Don Imus returns to radio this morning.Imus and his new station, WABC-AM, aren't saying much about the format of the new show, although at least one black person will participate regularly, along with longtime news reader Charles McCord.
His premiere will be held at Town Hall in Times Square, where $100 tickets were sold to benefit the Imus Ranch for Kids With Cancer.
Imus' backers believe his comeback will be a successful one. They say he has paid his price for his mistake and learned his lesson.
"I don't have any doubt on his future," said Phil Boyce, WABC-AM program director. "He'll obviously be wiser, smarter and a bit more careful. He's learned from this. I'm not concerned that he'll have a repeat."
Imus' return won't impact me at all.
I did't listen to him before he was canned because of the "nappy-headed hos" controversy and I won't listen now.
Nonetheless, I am somewhat interested in Imus' reemergence.
Rising star among the Republican presidential candidates Mike Huckabee will be a guest. I suppose he figures that he's far more likely to benefit by the massive exposure he's sure to get by appearing on the debut show than he is to be hurt by associating with the disgraced Imus. Other guests include Dem attack dog James Carville and Levon Helm. The former member of The Band is slated to perform live.
Not everyone eagerly awaits Imus' return to the air.
There have already been some protests.
BOSTON -- A group of black community leaders angry with the decision to bring back Don Imus protested at WTKK-FM's office Friday, three days before the radio host returns to the airways after being fired for making racist and sexist comments about the Rutgers women's basketball team.
"We as black men could not sit idly by while you reinstate an individual (Imus) who has insulted the black community and in particular black women," Sadiki Kambon, the director of The Black Community Information Center at Roxbury Community College said, speaking of the station. "Yes, we cannot stop the Imus return, but can express our anger at your decision, which in the very least is racist in nature."
...Kambon said his group would now would focus on asking companies to pull their advertisements off the station.
These leaders really hold a grudge, don't they?
I don't know how airing Imus' show can be considered racist.
Months ago, he made a really offensive remark. He apologized, profusely. He was fired.
I think he's earned a second chance.
Kambon's group should hold off on pressuring advertisers for the time being and at least wait until Imus makes his first slip up.
To appease those still troubled by the controversial remarks that led to his firing, Imus will have a sidekick aimed to soften the hard feelings.NEW YORK -- The black sidekick joining shock jock Don Imus on his return to the airwaves today is an Oxford-educated Texas cowgirl whose career has ranged from broadcast journalism to stand-up comedy, sources told The Post.
Karith Foster, a Harlem resident who grew up outside Dallas, was brought on by Imus to ease tension stirred up by his racist comment about the Rutgers women's basketball team, which got him booted in April, sources said.
Foster was raised in upscale Plano, Texas, which she describes on her Web site as having “the ethnic diversity of a Klan rally."
...Despite her Texas roots, “I'm really a Jewish girl from Long Island trapped in this body, which technically makes me a JA-AP [Jewish African-American Princess]," she jokes on her Web site.
“So it's not ‘talk to the hand,' but ‘talk to the manicure.'"
Is Foster serving as his sidekick or as his monitor to keep him in line?
Whatever, WABC has determined that Imus has been rehabilitated and he's ready to reenter society.
I wonder if Al Sharpton agrees.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel published another love letter to Tom Barrett.
It doesn't read like hard news. It reads like a press release from the Mayor's campaign.
Little opposition lines up for Barrett Four years after a crowded, intense battle that sharply split the city's voters, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett is launching a re-election bid Monday night facing. . .
Well, not much competition.
...Analysts chalked up the lack of serious competition to a variety of factors, from the power of incumbency to Barrett's nice-guy likability, from a $600,000-plus war chest to a local electorate that historically sticks with what it knows when it comes to City Hall.
Consultant Jeff Fleming of the Zizzo Group, who worked on then-Mayor John O. Norquist's staff, said many overlook that Barrett, who took office after a racially fractured election, worked hard to mend fences, build support and position himself for a second term.
"If somebody is going to run against Tom Barrett, what would their platform be?" asked Fleming, who is a Barrett supporter. "What do you choose? Maybe crime. Maybe a broader vision for what the mayor's office is."
