Leaving this afternoon for a long weekend. Check back next week.

Gazette county government beat writer Adam Belz wants your take on the hot Democratic primary race for Linn County auditor between incumbent Joel Miller and Lyle Hanson.

Go here right now to chime in.

What’s frightening us this week?

1. Measles. From The Gazette:

A national measles outbreak has state officials urging Iowans to make sure their vaccinations are up-to-date.

No cases have been reported in Iowa, but Iowa Department of Public Health officials caution that the risk is high for measles to enter the state.

…Measles, a highly contagious disease, causes high fever, cough, runny nose, watery eyes and a red rash that moves from the face to the body.

Someone with measles can start an outbreak by walking through a public place such as a mall or an airport, as the virus is contagious even hours after the patient has left.

 2. Lipstick. From MSNBC

…some dermatologists say that slathering on shiny lip glosses can actually increase your risk of developing skin cancer. Of course, wearing any lip product without SPF doesn’t exactly shield the thin skin from sun damage. But the slick, shiny nature of the gloss could be making the sun’s UV rays hit harder, some experts say.

 3. Chinese dental filings. From the Columbus Dispatch:

 An investigation by WBNS-TV (Channel 10) raises questions about the safety of dental crowns, or caps, which are cemented over teeth to improve their strength or appearance, at a cost of hundreds of dollars.

Working with a Columbus dentist, WBNS ordered eight supposedly identical dental crowns from four labs in China, the source of a growing number of dental implants used by U.S. dentists. The labs are regular advertisers in industry publications distributed in the United States.

A certified testing facility in Cleveland found that the porcelain veneer of one of the crowns contained lead — 210 parts per million.

 4. Sleep. From The Gazette:

ATLANTA (AP) — People who sleep fewer than six hours a night - or more than nine - are more likely to be obese, according to a new government study that is one of the largest to show a link between irregular sleep and big bellies.

The study also linked light sleepers to higher smoking rates, less physical activity and more alcohol use.

The research adds weight to a stream of studies that have found obesity and other health problems in those who don’t get proper shuteye, said Dr. Ron Kramer, a Colorado physician and a spokesman for the American Academy of Sleep Medicine.

 5. Oil. From the Associated Press:

Oil futures blasted to a new record near $123 a barrel Tuesday, gaining momentum as investors bought on a forecast of much higher prices and on any news hinting at supply shortages. Retail gas prices edged lower, but appear poised to rise to new records of their own in coming weeks.

A new Goldman Sachs prediction that oil prices could rise to $150 to $200 within two years seemed to motivate much of Tuesday’s buying, although a falling dollar and increasing concerns about declining crude production in Mexico and Russia contributed, analysts say.

From The Des Moines Register:

Gov. Chet Culver’s office has begun to encourage state agencies to charge for the cost of having government lawyers review documents requested under Iowa’s open-records law.

The advice runs contrary to past practices of numerous city and state agencies, which sometimes charge citizens or media to retrieve and copy records and e-mails but have not charged for having lawyers review records that are presumed public under law.

At stake is whether the government or its citizens should bear the cost of determining whether a record should be kept confidential.

 Open records experts say the new charges - which have been estimated at $25 and $35 an hour - are largely untested in Iowa courts and uncommon in other states across the country.

If the advice by Culver’s legal counsel to the state agencies is ultimately found to be legal, it could have a chilling effect on those attempting to watchdog government and keep it open, said Kathleen Richardson, executive director of the state’s Freedom of Information Council.

 So let me get this straight, just a couple weeks after the closure clowns in the Iowa House killed a bill that would have beefed up enforcement of open meetings and records laws, the governor wants to start charging Iowans potentially hundreds of dollars to get their hands on PUBLIC records.

Of course, the Culveristas are ticked because the DMR is asking for bushels of e-mail records, but this goes way beyond some tiff they’re having with one news organization. This could open the door for fake fees to be charged all over Iowa by officials trying to scare off scrutiny.

And to those who think this is all about the pesky media, if big fees are charged, only pesky media organizations with deep pockets will be able to afford public records. Ordinary people will be out of luck, unless they’re willing to pony up. This is an incredibly bad idea.

Maybe Culver was inspired by his big pay raise, approved by lawmakers in the middle of the night. Lack of public scrutiny can be very profitable.

May 6, 2008

Level: Low (Actually, more odd and amusing than awkward)

Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal and House Speaker Pat Murphy stopped at The Gazette today to tout their legislative accomplishments. But before we dug into the meaty details of health care, the leaders shared dead pigeon anecdotes.

