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Happy BD Shun!

The surprise worked! Go Tribe!

Socio-Religious Dialogue at our house

Joey, "Dad what does ponchince mean?"

Me, "What?"

Joey, "Ponchince!"

Me, "What? Is that a word? Can you spell it?"

(repeat for about 5min)

Joey, "Mom! What does Ponchince mean?" (He's decided that I'm an idiot at this point.)

Jane, "Joey! Talk to your Dad!"

(minutes of discussion pass with various other kids adding their views)

Finally,

Me, "Joey, where did you read this?"

Joey, "Oh. In the Bible. Pontius Pilate"

Me, "OOOOh. That's a person's name."

Fin, "Yeah, like Krusty the Clown!"

Dandelion Season

This was from before the rain.

Long, busy, fun but not restful weekend. Soccer is over. A party was had. Mother's day came and went. I got Jane laundry baskets. We had a tornado warning.

Head filled with random crap

Four straight hours of play and I'm getting better at FIFA 08. My thumbs are paying the price though.

I'm still not entirely sure how to frame box soffits with steel studs.

Screens are up. Storm windows are put away.

Jane's bike needs one of these, and a more round back wheel.

3 c-forms in a year leads to one very in trouble boy.

The blonde tornado is now down to a 1/2" buzz cut.

The bus has trouble running cold. My first project. Gotta remember how carburetors work.

Crew on top of league. Celtic won and Huns drew, so hope is still alive.

Head exploding with ADD. Gotta do twelve things.

Pastors and Politics

So, why isn't this Presidential candidate being raked over the coals for actually pursuing, and advertising the endorsement of a preacher who compares the Catholic Church to Hitler and wants a "Holy war" with Iran? Why is it that McCain gets away with a few denouncements, and YouTube clips of Hagee aren't played over and over on CNN?

Can you say "media double-standard?"

[Frank Rich: The All-White Elephant in the Room - New York Times]

Jackass

[From Marc Dann admits to affair with staff member - OPENERS - Ohio Politics Blog by The Plain Dealer]

Resign already, and let someone with integrity run the AG's office.

And another Skybus letter

[From The Columbus Dispatch : 'Dispatch' betrayed trust of its readers]

Ouch.

[From The Columbus Dispatch : 'Dispatch' overlooked Skybus' difficulties]

More Dispatch and Skybus Reaction

Many of these are missing the ownership angle, probably because the Dispatch doesn't actively disclose it.

Two-Four.net

EdCone.com

Kayak4U.com

PapaGolf Chronicles

Mark Tatge's Journalism 411 Blog at E.W. Scripps (makes me proud to have dropped out of OhioU!)

BoardingArea.com

Romensko (HT to Zardo)

Some Random person at owujour350.blogspot.com (Ohio Wesleyan Journalism 350?) with a protected blog

Ten

We've been parents for ten years. It is such a clear before/after line in my life.

On a vaguely related note, Michael texted me to remind me that I took him to see Primus open for 24-7 Spyz on 7/26/1989, his 10th BD, and then abandoned him at the Newport to go to the mosh pit.

I just bought 4 tickets to see Flogging Molly in August, and what do you know! It's an all-ages show....

Calling Bullshit on the Dispatch and Skybus

Ben Marrison, editor of the Columbus Dispatch wrote in his column this weekend that the Dispatch knew in advance of Skybus' announcement that they were going to close immediately last Friday. As it turns out the Dispatch knew far enough in advance that they were able to place a reporter on the last outbound plane, knowing full well that the people on the plane who weren't flying home were going to be stranded.

Now, if this weren't bad enough, a subsidiary of Dispatch Printing Co. is an investor in the airline, a fact that the Dispatch simply got tired pointing out in their online content (electrons are costly, you know) and buried in this remote corner of their site.

The Dispatch, faced with this conflict of interest, took the easy road, writing softball stories on the airline, and even letting one of their business writers write a blog about airline travel. Through the process of the Skybus collapse, CEO resignation, COO resignation and all, it didn't seem like they were doing much hard work on reporting the state of the airline. Even afterward, their coverage sheds little light on what went wrong.

Strangely, they chose not to send the airline blogger on the mission to Florida, and have her blog her adventures purchasing tickets back to CMH.

Now, Marrison is posting some reader reactions to his Sunday column and the Dispatch's reporting in his blog. Of course, none of the hand-picked reactions deal with the fact that the Dispatch's parent company holds a financial interest in Skybus. Marrison keeps his focus on the Dispatch's upstanding decision to respect their anonymous source's insistence on a 9:30PM embargo on the story.

Too bad, so sad for the Dispatch though, as other local news sources broke the news long before the Dispatch was allowed. Hell, I got an email from my mom while sitting in DTW and Twittered it ~40min before the Dispatch's embargo was lifted.

The real question that I want to see answered by Marrison is whether their source had any connection to Wolfe Enterprises or the Dispatch Printing Company, and why on earth they agreed to let this story rot? Had they done harder work on covering Skybus they would have developed sources like those the TV stations obviously picked up to scoop the Dispatch.

UPDATE: Whomever is linking me from the protected blog at owujour350.blogspot.com, common courtesy demands that you open up for your link targets.

Weekend Wrapup

New favorite blog

PhotoshopDisasters

New Product Day at Archie McPhee

Check it out here.

Featuring their new Dog to Unicorn Transformation kit. Dremmel not included.

Damn

The Columbus Dispatch : Ohio soldier's remains found, father says.