News Cut: August 11, 2008 Archive

Monday morning giggles

Posted at 8:21 AM on August 11, 2008 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)

A few weeks ago, I live-blogged a segment of Midmorning on the joy of airline travel. One of the people commenting was a flight attendant who had nothing but horror stories of what it's like to be a flight attendant on a major airline. I was hoping she'd come back to News Cut and tell us more, but she didn't.

And so ends the relevant news portion of this post, now on to the giggle I know you need on a Monday. There'll be plenty of time to depress you in the next post.

(H/t: : Thirty thousand feet blog)

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To be old, frail, and evicted

Posted at 8:30 AM on August 11, 2008 by Bob Collins (5 Comments)
Filed under: Health

A peek at the National Public Radio story board this morning shows All Things Considered is planning on a story this evening on "assisted living evictions." No details are provided, but that's what Google is for.

As near as I can tell, this subject starts in New Jersey where the most vulnerable among us are, as usual, the victims of apparent greed, according to thepressofAtlanticCity.com.

The investigation by the state Department of the Public Advocate comes after complaints from residents who spent tens of thousands of dollars paying for assisted living. When the residents prepared to switch to Medicare after draining their life savings, the company involuntarily discharged them.

From there it became obvious this is something of a nationwide problem, the Wall Street Journal reported. Long-term residents of facilities are being replaced by short-term residents. There's more money in it.

Those on Medicaid bring facilities as little as half what they can get from residents who pay out of pocket, with private health insurance or through Medicare, the federal-state health program for the elderly.

No one counts evictions nationwide. But formal complaints about nursing-home discharge practices have doubled over a decade, to 8,500 nationally in 2006, making it the second-biggest category tracked by the federal Administration on Aging, trailing only complaints about unanswered calls for assistance.

Part of the problem is that assisted-living facilities are often below the radar of regulation. And old people's needs change over time, often to the point where a facility almost can't afford to care for them, anymore. That's something that often doesn't get mentioned in the glossy brochures. Here's a view of things from a couple of consultants for the long-term health care industry.

A typical disclosure provides details on services included in the base rate and a listing of additional services available for purchase. More importantly, the form "should" include critical information regarding staffing patterns, staff licensing and staff training. Equally important, the form should disclose what changes in health status will result in a discharge or transfer. While the resident, the family and the facility may all agree that aging in place is the optimal goal, full disclosure assists everyone in the decision-making process and eliminates future surprises regarding the facility's capacity for delivering increased services.

For nursing homes, Minnesota has been a battleground for a few years now. The Tower Timberjay, for example, pointed out the situation in an article just last Friday.

The decisions to reduce beds and increase the levy are both driven by economics. State payments to nursing homes have not kept pace with rising costs. In three of the past six years, nursing homes saw no increases by the state.

Although the state approved a modest cost-of-living increase for fiscal year 2009 and agreed to re-evaluate the rate cap for the first time since the 1990s, the gap between revenues and expenditures remains daunting. More than 50 percent of nursing homes in northeastern Minnesota are posting losses of minus five percent per year or greater, according to a 2007 study of the industry.

The situation is critical, and it's not getting much attention. I'm guessing there are News Cut readers who are living this situation. If so, I'd like to hear from you.

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The Georgia-Russia cyberwar

Posted at 10:31 AM on August 11, 2008 by Bob Collins (3 Comments)
Filed under: War

Bombs are dropping in Tblisi, in what we used to call Soviet Georgia. While everyone was focused on the Beijing Olympics, the Russians and Georgians (correction) have started a war.

This is an ongoing thread with some of the highlights:

It's not all bombs. It's also a battle on the Internet. The Russians have reportedly launched a massive cyberwar, hijacking the routing of communications and attacking government Web sites.

Russia -- or more specifically, Russia Today -- is using YouTube to get its message out. And it's one of peace, the latest video insists:

There is some information getting out from Georgia. The Georgia Ministry of Foreign Affairs set up a blog on Google's blogspot service. The images are quite disturbing. There's also a minute-by-minute account of the war being posted.

