a small news roundup

[lagilman]

Just to give you a taste of what it's like outside the office...

Courage and bloodshed in Myanmar. I am reminded, in a moment of dark humor, of Robin Williams' bit about monks-as-activists, when the Buddhist monk sets himself on fire as a protest -- "what are you doing!" a government agent shrieks. "Making you deal with your shit" comes the serene answer. But there's nothing funny here, only anger and frustration.

more on the children's health bill -- "Do you really believe Republicans don't want to help poor, low-income children?" (Sen. Trent Lott) Do you want me to answer that, or shall I just glare?

Proof that we can learn, the instant alert system at St John's University gets a dry run -- and a passing grade

giving new meaning to the phrase 'better late than never,' Bush finally does something about airline delays. Because yeah, that's not a federal issue at all, cause the FAA isn't a federal...oh, wait. And we won't even get into the whole 'deregulation is good for the consumers rant.

And for my cousin the budding beekeeper, an article on backyard beekeeping that makes me crave honeycomb...


And now, into the day I go.

EtA: and, because how could I not? The Boss, interviewed in the NY Times on the release of Magic.

Comments

[wishwords.livejournal.com]

I can't find the link to a story, but I saw a nice bit of news on TV this morning. In Clear Lake, Texas they have implimented a new system for missing children alerts. If you call in that your child is missing the system automatically phones everyone in the surrounding area and notifies them to be on the look out.

The example they showed on the news said that dozens of people came out of their homes and started going door to door and looking all through the neighborhood for a missing three-year-old. Turned out he was visiting the neighbor lady, who had an unlisted number and hadn't gotten the calle, and when she saw all these people outside looking for something she went out to see what was happening. It all ended well.

[nycdeb.livejournal.com]

having just flown into Newark last night (after a late take off from Seattle, circling above Detroit and circling again somewhere over the middle of Pennsylvania - all explained to us as a result of "crowded skies over the NY-NJ area"), I couldn't help but laugh bitterly when I saw the "Bush addresses flight delays" headlines.

I can't say I think much of any of the ideas floated in that article. They sound short terms and designed to come back and bite the consumer in the butt (not that the consumer will notice since their nether regions will have gone numb from having been stuck on the runway for so long).

And relevant to nothing - WHAT is with Mary Peters' hair in that picture? Was she out on the runways doing an inspection?

I wonder who told W to use the word "egregious". And I wonder if they defined it for him.

[dianora2.livejournal.com]

Do you really believe Republicans don't want to help poor, low-income children?

Easily.

[chibiaingeal.livejournal.com]

"Do you really believe Republicans don't want to help poor, low-income children?"

Why yes I do actually. And I get super annoyed hearing shrub say how he wants these people to be encouraged to get private health insurance. How the hell can they afford that????? There is no such thing as affordable private health insurance if your company doesn't provide it for you (and even then it may not always be affordable...)

[lagilman]

Um you know that wasn't me, that was a quote, right? My comment came after...

[chibiaingeal.livejournal.com]

Yes, of course I know that wasn't your comment. I was just adding my own commentary....

[kalligraphy.livejournal.com]

That whole airline story was just chock full-o-stupid. In an effort to meet consumer needs they want to raise the landing fees, like the airlines won't pass that onto the consumer. Or have fewer flights, because the consumer wants to A) not be able to get a flight and B) when they can get a flight, have to pay HUGE sums of money for the ticket. Last January I flew I from DC to Jacksonville Fla. In February I flew the exact same itinerary on the same days with the same airline. I paid 3 times as much for the ticket in February as I did in January. Why? Because in February it was President's Day weekend AND it was Daytona weekend. Seats on flights were hard to get and you had to pay premium prices. So it seems that in order to reduce consumer complaints about delays, their solution is to impose higher prices on the consumer that airlines will be able to reap better profits. Other option is to kill the free market system in order to once again impose higher prices on the consumer for no benefit.

The solution is to encourage the airlines to fly fewer flights with larger planes. This reduces overhead congestion and gets more passengers moving with flew flights. Furthermore airlines need to be forced to find better scheduling methods. The way it works now, a flight delay going from Phx to Dallas at 8am will result in half a dozen or more flight delays. I spent 7 hours waiting for a flight in DCA because the plane left Indianapolis 7 hours late. Mind you the flight was not from Indianpolis to DCA, it was from Indianapolis to Charlotte, from Charlotte it went to Philadelphia, from Philadelphia it went to Albany and then from Albany it came to DC. The airline should have been forced to replace the plane or reroute the passengers to keep things rolling. But they didn't. Anytime a flight is delayed it causes delays all up and down and around the system further causing delays.

And yes, contrary to GOP mantra, deregulation is NOT the key. We instituted regulation because when it wasn't regulated, we had problems. This has been proven time and time again, that a certain amount of regulation in any industry is required to keep them honest and protect the consumer. It's really sad that apparently our educational system no longer teaches basic history.