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Congress gets mixed advice on regulating drones
WASHINGTON (AP) — The growing use of unmanned surveillance “eyes in the sky” aircraft raises a thicket of privacy concerns, but Congress is getting mixed advice on what, if anything, to do about it. A future with domestic drones may be inevitable. While civilian drone use is currently limited to government agencies and some public universities, a law passed by Congress last year requires the Federal Aviation Administration to allow widespre...
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IRS targeting of groups
There’s a question that’s useful when trying to decide whether a course of action is a good idea: If the worst possible outcome occurs, how will this look in the newspaper (or on a mobile news platform)? Asking that question could have saved Internal Revenue Service agents in the Cincinnati Determinations Unit a lot of trouble. There’s no way to defend their targeting of groups applying for tax-exempt status using names that indicated a con...
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Becoming a nation of jugglers
To juggle means to keep things “continuously in the air.” I tried it with green apples, tennis balls and once with three croquet balls. I was doing well until two of those wooden balls collided and went separate ways enough to allow the third ball to hit me between the eyes. After that headache, I lost my desire to be a juggler. We all may have been warned, “Don’t try to do too many things at the same time.” We are advised to keep our minds...
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All have a stake in healthier community
An event held recently in Colorado should be of particular interest here in the heart of Central Appalachia. Last week, the National Press Foundation hosted 16 journalists from around the country, including a representative of Civitas Media, for a four-day conference about obesity, including its causes, problems and potential solutions. The conference included presentations from some of the nation’s foremost experts on the condition. Whil...
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Women have more options for breast cancer surgery
CHICAGO (AP) — One of the world’s most glamorous women had an operation that once was terribly disfiguring — removal of both breasts. But new approaches are dramatically changing breast surgeries, whether to treat cancer or to prevent it as Angelina Jolie just chose to do. As Jolie said, “the results can be beautiful.” Jolie revealed on Tuesday that she had a double mastectomy and reconstruction with implants because she carries a gene muta...
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Wasted resources
The news is familiar. A man was electrocuted Wednesday and a second arrested in connection with an attempted copper theft in our area. Familiar, but with a twist this time. According to investigating officers, the pair used a rifle to shoot down a power line owned by Appalachian Power Co. in an alleged attempt to steal copper wire from the line. One of the men then touched the power line and was electrocuted. Unbelievably brazen and foo...
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Don’t Fence Me In
The prosperous are further isolating themselves physically, as well as economically, from the rest of us.No job now, Provides the pay, To let me find, A place to stay. Many folks with big incomes are responding to the tensions of America’s growing economic inequality by moving into gated communities. This isn’t new, just growing more common. Ten percent of us are already gated in one way or another. The recession has added further i...
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Military assaults
People serving in the U.S. military face all kinds of threats and hazards, ranging from enemies in overseas war zones to dangerous training missions on American soil. Should they also have to contend with an epidemic of sexual assaults that continues to be embedded in all the military branches? Apparently so, according to a new report from the Department of Defense. What’s most troubling about the report is that the military seems to be m...
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Am I becoming the 2013 version of radicalism?
I may have finally reached the pinnacle of my journalistic ability. For the first time in my 40-year career in newspapers and politics, I have come close to being called a “left-wing radical.” In fact, a reader last week said I was “teetering on the edge” of becoming the 2013 version of radicalism. I can envision me now, dressed in a … wow, how DOES a 2013 left-wing radical dress? I need to do some study on this subject. Meantime, I perhaps...
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Greenhouse buildup
A historic landmark occurred last week. Scientists at a Hawaii mountaintop observatory reported that carbon dioxide buildup in the atmosphere reached 400 parts per million for the first time since the Pliocene Epoch — 5 million to 3 million years ago, long after dinosaurs died, but before early humans evolved. Before the Industrial Revolution, atmospheric CO2 had averaged about 280 ppm for at least 800,000 years. But an upsurge of coal, oil...
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Project aims to track big city carbon footprints
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Every time Los Angeles exhales, odd-looking gadgets anchored in the mountains above the city trace the invisible puffs of carbon dioxide, methane and other greenhouse gases that waft skyward. Halfway around the globe, similar contraptions atop the Eiffel Tower and elsewhere around Paris keep a pulse on emissions from smokestacks and automobile tailpipes. And there is talk of outfitting Sao Paulo, Brazil, with sensors that...
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Know our own neighborhoods
The discovery of three young women who were missing for more than a decade in Cleveland calls for action in several ways, the most basic of which is to know our own neighborhoods, if not our neighbors. There was a time in America, back when front porches and stoops were the evening hangouts for families, that people knew the names of everyone on their block, all of their children and their pets. There was a time when the cop on the beat in ...
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What do we know about Mother’s Day?
