanings are not being interpreted. Certain neighborhoods are not being visited. Certain lives are not being explored in a meaningful way. And, through the prosecution of basic journalism, agendas are being set that do not reflect the way the other half, without the bulging 401ks, lives.

For instance, how many people on air or in print came from families that had walked a picket line? How many know how to bait a hook or gut a deer? (I’m bad at both.) How many have felt the economic insecurity that stalks the working poor? (And I’m not talking about the few weeks at college on the Ramen noodles diet.)

How many have had real experience with the criminal justice system, who have had home visits from social workers, who have scrambled to call the probation office, who know the awful taste of government cheese?

My feeling about the growing social distance was reinforced most personally during the investment of Wisconsin by the national press. I traveled with the Howard Dean camp, and there saw again how the elite media outlets employ people who, when they dip into smaller places away from Dupont Circle in Washington or the Lower East Side in New York, treat it as some sort of anthropological adventure.

It’s not just the media who do this; it’s any condescending person who thinks that New York, D.C., or Boston is the center of the whole universe, not just the condescender’s. By the same token, we must remember, too, that our Midwestern experience is not the end-all be-all, even if it’s down to earth and touch with physical reality. As individuals, we should keep some open minds toward all kinds of experience, even if it’s Ivy League education; just recognize that each experience offers perspective which might provide insight into different situations. It’s always a good idea to mix a cleric in with your fighters and magic user when you go dungeon-crawling.

And another point: USDA cheese doesn’t taste awful. It tastes like cheese.

Thank you, that is all.

A mother whose daughter was killed by a drag racer wants vengance to deter future teenagers from acting stupid:

The mother of accident victim Megan Landholt urged a stiff prison sentence for a teenage street racer who pleaded guilty Monday in the collision that killed her daughter in south St. Louis County last year.

Barbara Landholt said she wanted to make an example of the driver. She told Judge David Lee Vincent III that Jeremy Ketchum “and people like him cannot go on and think that this is not a big deal. We have a chance to set an example here. A message has to be sent to the drivers of these cars.”

I don’t want to knock this woman’s pain, but kids getting into their cars on Saturday nights don’t read the St. Louis Post-Dispatch or their court dockets to keep up with the consequences of their actions. They don’t think about their actions, much less the consequences. Automobile accidents, death? That happens in another school district every couple of years.

So putting the guy who killed your daughter in prison for a long or short time won’t do much for the greater good, and it probably won’t save another daughter from a drag racer, drunk driver, or cell-phone yakker. It will, quite frankly, end the life of another, albeit dumber, kid, and maybe that’s just retribution. Iit’s not, however, an example since not many are paying attention.

Gee, Thanks, Mom, for sending me this unenlightened e-mail forward:

>A car company can move its factories to Mexico and claim it’s a free market.
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>A toy company can outsource to a Chinese subcontractor and claim it’s a free market.
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>A major bank can incorporate in Bermuda to avoid taxes and claim it’s a free market.
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>We can buy HP Printers made in Mexico. We can buy shirts made in Bangladesh.
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>We can purchase almost anything we want from many different countries BUT, heaven help the elderly who dare to buy their prescription drugs from a
>Canadian (Or Mexico) pharmacy. That’s called un-American!
>
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>And you think the pharmaceutical companies don’t have a powerful lobby?

File this under When AOL Members Vote!

So Jean Boutros Boutrous Aristide claims says U.S. forces kidnapped him because they wanted him out of power. United States officials, including Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell, and Scott McClellan have issued denials. How stupid is that?

A more appropriate response would be for Donald Rumsfeld to stand behind a podium and say, with all appropriate hand gestures:

Question: Did the United States Special Forces kidnap Jean-Boutros-Boutros Aristide?

Rumsfeld: You need to ask yourself this question instead: Do you think that the United States armed forces and their special forces have enough technology and expertise to perform an operation of this nature. Look at Aristide. One day, he’s the unpopular ruler of an oppressed country, and then suddenly he wakes up in the savannah with just the clothes on his back and a cell phone with which to call everyone he knows to complain, to ask for cab fare home, or to plead for some anti-lion underwear. Do you think that the special forces within our country can insert into hostile territory, infiltrate a tyrant’s security, tranquilize or otherwise stun him, extract him, fly him half way around the world in a matter of hours, and deposit him into an environment that is both alien and hostile to him. Do you imagine Iranian clerics shocked to find themselves nuzzled by caribou in the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge, or Fidel Castro coming to alone on a road on the Isle of Wight, or Kim Jong-Il awakening one night in a Philadelphia crack house, surrounded by gang bangers. What, do you think Aristide’s departure was a trial run of some sort? Are you all planning to be the next Tom Clancy with these plots?

