Animation Clip: “Self Image” by Creature Comforts

All comments are edited for length and content. Due to content or space limitations some comments may not be published. More than one comment from the same person during the same week will normally not be published. Please limit calls to two minutes or less.

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A woman said she was calling about (a local) thrift store. “I donate most of my stuff there. I went in there the other day and things were hanging on the rack for $40, $30, $45. That’s outrageous. People donate to help others and the prices are outrageous. It’s a crying shame.”

“Lawyers and frivolous lawsuits are one of the reasons for our bad economy,” said a lady. “Terrorist trials in the U.S. will cost taxpayers for lawyers. They need to be tried in military tribunals. Lawyers promote other lawyers. We all suffer from lawyers who are one of the biggest problems in our country.”

A woman expressed “how disappointed and angry” she was “with the (county) health department that had their H1N1 shots at Washington School.” She went there with her child and “stood there for an hour and a half while people cut in front of me. The security guards were too afraid to say anything.” She “finally got in there only to be told, we’re not giving shots to children with asthma. They did not give any type of notice. Thanks for letting me know. There is no communication between the health department and the schools.”

A man who “moved from the Bay Area to Madera a year or so ago” said, “There is not enough compliments or good things in the Red Line, but here’s one… The Tribune beats my local paper where I used to live and sometimes even the San Francisco Chronicle by a long shot. I enjoy all your columnists, especially Leon Emo, Bill Coate and Tami Jo Nix. I also, most of the time, enjoy the Editor’s Corner. Keep up the good work. Out of all the papers you can get locally the Tribune is the one I get my money’s worth.”

A woman said, “The county is in a budget crisis. They’re asking all of their employees to take a 10 to 20 percent cut in pay.” She “wanted to know if the Board of Supervisors is going to be taking the same cut in pay, and also if their legislative aides will be. Also, we have hired a new county administrator, yet the old county administrator has been hired back as a consultant at full salary. If these new people can’t do their job why are they in their positions?”

“So I have my graffiti removal kit,” said a man, “it mostly works, but is that it for the people of Madera? Didn’t we hire consultants at tens of thousands of dollars to help us with our graffiti problem? I would hope we get a lot more for our money than what we’ve seen so far.”

An online reader, “Tim Riche,” writes, “I just want to say how awesome our school nurses are. They check all the students hearing and eyesight and many students would not get this if not for them. They provide help and care for students throughout the year and are valuable to keeping schools safe”

Another Internet guest, “Julie Kutz,” writes, “In response to the $95 fee to adopt an animal from the animal shelter being high, having adopted two dogs from there a month ago. For my fees, I appreciate that they were given antibiotics to assure that I was bringing home healthy dogs since living in the shelter is not an ideal place, that their shots were up to date, and that they were neutered before bringing home. That is what your adoption fee is covering. You will pay more if you did that on your own.”

A third, “Diana,” writes, “My three cents on Sarah Palin’s book, ‘Going Rogue.’ I watched with great intensity our last presidential elections. Was awed by the candidates, and the women that could change the face of ‘good ole boys’ political parties. However, I don’t see anything earth shattering about Sarah Palin. She is a strong woman in politics. Yet, there are a lot of strong women that are playing a role in our government.”

A Web site visitor, “Jaz,” found a claim cited by columnist Tom Elias to be a bit off. “Inmates can’t sue physicians working for the prison, they can only sue the state,” she writes. “So there is no question of suing 100 times.”

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Thank you for your calls. Remember, the Red Line is open for your messages 24 hours a day by calling 674-4478, or by visiting www.maderatribuneredline.com.

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Animated Music Video

By Chuck Doud
The Madera Tribune

I happened to catch some of the American Music Awards Monday night and was amazed by stagecraft used by a couple of the singers.

One of them, Lady Gaga, played a burning piano while breaking fake whiskey bottles over the keyboard and wearing a white body stocking decorated in white braid. A lot of smoke was coming off the burning piano she was playing, and you could see her eyes watering. She also seemed to be perspiring quite a bit. (Girls don’t sweat, they perspire.)

Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta is Lady Gaga’s real name, which is probably why she calls herself Lady Gaga. It is much easier to remember. And if she plays a burning piano rather than an ordinary one, perhaps the audience would remember her.

You would not remember her for her singing. It is more like shouting, or perhaps an unduly loud moan. But if one has a piano that burns, and establishes a reputation for performing in one’s underwear, one can get away with having had too few voice lessons.

