Protesting the war to take our troops out of harm's way equals spitting on our veterans. Uh-huh. The mind that can buy into this drek is pitiable, but the minds that conceive this message and abet its distribution are the real serial abusers, taking advantage of those who are too weak to defend themselves.
Leaving aside the standard nonprofit thank-you letter, today's mailbag is about missing the boat: Suzanne MacGowan thinks we can just tax the underground economy, Peggy McCauslin agrees with me but didn't quite read the material, and Reb Satterfield, while doing wonderful things for the troops, remains confused about the war.
While the unnamed Courier editor goes a bit over the top in referring to wannabe vigilantism as "noble work," his central point is correct, even if its motivation is a bit venal. (He really wants to print the vigilante rant sitting on his spike, but with no name on it, he can't.) The writing is all original, the idea is good for the town, that's enough to rate a cookie. Too bad he couldn't resist the gratuitous cowboy reference.
Georgene Lockwood, a friend of mine, lets the Queen Bee have it with both barrels. We haven't always seen eye-to-eye on the issues and tactics going on in Williamson Valley, but here she stays on track and I think she's right on.
Okay, this is different from what I was thinking on Sunday. The Supes voted against the Queen Bee to allow the county to revoke land-use changes requested by owners if they subsequently sue under Prop 207 rules. I'm just having a hard time figuring out when that might happen, since you're supposed to invoke 207 if a state or local authority does something that impacts your land value. Very interesting that Springer invokes the 'will of the voters' (not unlike the 'will of the hypnotized subject to bark like a chicken') and makes a big deal about what looks pretty basic to me. There's a very bad smell in the room.
The unnamed Courier editor again repackages page one and -- surprise! -- comes to the same conclusion pushed in the uncritical coverage. At least there's no cowboy-movie reference, thank Cthulhu.
Most readers won't make it through the first graph of this academically styled bumble through Beside-the-Pointland, so it might be unfair to ask that the Courier editors recruit a street lawnforcement officer to reply to Tony Imbronone's ultimate point, that the government has neither the capacity nor the inclination to protect you from crime, so you'd better get a gun. That seems a mighty sweeping indictment of our peace officers, not to mention the whole concept of civilization, capping his massive naivete about the likely effectiveness of the strategy.
In the comments, Carlos Gaines gives the expected instant judgment, and things look bad for the deputy. I hope the reader will resist the urge to infer this or that, and bear in mind that using drugs recreationally doesn't make you evil.
Mirsada Buric follows up on her story from Saturday with the expected news that Arizona will send him back to California and the death threats against him. I can understand the journalistic rationale for "a misdemeanor conviction involving his threats against the Church of Scientology," but given the facts of the case it would have been nice to see 'purported' or 'alleged' in there somewhere. And I expect we'll never know whether YavCo jail personnel really withheld his drugs or kept him from his lawyer. I hope he makes it through the ordeal OK.
Al gives us a nice basic summary of the issues our soldiers are facing down in Iraq. Of course, we knew all this four years ago, only the numbers of dead and maimed have changed, so it's a little late. He promises a second part to this, and I hope it will include a clear and forceful position on what we should do about the 'big mess.'
The unnamed Courier editor raises the bloody effigy of Ted Kennedy over his head to scare his tiny audience, but he collapses under the weight of his own rhetoric. Failing to mention that the other main sponsor of this bill is John Kyl and that it's supported by both St. McCain and the Current Resident puts the editor squarely in the center of the hooting platoon led by Russell Pierce. After stoking the fire for "immigration reform" for several years in a pathetically transparent attempt to stampede voters toward the Rs, suddenly now there's no hurry. Blaming the current Congress for the Preznit's massive deficit-spending rates a chuckle, as well.
Guys, you've been pandering to this reactionary put-up job for so long you've bought into the gag. The vast majority of Americans know that the situation is both complex and not an emergency, and so do you. Put a sock in it and let the adults get something done.