...Last week, Milwaukee County Sheriff David A. Clarke Jr., who had publicly considered a bid, said he would not run.
"I want to be smart about this and not make a decision based on emotion, but one based on reality," Clarke said.
"There's been no outcry from residents for change. It's hard to beat an incumbent unless there is a huge outcry for change."
No outcry?
WAAAAAAAAAAAH!
MILWAUKEE NEEDS CHANGE!
The question is simple:
Is the city of Milwaukee better off than it was four years ago?
The answer is obvious:
NO.
Barrett is a likable guy. So what?
Never mind the hostile climate for business, the tax hell, the failing public schools, and the ever-growing crime crisis. Forget about all that stuff. Barrett is a nice man. He deserves another term.
And what will Barrett accomplish in what appears to be a guaranteed second term?
Well, I suppose he'll be nice.
In today's Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Mike Nichols weighs in on the James Buss bust.
Nichols writes:West Bend police arrested James Buss the other day for being an anonymous idiot on the Internet.
I hope they have a big jail.
This is America.
Anonymous idiocy is our national pastime.
It's true that what police say Buss posted under the nom de loon "Observer" on a Web site discussing teacher salaries was of particular note - if for no other reason than how he was unveiled.
A teacher called the police after Mr. Observer praised the Columbine killers who "knew how to deal with the overpaid teacher union thugs. One shot at a time!"
It turned out, according to police, he is a teacher himself down in Oak Creek.
In addition, it seems, to being a poseur.
But, hey, is there anyone on the Internet who isn't?
In response to Nichols' question:
Yes, there are people on the Internet who aren't poseurs -- me.
It's not all "anonymous idiocy."
True, I don't plaster my full name on my blog. I intentionally don't put out identifying information about myself, not because I'm "hiding" but because it's the smart thing to do. Especially when voicing opinions about politics or controversial issues, it's not wise to put out the welcome mat for nutcases and stalkers.
That said, I stand behind everything I say. I'm willing to be held accountable.
Why? Because I'm not going to do something as stupid as James Buss did.
I'm not going to create a character and then say threatening things, however vague.
Nichols proceeds to run down some examples of offensive, nasty e-mails that he and his colleagues have received.
There's no denying that they're ugly. There's also no denying that people take advantage of the supposed anonymity of the Internet to vent. Apparently, conscience often loses in the battle with the twisted pleasure of spewing vile stuff anonymously.
Nichols says:Most anonymous blathering is harmless. I don't think Mr. "Observer" was advocating real violence. I'd be surprised if he's even charged. He was, it appears, just doing what everyone else does. Pretending. It's hard, most of the time, to even pretend to care.
I don't know why Nichols is being an apologist for Buss' boorish behavior.
When one comes across some disturbing comment on a forum or a creepy threat on YouTube, it's not prudent to assume the individual is harmless.
Nichols takes the stand that "this is America." Everybody acts like an idiot. So, what else is new?
I disagree.
Everyone doesn't pretend. I think the ones who do don't understand that they aren't as anonymous as they think.
If they knew that what they post on Internet forums and blogs leaves a traceable trail, perhaps the phenomenon of "pretending" wouldn't be as prevalent as it is. Debate wouldn't be as poisonous and it might actually be constructive.
Nichols concludes:Entire debates take place on blogs and the radio without anyone ever knowing who is speaking or writing.
It's more than cowardice that prompts it. It's habit.
People, even smart people with valuable things to say, have abandoned the very thing that was once supposed to be their most treasured possession: their name.
NO.
In some cases, it is a matter of cowardice, but not in all. For me, it's a matter of taking proper precautions to safeguard myself and my family from dangerous people. And there are truly dangerous people trolling around the Internet.
My good name, my word, is a treasured possession. I wouldn't blacken it. I take full responsibility for what I write. I'm not ashamed of it.
I can guarantee that no one will ever accuse me of making a threatening remark over the Internet.
I will never find myself in Buss' position.
Is it possible for a Christmas message to be too religious?