A similar blog -- Russia and George At War -- exists here, although its pedigree is unclear. Another blog -- The State Minister for Reintegration -- also has images and information from a Georgia perspective.

But back to the Russians. Siberian Light, which bills itself as "The Russia Blog," isn't carrying a word about the hostilities. Its top story is the Russian space shuttle floating toward a museum in Germany.

I've sent an e-mail to the writer to ask why he's not covering the war. I'll let you know what I hear back.

Update: The response is:

Yes. I'm on holiday in an isolated Cretan village with only expensive mobile phone Internet access. I'm watching events as closely as I can, but won't be able to blog again for at least two weeks.

Russia blog, on the other hand, is tackling the story head-on, and clearly writing to an American audience:

What would have United States done if a bordering country (let's say Mexico) slaughtered 1,400 U.S. citizens and 10 U.S. soldiers overnight, leaving U.S. citizens by the tens of thousands without food and water?

If you are following other blogs, feel free to post their links below.
However, if you don't know html, just send the URL it to me, please.

Update: Here's a really good list.

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A letter from the Bachman family

Posted at 10:24 AM on August 11, 2008 by Bob Collins (0 Comments)

The Bachman family has issued an open letter from Hugh & Elisabeth (Bachman) McCutcheon, in the wake of last weekend's stabbing death of Todd Bachman. You can find it here. Reflective, perhaps, of everything I've heard about the Bachman family in the last 48 hours, the extent to which the Bachman's have opened themselves to the public at such a tragic time is unparalleled.

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Sun Country's concert in the sky

Posted at 12:10 PM on August 11, 2008 by Bob Collins (3 Comments)
Filed under: Marketing and advertising

There are days when Sun Country Airlines seems like the Saint Paul Saints to Northwest's Minnesota Twins. Trying harder and putting up a different vibe. A news release from the company suggests this is one of those days.

Sun Country is promoting its Minnesota Music Campaign, which features Minnesota artists on its in-flight entertainment. So tomorrow, it's holding what it bills as the first "concert in the sky."

Lorie Line will open the concert with a performance at the Humphrey Terminal, and Dan Wilson of Semisonic, Tim Mahoney, and George Faber will perform onboard the flight. Upon landing, an additional Minnesota band will be performing in the Humphrey Terminal. The Airline will host the 'Concert in the Sky' on a specially-scheduled Sun Country flight. Following the concert, there will be an after-party at Fletcher's Wharf at the Humphrey Terminal featuring the Maeflies.

But where will the flight be going? "The flight will tour around Minnesota for a total of approximately 2 hours - take off and landing will be at MSP only," Heidi Bausch, the airline's marketing coordinator said in a follow-up e-mail. Presumably, the flight will be packed with media.

For the record, I flew up to Madeline Island yesterday and my wife sang to me at points along the way -- not well, but she sang. I'm pretty sure that constituted a "concert in the sky." She was born in Vermont, however, so that may negate the historical aspect we were hoping for.
.

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The Olympic ideal

Posted at 1:35 PM on August 11, 2008 by Bob Collins (4 Comments)

The Olympic ideal is to "build a better world through sport." It's a quaint -- and certainly, debatable -- notion. The secret of the popularity of the Olympics, however, can be summed up in two words: beach volleyball.

It's the one Olympic sport that even has cheerleaders.

NBC, no dummy in the big scheme of things, is showcasing beach volleyball in these Olympics, giving the sport more prime-time coverage than, say, field hockey or softball, which is played fully clothed.

Reports the Vancouver Sun:

President George W. Bush went a couple of days ago. He wasn't chased by cheerleaders, but one of the U.S. women's team bent over to let him give her the traditional butt-pat for good luck. But with photographers standing by, Bush chose instead to tap her on the middle of the back with the back of his hand.

There's a "traditional butt-pat? Who knew?

The Washington Post's Paul Fahri writes in his blog, however, that the reason the more covered-yourself-up sports are relegated to the late, late-night slots, is women.

