News That Caught My Eye

Here's a few stories that interested me this week:

Sirius and XM are attempting a merger, which is interesting but shouldn't affect my radio life much. As long as both NPRs and BBC World Service are still available to me, they can pretty much turn the rest of the service into All Howard Stern All The Time for all I care.

The question is will it get past the FCC? And the answer seems to be, "Probably."

If they can convince the review panel that their competition is not with each other, but is instead with broadcast radio, the merger will be approved. If not, it'll perfectly fit the definition of a monopoly and go down in flames, like the EchoStar/DirecTV merger.

Why the endless mating dance between AT&T and the Baby Bells slips under the FCC radar, by the way, continues to mystify me. They break up and get back together more than even the most volatile lesbian relationships.

The consensus in my workplace is that even if they merge, not much will change, except that we'll all end up forced to buy "new, improved" receivers for $100.

There was a fascinating article yesterday in the Washington Post about soldiers languishing in government limbo at Walter Reed army hospital while the army decides whether to pay them for their disabilities or not.

Once again, the Bush Administration is having a priority problem. They're willing to spend trillions on the nifty toys of war, but pinch pennies on caring for the men and women that actually do the fighting. Maybe if the troops were classified as machinary instead of humans, they could get better maintenance.

The army like to trot out these kids for parades and medal ceremonies on the White House lawn, but they are parsing their disabilty ratings as if it's coming out of the pentagon generals' own paychecks. As it stands, a disabled war vet in Washington seems to have a better chance of getting a photo op with the President than he does of getting a disability check. What's wrong with that picture?

What else?

The price of gas seems to be creeping back up, but Pulaski County is getting an ethanol plant.

You'd think that the county had bagged the site of the second coming of Jesus Christ for all the crowing they're doing about this factory. Let's hope that it actually does provide 3,000 good paying jobs, increase the tax base, and reduce the price at the pumps like the county promises. I'm reserving judgment until we see if the secondary effects include toxic runoff into the rivers and lakes and an influx of carpetbaggers and tract housing.

As Robin says...the subdivisions may be just around the corner.

Happy Wednesday!

Ev