The Royal Commonwealth Society says YES, because it might offend the non-believers in the audience.
Watch video of the banned message here.
Read the text of Cristina Odone's remarks here.
If one attends a Christmas church service, shouldn't one expect a religious message?
Good grief.
I don't think that atheists should be protected from being offended at a CHURCH SERVICE.
If steps need to be taken to keep from offending non-believers in church, then steps should be taken to keep from offending believers in secular society.
Although advocates to keep juvenile offenders out of the adult prison system are probably thrilled with the findings of a recent study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, it seems flawed to me.
From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:Youth offenders tried and detained in the adult criminal justice system are a third more likely to be arrested for a crime later in life than youths who go through the juvenile justice system, according to a national report published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
So Wisconsin's practice of transferring 17-year-olds to adult courts, jails and prisons may increase crime, local juvenile justice advocates say.
"This report should be a call to lawmakers that it's time to revisit our treatment of 17-year-olds as a group as adults," said Wendy Henderson, a policy analyst with the Madison-based Wisconsin Council on Children and Families.
Legal experts, legislators and activists have debated the issue since 17 became Wisconsin's age of majority in 1995. Opponents have argued that reforming juveniles should be the priority and an adult record shouldn't follow a youth offender the rest of his or her life. Backers pointed to the nationwide trend of adopting such measures, a response to a spike in children committing violent crimes.
The report marks the first time the public health community has weighed in on the debate, Henderson said. A task force staffed by researchers at the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, National Institutes of Health and the National Institute of Justice compiled data from six previous studies to produce the report, which was first released in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine earlier this year.
The report does not focus on Wisconsin but compares existing data on offenders younger than 18 in Washington state, Pennsylvania, and regions of New York, Minnesota and Florida. Youths who had been transferred to the adult system in a previous brush with the law were more likely to be rearrested for offenses, violent or otherwise, than those who had been processed as juveniles, the study found.
As I read this article, I'm thinking it's a classic chicken or the egg matter.
Did the experience of juveniles in the adult prison system directly result in their increased likelihood of being rearrested later?
Or, as assistant professor of political science at Marquette University John McAdams suggests, were recidivism rates higher among those juveniles because "[t]he adult system got the kids who are toughest to begin with"?...Researchers considered this and looked at only serious cases that would be eligible for transfer to the adult system, according to the report. They then compared the outcomes of cases transferred with those dealt with in the juvenile system.
No, no, no. Researchers can't dismiss the matter that easily.
There are variables in specific serious cases that make the outcomes impossible to compare with other serious cases.
There are qualifying factors that led to the decisions for certain juveniles to be sent to the adult prison system as opposed to the juvenile justice system in the first place.
This study could not possibly have controlled for those variables.
In sum, it does not prove that transferring serious juvenile offenders to the adult system, rather than taking efforts to reform young murderers, shooters, and rapists, actually creates more crime in the long run.
Without question the study is flawed, but I'm sure that won't stop the advocates for treating 17-year-old serious offenders with kid gloves from citing the findings as gospel.
This is a study, not Revelation.
Hillary Clinton is in trouble.
That inevitability of Hillary as the Dem nominee has evaporated.
She seems vulnerable now, but not so much for her flaws and flip flops, her mistakes and her pandering.
It's not that Hillary's stock is tanking. It's more that Barack Obama's is rising.
Dems have had a difficult few weeks with Hillary -- the planted questions, her support of Eliot Spitzer's policy of driver's licenses for illegal immigrants and then her about face, about face, about face. Go back further and consider Norman Hsu and the Chinatown donors.
The far Left Left have been dissatisfied with her stance on Iraq.
Occasionally, Hillary will try to appease the anti-war Left, but it's too little too late.
Last week, Bill Clinton added to Hillary's headaches by claiming that he always was against the war in Iraq, which of course is as flat out a lie as his finger-wagging claim, "I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky."
Republicans aren't the only ones sickened by the Clintons' crap. When all is said and done, I don't think the Dems want to revisit the Clinton era either. They aren't in the mood for a sequel. She's running on Bill's resume as her own, but I don't think the "Happy Days are Here Again" shtick will work. They want change, something Hillary can't possibly deliver.
