"Missing Issue"
(c) Kevin Dayhoff
August 15th, 2006
(c) Kevin Dayhoff
August 15th, 2006
Wednesday, August 16, 2006
20060815 KDDC Check Out ation
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"Check Out Ation"
(c) Kevin Dayhoff
August 15th, 2006
(c) Kevin Dayhoff
August 15th, 2006
20060815 KDDC Ben Cardin to cure cancer
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Ben Cardin to cure cancer
August 15th, 2006
Before I say another word, I gotta tell ya, God Bless everyone who is running for office. Considering today’s technology which allows saturation coverage of every candidate’s every waking moment. Anyone – everyone - can and will make a mistake or say something that will be taken out of context or utter words that may be misconstrued by the practitioners of professional outrage.
Need I mention this or this or here?
Never-the-less, BlogDC (“100,000 Airplanes” By Andrew Daniller) has the scoop that Congressman Ben Cardin is going to cure cancer.
No mention as to whether or not he invented the Internet.
Hat Tip: Wonkette: “More fuel for the debate on whether life in
Apparently BlogDC found it in a post on MyDD: “Ben Cardin's Promise to Cure Cancer” by Matt Stoller, Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 12:30:42 PM EST:
“Let's say a credible biochemist friend told you that it was likely that we could cure many forms of cancer by 2015. Would you believe him? Let's say, on the other hand, that a politician running in a hotly contested primary, told you that if you elected him he would cure cancer by 2015. Would you believe him? Welcome to Ben Cardin's strategy. Color me skeptical of Cardin's political approach.”
However, BlogDC made an inaccurate conclusion –
Anyway – this is what the BlogDC said:
“Remember that episode of The West Wing from the middle of the third season when Bartlet had just been censured by Congress and needed a huge State of the Union bump to give him any chance of winning reelection and so he and Sam began to obsess about promising a cure for cancer within ten years as a message of hope for the country?
Well, I do, and Rep. Ben Cardin is stealing the plot (via Matt Stoller):
"We are going to lick cancer by 2015," Cardin told a group of 15 people
at the
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Tuesday, August 15, 2006
20060815 KDDC Who are these community leaders?
August 15th, 2006
The ladies pictured above are two of my most favorite folks in the world today.
Hint: I ran across them as I was researching a future column for which I had to use microfiche.
They were very kind and helpful to an old and aging artist and writer. They are that great mix of professional, knowledgeable and fun. That’s a wonderful way to be when ya wait on the public for over a third of your everyday life and
PS: There was a third lady who was also very helpful, but she got really shy for the picture taking part of the program.
E-mail him at: kdayhoff@carr.org
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20060815 KDDC Former CCPS employee charged with stealing
Former Public Schools employee charged with stealing school funds
Tuesday, August 15th, 2006
Westminster, Carroll County, MD - - The Carroll County Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Charles Ecker announced in a news conference this morning that a former Carroll County Public Schools employee with South Carroll High School has been charged with stealing school funds.
The news conference will be broadcast on Channel 21 at the following dates and times: Wed., 8/16, 11 a.m.; Thurs., 8/17, 5 p.m.; Fri., 8/18, 1 p.m.; Sat., 8/19, 9 a.m.; Sun., 8/20, 5 p.m.; Mon., 8/21, 8 p.m. Tues., 8/22, 10 a.m.
Although not named in the subsequent press release, the Carroll County Times reports, “Wendy Sue Bowers, 39, allegedly stole the money over a period of six years by keeping two sets of books,” according to an article written by Penny Riordan.
The Carroll County Times also ran the above photograph of Ms. Bowers.
A press release further reveals:
A former employee is being charged with stealing significant school funds from South Carroll High School. We estimate the amount stolen over six years to be just over $200,000.
The money taken was raised through athletic events, student fundraisers, vending machines profits, student yearbooks, and other such school-based accounts.
It was not funds provided to the school by the school system’s operating budget to support South Carroll’s instructional program.
How did we find out? In early spring, our Finance Department noticed deficits in South Carroll High School’s balances.
Once we the concluded that theft was a possibility, we immediately contacted the State’s Attorney’s office and requested their guidance.
We fully cooperated with them during the investigation.
Another obvious question is “How could it have happened?” We are still working on that answer. While we thought our controls were sound, they obviously weren’t good enough. We will correct them.
