Red Light Cameras - A For-Profit Business

Michael Silence points to a report that the city of Morristown is fighting against proposed legislation from Rep. John Litz and Sen. Steve Southerland which would mandate statewide more time for a yellow light to last. The city is unhappy to see a challenge to their red light revenue cameras program, saying such a change would create massive traffic delays.

There are plenty of studies which note these revenue cameras often cause more accidents than they create safer driving. Mississippi has banned them statewide. Debate rages:

"Red-light cameras may sound great on paper, but they're an idea whose time may never come. There's no room in the system for manual inspection (the automation is what keeps it cheap), the officials in charge of the program inevitably come under pressure to milk this marvelous cash cow they've discovered, and the cameras are easily spoofed or sometimes just plain wrong."

Since the effort to ticket drivers who run red lights has been a low priority for law enforcement for a variety of reasons, the reality sinks in that cities are in essence sub-contracting law enforcement out to for-profit companies.

Safety and traffic flow is certainly a concern for cities, but revenue cameras are not the way:

"If intersection controls are properly engineered, installed, and operated, there will be very few red-light violations. From the motorists' perspective, government funds should be used on improving intersections, not on ticket cameras. Even in instances where cameras were shown to decrease certain types of accidents, they increased other accidents. Simple intersection and signal improvements can have lasting positive effects, without negative consequences. Cities can choose to make intersections safer with sound traffic engineering or make money with ticket cameras. Unfortunately, many pick money over safety."

It's Now A Crime To Report Pollution

Attempting to assist residents in Roane County following the catastrophic coal ash spill from TVA and attempting to monitor or report on pollution is apparently a crime.

"I was threatened with up to one year in jail for my work with the air monitoring program. Truthfully I love yall but it sorta freaked me out today to hear that I may spend a year in jail because I put up an air monitor.

TVA is very scared about the samples that we are taking with this air monitoring equipment and they are willing to threaten me and other UMD volunteers to keep this valuable field work from being done. We need your help. UMD volunteers have listened to your concerns about air and water quality, we have done the sampling, and we have been threatened with jail time because of our scientific monitoring."

The court system should be ashamed for adding muscle to TVA's intimidation.

Rep. Roe Clueless On Economy

My congressman, Rep. Phil Roe (R), told the local press he was "astonished" to learn that the unemployment rate in Morristown was over 10%, It stands at last report at more than 15%.

To which I say, "Sir - the unemployment rate was 13% last summer, when you were running for office. You weren't aware of that? Then you have been in Washington voting NO on economic stimulus packages and mortgage-preservation programs and bailouts with no concept of what life was like for the people you represent."

NYTimes Eyes Morristown, Immigrants, and The Economy

Caught in the endless down-spin of the economic spiral, Morristown and Hamblen county has seen many a factory close up and move south of the border in the last ten years, even as residents from south of the border have come in record numbers to this small southern community seeking work.

On Saturday, the NYTimes told some of the tales from this economic battlefield in a story titled "A Slippery Place In The U.S. Workforce".

Slippery, indeed.

Factory wages have always been lower here than many places, and millions and millions in state and federal grants have been spent here to attract more and more factories. Most recently, stats show the unemployment rate is above 15%.

Too bad we see so little effort given to creating a local economy built on something besides the ever-shifting tides of companies on the hunt for lowest paid workers they can find.

SEE ALSO: The Crone Speaks has links to the NYTimes video report on this story and adds some timely wisdom to this story:

"These real live people highlight not only how the recession has hit all of the residents in Morristown, TN, it also makes a statement on the right-to-work employment structure of the state. Right-to-work is a misnomer for employers exploiting workers, and something that Sen. Corker truly supports , as we saw in his lambasting of the US auto industry. And, why not support the exploitation of workers? Afterall, that is how he made his millions.

As the nation sets about trying to dig out of the recession, states like Tennessee will have to take a good long look at getting rid of the right-to-work structure, which has only benefited the elite in this state."

Camera Obscura: Cars The Movies Love

The roads which cover America pulse with our lives and our lives become reflected as the cars we take to those roads. These aren't just roads - they are called 'national infrastructure', cars are economic giants, and wars are fought over oil and fuel around the world. Cars and driving are serious, really serious business.

I got lost on this road of thought when I decided to mention that you can see Monte Hellman's great 1971 movie "Two-Lane Blacktop" on Turner Classic Movies, 2:30 a.m. Saturday morning. The movie follows two guys - The Driver, played by then long-haired singer James Taylor, and The Mechanic, played by Beach Boys drummer Dennis Wilson - as they take their '55 Chevy tooling across America, hitting the drag racing circuits in town after town. Driving is their life. The Chevy is their home.

They hookup with a young female hitchhiker and then with another lost soul racing across the American landscape in a Pontiac GTO - actor Warren Oates in a must-see performance is the man known only as GTO. Each time he talks to someone, his entire life's background changes, and he gets obsessed with racing that Chevy. They criss-cross the country (including scenes shot in Athens, TN, and in Deals Gap, TN and in Memphis, plus Tucumcari, New Mexico, Needles, California, Flagstaff, Arizona - towns roll past like song lyrics.)

But the movie is no stack of simple action scenes - it's more a sad and moody song, the kind you hear in a barren roadside diner playing on a glowing Wurlitzer jukebox. Appropriate, really, since it was novelist Rudy Wurlitzer who wrote the script and with director Hellman created a unique American story set in that time when the love of roads and cars had started to peak, just a few years before the first Oil Crisis hit the nation. The hollowed-out rootless wandering of the 1960s is swallowing up all of the characters, too.

All the words of the characters are swallowed up too. There isn't much dialog in the movie. But you do hear the hum of the wheels on the highway and that incredible throaty roar of the Chevy (the sounds were lifted from this movie and used as the sound of Burt Reynolds' Trans Am in his "Smokey and the Bandit" movies). There were three Chevy's built by Richard Ruth for the movie, two went on the be used a short time later in "American Graffiti".