Not everybody gets the fun. The musical element has to go, says San Francisco Chronicle pop culture critic Peter Harlaub

It's awesome that beach volleyball is an Olympic sport, but the blasts of rock music between points (which sounded like they were coming from a dude with a boom box) need to go. This is the Olympic Games, not your uncle Dave's annual beach barbecue.

But, perhaps beach volleyball -- or sand volleyball as it's called in the land-locked regions of our country -- is more popular than we think. In Faribault, for example, one bar reports 158 teams are participating in its four-month "season."

"It's supposed to be recreation, so people can leave their stress from work and everything else at home and come and have fun. That's what it should be all about," its organizer says.

Now, there's an Olympic ideal you can really get -- wait for it -- behind.

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Road closings for the GOP convention

Posted at 3:21 PM on August 11, 2008 by Bob Collins (0 Comments)
Filed under: The political conventions

Where can't you drive -- or ride your bike -- during the Republican National Convention in St. Paul.? Just about anywhere around the Xcel Energy Center. Releasing its "second phase" of transportation restrictions, the St. Paul Police Department said the restrictions will start on the Friday before the convention and continue until Saturday after the big show.

Says the release:

Free speech

Posted at 3:44 PM on August 11, 2008 by Bob Collins (5 Comments)
Filed under: The political conventions

There is free speech, and then there is free speech.

Minnesotans have gotten a steady dose of free speech tutorials in the last few months from would-be protesters at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul.

Today, for example, two groups are suing the city of St. Paul, not because they don't have the right to free speech, but they haven't been given close enough access to be heard by their intended targets -- the delegates.

It's an interesting claim -- that you not only have the right to speak freely, you have the right to be heard when you do speak.

Then there are actual cases of people not being allowed to speak. That's playing out today in Boston, where a trio of MIT students discovered a significant security flaw in the Boston mass-transit system's fare-card program. They had planned to release their findings at DEFCON 16, a hackers convention today. The MBTA -- the transit system in the city where some say freedom was born -- sued the group and was granted an injunction, preventing the three from speaking... anywhere.

"The court's order is an illegal prior restraint on legitimate academic research in violation of the First Amendment," said Electronic Frontier Foundation Civil Liberties Director Jennifer Granick.

It's an argument that probably has more legs to it than the St. Paul case. But no worries, Minnesota, your name comes up all the time when free speech cases are debated. For it was Mr. Jay Near and Howard Guilford who published The Saturday Press, and wrote on September 24, 1927 that "a Jewish gangster was in control of gambling, bootlegging, and racketeering in Minneapolis" and that law enforcement agencies were looking the other way.

The attempts to silence -- literally -- the press (in this case) made it to the Supreme Court where the idea that muzzling free speech is censorship was further codified.

For his trouble, Mr. Guilford was shot dead.

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Olympic fakery

Posted at 5:33 PM on August 11, 2008 by Bob Collins (3 Comments)
Filed under: Sports

Of all the moments of breathtaking pageantry that made up the opening ceremonies of the Olympics in Beijing, the synchronized fireworks simulating footprints was a high point for many. They started miles away from the stadium and then, viewed from the air, created the appearance of giant footprints marching to the stadium.

"This is not some computer animation you're seeing," Bob Costas told us as we watched, amazed. And that's true. Well, except for the part about it not being a computer animation. (Update Tues morning: The NPR media critic this morning played the tape. It wasn't Costa. It was Lauer. His actual words were, "this is almost like an animation.")

Gao Xiaolong, head of the visual effects team for the ceremony, said it had taken almost a year to create the 55-second sequence. Meticulous efforts were made to ensure the sequence was as unnoticeable as possible: they sought advice from the Beijing meteorological office as to how to recreate the hazy effects of Beijing's smog at night, and inserted a slight camera shake effect to simulate the idea that it was filmed from a helicopter.

"Seeing how it worked out, it was still a bit too bright compared to the actual fireworks," he said. "But most of the audience thought it was filmed live - so that was mission accomplished."

He said the main problem with trying to shoot the real thing was the difficulty of placing the television helicopter at the right angle to see all 28 footsteps in a row.

The Guardian

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