Another performer was Jennifer Lopez, who used to be able to sing, but in this performance spent most of her time marching around on the stage dressed as a boxer and yelling the words to a song which turned out to be unintelligible. While she was trying to dance with another boxer, a male, she slipped and fell, but got right up again and continued to make a fool of herself.

I would have just stayed down on the stage and pretended that the act was over.

However, I have to say that I am in no position to be critical. When it comes to singing, I am about as melodious as a gravel truck. If I were to perform on the American Music Awards program, I would have to sing while hacking up burning logs with a running chainsaw so that nobody could hear me.

Best wishes from the staff of The Madera Tribune on this traditional national holiday of thanksgiving.

By Chuck Doud
The Madera Tribune

You may be relieved to know that the news is good about the Large Hadron Collider. It is running again, after being down for a year. It broke the first time it was started up.

The purpose of the machine, which cost $10 billion or so, and is 17 miles long, is to bash protons together at almost the speed of light.

Physicists think this is very important. Who am I to disagree with them? My own knowledge of physics pretty much ends with the falling apple. You may recall that Isaac Newton, the father of modern physics, came up with the notion of gravity after an apple fell from a tree and he wondered why it hit the ground. He also developed the binomial theorem and the infinitesimal calculus and examined the elements of circular motion. And that was just in his spare time.

Newton did not have access to a Large Hadron Collider, or to a computer, or to a calculator, or even to a ballpoint pen. Like all those who wrote in the 17th century, he used quills.

About 8,000 scientists are either working on the Large Hadron Collider, or plan to conduct experiments with it once it is open for business.
Will they discover anything on the order that physicists such as Newton, Albert Einstein and Max Planck discovered? Like Newton, Einstein and Planck didn’t have computers or calculators, and it makes you wonder whether the physicists really need a Large Hadron Collider in the first place.
It makes a person wonder whether all these scientists are as good as just those three, or whether they are on the verge of discovering something even bigger than the law of gravity, or the theory of relativity or quantum theory.

Maybe it will be called the law of why people love to build ever-bigger and more complicated machines.

We’ll just have to wait and see.

By Chuck Doud
The Madera Tribune

Recommendations by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force that women get fewer Pap smears and mammograms, and forgo breast self-exams, have a lot of people upset. I am one of them. I’ve no doubt the task force meant well with its recommendations, but I think the American Cancer Society’s recommendations are better.

You probably wonder why I am thinking anything about this. After all, I am a guy. But I am a great admirer of women, especially Mrs. Doud. I want her to stay healthy and live long. I am a great admirer of our three daughters. I want them to be healthy, too, and to live long lives. I want all my friends who are women to be healthy and long-lived.

I know women who are free of cancer today because they followed the American Cancer Society recommendations of self-exams of the breasts once a month and a mammogram annually from an early age. They caught the disease in time and were cured. I know women who have beaten cervical cancer because of early detection through Pap smears. I also know of women who have died of cancer.

There is an inviolate rule about cancer: Early detection enables early treatment. Early treatment increases the chance of survival. That rule — which the task force does not dispute, by the way — came after years of research based on thousands of doctors treating thousands of patients.

The task force did not treat any patients. Its members crunched numbers and extrapolated their opinions. That is not necessarily a bad thing, but in this case it overlooks an absolute, inviolable truth: Nobody ever wants to get cancer. And why take a chance?

What do you want to bet the women on that task force, regardless of age, are giving themselves breast self-exams every month, and get mammograms and Pap smears every year?

Humorous Song: “The Scotsman’s Kilt”

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All comments are edited for length and content. Due to content or space limitations some comments may not be published. More than one comment from the same person during the same week will normally not be published. Please limit calls to two minutes or less.

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A man warned, “the good old boys that are the Madera County Supervisors should start watching out because they are going to get booted out if they continue to do these good old boy shenanigans. Somebody wake up and smell the roses, the coffee, the beans or something.”

A man said he thought “a holiday should be named after a gentleman who is gone now. Mr. Bob Hope spent a lot of time away from his home and family to try to entertain the troops.”

A male voice, referring to Madera High’s varsity football team, had a response to the person who said the sophomores were winning games and then the juniors and seniors played and they began losing.

“I got news for you,” said this week’s caller. “The sophomores aren’t that good. Take a look at the opponents’ records they beat. They barely beat Madera South. It doesn’t matter if it’s sophomores, juniors or seniors who is playing. As long as that football coach is in town they are not going to win.”