On one of many fan-pages of the movie found on the web, the car's description sounds like the lyrics of a Bruce Springsteen song and pure poetry for car fans:

"The 55 in Two-Lane had a big block 454 with aluminum heads, a tunnel ram intake and dual 4bbl Holley carbs. The transmission was a Munci M-22 "rockcrusher' feeding the power back to an Oldsmobile rear axle with 4.88-1 gears. Ruth fitted the car with a straight axle and four wheel disc brakes. The tilt front end was fiberglass as were the doors and deck lid.
Ruth also used plexiglass for the side windows that slid back to front instead of rolling up and down. The wheels were American mags 200-s, 15x6 front and 15x10 rear. They used M&H Racemaster drag slicks for racing and Firestone grand prix rain tires for street use. In the movie the car is said to run "well into the 12's. However later in the movie he beats "Mr. Bardahl". I heard the 55 was capable of low 10's at over 130mph! "

Back in 1971, there were no laws about seat belts, gasoline was 35 cents a gallon, road trips were something we inherited from the pioneer days. Today, it's hard to get much feel for the road in heated seat cushions, embedded DVD players and computer maps.

Something happens to you when you ride the road for long stretches. You're not a commuter anymore. It changes how you look, what you eat, and you start talking about "making good time".

Newer attempts at car movies don't cut it - the remake of "Gone Is 60 Seconds" went from lean independence to an over-glossed videogame. The upcoming release of the fourth "The Fast and the Furious" will see some theaters install new seats which are meant to shake and rattle their inhabitants like a thrill park ride.

A real car movie already knows how to make you feel the road. It's the journey itself.

OpenPen: Online News For East Tennessee

I welcome OpenPen Media, a unique online alternative news source for East Tennessee, and happily add them to my blogroll and hope you start making them a reading habit too.

"OpenPen media was created for residents of eastern Tennessee and it’s surrounding regions to address their concerns and voice their opinions as well as address the lack of relevant local news. Some opinions and commentary on the site may be passionate in their content and viewpoint. We encourage vigorous debate and conversation on all issues from all perspectives."

Stories posted there today include:

- Democratic Candidate for Governor Kim McMillan To Speak in ET (More On Her Campaign Here)

- Al Gore Offers Free Lecture At ETSU

- Rep. Phil Roe Hates Me, You and Everyone We Know

- Repeal The Patriot Act

- Vigil Marks 6th Anniversary of Iraq War

And this is just the start of this new citizen journalism project, and R. Neal at KnoxViews writes it is:

" ... the brain child of Janet Meek, former East Tennessee Coordinator for the Tennessee Democratic Party and founder of the independent Democratic Resource Center in Johnson City.

Janet has worked tirelessly for progressive government and politics for years, and her latest venture is a new, non-partisan approach to citizen journalism and alternative online media."

I certainly like what I've been reading and celebrate their efforts!

Bob Dylan Springs Eternal

It's such a fine Spring day here in East Tennessee. I'm a sure-fire lover of this season and today also brought about a renewal of an longtime friendship.

Thanks to a mention from the fine folks at KnoxBlab about a new Bob Dylan album on the way out, I realized I had not spent time listening to his last studio release, "Modern Times", even though it has become one of his best-selling releases. So as I was working and writing today, I let it whirl in the background.

His work has been a constant companion for me - I like his music very much, and yes that means his voice sounds just fine to me, your loss if you dislike it. As I was growing up (and I apparently seem to continue shuffling along the trail here too, aging jes' fine thankyouverymuch) and thru to this day itself, he's just always been here. He's created as astonishing a body of music as any American musician ever has. And he's stayed at it, working and noodling away at words and music as fame and awards rise and fall around him, just working at making music and touring and touring, season after season.

I decided for a post today that I'd just share a song from Modern Times which makes me smile for Spring and for old man Dylan and for myself too. I hope you take some time to enjoy this day however you will, and maybe this song will accompany our Spring.

Bob Dylan - Beyond The Horizon

Why Are Newspapers Failing?

The continuing failure of newspapers nationwide raises many questions, and a very random survey at the Kingsport Times News shows some clear indications at what the public sees as problems and solutions:

Times News Poll • All Polls

The Pew research Center says one-third of survey respondents say they'd miss reading their local newspaper if it stopped publishing. What do you think?

40% - I see no value in the local news report.

31% - Something would replace it.

29% - It would seriously damage civic life.

Total Votes: 803

For more tales of the demise the newspaper business see:

- Do Newspapers Matter?

- Why Newspapers Can't Be Saved But The News Can

- Seattle Post Shuts Print Down, Goes Web-Only

- The Secret Success of Ethnic Newspapers

UPDATE: One commenter below, offers a valuable viewpoint about print and digital formats.

Southern Living Requires Docile and Dim Population

"Cheap labor. Even more than race, it’s the thread that connects all of Southern history—from the ante-bellum South of John C. Calhoun and Jefferson Davis to Tennessee’s Bob Corker, Alabama’s Richard Shelby and the other anti-union Southerners in today’s U.S. Senate."
---
"The idea of working people joining together to have a united voice across the table from management scares most Southern politicians to death. After all, they go to the same country clubs as management. ...

"The South today may be more racially enlightened than ever in its history. However, it is still a society in which the ruling class—the chambers of commerce that have taken over from yesterday’s plantation owners and textile barons—uses politics to maintain control over a vast, jobs-hungry workforce. After the oligarchy lost its war for slavery—the cheapest labor of all—it secured the next best thing in Jim Crow and the indentured servitude known as sharecropping and tenant farming. It still sees cheap, pliable, docile labor as the linchpin of the Southern economy."

The essay quoted above is from this story at Alternet, mentioned in posts at The Crone Speaks and KnoxViews.