Apparently, the Statehouse’s resident nesting Peregrine Falcon catches and eats resident pigeons. As Murphy described it, the falcon snares a pigeon, pins it down by its wings and, well, lunch is served. Trouble is, the pigeon-stuffed falcon then leaves its less-than-appetizing meal remnants on an outdoor balcony just off the House chamber. The presence of these spent pigeons apparently have spoiled the speaker’s plans for a balcony lunch of his own. Understandable.

Gronstal said the falcon occasionally grabs pigeons outside his office window in a cloud of flying feathers. Watching such natural selection has become a pastime.

I was at a loss to comment on any of this. As Murphy described feeding falcons and pigeon peril, I thought about making a crack. “Sounds like budget negotiations,” I could have said. Instead, I just took it all in, and thought, you know, grilled chicken sounds good tonight.

Nobody really believes all that ridiculous “Obama is a Muslim” smear-mongering, right?

From the Chicago Tribune Swamp blog:

As Obama downed another hearty breakfast like the one he had a day earlier in Evansville, Obama noted that he has “lost about 7 or 8 pounds” during the campaign, according to a pool report of the stop. About 50 people were eating breakfast at the restaurant when Obama walked in.

One of his first table stops did not go well. As he approached a man sitting alone at a table, Obama was waved away. The man later told a Los Angeles Times reporter that he was not interested in meeting Obama.
“I can’t stand him,” he said. “He’s a Muslim. He’s not even pro-American as far as I’m concerned.”

From the Richmond, Ind., Palladium-Item:

Mary Bunger, a 44-year-old single mom from Abington, emerged from the town’s general store on Wednesday, the only place to purchase a snack in a 10-mile radius.
“I am definitely going to try to go with Hillary,” she said. “I almost feel like (Obama’s) the anti-Christ from the Middle East.”

Bunger reads news online about the election and has been “trying to talk everybody into voting, especially this year because I’m really scared for Obama to get it.”
Bunger worries about the Illinois senator’s ties to Rev. Jeremiah Wright, whose recent remarks and former association with the candidate made headlines the past couple months.

From the UK Telegraph, datelined Zebulon, NC:

Like lots of conservative white voters in rural parts of the South and Mid-West, many in Zebulon harboured doubts about Mr Obama. “He’s a Muslim,” said Mr Lipscomb. “The president of Iran’s a Muslim too and he wants to kill all the Jews. I’m not sure what this one here wants to do but if he’s elected there’ll be turmoil in this country.”

5. Road trip — Spent Saturday and part of Sunday at my parents’ house. Sunday was a beautiful day for a drive, except for the US 20 speed trap in Grundy County. That’s $102 I now won’t be using the stimulate the American economy. 

4.  The Kentucky Derby — My wife and I coaxed our horse-loving 6-year-old to watch her first Kentucky Derby on Saturday. Everything was great, until the end. Luckily, she didn’t know what “euthanize” meant, and frankly, I didn’t have the heart to fill her in. Hey, let’s turn it to Noggin.

3. Grain Belt — On an up note, we finished our first locally purchased 12-pack of Grain Belt while gardening Sunday. I bought it at Benz Beverage Depot for a very reasonable price. Thanks to all the kind readers who guided my search, and I will be visiting other suggested establishments soon. Grain Belt is everywhere, I now realize.

It’s also worth noting that once I found Grain Belt, the Twins cracked off five straight wins and climbed into first place. Coincidence? Not a chance.

2. Tomatoes — Eight plants have been purchased and will be planted this week, unless some experts out there have objections.  Expectations are high for our first true vegetable garden after living with an overly shady yard in Ames for six years.

1. The Headliners –The newsrooom softball team overcame a shaky first inning for a dramatic come-from-behind victory over the Slip n’ Sliders. The big hit was delievered by Jacob Kopp, who smashed an inside-the-park grand slam that put the Sliders away. 

This reporter was 1-4 at the plate after the criminally generous scoring decision gave me a hit for a misplayed pop fly in the fourth inning. I myself misplayed a pop fly in the first.  Karma.

Pretty light week, mail-wise.

My Sunday column offering praise for New Bohemia revitalization efforts along Third Street southeast of downtown drew criticism from reader William H. Dahlsten. I saw a neighborhood with potential, like Des Moines’ once dead, now thriving East Village. Dahlsten, instead, sees a taxpayer-funded, flood-threatened “New Sudetenland.”

If you pay them, they will come. If you pay them, their wealth will make entrepenuers cater to their tastes. Why is it my problem that local employers are unwilling to pay what it takes to recruit the top 3% out of graduate schools.