Our new procedures will have to assume that everyone is dishonest. That may seem harsh, but this former employee was a very trusted individual who was also a respected payroll clerk and finance clerk in our central office.
Not long after she arrived at South Carroll, she was able to create an intricate and systematic method of stealing that extended back at least six years and allowed her to pay school bills, but still take significant dollars
The next question is “How will we respond?” Our action plan will respond in four separate, but related ways:
1. Education of Staff: We will work with the State’s Attorney’s office, our auditors, our own legal council, and others to highlight real life examples of employee theft. We will provide specific information about how and why it occurs, we will heighten their awareness that, given the right set of circumstances, theft can and will happen anyplace.
2. Increase in School Account Oversight: We will work with our quality control department to provide for more direct supervision of school-based account. This action will include random visits to audit school records with class and club advisors and provide more oversight of school-based deposits and expenditures.
3. Increase in Audit Staffing: Currently, we only have a single person whose job is devoted to quality control. This staffing is inadequate for a school system our size. I will include in next year’s budget request, additional staffing in our audit department.
4. Revision of School-Based Account Control Procedures: As I stated, we are revising the procedures that provide controls to school-based accounts. While some of the cause of this theft was related to the former employee’s in-depth knowledge of the system and her stellar reputation, we can benefit by several changes in our procedures.
They will include:
(a) Eliminating the use of separate account software by financial secretaries. All financial transaction will be completed using the school system’s centralized finance system.
(b)A redesigned Fund Collection Record. This revised form will place an additional review of the deposit of funds for school-based accounts.
(c) Assign ownership of all school-based accounts. Some accounts such as student parking lot permits, vending machine funds and others are not regularly monitored because they are only deposit accounts that do not have regular expenditures to monitor.
(d) Provide more in-service training for administrators, secretaries, athletic directors, club sponsor, and anyone that collects money for school functions. (Currently we do provide in-service training each year for administrators and secretaries)
The money will be recovered, either through repayment of some or all of the missing funds by the former employee, or by insurance.
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20060814 KDDC Ceasefire Fallout begins
Ceasefire Fallout begins
August 14th, 2006
Now that United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701 has been passed and the Israeli are going to depend on the United Nations to defend innocent civilians from being rocketed by Hezbollah, the ceasefire fallout in
First we have been assured that this ceasefire and disarming of Hezbollah will succeed this time because Kofi Annan will require all reports to be provided in triplicate.
I’m certainly reassured and buoyed for the future with that information at hand.
The DEBKAfile reports that already, “Hizballah is filtering reinforcements into South Lebanon among returning refugees. They are taking up positions in the still undamaged bunkers and fortified civilian dwellings.”
(Yes, in
And a debate rages as to just how well the IDF performed. Rumblings about strategy, military preparedness, adequate, timely and adequate intelligence, and performance abound.
Meanwhile the Israelis honor their dead. One account I found in Haaretz was particularly poignant. An account about the first female soldier, Sergeant Major Keren Tendler, lost on active duty since the Yom Kippur War in 1973: “In life and death, she pushed all boundaries.”
In the coming weeks, there will be a great sorting out of what has happened and the implications of the future.
One thing to be sure, much of the media and liberal bias against
Read “Don't boycott the BBC,” by Stephen Pollard in the Jerusalem Post:
Switch on the BBC News and, other than the fact that it is in English, you might think that you had tuned in by mistake to al-Manar, Hizbullah's own TV station. The BBC almost always ignores any case
So it's understandable that there have been calls for Israeli officials and politicians to boycott the BBC. Understandable, but wrong.
Read the rest here.
Many were surprised by the lack of support for
In
The doctored photograph phenomena will be debated for quite sometime. See the New York Times piece: “Ease of alteration creates woes for picture editors.”
Carolyn Glick says that “The Olmert government must go:”
From all sides of the political spectrum calls are being raised for the establishment of an official commission of inquiry to investigate the Olmert government's incompetent management of the war in
We do not need a commission to know what happened or what has to happen. The Olmert government has failed on every level. The Olmert government must go.
The Jerusalem Post carries a story about the political and the military fallout of the Israeli-Hezbollah conflict. Hat Tip: Michelle Malkin.