Sen. Corker has earned the many criticisms this article heaps upon him - outrage at the Big Three automakers, obedience to Wall Street's calls for cash. East Tennessee certainly relies on cheap labor for the thousands of manufacturing jobs and those same businesses often use temp agencies to supply them while importing workers from out of state for high-skill jobs -- though that is not always the rule.

It is a deeply complex issue, which perhaps gets some glossing over in the Alternet piece. Still, since Republicans have dominated federal and state offices in this part of Tennessee, the status quo of low education among poorly paid workers - jobs earning much higher salaries in other locations - that status quo seems more like bedrock foundation. Some years back I pointed out this dire and thorny problem.

And likewise the fact remains that while many folks here idealize a sort of rugged individualism and brook no interference, time and again the voice of the individual and the needs of their collective good are far in the background behind the lobbying professionals who dictate the bills and laws which govern.

Perhaps it's that those who rule and those who serve both get something that allows each a perception of independence which is beyond question - but the reality is that Southern living comes at a high price.

UPDATE: See Mary Mancini's post at Liberadio(!): "And, really, if an employer doesn’t need the permission of their employees to join the Chamber of Commerce, than why should employees need the permission of their employer to join a union?"

A Monday Web-Walk

-- Is Glenn Beck saying mass murders like the one at Knoxville's Unitarian Church is justified?

-- The NSA wants control over American Internet says outgoing DHS Cyber-Security Chief.

-- Worst. Shakespearean. Hip-Hop. Ever. (And the one for Edgar Allan Poe is even worse.)

-- Pi are not square, Pi are round. Cornbread are square.

-- "So, here we are, forced to think about (Rep. Stacey) Campfield having sex."

-- Holi, The Spring Festival of Colors in India looks astonishing. Beautiful images via the Boston Globe.

I Got The News

Hello Internet, how was your weekend?

Mine was fine, thanks. I have been taking some enjoyment and wonder at how the national, regional and local news media machines of the last century are trying to figure out how to stay in business (see Clay Shirky's essay).

They say things like: The Internet is killing us off! Un-credentialed writers and photographers and videographers are slumming up the works!! America will die without us!! OMG! News is a business threatened by anyone with the skill to plunk words and images onto a web site!! Civilization is crumbling!!!!!!

I say: Easy there, Sparky. It's just your business that's folding up faster than a cheap cardboard table.

I've spent many years working in those traditional forms of news - print, radio, tv - and worked alongside a heap of very poorly paid and intelligent (sometimes) folk which seemed to bring only wealth and power to a very select few owners and power-brokers. Sometimes important stories broke out and shook up the status quo. Sometimes such tales were crushed to prevent a shake up. Many readers read or listened or viewed the tales told as Gospel. The smartest ones, however, relied on more useful axioms of doubt and critical examination, by probing into the tales being told, by talking to our friends and neighbors and seeking out the opinions and tales being told by others.

I've spent even more years simply working with words, just trying to communicate effectively. Here in America our 26 letters can be combined in ways which rock the world or land with an empty thunk in oblivion.

Here's something I've learned: Humans work mighty hard to create a narrative of design and meaning out of their own experiences. There seems a near primal need to construct a reasonable pattern out of what we see and hear or were told or weren't told, it's just the way our brains want to work. Even when we sleep, we experience sensations which are swirled into patterns of stories and meanings which we dimly recall upon waking, or perhaps the patterns are so intense we can't shake them loose for days and days.

So while a business - a paper or tv station or radio station - begins to land with that thunking sound, it is not a sign of the Apocalypse. Instead we are finding new ways to communicate with each other, about "news" and about our lives. Proof? Tell me, have you ever heard of anyone and I mean anyone taking a class or training seminar on how to text message someone else? Or did we just create the very tools and pieces of it as we were using it?

I do not really consider myself what has been termed a "blogger". I write.

And here in the year of our Lord 2009, more people than ever before in human history are writing and making images and creating and communicating with each other across the digital universe. Not everyone is accessing the Internet or using computers or hand-held digital communicators -- not yet. That may well take decades to take place if it ever does at all.

We don't have to rely on a a few hundred or a few thousand sources of news and information. We're dispensing with all that and news is still being reported and yes, lies and rumors are spread right along with it. Truth emerges under its own viability. Or it thunks as all lies and rumors do.

I have often written things which newspapers or other outlets then reported and I often have written about the things I've read or seen which were created by a newspaper, or a magazine essay, an online account, a song, an image and many other sources of information and communication.

Worries and fears about business will likely be with us always. News or journalism or writing or fact-checking or watch-dogging or whatever you wish to call the infinite narratives of our days is thriving and growing so fiercely it frightens those who no longer have the muscles of control they once had.

I got the news. You can get it too. We make it, ordinary folks who probe and ponder our world. We always have and we always will.

Dr. Helen, Malkin, GOP Get It Wrong on "Going John Galt"

I noticed a post recently at No Silence Here on the rather dubious and sadly empty-headed Defeated Conservative Conference - I mean the CPAC - where MIchelle Malkin and Dr. Helen called for their faithful followers to adopt a new catchphrase taken from character named John Galt in an Ayn Rand book called "Atlas Shrugged" published in 1957. Until recently, it was best known for prompting this review from writer Dorothy Parker: "This book should not be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force".

The CPAC panel's collective misunderstanding of so many topics and especially of the character of John Galt was staggering and rather typically shrill.

Hilzoy lays out their failure to understand the character and has links to the video as well posted at Washington Monthly today:

"Dr. Helen has put up a video about 'Going John Galt' on PJTV, in which she interviews three people who claim to be Going Galt. (To see the relevant bit, follow the link, click the arrow to the right of the blue segment bar just below the video, and click on 'People Who Are Going John Galt'.) What's odd is that the people Dr. Helen interviews don't really seem to understand what 'Going Galt' means. Two of the people Dr. Helen interviews are trying to reduce their taxable income, and the third is trying to "follow Ayn Rand's morality as much as I can, and spread her philosophy as far as I can."