…I hope I live long enough to see the big one. With the water over the ice bar in the Chrome Horse, the Peace Center and all those BMWs will be washed into the big river below Wapello.

Glad I drive a beat up Honda.

I did get a few phone calls on my second column addressing prime time TV viewers who complain about interruptions caused by tornado warnings. I said the warnings, even if they’re annoying, are necessary and part of the Midwestern landscape. Live with it.

Most folks disagreed with me. But Jean Vopalka of Belle Plaine took my side.

Vopalka said when warnings pop up for her area, family members gather around the TV to watch the weather and talk. They also get phone calls from friends and relatives in Cedar Rapids and elsewhere, asking if they’re all right.

“It’s more of a family thing than we have all week long,” Vopalka said in a voice mail message. “There’s not that much good on television that we’re worried about missing.”

Twister togetherness. How can anyone complain about that?

From Bloomberg:

May 2 (Bloomberg) — Hillary Clinton and John McCain are both pushing a “gas-tax holiday” to give consumers an 18.4- cent-a-gallon price break. Clinton says the plan will take excess profits from oil companies. McCain says it will help families buy school supplies.

Economists have a different take: They say the oil companies may end up the biggest beneficiaries, while the aid to families wouldn’t be enough to buy a $35 backpack.

The trouble with the plan, they say, is that oil prices are rising because of low supplies, and companies will continue to charge the average $3.60 a gallon and just pocket the money that would have gone to federal taxes.

“That’s $10 billion, and it’s going into the pockets of oil refiners,” said Leonard Burman of the Tax Policy Center in Washington. “The last time I checked, they didn’t need it.”

Supplies are “being cleared at the current price,” said Donald Parsons, an economics professor at George Washington University in Washington. “If you take away the tax, you’ll have the same number of consumers willing to buy the gas at the same total price.”

 Or how about Tom Friedman’s take in the Times yesterday:

It is great to see that we finally have some national unity on energy policy. Unfortunately, the unifying idea is so ridiculous, so unworthy of the people aspiring to lead our nation, it takes your breath away. Hillary Clinton has decided to line up with John McCain in pushing to suspend the federal excise tax on gasoline, 18.4 cents a gallon, for this summer’s travel season. This is not an energy policy. This is money laundering: we borrow money from China and ship it to Saudi Arabia and take a little cut for ourselves as it goes through our gas tanks. What a way to build our country.

When the summer is over, we will have increased our debt to China, increased our transfer of wealth to Saudi Arabia and increased our contribution to global warming for our kids to inherit.

 I sat and listened to several so-called expert pundits this morning on cable “news” channels telling me how smart Clinton and McCain are on this and how Obama, who opposes the gas tax holiday, just doesn’t understand what “blue collar voters” want. They said this, even though most agreed it’s a thin gimmick that won’t have much impact on anyone and could even be harmful.

I think it’s an insult to working people to assume they’re not smart enough to figure out when they’re being hoodwinked. You can’t call them bitter, but I guess It’s OK to assume they’re stupid.

5. Miley Cyrus — Lot’s of folks are very worked up about the cultural implications of the 15-year-old pop star’s bareback pose in Vanity Fair. Great. So will someone from the National Association of Easily Outraged People please confiscate my daughter’s singing Hannah Montana doll? If I simply can’t stand to hear “This is wicked awesome!” at 80 decibels one more time. Thank you.

4. Grand Theft Auto IV — News Flash! Older, uptight caution crusaders target a form of art, culture or technology favored by young, irreverent thrill-seekers. Stop the presses.

3. Rice Shortage — I rarely eat rice, but suddenly I have an overwhelming desire to hoard it in obscene quantities. What gives?

2. Emerald Ash Borer — Every time I see one of those little metallic green tree menaces, I think of a super-cool Hot Wheels car I had back in ‘78. Man, was it fast.

1. Deer Ticks — From the Mason City Globe-Gazette, via the AP:

“State health officials are warning that cases of Lyme disease in Iowa are expected to rise this summer because of an infestation of deer ticks, which carry the disease.

Nationally, the number of Lyme disease cases has doubled since 1991, the Health Department reported. Minnesota set a record for cases of Lyme disease in 2007, with approximately 1,200 cases.

A person’s chances of being infected with the Lyme disease organism is usually less than 3 percent. Research has shown that an infected deer tick must be attached for more than 24 hours to transmit the organism.

Approximately 75 percent of people with Lyme disease did not find a tick on them, nor did they recall being bitten by a tick.

 Guess I’ll stay inside and play Grand Theft Auto. If other things are scaring you this week, please add them to the list.