I remember doing a story a lot like this for my high-school paper about our custodial department. Paula Rhoden gets the byline, but this is another in what we can expect will be a regular series of utterly uncritical features that could have been written by departmental PR flaks. Again we learn nothing about the quality or relative value of the services we're all paying for.
I've dealt with Pat Kirshman professionally, and the sooner he shuffles off to obscurity the better I'll like it. There's plenty of stink to investigate here.
Another regular Monday agenda story from Cindy Barks. If there's going to be no analysis or background to the issues that the councils and boards are preparing to discuss, it seems to me that this sort of information would be easier to access in a regular, dependable notice box shared by the various government authorities. Consider how the agenda information can best serve the voter, and what the paper could include to facilitate and encourage public participation.
Update, 9:47: Page number corrected, thanks Jared.
Joanna Dodder has a little wander through Prescott history to pad out a puffer about our local military dress-up club. I suppose it's no surprise that she doesn't mention the actual subject of the documentary, America's first unprovoked, aggressive war of expansion and conquest.
Dan Pederson makes some good points about what it's like for the business neighbors, and writes with some intelligence and sensitivity. Overall I think he's got the wrong end of the stick, though. Do the would-be workers deserve the blame, or should we be looking more closely at ourselves for creating the conditions that force them into an underground economy? Are we looking at causes here, or consequences?
There's another response to Dennis Duvall in the letters section, too.
The unnamed Courier editor crawls further out on his limb, trying to get the rope in the right position to hang Vic Hambrick. This follows up on his May 8 offering, "Link with Townsend doesn't pass 'smell test'," demonstrating a stunning level of creativity with headlines, if nothing else. (I know, I used it too -- but only once, and first.)
Just to sum up one more time: Hambrick may be as dirty as the editor seems to think, but so far he hasn't shown us the goods on that, and for that reason I think the editor is way ahead of himself on calling for the assessor's removal by whatever means. The Courier also took a position against Hambrick in his election, and that should be mentioned. By using the editorial page in this unwise manner, the paper has made itself part of a story that could unfairly damage professional reputations and erode confidence in elected officials. Whatever the underlying truth is, more care is warranted here.
Uh-huh, here it comes. The Supes will be voting on a new policy of backing off from any land-use regulation if the landowner threatens to sue for compensation under Prop 207 rules. This will effectively prevent any land-use regulation change that does not favor development. And who was the local mouthpiece for this touch of evil bought and paid for by radical New York libertarian Howie Rich? The Queen Bee herself, that's who. Why can't the Courier say so?
Sometimes I feel like I'm looking through the wrong end of the telescope. Cindy Barks tells us -- first time I've read this, as far as I can recall -- that the 'ultimate goal' for membership in the Adult Center has been about 1,000. Yikes, for all the money and hassle the City has pumped into that facility, it ought to be serving a whole lot more people than that! I'm all for public partnerships with nonprofits, but Adult Center has historically been afforded sacred-cow status that deserves a little more skeptical inspection.
Outside the body copy: The headline hints that the new name for the place isn't sticking, and somebody please get control of the captions!
PV declares victory with its Glassford Hill gauntlet, and Ken Hedler covers it in a three-angle feature here and here. Chunks of this are clouds of numbers that might have been better done as comparison tables, so it's a bit of a challenge to sort out.
What Ken's focusing on is all pretty obvious -- it's no surprise that people learn where the cameras are and change their behavior accordingly.
I've been hoping that the Courier would provide a little transparency on the corporate side of this system, though, and here I'm largely disappointed. We get a per-ticket rate of $70 and a total of 97K-odd bucks that PV has sent to Redflex so far, but no overall income number for comparison. Ken also describes Redflex as "Scottsdale-based," which is plain wrong -- it has a satellite operation in Scottsdale, but it's based in Australia, and some voters might consider that significant. This gives me some pause about whether to trust the rest of Ken's coverage.