That's not what Rand meant by Going Galt at all. In Atlas Shrugged, John Galt decides to withdraw his creative and productive efforts from society. He is going on strike, and he convinces other creative, productive people to follow him. Here's what happens when someone Goes Galt in Rand's novel:

"He's quit! Gone! Gone like all the others! Left his mills, his bank accounts, his property, everything! Just vanished! Took some clothing and whatever he had in the safe in his apartment -- they found a safe left open in his bedroom, open and empty -- that's all! No word, no note, no explanation! They called me from Washington, but it's all over town! The news, I mean, the story! They can't keep it quiet! They've tried to, but...Nobody knows how it got out, but it went through the mills like one of those furnace break-outs, the word that he'd gone, and then...before anyone could stop it, a whole bunch of them vanished! The superintendent, the chief metallurgist, the chief engineer, Rearden's secretary, even the bastards! Deserting us, in spite of all the penalties we've set up! He's quit and the rest are quitting and those mills are just left there, standing still! Do you understand what that means?"

Rearden and his associates will not be paying a lot of taxes now that they've left. But that's not the point. Withdrawing their creative efforts is. In Rand's novel, it is they who keep the mills running, and without them, everything grinds to a halt and the world is plunged into crisis.

None of the people Dr. Helen interviews is actually Going Galt. More to the point, neither is Dr. Helen. She claims to be "mulling over ways that she can "go Galt". Allow me to help her out (along with Michelle Malkin, Glenn Reynolds, et al.) To Go Galt, she should:

(a) Identify those things that she does that are genuinely creative and productive. If there aren't any, then the fact that it will be difficult for her to Go Galt is the least of her problems.

(b) Refuse to do those things in any way that allows society at large, as opposed to a small circle of like-minded individualists, to benefit from them.

It really is that simple. If she and the other bloggers who are calling on people to "Go Galt" don't do this, the only explanations are that they don't have the guts to do what they are encouraging others to do, or that they recognize that nothing they do counts as creative or productive, or that they just aren't thinking about what they write.

They might respond by saying: we are doing something genuinely useful by making the case that people ought to Go Galt. So long as we are doing that, we can't Go Galt! But while this accords with Ayn Rand's actual practice, it does not accord with her views as expressed in Atlas Shrugged. John Galt did not need to go on the air to make his point. He made his case in private, to creative and productive people like himself. They went on strike, and as a result the world was plunged into crisis.

That's not a minor point. It's essential to Rand's entire view. Here's why Galt says that he decided to withdraw:

"Then I saw what was wrong with the world, I saw what destroyed men and nations, and where the battle for life had to be fought. I saw that the enemy was an inverted morality -- and that my sanction was its only power. I saw that evil was impotent-that evil was the irrational, the blind, the anti-real -- and that the only weapon of its triumph was the willingness of the good to serve it. Just as the parasites around me were proclaiming their helpless dependence on my mind and were expecting me voluntarily to accept a slavery they had no power to enforce, just as they were counting on my self-immolation to provide them with the means of their plan -- so throughout the world and throughout men's history, in every version and form, from the extortions of loafing relatives to the atrocities of collective countries, it is the good, the able, the men of reason, who act as their own destroyers, who transfuse to evil the blood of their virtue and let evil transmit to them the poison of destruction, thus gaining for evil the power of survival, and for their own values -- the impotence of death. I saw that there comes a point, in the defeat of any man of virtue, when his own consent is needed for evil to win -- and that no manner of injury done to him by others can succeed if he chooses to withhold his consent. I saw that I could put an end to your outrages by pronouncing a single word in my mind. I pronounced it. The word was 'No.'"

By withdrawing, Galt was, essentially, testing this view. If he was right to think that an inverted morality could triumph only with his sanction, and that the parasites around him were helplessly dependent on his mind, and could survive only with the aid of his self-immolation, then once he and others like him withdrew, that fact would become clear. If not, not.

If Dr. Helen, Glenn Reynolds, Michelle Malkin, and the rest of the bloggers who are talking up the idea of Going Galt had the courage of their convictions, they would make the same experiment. If they don't, it's worth asking why not.

As I said above, the three most obvious answers are: (1) they do not believe that anything they do is in fact creative or productive, or (2) they are urging other people to do something they don't have the guts to do themselves, like scam artists who convince people to invest their money in schemes they themselves steer clear of, or (3) they have not bothered to think about what they are saying, even to the limited extent required to see that there's a conflict between their words and their actions.

In a review of the book from the National Review from 1957 by Whittaker Chambers, he writes this book espouses class war in a purely political novel, and adds:

"Out of a lifetime of reading, I can recall no other book in which a tone of overriding arrogance was so implacably sustained. Its shrillness is without reprieve. Its dogmatism is without appeal. In addition, the mind which finds this tone natural to it shares other characteristics of its type. 1) It consistently mistakes raw force for strength, and the rawer the force, the more reverent the posture of the mind before it. 2) It supposes itself to be the bringer of a final revelation. Therefore, resistance to the Message cannot be tolerated because disagreement can never be merely honest, prudent, or just humanly fallible. Dissent from revelation so final (because, the author would say, so reasonable) can only be willfully wicked.

Why Not Just Require A State License For Sexual Activity?

As the state of Tennessee ponders passage of a whole slew of laws removing/altering women's rights and their ability to decide on whether to be a mother or not, it seems that what they are really seeking is a Sexually Activity License.

Liberadio(!) has been tracking the list of legislation (her full post follows and I hope like me, you do contact by phone or email the list of representatives included):

Wednesday, March 11, at 3:00 pm, in room 16 of Legislative Plaza, the conversation will continue at a Public Hearing [pdf] in front of House Health and Human Resources Committee. Please consider attending the hearing so you can both stand against the most cynical of legislators and their divisive bills and support women’s reproductive health advocates.