The countdown for Olmert has begun
Whatever way you analyze UN Security Council Resolution 1701 and the cease-fire that might have broken out at 8 a.m. Monday morning, and even if you accept the government's claims that it's good for Israel, there is no way that it can be good for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.
This was the war that was going to establish him as a bona fide leader. During the first few weeks, his popularity ratings soared sky-high as the public expressed its trust in the government's decision to go after Hizbullah. There was a great deal of disappointment and skepticism regarding the IDF's conduct following the twin kidnap debacles at Kerem Shalom on June 25 and two weeks later at Biranit, but for once the politicians seemed to be calling the right shots.
The rest of the story can be found here.
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Monday, August 14, 2006
20060813 KDDC The politics of going negative
NY Republican Senatorial primary debate and why it reminds me of the upcoming Carroll County primary.
August 13th, 2006
August 13th, 2006
Let’s back up before we even attempt to go forward. Apparently New York Senator Hillary Clinton has two Republicans vying to run against her in this fall’s general election.
The New York Republican primary has former Yonkers Mayor John Spencer going up against a former President Reagan administration Pentagon official, Kathleen Troia "KT" McFarland.
So far, by many accounts, it would appear that they are running neck-and-neck to see who can be the most unpleasant.
Now perhaps this essay is about the New York Republican Senatorial primary and maybe it’s not. Perhaps it serves as a good allegory for the Carroll County primary?
In Carroll County we have a number of folks who are trying to unseat various incumbents.
Whether some or all or none of the incumbents need to be replaced, is, to be simplistic about it – up to the voters. Inside baseball ain’t going to do it. And if any of the incumbents fail to be re-elected, I either hope or pray that negative politics is not going to do it.
So far, I’m not seeing a lot of campaigning that is reaching the average, overworked, busy Mom and Dad voter at the kitchen table.
Unseating an incumbent is hard to do. Usually a challenger needs to have an overwhelmingly persuasive and compelling platform to unseat an incumbent – or ride the wave of a sea change on the part of the electorate in approach to government. That kind of change of difficult to cultivate in an election campaign, it will only come from the grassroots.
Of course, if an incumbent has demonstrated incompetence, malfeasance, dereliction of duty or a plain and simple palpable lack of skills, knowledge and ability in which to do the job, then that is another story.
None of the incumbents has demonstrated that lacking. Oh sure, there is lots of political spin and rhetoric being bandied about, however, we also have too many young reporters in the county who have never learned or simply don’t have the time for the follow-up question.
The superficial will get ya through the article, but in the long run it is not sustainable...
In the case of the Senator Hillary Clinton’s New York contest, there is no such sea change on the part of the New York constituency and nothing short of miracle is going to prevent her from winning this fall. That’s reality politics.
Regardless of how you may agree or disagree with her politics, unless you are a New York voter, it doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters is the facts on the ground in New York.
On a political theory level, being unpleasant will work for sure if you’d like to win the primary and lose the general and be forever remembered as an unpleasant person.
I mean, after being unpleasant for months, whadda ya goin’ to do after the election?
Most folks know that you can’t get to a positive by utilizing the negative. It may work in the short term, but eventually folks catch on that it was not simply situational that you are a negative and unpleasant person, that it is systemic – it is who you are.
Sorta like the rule to never date a married person. What they are doing to their present partner, they can and usually do to you. And when they do you wrong in the future, they will rationalize it just as well as they are rationalizing it to date you now.
Apparently a few folks running for election in Carroll County have yet to figure this out.
And another thing while I’m on a roll; for those who want to plead that the elections this fall are not about taxes, think again. One wonders how many times that must be repeated before it will change reality and make it so.
I’ll put it this way. Taxes and big government are an issue with me. We don’t need bigger government; we need better and cost effective government – in Annapolis and in Carroll County.
As far as temperament, I would almost rather vote for a pleasant accessible, well-intentioned person with integrity - with whom I disagreed about certain issues than vote for someone with whom I agreed, yet was absolutely unpleasant about promoting their position.
A memo for challengers to the incumbents. I don’t care a rat’s ass about voting the incumbents out. That’s your thing. Hopefully the election is not about your personal feelings, it is about what you bring to the table professionally. I care about voting in folks who have a vision and a positive plan for families, schools, growth and lessening our tax burden.
