News Cut: December 13, 2008 Archive

Protecting property: The right to spray

Posted at 8:01 AM on December 13, 2008 by Bob Collins (4 Comments)
Filed under: Crime and Justice

As I am entering the "you kids get off my lawn" stage of my life, this story from Willmar resonates:

A 50-year-old man told authorities he was fed up with teens toilet-papering his house during homecoming week. This year, he decided to defend his property -- with a squirt gun filled with fox urine.

Now, Scott Wagar is in trouble with the law. He pleaded not guilty on Wednesday in Kandiyohi County District Court to misdemeanor assault and other charges. He was released on personal recognizance.

I'm not much of an outdoors guy but where does someone get fox urine? At the Fox Urine 'R Us store?

The excellent West Central Tribune has the answer:

Fox urine, it turns out, is readily available online and in stores that sell hunting supplies, pesticides and critter repellents. A visit to Google yielded 192,000 references to the stuff.

The story is causing some reaction, as you might expect. Kentucky checked in on the comments section of the newspaper story:

I am form Kentucky. This is the dumbest stuff i have ever read about. i cant beleive the police are that dumb. I am only 30,,but back when i was a teenager,,,we would get rocksalt or bird shot from a 12 guage in our backside. if you know what i mean. i cant believe this even made the news........how dumb!!!!!!

Fox urine, as it turns out, is regularly used by Christmas tree farms to discourage theft.

Still unanswered, however, is how the Willmar man attacked his attackers. How do you spray fox urine? Do you just keep it in a bucket by the door?

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Can you make money in the newspaper business?

Posted at 2:50 PM on December 13, 2008 by Bob Collins (2 Comments)

So what's the deal? Are newspapers on their deathbeds or not?

The Teamsters Union has a letter on their Web site today claiming the owners of the Star Tribune are asking for a 32-percent pay cut for the truck drivers, the reporters and editors are being asked for wage freezes and an end to some overtime, and the union speculates a buyer is waiting in the wings once the unions are busted.

What did in the Star Tribune? A loss of classified advertising? The Internet? The changing tastes of America? Partly, one supposes, but the root of the problem seems to be the same as people who couldn't keep their mortgages -- Avista Capital Partners paid too much in the first place hoping for a big payday down the road. In short, it's just another failed gamble.

The notion resonates even more after hearing Weekend America today. In a segment on newspapers, it was revealed that the average profit margin for newspapers in this country right now is 11 percent. Unfortunately the segment isn't anywhere on the show's Web site, but a search reveals a possible source of the assertion, albeit with a much higher number..

The Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism, meanwhile, reported that the average pretax profit margin for newspapers was 18.5 percent in 2007. Some newspaper profits remained well above 20 percent. But the center also noted that newspaper companies were accustomed to profits topping 25 percent and that 2008 looked to be significantly weaker.

"The industry remains profitable, but it has come time to take the 'obscenely' out of that commonplace observation," the group said in its annual State of the News Media report.

If it really is possible to make money in the newspaper business, why hasn't someone else stepped in to try to make it?

Are we really seeing a societal shift here? Or just the fallout from poorly-run institutions?

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Recommended reading: Saving Dad

Posted at 3:29 PM on December 13, 2008 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)

A TV anchor at a Grand Rapids (Michigan, I presume) station has posted a powerful piece on his blog today about the death of his father. Well worth reading.

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The church and tough times

Posted at 9:14 PM on December 13, 2008 by Bob Collins (5 Comments)
Filed under: Religion

Do me a favor, will you? When you head to church on Sunday, check to see if there are more people there than usual.

The New York Times has a story that says the bad times are good ... for evangelical churches.

Like evangelical churches around the country, the three churches have enjoyed steady growth over the last decade. But since September, pastors nationwide say they have seen such a burst of new interest that they find themselves contending with powerful conflicting emotions -- deep empathy and quiet excitement -- as they re-encounter an old piece of religious lore:

Bad times are good for evangelical churches.

"It's a wonderful time, a great evangelistic opportunity for us," said the Rev. A. R. Bernard, founder and senior pastor of the Christian Cultural Center in Brooklyn, New York's largest evangelical congregation, where regulars are arriving earlier to get a seat. "When people are shaken to the core, it can open doors."

The story says attendance is also up at some of the mainstream churches, but nowhere near what it is at evangelical churches. Some studies suggest evangelical churches always find an upsurge during recessions.

The "why" of that is puzzling.

Msgr. Thomas McSweeney, who writes columns for Catholic publications and appears on MSNBC as a religion consultant, said the growth is fed by evangelicals' flexibility: "Their tradition allows them to do things from the pulpit we don't do -- like 'Hey! I need somebody to take Mrs. McSweeney to the doctor on Tuesday,' or 'We need volunteers at the soup kitchen tomorrow.' "

I come from a mainstream religion. We never had a problem hollering for help for the Mrs. McSweeneys. The trouble with my old-time church was that there was nobody but Mrs. McSweeneys in the pews, which were mostly empty. The church in which my wife and I were married some 26 years ago, closed its doors for good a few weeks ago.

Church is one of the few places I can still go, and have people tell me it's nice to see me, because it's "good to see young people in the church." I'm 54.

We'll see if things are different tomorrow.

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