The bills to be discussed are as follows:

HJR 0061 JUDICIARY: Constitution - right to abortion. Adds new provision to Article I to provide that nothing in Constitution of Tennessee secures or protects right to abortion or requires the funding of an abortion except in cases involving rape, incest, or health of the mother. (H: Fincher)

HJR 0066 JUDICIARY: Constitution - right to abortion. Adds new provision to Article I to provide that nothing in Constitution of Tennessee secures or protects right to abortion or requires the funding of an abortion. (H: Maggart)

HJR 0088 JUDICIARY: Constitutional amendment - right to or funding of abortion. Adds new provision to Article I to provide that nothing in Constitution of Tennessee secures or protects the right to abortion or requires the funding of an abortion. Gives the legislature the authority to enact, amend, or repeal statutes regarding abortion, including circumstances of pregnancy resulting from rape or incest or when necessary to save the life of the mother. (H: Curtiss)

HJR 0132 HEALTH CARE: Constitutional amendment - vasectomy rights of married men. Adds new provision to Article I of the state constitution to provide that nothing in the constitution secures or protects right to a vasectomy. (H: Camper)

HB0025 - FAMILY LAW: Paternity testing for birth certificates. Requires paternity testing before a father can be listed on a birth certificate. Requires department of human services to pay the costs of the paternity tests for parties who are financially unable to pay. Broadly captioned. (S: Jackson; H: Hardaway)

HB0436 - HEALTH CARE: Standards for ambulatory surgical treatment centers. Requires that any physician’s office that performs abortions be classified as an as ambulatory surgical treatment centers. Requires the department of health, through the board for licensing health care facilities, to promulgate rules and regulations that contain certain minimum standards for the maintenance and operation of ambulatory surgical treatment centers. (S: Beavers; H: Shipley)

HB0445 - CRIMINAL LAW: Informed consent for abortions. Requires that the informed written consent of the woman be obtained prior to an abortion, providing for 24-hour period of reflection after the woman receives the information needed for an informed consent. Establishes requirements for a physician or other health care professional to follow in order to obtain informed consent from the woman. Establishes an exception to informed consent and waiting period requirements when necessary to protect the life or health of the woman. (S: Herron; H: Maddox)

HB0638 - FAMILY LAW: Viable human fetus as victim of child abuse. Revised definition of “child” to include a viable fetus of a human being for purposes of child abuse and aggravated child abuse offenses. (S: Burchett; H: Maggart)

HB0807 - HEALTH CARE: Stillborn deaths to be placed in vital records. Requires each fetal death, 500 or more grams or 22 or more completed weeks of gestation, to be placed in vital records. Gives parents the option of naming the stillborn child on such records. (S: Bunch; H: Campfield)

HB0819 - HEALTH CARE: Death certificate to be issued for abortions. Requires a death certificate to be filed with the office of vital records for each abortion performed in the state. Requires death certificate to state that the fetal death was due to an abortion. (S: Bunch; H: Campfield)

HB0862 - FAMILY LAW: Inception of human life. Defines “inception of human life” to mean the moment of human conception. (S: Gresham; H: Mumpower)

HB2106 - FAMILY LAW: Tennessee Pregnant Women Support Act. Authorizes the department of health to apply for federal grants to fund the collection of data regarding the number of abortions performed in this state, the characteristics of those seeking abortions, the reasons why women choose abortion, or any other information applicable to supporting pregnant women in this state who may be seeking an abortion. Requires the department of health to create a hotline as well as pamphlets for doctors’ offices to provide interested women with information about public and private health care services available to women during and after the birth of a child. (S: Herron; H: Fincher)

HB1756 - FAMILY LAW: Disposition of Family Planning Funds. As introduced, establishes a new methodology for disposition of family planning funds that disburses funds to public women’s health services programs before other providers are funded. - Amends TCA Section 68-34-105. (S: Johnson; H: Hensley)

Any legislation, including SJR127, HJR61 and HJR66, which attempts to begin the process of amending the State Constitution would be doing so in historical violation of the document’s purpose to expand rights, not take them away.

In addition, there are already a number of Tennessee laws which already regulate abortion, including parental consent, a ban on late-term abortions and patient informed consent. You can read about the effects of these laws in an open letter to Rep. Debra Maggart that was written by one broken-hearted Tennessee woman.

And, as I stated earlier, with the number of abortions in Tennessee is declining the focus of our legislature should be on how to prevent unwanted pregnancies by providing education and resources.

Before 3:00 PM tomorrow, please contact by phone or email each committee member. This is especially important if your representative is on the committee. You can find out who your Rep is at the Capitol website. Don’t forget to put your zip code in the subject line of your email.

Chair and Vice Chair of the House Health and Human Resources Committee:
Rep. Joe Armstrong rep.joe.armstrong@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Joey Hensley rep.joey.hensley@capitol.tn.gov

Members of the House Health and Human Resources Committee:
Rep. Curt Cobb, Rep.Curt.Cobb@capitol.tn.gov Rep.Curt.Cobb@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Jim Cobb, Rep.Jim.Cobb@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Charles Curtiss, Rep.Charles.Curtiss@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Vince Dean, Rep.Vince.Dean@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. John DeBerry, Rep.John.DeBerry@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Lois DeBerry, Rep.Lois.DeBerry@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Vance Dennis, Rep.Vance.Dennis@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Joshua Evans, Rep.Joshua.Evans@capitol.tn.gov
Rep.Dennis Ferguson, Rep.Dennis.Ferguson@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Dale Ford, Rep.Dale.Ford@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Curtis.Halford, Rep.Curtis.Halford@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Sherry.Jones, Rep.Sherry.Jones@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Debra.Maggart, Rep.Debra.Maggart@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Jason.Mumpower, Rep.Jason.Mumpower@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Gary Odom, Rep.Gary.Odom@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Mary Pruitt, Rep.Mary.Pruitt@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Bob Ramsey, Rep.Bob.Ramsey@capitol.tn.gov
Rep.Barrett Rich, Rep.Barrett.Rich@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. Jeanne Richardson, Rep.Jeanne.Richardson@capitol.tn.gov
Rep. David Shepard, Rep.David.Shepard@capitol.tn.gov

And at Tiny Cat Pants, Aunt B, minces no words in pointing out that some proponents of legislation seeking to outlaw abortions has no idea what medical procedures even take place between a physician and a patient.