Think about it, the two approaches are not the same. I’m voting for someone who is thoughtful, well versed in the issues, has a positive plan for the future and a person I can take my problems to (without a preachy condescending lecture.)
It is back to basics time. As a young man, my Mom hammered into me, it is all about what I do that counts. She never cared about what the other kids did. That was not of her concern. I cannot get to heaven based on the sins of others.
You will not be elected based on the perceived sins of the current incumbents or your personal dislikes of certain individuals. You will be elected because the voters believe that you will do a better job.
Stay positive. Voters ultimately want to know what you are going to do. You can say more about what you are against by saying what you are for and are going to do.
If you would like to get in touch with your feelings, go skeet shooting with me. Otherwise, this is about winning an election. I have no interest in electing enraged individuals.
Of course, the purpose of a primary is to win – and win in such a manner that a candidate will carry some momentum with them into the general election.
Going negative always needs to be carefully weighed. Usually folks who are behind go negative because they will often feel that they have nothing to lose.
Many folks become fixated upon serving as an elected official to “contribute and make a difference in the community.” Therefore, anything and everything it takes to win is justified by the winning.
My world view greatly disagrees with that position. There are many ways to serve, make a difference and contribute to a community beyond being an elected official.
I have had a practice and policy to “never” go negative. Although I have been the brunt of a negative campaign or two. When friends and colleagues pleaded with me to respond, I choose not to. If I had to win by going negative – the office and position was simply not worth it to me.
At this point in time, I have no regrets. If the electorate wanted to “hire” someone who moved their ball forward by being unpleasant, that is up to the voters. Ultimately everyone gets their karma.
So anyway, I was surfing the net as I was putting together some thoughts for my next Tentacle column and came across this in the Examiner… This… Well, what is it? I thought I had been diverted to The Onion.
This would be believable if it were on Saturday Night Live – but it is not. Apparently it was live, perhaps a little too live.
And these are the folks that the Republican Party is going to send up against New York Senator Hillary Clinton? I’m not sure whether to laugh or cry.
This is pathetic. Except for one great line: "John, you are like the Clintons," she said. "You taxed and spent like Hillary and behaved like Bill."
I wonder if they later exchanged addresses so that they may exchange holiday greeting cards this winter?
Did they remove all sharp objects from the room before the debate?
I’m sure that Senator Clinton is laughing – and will continue to laugh all the way back to her Senate seat this fall.
If this is what it is going to take to defeat Hillary Clinton, than maybe it is not worth it for the karma of the party? She is simply not that important in the grand scheme of things.
Likewise, if the challengers in Carroll County want to continue to be negative, the incumbents are going to laugh all the way back in office this fall.
_________________
NEW YORK - The two Republicans vying to challenge Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton this fall tore into each other Wednesday in a debate dominated by angry accusations of personal and professional misconduct and abject dishonesty.
From the early minutes of the hourlong forum sponsored by all news cable channel NY1, former Yonkers Mayor John Spencer found himself repeatedly on the defensive about his unconventional private life and its impact on his tenure as mayor from 1996 to 2004.
While married to another woman, Spencer fathered two children with his then-chief of staff and substantially raised her salary. He eventually divorced his first wife and married his chief of staff.
So with an opening question from debate moderator Dominic Carter about whether a candidate's personal life should be off-limits, the responses got very personal, very fast.
Kathleen Troia "KT" McFarland, a former Ronald Reagan-era Pentagon official, immediately accused Spencer of engaging in adultery and nepotism and said it spoke to his lack of credibility to serve in office.
Read the rest here, if you can stand it - - it gets better, err, Hmmm, I mean worse…
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Sunday, August 13, 2006
20060813 KDDC The Pillage Idiot has wonderfully struck again
She’s everywhere she’s everywhere
August 13, 2006
The above photo, “Doctored photo of Lebanese woman,” is from the Pillage Idiot and once again it is priceless. Thanks.
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20060813 KDDC Just hanging
Posts have been few and far between in recent days. All apologies, but life has interfered with art. Yard work, column deadlines, doing a little art and hanging with the wife.
Then, last night, just as I was ready to work at the keyboard, my ISP went dead. Recently, fortunately, this does not happen often. But it made me sad.
So today, I’m trying to catch up on my reading.
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