Another man, after reading the headline “Coyotes given incentive in the season finale,” said, “I’ve never heard of such a ridiculous statement by a football coach that if you win this Friday, I’ll take you to the playoffs. (Note: The Coyotes lost 35-28.)

“How can you go to the playoffs with a record like that? And why is the (Madera Unified) school district, when we’re in these economic times, wasting money to go to a playoff game somewhere when there is no incentive for the kids because they haven’t been winning. The best thing they can do after seven years and his record is get rid of him (the coach).

A woman who “went to a gang management meeting, heard that whenever tennis shoes are thrown over a power line that means gang activity.” She said, “There’s been shoes hanging at Gateway (Drive) and E Street for almost six months. What’s wrong with our city that they can’t get those shoes down?”

A man thought the prices for dogs and cats adopted from the animal shelter was high and suggested, that “they lower the price and more would be adopted.”

Another man “would like to know why law enforcement does not enforce the crossings in the crosswalks in the city. All these residents we have walking the streets walk against the red. They have no regard for the traffic laws. They think I’m going to go, no matter what. If they get hit, I guarantee you the driver will be the one at fault because they’re in the crosswalk. Why can’t something be done about this? I complained a couple of years ago and nothing has yet to be done.”

A gentleman said “it was sad for me to read” in another paper of “a new manufacturing business that opened up in Chowchilla hired five people from Fresno through a government-sponsored program that would pay some or their wages. Does this mean that the employment department in Madera was not notified of this company?”

A woman asked “if we could print a birth announcement of a baby (name given) who was born Aug. 22.” (Editor’s note: The parent should come into the office at 100 E. 7th St. and fill out a form.)

“Congratulations to Warren Buffet,” said a regular caller. “He now owns a large chunk of California running along the railroad line when he took over (purchased) Burlington Northern.”

The caller referenced “the Homestead Act of 1862” and said “the railroads probably own every alternate section of land along their lines.” He suggested since Buffet “owns so much of California, why doesn’t he solve some of its problems?”

A man “thought he would help” by responding to last week’s lady who asked about where she could find some walnuts in the shell. “If she would go for a nice drive down Madera Avenue to Kerman. Just north of Kerman and Highway 180 (Whitesbridge Road), there’s a walnut grove on the right hand side with a sign that says walnuts for sale.”

He also said, “you can see the new construction on Madera Avenue. It’s going to be nice when it is widened.”

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Thank you for your calls. Remember, the Red Line is open for your messages 24 hours a day by calling 674-4478, or by visiting www.maderatribuneredline.com.

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Rock Music Video: “Beautiful Bride” by Flyleaf

By Chuck Doud
The Madera Tribune

One of the suggestions being floated for reforming the California Legislature is limiting the number of bills any one legislator can introduce in any one year while the budget remains unpassed. I believe if that were put on the ballot tomorrow, it would pass.

Too many of the bills that are introduced do little except to clog the legislative pipeline. Most bills introduced are designed to deliver something to special interests. That often leads to bad lawmaking. It amounts to inviting your friends to a banquet, then serving four courses of dessert first. When it comes time to tackle the meat, potatoes and vegetables of legislation, little appetite remains for it.

The same kind of rule would be good for Congress. A limit could be put on how many bills any member of the House or the Senate could introduce in a single year. And it might not be a bad idea to put a limit on the the number of words in any one bill. The proposed Senate and House healthcare bills each have about 330,000 words. That’s absurd. Try reading something with 330,000 words in it, then interpret it. That’s on a word-count par with the King James Bible. The Constitution only has 8,100 words.

People shouldn’t have to spend months trying to figure out what one law means, espcially one on health care.
Laws should be easy for ordinary people to understand. They should be written in clear language, not bureaucratese. They shouldn’t take days to read. Making them too long or overcomplicated merely makes work for attorneys and judges who wind up duking out the meanings of laws in court.

Maybe that’s why so many people object to the 10 Commandments being posted in courthouses and other public buildings. Depending on which version you choose, they only consist of about 100 words, give or take a few.

By Chuck Doud
The Madera Tribune

When Presidents Bush and Obama hurled some $1 trillion in bailouts at the nation’s banking system, they assured us that money would trickle down and that the banks would feel free to lend that money out, which in turn would stimulate the economy and create new jobs. Banks generally did the opposite. They stopped lending, even to many of their best customers.

The two presidents probably should have instead followed the lead of former President Franklin Roosevelt, who spent money in the depths of the Great Depression to built vast public projects, which put people to work. It also gave the country something to show for its money — improvements that we enjoy today.