"I write to you out of such deep despair I don’t even know where to start. I read Jeff Woods’s post an hour ago and I’m still so angry I’m shaking.

I’ll just quote:

Q: What else?

Fowler: There are other things we could do as well if this resolution passes that we probably could not do under Planned Parenthood v. Sundquist. For example, many states now are requiring doctors to inform women that they’ve performed an ultrasound and that they have the right to see that ultrasound. Many women think it’s just a blog [sic]of cells or tissues. But literally within eight days, I think you can notice the heartbeat on the sonogram and when they begin to understand the truth about what is inside their body, they recognize it as a human being and a child. That kind of law probably would not be constitutional under Planned Parenthood v. Sundquist.

Women of Tennessee, I don’t care where you stand on the abortion issue. I just want you to read that and see it for what it is. Fowler CANNOT EVEN BOTHER TO LEARN ABOUT WHAT GOES ON BETWEEN A WOMAN AND HER DOCTOR BUT HE THINKS HE SHOULD GET TO SET THE LAWS TO GOVERN IT. Just let that evil sink in. He cannot even bother to get his facts straight, he can’t be bothered to learn about what you might go through if you have an abortion, he can just make shit THAT IS PLAINLY NOT TRUE. Just demonstrably false. LIES, lies, lies.

He can just lie, plain and bald-faced and make shit up and not even be bothered to learn about what you might go through when you go to the gynecologist and he and his buddies are going to win.

He doesn’t even give enough of a shit about you to bother to learn what you go through and he’s going to get laws that affect you passed. He can’t even be bothered to learn basic science, and he gets to govern your body.

Let’s start with the “requiring doctors to inform women that they’ve performed an ultrasound.” Most women have abortions in the first trimester. In order to perform the abortion, her doctor does an ultrasound, at the least, to determine the age of the fetus. In the first trimester, the fetus is so tiny that it cannot be seen using an abdominal ultrasound. As you know, the doctor will therefore almost always perform a vaginal ultrasound on you. There is no way you won’t know that they’re performing the ultrasound. But Fowler doesn’t know that. He’s apparently gotten his information on how doctors work from television, so you’re going to be ruled by laws set by a guy who doesn’t know basic gynecological procedures.

He can’t bother to learn that there’s not a heartbeat until 21 days after conception. So, he just makes up 8 days, because he’s too lazy to learn the truth and anyway, he’s too busy protecting us stupid, stupid cows from ourselves.

And that’s what burns me. He thinks that, if we only had more knowledge–the very knowledge HE CAN’T BE BOTHERED TO EVEN FUCKING ACQUIRE–we wouldn’t have abortions.

But it’s beneath him to worry about the details or the truth of what he wants to force us to know.

And yet, he’s going to get his way. He’s a lazy, condescending liar who can’t even be bothered to learn about the stuff he wants to force on women and he’s going to win.

God damn, that burns me. It insults me so deeply that some man–who will never be faced with this decision and who can’t even bother to learn enough about it to get his facts straight–is going to make the laws we have to live by. Damn it’s insulting to the core.

But then, let’s look at the second half of the problem. There’s not a woman in this state who hasn’t been through one kind of gynecological problem or another, even if she’s never had nor would ever have an abortion, who would hear what Fowler says and not say to herself–”But wouldn’t they have to do a vaginal ultrasound? Um, of course they would. And wouldn’t a doctor already tell her what she’s doing and why? And wouldn’t a woman notice that?”

It’s not Jeff Woods’s fault that he’s not a woman. And it’s not his fault that he didn’t know, so it didn’t sound funny to him. But he’s who Fowler’s sitting down with to spew this bullshit. And he doesn’t know what he doesn’t know to be able to press Fowler about it.

And what do you do in the face of that?

Dropping Pencils Brings School Suspension

Some students at Indian Trail Middle School in Johnson City took part in a "prank" by agreeing to dropping their pencils onto the floor at a specific time. The students were then subject to a mass In School Suspension. No parents were notified by the suspension, according to one parent.

School officials deemed this horrific pencil drop act as a coordinated assault on education, saying it violated the school's top policy to maintain order, none shall - "interrupt the educational process". Students involved all had their cell phones confiscated so officials could examine each one to see if text messages were sent to students so they could all enact their nefarious deed to drop pencils at one specific time.

Fortunately, no criminal charges were filed against these students, however one parent says her child was told by a school police officer that: "they could be charged with disorderly conduct." Perhaps that is because the students all laughed out loud when the pencils fell to the ground.
Synchronized pencil dropping must be the first step to starting a meth lab in the school bathroom and that of course is just another short step to becoming heroin dealers.

Camera Obscura: The Superhero Decadence of The Watchmen

It is most satisfying to see so many news and media outlets talking about writer Alan Moore's 1986 graphic novel "The Watchmen", which is arriving as a big-budget studio movie this weekend across the nation and the world. Moore - who no longer owns the rights to the story he created and won't see a penny from the movie or the merchandise - must still take some joy in the fact that his work is creating an even larger debate today than when it was first released.

I was among those who bought each issue of The Watchmen when it came out, one at a time, waiting each month for the next chapter, a process which took over a year to complete. The nerdy fanboy in me knew that Moore's creation was based on superhero characters from the old Charlton Comics company. And I had already become a fan of the very imaginative narrative experiments in comic book form Moore had created in his run on the odd tale of "Swamp Thing." He took a minor character and made a mythic, Lovecraftian phantasmagoria whose sum far exceeded its parts. Those familiar balloons inked with the dialog and thoughts of comic book characters were turned into prose, rupturing those balloons into a near-Joycean stream of consciousness.