Hillary can be "not Bush" but that isn't enough change for a growing number of Dems. They want someone fresh.
Enter Obama.
No wonder he appeals to them--
He's against the war in Iraq and was from the beginning.
He's a big government, big time Lefty.
He's personable, likable.
His name isn't Clinton.
In short, he's all that the Dems wish Hillary would be, yet he isn't what she is.
It has to be troubling to the Clinton camp that the lib media, like that evil Tim Russert, are turning against Hillary and turning to Obama.
Maureen Dowd has taunted Obama for months and months. But even queen of the libs Dowd now seems to have decided its time to get on board and help mythologize Obama.
Her column "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" points out that Obama is gaining momentum. He appeals to people in a way that Hillary can only dream about.
She writes: He seems more like a child prodigy. Those enraptured with his gifts urge him on, like anxious parents, trying to pull that sustained, dazzling performance out of him that they believe he’s capable of; they are willing to put up with the prodigy’s occasional listlessness and crabbiness, his flights of self-regard and self-righteousness. Despite his uneven efforts and distaste for the claws of competition, they can see he is a golden child, one who moves, speaks, smiles and thinks with amazing grace.
His advisers and fund-raisers have pressed him to go fortissimo. Many voters with great expectations are hovering, hoping for a crescendo.
Except for panicked Clintonistas, everyone seems eager to see if the young pol can live up to his potential. Responding to his more combative style, the press has relaunched him, giving him a second chance to shine, on this week’s cover of Time, in the pages of The New Yorker, in the up arrow of Newsweek, which now declares him “poised to be the comeback kid,” and at The Times, where young female assistants lined the halls on Wednesday to watch him glide into a second meeting with editorial board writers and editors.
In The Atlantic, Andrew Sullivan lays out what he sees as Obama’s “indispensable” capacity to move the country past baby-boom feuds and the world past sectarian and racial divides. “It’s November 2008,” he imagines. “A young Pakistani Muslim is watching television and sees that this man — Barack Hussein Obama — is the new face of America. In one simple image, America’s soft power has been ratcheted up not a notch, but a logarithm.”
In Time, Shelby Steele agrees that a President Obama could show “that race is but a negligible human difference.”
...Obama came to the Apollo Theater in Harlem Thursday night — down the block from Bill Clinton’s office — to try to wrest some support back from the first black president and his wife. Some young Obama fans wore yellow tees reading, “Who decided Hillary is best for the black community?”
...Obama got an introduction from Chris Rock, who warned the audience that “you’d be real embarrassed if he won and you wasn’t down with it. You’d say, ‘Aw, man, I can’t call him now. I had that white lady. What was I thinking?’”
And he got a benediction from Cornel West, the Princeton professor who took Obama to task earlier this year for not attending a national gathering of black scholars and civil rights leaders.
West tried to help Obama in his uneasy quest to claim his place in the black community, calling him “my brother,” “an eloquent brother,” “a good brother” and “a decent brother.” He urged the audience to put Obama in a historical continuum with the spirituals on the plantation and Apollo stars like James Brown and Billie Holiday. Black, he said, has variations. “We don’t expect Alicia Keys to be Aretha,” he said.
As it turns out, Obama is black enough.
Who knew?...“I’m in this race because I’m tired of reading about Jena,” he said. “I’m tired of reading about nooses. I’m tired of hearing about a Justice Department that doesn’t understand justice. ... I don’t want to wake up four years from now and discover that we still have more young black men in prison than in college.”
As usual, Dowd rambles. However, her point that Obama is a real contender is well-taken.
He's good enough, he's black enough, and doggone it, people like him!
Clearly, Obama was pandering to his audience at the Apollo by talking about "Jena" and the new N-word, "nooses." He said he’s running because of what Martin Luther King Jr. called “the fierce urgency of now.” Now can the prodigy muster that fierce urgency?
Obama isn't shy about evoking Martin Luther King Jr. when discussing his candidacy. That takes a certain chutzpah.
