News Cut: January 19, 2009 Archive

The peanut butter chronicles

Posted at 8:15 AM on January 19, 2009 by Bob Collins (3 Comments)
Filed under: Health

Any minute now, perhaps, the peanut butter industry will file its request for some bailout money. It has to be reeling as health investigators from Minnesota and across the country continue to track the salmonella outbreak

We should emphasize Minnesota more than across the country there.

A Seattle Post Intelligencer blog writer takes note of that.

Seattle lawyer Bill Marler, the guru of the nation's food safety investigators, is spitting mad about the way the Food and Drug Administration failed to take any definitive action when the first case of peanut-butter spawned salmonella surfaced in Minnesota in September.

"What in the hell are they thinking?" Marler told me today. "The FDA knew there was a problem on Labor Day and they wait for inaugural day to do anything."

Marler says he just returned from Minnesota where the nationwide outbreak of 500 or so cases of illness and at least six deaths were first reported by Minnesota's top notch health detectives.

The peanut butter contamination has been traced to a plant in Georgia, and companies that don't use the plant's peanut butter are issuing claims of innocence. No matter, consumers mostly can't tell what peanut butter in what cookie or other snack came from one plant. Better to avoid it altogether, said the Food and Drug Administration on Sunday.

Because identification of products subject to recall is continuing, the FDA urges consumers to postpone eating commercially-prepared or manufactured peanut butter-containing products and institutionally-served peanut butter until further information becomes available about which products may be affected. Efforts to specifically identify those products are ongoing.

If you'd like to check your current stocks against the list of products that have been traced to the salmonella-contaminated plant, here's a list.

update - Via comments, the above list are product that contain peanut butter, not necessarily the bad peanut butter. A link to recalls is in comments.

Comment on this post

From worms to heroes

Posted at 9:19 AM on January 19, 2009 by Bob Collins (4 Comments)
Filed under: Disasters

There's no end to some of the fascinating insight that comes from Thursday's ditching of the US Airways plane in the Hudson River. It was brought down by a flock of birds. Today, I found an obscure publication -- until last week -- from the Department of Agriculture and the Federal Aviation Administration on bird strikes.

The most interesting part? One of the big reasons birds hang out at airports: worms. If you've ever walked down your driveway during a rainstorm, you know the scenario. Rain brings out the worms, worms bring out the birds.

There are plenty of pictures in that report, and also in this one, which features archived bird-strike reports.

Meanwhile, the pilot of the plane in the New York incident, Chesley Sullenberger III, canceled his appearance on the Today Show this morning at the request of his union.

We love heroes, of course. Sullenberger's name was even invoked in Ireland today. A commentary in the Irish Times said what Ireland needs is, well, more Sullenbergers.

On Facebook this weekend, a marketing specialist in branding (Sullenberger is now a brand), set up a Sullenberger group. In four days, it attracted 368,765 members.

We're still waiting for the first lawsuit, but it probably won't come from a Wisconsin lawyer who was on the plane. She wants Sully at her wedding.

Comment on this post

The mysterious disappearance of V. Gene Robinson

Posted at 10:22 AM on January 19, 2009 by Bob Collins (7 Comments)
Filed under: Religion

A controversy is brewing over HBO's decision not to air the invocation by Bishop V. Gene Robinson at Sunday's big concert at the Lincoln Memorial. The openly gay bishop called on God to "bless us with anger - at discrimination, at home and abroad, against refugees and immigrants, women, people of color, gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people," the Boston Globe's religion blog reported.

Media critic Aaron Barnhart says the apparent snub of Robinson appears more widespread than HBO:

Nor did Robinson's picture find its way into NPR's gallery of images from the concert. Admittedly, the news division did not cover the event -- NPR Music did -- but the website certainly is the domain of NPR News. A search of Getty Images, NYTimes.com and WaPo slide shows turned up nothing. In short, I found no visual evidence that an invocation was ever said.

Suddenly, Barack Obama's minister friends aren't news?

Robinson, a supporter of Obama, was given the concert role after criticism mounted against Obama's choice of pastor Rick Warren to give the invocation at the inauguration on Tuesday. The two will never be confused for one another.

A "technical glitch," is reponsible, according to Religious Intelligence, which doesn't appear to buy the explanation:

Concert-goers reported that while Bishop Robinson could be seen on the "Jumbotron" viewer, he could not be heard by the crowd --- estimated at 750,000 by organizers. One person present told ReligiousIntelligence.com that the HBO logo did not appear on the jumbotron until after Bishop Robinson's prayer was concluded --- apparently indicating the prayer as a pre-concert event. Those close to the front of the podium, including a reporter for Christianity Today, reported the sound system was working around the stage --- and privately recorded videos of the invocation were taken, showing that Bishop Robinson did indeed appear that day.

Messages to NPR's ombudsman have not yet been returned. NPR.org, coincidentally, is currently featuring a profile of Rick Warren.

Update: Robinson was on NPR's Talk of the Nation on Monday.

Comment on this post

Looking back

Posted at 5:30 PM on January 19, 2009 by Bob Collins (0 Comments)
Filed under: Politics

Julia Schrenkler and I will be blogging inaugural activities on Tuesday.

Before then, let's his the News Cut Wayback Machine.

First stop: 2001...

Then, 1993...

And.... 1989

All speeches noted some sort of renewal.

What do you want to hear in the speech on Tuesday? Better still, write the one you'd give.

Comment on this post

Star Tribune woes may claim carrier jobs

Posted at 10:28 PM on January 19, 2009 by Bob Collins (13 Comments)
Filed under: Economy

I wrote a few months ago about the people who work hard delivering the morning paper.

A bunch of them may have just lost their jobs, with the announcement the Pioneer Press carriers will now start delivering the Star Tribune.

If you're a carrier keeping his/her job,it'll be a massive change. Your one or two hour route delivery probably just went to three or four. Your Sunday delivery will probably require an extra vehicle and another two hours to put together.

Who knows? If the East Metro combination works out, it wouldn't be hard, perhaps, to start printing the paper using Pioneer Press facilities. And what's next after the operations are combined? We'll see.

Comment on this post