He was the New Kid in Town and was beyond bold in his approach.

There were countless hours in 1986 and 1987 spent lounging about the boxes and stacks of plastic-wrapped comics and magazines in a variety of local comic shops where we would dissect and debate each issue of The Watchmen. The story of this limited series was a murder mystery, but it was also a dense and layered commentary on comic books, comic characters, heroics and myths, power and the abuse of power, satire, politics, science fiction, tragedy, and even on the very structure and form of comic books. (See here for more)

The cover illustration by Dave Gibbons on that first issue, shown above, was a sly pun in itself -- meant to indicate the "doomsday clock" closing in on midnight, it is also a spatter of blood on a smiley face button, a remnant of the murder of a brutal and hateful 'retired' superhero named The Comedian. And it rests in the gutter, in a pool of blood from the dead Comedian. It's also, like a movie, the first 'shot', and each image after on that first page is a 'dolly-out', as if the camera were pulling back further and further, which then places the button as a but a tiny speck seen from the window of the Comedian's apartment, now a murder scene.

There was nothing like it before. There were a few old school comic fans who did not like Moore's work one bit. In a way, Watchmen was too hip for the room, but sales of the issues and collected graphic novel were huge. DC Comics earned some credibility among us discerning readers - which they promptly trashed by invoking a clause in Moore's contract that allowed them to keep the rights to the tale simply by publishing reprints year after year. Moore lost control and eventually accepted his fate and demanded his name be removed from future printings.

For many years tales of movie adaptations rose and fell away. However, this weekend will see a 163-minute version of the story hit movie screens. Critics just do not know what to make of this movie -- will audiences get it even if they didn't read the books? Will they like it if they did read the books? Is it a good film, a great one, a mindless jabber of ideas? As cinematic as much of the design and imagery of the comic might be and adaptable to movies - it was a creation specifically for comic panels and colors and mythology.

I hope it sends even more new readers to the novel.

I hope audiences and fanboys and critics talk and debate the movie for some time.

There are ideas in the story which are meant to disturb and rattle the status quo. And I have always been a supporter for that. Someone asked me once, "Why do you like to rattle people's cages?" and I replied "Why are people living in cages?"

Double-Digit Unemployment Hits East TN

Layoffs and business closings in January have taken a steep toll in East Tennessee:

"Kingsport’s January unadjusted unemployment rate moved to a five-year high of 10.5 percent — up from 8.1 percent in December.

Morristown had the highest jobless rate for area cities — 15.2 percent, up from 12.1 percent in December.

Johnson City and Bristol were the only cities in the region with jobless rates that stayed in the single digits for January. Johnson City’s unemployment rate was 7.0 percent, up from 6.0 percent in December. Bristol’s jobless rate was 7.1 percent, up from 6.0 percent in December.

Knoxville’s unemployment rate was 10.6 percent, up from 8.9 percent in December.

Sullivan County, which has the fourth-lowest unemployment rate in the state, posted a 6.9 percent January rate, up from 5.7 percent in December.

The unemployment rate in other Northeast Tennessee counties was:
•Washington County — 7.4 percent.
•Carter County — 9.1 percent.
•Grainger County — 12.4 percent.
•Greene County — 14.1 percent.
•Hamblen County — 10.4 percent.
•Hawkins County — 10.8 percent.
•Johnson County — 12.4 percent.

The Combined Statistical Area of Johnson City-Kingsport-Bristol TN-VA had an 8.3 percent jobless rate last month — up from 6.6 percent in December. Knoxville’s CSA was slightly higher at 8.7 percent. (Source)
Some Tennessee legislators continue to reject and refuse stimulus payments aimed at unemployment insurance benefits, though I see few from the cities and counties above, except for Knoxville's representatives and one each from Kingsport and Bristol. You stay classy, guys:

• Harry Brooks (R-Knoxville)
• Stacey Campfield (R-Knoxville)
• Bill Dunn (R-Knoxville)
• Eric Watson (R-Cleveland)
• Susan Lynn (R-Mt. Juliet)
• Eric Swafford (R-Pikeville)
• Debra Maggart (R-Hendersonville)
• Richard Floyd (R-Chattanooga)
• Jon Lundberg (R-Bristol)
• Joe Carr (R-Lascassas)
• Jimmy Eldridge (R-Jackson)
• Tony Shipley (R-Kingsport)
• Vance Dennis (R-Savannah)
• Matthew Hill (R-Jonesborough)
• Glen Casada (R-Franklin)
• Gerald McCormick (R-Chattanooga)
• Mike Bell (R-Riceville)
• Joey Hensley (R-Howenwald)
• Phillip Johnson (R-Pegram)
• Curtis Johnson (R-Clarksville)
• Jimmy Matlock (R-Lenoir)
• Curtis Halford (R-Dyer)
• Beth Harwell (R-Nashville)

(list via KnoxViews)

Burchett Calls Out TVA 'Bozos'

State Senator Tim Burchett was moving forward new legislation demanding protections for people and the environment from TVA regarding TVA's coal ash storage -- calling them out as bozos and arrogant for their inept handling of the massive coal ash spill in Roane County in December 2008. Video and audio of the committee hearings where Rep. Burchett spoke on SB 1559 is here. Comments from Burchett begin in the last 10 minutes of the meeting.

Sadly,Sen. Ken Yeager, who represents Harriman, moved to delay the bill, saying that the mayors in the affected communities might have some suggestions for elements to add to the legislation. Of course, Sen. Yeager has no idea what those suggestions might be. He would have actually needed to have spoken with the gentlemen in question. At best what he wanted was to delay action on the legislation.

At RoaneViews this week, Sen. Yeager is cited for his failures to stand for the best interests of his constituents and his desire to protect coal companies instead.