Dowd wonders whether Obama can live up to the promise. No doubt, Hillary is fearing that more and more people are beginning to believe that he can.
UPDATE: The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel screws up AGAIN. This time, the "editing error" is noted. An "editing error" put words in the mouths of the police -- right. Correction: Because of an editing error, an article Saturday on a teacher's arrest in connection with a blog item that praised the Columbine High School killers incorrectly stated that police said he was “apparently posing as a teacher-hater.” That statement was not made by police.
_____________
When will people learn that posting anonymously on the Internet is not the same as being anonymous?
Cudahy man and Oak Creek High School teacher James Buss learned that the hard way. West Bend -- As readers of a conservative blog debated the subject of teacher salaries, a writer using the pseudonym "Observer" weighed in.
The West Bend teachers' salaries made him sick, the person wrote, adding that the 1999 Columbine High School killers had the right idea.
"They knew how to deal with the overpaid teacher union thugs. One shot at a time! Too bad the liberls (sic) rip them; they were heros (sic) and should be remembered that way," the writer said.
But police say the writer was a teacher himself - and the past president of a teachers union - apparently posing as a teacher-hater.
James Buss was arrested Thursday by West Bend police, and the 46-year-old Cudahy man could face criminal charges. He has been suspended from his job as a teacher at Oak Creek High School.
Buss, a former president of the Oak Creek School District's teachers union, is on an indefinite leave of absence from the school pending further investigation, district Superintendent Sara Larsen said. He teaches chemistry and has been employed at the school since 1994.
...[Owen Robinson, a West Bend resident and administrator of bootsandsabers.com] criticized Buss' arrest as an overreaction.
"The comments were not a direct threat to teachers," he said. "This is free speech."
...One message Buss is accused of posting praises Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. They were the high school seniors who killed 12 students and one teacher at Columbine High School in Colorado in April 1999 before taking their lives.
"We've got to get in back of the kids who have had enough of lazy, no good teachers and are fighting back. Kids like Eric Harris and Dylen Klebold," wrote the "Observer," whose message contained several misspelled words, including Klebold's first name.
A teacher employed by the West Bend School District read the message later that evening and immediately contacted School District administrators, West Bend police Capt. Toby Netko said.
Netko said Buss posted the message from his home computer. Netko released the text Friday.
Buss was arrested Thursday and released from the Washington County Jail after posting $300 bail.
"The teacher and district officials considered it a threat," Netko said, referring to the statement "One shot at a time" in the message.
"If you're a teacher, you would take this seriously," he said.
Maryjane Burdge, West Bend's assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction, agreed that she and other officials did interpret the statement as a threat. For that reason, they notified police the same day of the posting.
Owen discusses the matter here and here and here.
I agree with his assessment of the situation, that it was a "gross overreaction for a comment left on a blog."
I also agree with Owen that Buss' arrest was unwarranted.
If every individual who left similar comments on blogs ended up under arrest, the jails would be bursting at the seams.
Yes, things changed after Columbine. The Virginia Tech shootings made officials even more jittery. Finnish teen Pekka Eric Auvinen posted his violent intentions on YouTube and carried them out, killing seven students, the principal, and himself.
Threats have to be taken seriously.
But-- Sound judgment needs to be applied to determine what constitutes a serious threat. Granted, that's easier said than done. A misjudgment can be deadly.
Buss is certainly paying the price for posting irresponsibly.
It appears that he may have posted while drunk or otherwise impaired. More likely, I think he utilized the technique of attempting to disguise himself with multiple misspellings and poor punctuation. (I'm assuming that Buss, the teacher, is more proficient at writing than his posts reveal.)
As Owen notes, the Internet provides a false sense of anonymity.
While blogs can provide forums for lively discussion, posters need to understand that they can be traced. They aren't free to say anything without being held accountable. They need to understand that they don't check their personal responsibility at the Internet's door.
The Internet is not a responsibility-free zone.
It's a creepy phenomenon. An otherwise responsible person will morph, jumping at the chance to let loose an alter ego when online. It can be remarkably reckless, as well as remarkably naive.
Will the real James Buss please stand up?
