An Ol' Broad's Ramblings
Morning Coffee 8/23/07
Arizona School Suspends 13-Year-Old Boy for Drawing Gun
Officials at an Arizona school suspended a 13-year-old boy for sketching what looked like a gun, saying the action posed a threat to his classmates.
The boy’s parents said the drawing was a harmless doodle and school officials overreacted.
Overreacted? Gee, ya think?!? Did the morons think the doodle was going to shoot paper bullets? Criminy! What happened to common sense??
30 Mexican workers level kidnapping allegations against police in Mississippi town
Thirty Mexican nationals with visas to work in the U.S. claim police in Pascagoula kidnapped and threatened them with arrest or deportation if they did not return to an employer.
The workers, backed by the Mississippi Immigrants Rights Alliance, the American Civil Liberties Union and other advocacy groups, said Wednesday that Pascagoula Police Capt. George Tillman threatened to send them to jail if they didn’t return to work for a recruitment company.
(…)
Under terms of their visas, the workers were permitted only to work for the company that sponsored them. A message seeking comment left after hours Wednesday with Southwest Shipyards was not immediately returned.
If they didn’t like the working conditions, or the pay, there were other avenues they could have taken, other than wandering on over to Mississippi.
3 killed as lightning hits near Madison bus stop
Two adults and a child were electrocuted by a downed power line on Madison’s north side late Wednesday afternoon as a storm swept through the city.
Prayers.
Record rout: Rangers win, 30-3
No need to step lightly here. Put simply the Rangers put a beating on the Baltimore Orioles on Wednesday, the likes of which has never been seen before.
At least not since fielders started wearing gloves.
Now that, is a serious butt whuppin’!
Court: Sharif Can Return to Pakistan
Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif can return to Pakistan from exile, the Supreme Court ruled Thursday, dealing another setback to President Gen. Pervez Musharraf.
And what would this mean to Pakistan’s fight against the terrorists?
Experts Tie Pigeon Dung, Bridge Collapse
Pounded and strained by heavy traffic and weakened by missing bolts and cracking steel, the failed interstate bridge over the Mississippi River also faced a less obvious enemy: pigeons.
Inspectors began documenting the buildup of pigeon dung on the span near downtown Minneapolis two decades ago. Experts say the corrosive guano deposited all over the Interstate 35W span’s framework helped the steel beams rust faster.
So, it wasn’t really Bush’s fault. It was the pigeons?
State’s senators say military strategy working
A new strategy of winning support for the U.S. military among local Iraqi leaders is working, Tennessee Sens. Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker said Wednesday in an upbeat report on their trip to the war-ravaged country.
“There is clear success province by province,” Alexander said.
He said al-Qaida terrorists have been pushed out in seven of the 18 provinces, and there is “enough security for Iraqis to live their lives.”
When the politicians step out of the picture and allow our military to do their job, then there will be successes.
Cold summer forces earliest French wine harvest on record
The first bunches of grapes for the manufacture of champagne will be snipped in north-eastern France today – one of the earliest wine harvests ever recorded. Despite miserable weather across much of France in June, July and August – which will greatly reduce the amount of wine produced – the 2007 vendanges, or grape-picking, will be two to three weeks ahead of the normal timetable in most of the country.
How does algore, the great global warming guru, explain this one?
US presses for presidential polls free of interference
The United States wants to see presidential elections in Lebanon held on time in accordance with the Lebanese Constitution, but most importantly wants elections free of external interference, according to Deputy Chief of Mission at the US Embassy in Beirut William Grant, who spoke to the Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation on Wednesday.
What? Queen Nan’s best bud? Interfering in the democratic process? Say it ain’t so! (sarcasm)
Law Would Be Curtains for Voyeurs
New legislation before the City Council could make it illegal for New Yorkers to look at a naked neighbor.
Council Member Peter Vallone Jr., a Democrat of Queens, is proposing to outlaw voyeurism by extending a state law that forbids nonconsensual peeping with cameras. He’d apply the law to also include, in the city, peeping with the naked eye.
So, let me get this straight. If I am standing in front of the window, butt nekkid, you can get arrested for looking? First off, calling 911 would be for the ambulance after you had a heart attack from the horror. Second, if I don’t want to be seen in my birthday suit, I shouldn’t be standing in front of the flippin’ window! Is there law against exhibitionism too?