Meanwhile, Senator Boxer is pushing a resolution demanding TVA actually fulfill the leadership role given them by Congress and for the EPA to start doing their job and start checking the safety of the nation's hundreds of coal ash dump sites and draft new rules to contain these toxic disasters in waiting. Again, RoaneViews has the details.

R. Neal posts that over 100 environmental agencies have signed a letter sent to the EPA likewise demanding changes in coal ash storage:

"The disaster at TVA's Kingston plant dramatized the need for federal standards for safe disposal of these wastes, which are virtually unregulated by the EPA. After eight years of counterproductive backpedaling, we are confident that you will chart a new, responsible course for the Agency by supporting the adoption of standards, whether reflected in legislation or new regulations, that reflect the gravity of the situation and are guided by a consistent set of principles."

Kudos to those elected officials who have been taking action to eliminate and reduce the dangers of these toxic dumps -- but where are Tennessee's federal officials? Sympathetic words and promises make nice media quotes while legislation creating much needed change actually gets the job done. In fact, all of Tennessee's legislature needs to come out of hiding and serve the state by requiring TVA to be accountable for their actions.

Fox News Dreams of High Speed Rail to Hookers

Maybe I should say "Lies" rather than "Dreams" since the folks at Fox News just made up the whole story about a high speed rail line (which was first, falsely, claimed to head to Vegas and now, falsely again, goes to a Nevada brothel.)

Steve Benen has the details:

"Check out this exchange between Fox News's Megyn Kelly and Rep. Trent Franks (R-Ariz.) on the omnibus spending bill pending in the Senate:

KELLY: It's a super railroad, of sorts -- a line that will deliver customers straight from Disney, we kid you not, to the doorstep of the moonlight bunny ranch brothel in Nevada. I say, to the moonlight Bunny Ranch brothel in Nevada. So should your tax dollars be paying for these kinds of projects? [...]

FRANKS: The majority leader of the U.S. Senate, Harry Reid has fought for this publicly and is committed to this project, even in the face of criticism.... If this is something that is truly the priority of the majority leader of the US senate, it's pretty late in the day, Megyn.

I love the way Megyn Kelly adds "we kid you not" while blatantly lying to a national television audience.

But notice the evolution of the lie. First, the non-existent project was in the stimulus bill; now it's the omnibus. First, the HSR was headed to Vegas; now it's Carson City. First, Reid was quietly sneaking this non-existent spending into law; now he's fighting for it publicly in the face of criticism.

Republican hacks like Kelly and Franks aren't just lying, they're getting their own lie wrong, screwing up the manufactured controversy that they helped create.

In an apparent attempt to win some kind of irony award, Kelly asked Franks about how to hold lawmakers accountable for made-up earmarks that don't exist outside Republican talking points and the GOP's cable news channel. Ali Frick noted Frank's unintentionally hilarious response: "Fortunately, people like yourself and Fox News are a tremendous help in that regard because they tell the people -- you know, sunlight has a way of being an accountability all by itself."

Newspaper Praises Racist Jokes?

The MTSU poll released Tuesday shows the state's new Republican-majority Legislature gets low approval numbers (34%) and that support for Obama is 11 points higher than the percentage of state residents who voted for him, higher still when ranking Obama's ability to handle the economy, foreign policy and ethical standards.

But what headline does the The Kingsport Times-News place on this survey?

"Obama's popular in Tennessee, but so are racist jokes"

Either that's a sign of an uneducated editor or a spin so twisted a person could throw out their back trying to make the comparison. (NOTE: A screen grab from the page I saw this morning is presented at the end of this post.)

The survey does say that 1 in 6 people polled claim they have made a joke about Obama's race -- that's 16.6% -- not "popular" by any math.

Michael Silence notes too that the headline in the Tennessean mangles the numbers:

"Obama's popular, but so are racist jokes"

That's really pathetic, and wrong. Both newspapers should be ashamed.


Highlights from the survey:

The poll found that 53 percent of Tennesseans now approve of Obama, even though only 42 percent of them voted for him just four months ago.

Fifty-seven percent express confidence in his administration’s ability to manage American foreign policy. About as many, 59 percent, express confidence both in his administration’s ability to improve the economy and to manage the federal government. And 61 percent express confidence in his administration’s ethical standards. Fifty four percent of Tennesseans say Obama is doing enough to cooperate with Republicans in Congress, but only 24 percent say congressional Republicans are doing enough to cooperate with Obama.

The poll assessed public opinion on a number of issues likely to be taken up during this spring’s state legislative session. For example, 62 percent of Tennesseans say grocery stores should be allowed to sell wine if they are located in areas that already allow the sale of alcoholic beverages. Education ranks highest on the list of things Tennesseans say state government isn’t spending enough money on. Fifty-one percent say Tennessee is spending too little on state universities. Fifty-four percent say the same about community colleges and technical schools, and 62 percent say it about elementary and secondary education. Highway construction ranks lowest, with only 25 percent saying the state should spend more.

Furthermore, 52 percent say abortion should be legal under some circumstances, but not others.

Full survey is here.



UPDATE: The Huffington Post picks up this story as well, featuring some comments from Dr. Ken Blake, director of the MTSU poll:

"It seems that Tennessee is awash in jokes about Obama's race even though most people say they don't tell them and most people say they don't find them funny," says Ken Blake, director the MTSU poll. Blake says he and his colleagues set out to quantify attitudes toward racial jokes in the wake of some high-profile gaffes, such as that of Tennessee Republican Chip Saltsman, who distributed CDs of the infamous "Barack the Magic Negro" song.

Blake's poll report says the gap between racial-joke-telling and racial-joke-enjoying suggests people tell racial jokes about the president even though they consider the jokes inappropriate. Or, Blake tells the Huffington Post, "It is possible there is truly a small core of people who broadcast these jokes to everyone else."

Facepalm - The Only Response

I hit the wall of Stupid after reading this.

And this.

And this.

Which meant the only response I could offer was Facepalm. (click to embiggen)