Bits & Pieces
Bits and pieces from this reporter's notebook.
Da-deet-da-deet-da-deet-deet....Back in 1988 an inspector at a nuclear plant in Ohio reported that there was a problem of leakage and corrosion around the containment vessel. He said that the core issue was the plant culture, where the management ignored the craft workers. He was told to change his report. He refused and resigned instead. Fourteen years later, the reactor vessel had been eaten away to the point of nearly rupturing. Evidence was in plain sight for years. No one did anything about it. Until recently. Now the owners are involved in major repair work. How close were they to a leak? Why didn't the NRC do something about the problem sooner? How many other plants are run this way? We'll probably find out, the hard way.
Da-deet-da-deet-da-deet-deet....A lawsuit against a gun manufacturer for negligence is revealing some ugly truths about the failure of some companies to take obvious steps to prevent their products from getting into the wrong hands. The government wants manufacturers to track how their guns get into the hands of criminals, which isn't such a difficult thing with computers and serial numbers, but the producers are not all availing themselves of the program. They don't have to, but that neglect may make them liable. Certainly more could be done; consider that one percent of all firearms dealers in the country are selling half of all the guns that are involved in crimes. It shouldn't be too hard to close that tap, if the will were there.
Da-deet-da-deet-da-deet-deet....The woman who gave birth to octuplets four years ago, seven of whom survived, has become a mother again; a single this time. Dunno if it's fertility drugs, nymphomania, or an unclear picture about the population bomb, but something is wrong with this picture; regardless of whoever is picking up the tab for all of these hungry mouths. Kinda like a bartender who doesn't have to drive home but is getting all of her customers drunk.
Da-deet-da-deet-da-deet-deet....Headline News promotes itself as offering "Real News. Real Fast." but they don't seem to worry about getting it real(ly) right. Two days after the ferry boat sinking off the coast of Senegal, they were sporting a graphic that read "Senagalese." I wonder if they had been so spelling it since the accident.
Da-deet-da-deet-da-deet-deet....Also getting it wrong are "The People of Saudi Arabia" who are allegedly sponsoring a feel-good message on one of the cable "news" channels. First of all, the Saudi people have nothing to do with foreign policy; it's just PR schmutz from the royals. Second is the execution. The spot features a series of still shots of American presidents shown with Saudi leaders over the decades, to illustrate the long-standing "friendship" between our two countries. This is an effort to deflect attention from the morally-bankrupt nature of their regime, and the fact that most of the terrorist hijackers came from leading Saudi families. But the photo with Jimmy Carter has been flipped, one presumes accidentally, so it shows our former president with his left hand over his right heart. Wonder how long that slip has been showing.
And that's SetonnoteS...I'm Tony Seton.
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