In Indiana, a college kid decided to wear a devil costume to a screening of The Passion of the Christ. In the self-aggrandizing manner adopted by college students everywhere, the kid explains himself thusly:

When asked what he hoped to accomplish by his actions, Wendell said he likes doing things to get a reaction. He was also inspired by a biography he read about the Marquis de Sade.

De Sade was an 18th century writer who caused scandals with his libertine behavior in pre-revolutionary France. De Sade was once arrested for desecrating the Holy Eucharist to see if God really existed. Wendell said his stunt was along the same lines.

Wendell, an atheist, said, “If God really existed, He would have struck me down for dressing as the devil.” He also wanted to prove “that Christians aren’t as forgiving as they portray”. Wendell says his actions were also partially due to a genuine dislike of Mel Gibson.

Buddy, maybe God didn’t see your hijinks as worthy of the amperage involved in a lightning strike and had a more fitting punishment for you:

Once inside the movie, Christians began pelting Wendell with Gummy Bears, Ju-Ju Bees, and popcorn. Management got involved after a 75-year-old woman, Hazel Meyer, poured a 64-ounce Coca-Cola on Wendell.

(Link seen on Fark.)

Daniel Henninger says what I think about the forces who would stand athwart innovation and technology and shout, “Stop!”

Fear, regulation, and litigation will strip America’s wealth and innovation to benefit of a bunch of trial lawyers and politicians. As well as our rivals on the Pacific Rim.

For more comments on amendments we could use to the constitution instead of a gay marriage ban, consult TheAgitator.com.

Update: Lest I forget, Owen wants to enable Congress to override the full faith thingamabob.

Headline in the Springfield News-Leader:

• With more time on his hands, he could concentrate more on his true passion, spreading the clap.
• With enough state-funded jobs, eventually all disease would be eradicated.

Just in time to take advantage of the new jail-term-for-illegal-parking described below, St. Charles, Missouri, has decided it’s going to send a bill to lodgers in its Compulsory Resort, previously known as the city jail:

The County Council voted Tuesday night to require such inmates to set up installment repayment plans within six months after they get out of jail. Failure to do so could spur the county to seize and sell the ex-offenders’ property to get some money back.

So after someone gets out of jail, after having his or her income interrupted, possibly losing a job if he or she had one, and making the next job more difficult to get, the lovely city will send a bill which might lead them to suing and seizing property–whatever’s left after the fines for the offense, that is. You city legislators have an interesting theory of reintegration and recidivism-prevention you have there, sirs.

Perhaps we should quote the article more fully:

The County Council voted Tuesday night to require such inmates to set up installment repayment plans within six months after they get out of jail. Failure to do so could spur the county to seize and sell the ex-offenders’ property to get some money back.

The council also passed a pay increase for council members elected later this year and a bill requiring council approval for naming or renaming most county buildings.

Policy made by a cash-hungry government makes awfully poor government of the government, by the government, and for the government. Fellows, you think police speeding ticket quotas suck? Wait until you’re slapped with a six month sentence at a double-occupancy government facility because the County Commission on Revenue’s assistant commissioner needs an office redecoration.

True to form, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch starts this article on policy off with an anecdote:

Jennifer Bresee was infuriated by the note she found tucked beneath the windshield wiper as she finished shopping at Wal-Mart.

If you’re truly handicapped, you can get a license plate indicating such at the Missouri Department of Revenue license office. If you are merely enjoying the convenience of parking here at the inconvenience of a handicapped person, shame on you.

Bresee did indeed have handicapped plates. But the note’s author apparently noticed only how healthy Bresee looked as she got out of her car and walked into the store. Had the accuser waited a bit longer, the person would have seen Bresee limping all the way back to her car.

“I have multiple sclerosis, which is most times very invisible,” said Bresee, 26, explaining that even a short trip to the store can exhaust her and cause severe leg pain. “Many times, walking back out of the Wal-Mart you can tell, rather than walking into the Wal-Mart.”

So obviously, to make Jennifer feel better, the state must do something? I guess that’s the point the writer of this bit has in mind. However, the something that state legislators have in mind is the obvious: dial up the punishment for people who abuse handicapped parking privileges:

It also would make abuse of the privileges a Class A misdemeanor, punishable up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine. The legislation would impose the same penalty on doctors who write notes for people who don’t need the special plates.

The measure (SB 1144) was approved 30-0 by the state Senate this week and now awaits a House vote.

A year in jail for illegally parking. Thank goodness our legislators are finally making laws that make sense rather than making feel-good laws with which no person with a heart can disagree.