To understand all the talk, advertising and celebrations about Mother’s Day, we must understand that it is more than the second Sunday of May in each calendar year. As in every story we must deal with who, what, where, when, why and how? The best source for the history of Mother’s Day is The West Virginia Encyclopedia, edited by Ken Sullivan and Managing Editor, Deborah J. Sonis. Quoting from this magnificent book are these three informativ...
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Caring for our mothers just as they care for us
Throughout our lives – whether as children or adults – our mothers look out for us. They help us take our first steps, send us off for our first day of school, and watch over us as we grow up. When we get a cold, twist an ankle, or have a more serious illness, they are the ones right by our side, taking our temperature, bringing us chicken soup to make sure we feel better, and calling to find out what the doctor said. And Mother’s Day is the ...
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Democrats: No scandal in Benghazi deaths
WASHINGTON (AP) — Politicians love few things better than a scandal to trip up their opponents, and Republicans hope last year’s fatal attack on U.S. diplomats in Libya will do exactly that to Hillary Rodham Clinton and other Democrats. History suggests it might be a tough lift. The issue is complex, the next presidential election is more than three years away, and a number of reports and officials have disputed criticisms of Clinton’s role...
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Plant explosion
Kanawha Valley seniors can remember when flamboyant Elmer Fike operated a small Nitro chemical plant and ranted endlessly against government safety inspections. He ran as a Republican against Sen. Robert C. Byrd (singing “Bye, Bye, Bob Byrd” in a TV spot) and abetted the 1974 fundamentalist Kanawha County uprising against “godless textbooks.” After Fike’s plant closed, taxpayers were stuck with monumental pollution cleanup costs. His clamor...
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GUEST VIEW: Stronger at home, more respected abroad
We must cut the things we don’t need, including Pentagon pork, to pay for the things we do. Americans agree it’s time to strengthen our nation at home and abroad — but how can we make it happen? We can start by making wise choices in the federal budget and with our efforts to cope with our nation’s debt ceiling problem. We can make smart military strategies, our troops, our veterans, and our families higher priorities than Pentagon pork a...
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A census first: Black voter turnout passes whites
WASHINGTON (AP) — Making history, America’s blacks voted at higher rates than whites in 2012, lifting Democrat Barack Obama to victory amid voter apathy, particularly among young people, new census data show. Despite increasing population, the number of white voters declined for the first time since 1996. Blacks were the only race or ethnic group to show an increase in voter turnout in November, most notably in the Midwest and Southeastern ...
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Everyone is entitled to his or her opinion
Although it seems that guns will remain at the top of every news cycle for months, we will only touch on them briefly this week. Past columns have attempted to make it quite clear that I believe the demagoguery regarding the Second Amendment is just plain asinine. I suppose everyone is entitled to his or her opinion. I am likewise pleased that so many readers in the Southern coalfields have chimed in with support for what I’ve written. Most...
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Benefits of Medicaid expansion
In deciding to loosen West Virginia’s tight restrictions on the state’s Medicaid program, Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin made the right call. Taking into account a variety of factors, the governor announced Thursday that the state will expand Medicaid under the controversial federal health care reform law that goes into full effect on Jan. 1. The chief result is that an estimated 91,500 state residents who now have no health insurance will have th...
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Letters
Letters To The Editor, May 19, 2013
Memorial Day Celebration Editor, Greetings, my name is Rick Bradley. I am a retired-disabled U.S. Army veteran. I have enclosed an essay that I wrote in college that I wanted to share with m...
May 19, 2013 | 1 1 comments | 1 1 recommendations | email to a friend
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Letters To The Editor, May 12, 2013
Jared Marcum incident Editor, I am appalled at the number of letters submitted by retired military personnel on the issue of the Jared Marcum incident. I can only surmise from their comments...
May 12, 2013 | 5 5 comments | 0 0 recommendations | email to a friend
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Letters to the Editor, May 5, 2013
First Amendment Editor, A benefit of the First Amendment is that when all people can freely express themselves, normal people are regularly reminded of how warped some can be in their thinki...
May 05, 2013 | 2 2 comments | 2 2 recommendations | email to a friend
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Letters To The Editor, April 28, 2013
Looking for Donna Editor, Hello, I’m from Michigan and I have been looking for Donna Sue Browning Gardner for over 35 years. I was told she still lives in Harts? It is really important to ...
Apr 28, 2013 | 1 1 comments | 1 1 recommendations | email to a friend
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Letter to Editors, April 14, 2013
Cabell County DOH Editor, Although I am not the supervisor for Corridor G, I would like to take the time to express my thanks to the DOH employees from Cabell County working in Logan on Corr...
Apr 14, 2013 | 0 0 comments | 3 3 recommendations | email to a friend
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