Obama said he would spend stimulus money on “shovel-ready” projects, and in some cases that happened. But just as often, the money was used to help states avoid having to lay people off as the recession deepened.

While there’s nothing wrong with that, the results are amorphous. Obama has had a hard time saying just which jobs were saved and how.

He would have been smarter to declare that the country would embark on big public-works projects to rebuild the nation’s infrastructure. New and rebuilt bridges, new and rebuilt highways, urban freeway improvements, park improvements, new dams, new sewer and water systems, new schools, new office buildings for federal purposes — these are all needed, and the need grows greater.

This would have put hundreds of thousands to work on things the country can use. It would have kept contractors busy. It would have kept the suppliers of construction materials and equipment busy.

In the long run, it would have been a bargain. Because that work will need to be done anyway. A lot of it is overdue.
The California high-speed rail project is an example of a big public works project that once completed will benefit the state for many years.

I am writing this letter after seeing some of the comments lately in the Red Line. First of all, let me tell you that I have a son on the team and have had another son who played for coach (Randy) Blankenship when he first arrived in Madera.

The first year my son played for Madera High we had a parent meeting where the then-head coach for Madera High spent 30 minutes telling us how Madera could not lift weights like the Clovis schools, could not compete with the Clovis schools, but maybe we could play one of them tough and even beat one of them once in a while.

When coach Blankenship took over he told the players, as well as parents, that we could not only compete with the Clovis schools but beat them. I can still remember parents laughing and saying that he was crazy. My son played as a sophomore and the team got beat badly that year, as a junior the team did better and people said Coach Blankenship was doing all right. As seniors, the Coyote team my son played on made it to the semi-finals of the valley championships.

The next year I believe they were ranked in the top four or five in the state, and life was good.

Then Madera South came on the scene, and what talent Madera had was cut in half. Madera was lucky to compete with Clovis schools before and now it is next to impossible.

Yes, the team took its lumps this year. I can assure you that there is nothing harder than watching your son and his team  try as hard as they can, and have it not be good enough.

For the seniors it is tough because they are caught up in the split of talent and have had a rough couple of years. Next year, I think Madera will have a better team, as the sophomores will be a year older, which will mean they will be bigger, stronger and, unlike the one Red Line person, a little smarter.

It makes me laugh when I hear people yell out and curse that coach B. is the cause of Madera’s problem, just how many valley titles does Madera have in football? I can say that in my years of watching Madera High play under coach Blankenship, I have never seen one of his teams quit and not compete, or watch him or his staff quit on the team.

By the way, when you complain about the score, at least get it right: it was 70 not 77.

A coach once told me, “there are no ugly babies,” but I think some are not as pretty as some others.

By the way, I wish he would pass more, but that’s my opinion, and we know what they are like, and everyone has one and they all stink.

By the way my first son has moved on in life, and tells me the lessons he learned from coach Blankenship help him every day. I could have done this on the Red Line, but I think if it’s worth saying then it’s worth putting your name on it.

Jim Bates,
Madera

By Chuck Doud
The Madera Tribune

I happened to catch a couple of news shows Tuesday that featured interviews on Sarah Palin’s book, “Going Rogue,” and here are some observations:

– Liberal talking heads say the book is awful, while conservative talking heads say it is pretty good. Do you suppose their minds were made up before they ever read it — if they have read it? I haven’t read it, but I probably will. I don’t know what I’ll think of it until I do read it, though. If I can’t put it down, or if it puts me to sleep, I’ll let you know.

– She takes issue with the people who were orchestrating the presidential campaign of Sen. John McCain, and they take issue with her. In that regard, it wouldn’t seem to be much different from any other tell-all book, particularly one about politics.

– Liberal talking heads criticized Palin for using her public persona to make a lot of money from the book and the speaking engagements that will follow. Huh? Isn’t that exactly how talking heads of either political stripe make money, and aren’t they always trying to make more?

– Six women, all confessed liberals, and none of whom had read Palin’s book, spewed vitriol at her during a CNN talk fest, primarily because of who she is and the choices she has made in her life. Her decision to give birth to her fifth child, who has Down syndrome, was criticized because it “insulted” women who had wrestled with abortion decisions. What? And didn’t she counsel her daughter Bristol, who turned up pregnant just before Palin was nominated to be McCain’s running mate, about premarital sex? Of course she did, she told one interviewer. But Bristol didn’t listen. That’s never happened before, has it?

– The liberals seem to be as frightened of Palin as they were when she first walked on the national stage. What is it about her that scares them so?