Friday, January 11, 2008

No Victory in 'V'

http://www.amherstbulletin.com/story/id/75823/

You can’t tell by the cyber-version, but Mary Carey’s article from last week’s Gazette made today's Amherst Bulletin Front Page, above the fold. And, as they did four years ago, the squeamish Bully headline editor avoids “vagina” in a headline. Talk about underscoring my point.

So it’s okay for young girls to publicly scream the actual C-word, yet the Bulletin hides behind the euphemistic V-word? Yikes! And it’s not like they are know for being a (Christian) conservative publication.

Although not the overall lead story…it’s a good start. Four years ago the first shots fired came from my column 3 or 4 pages inside the late-December issue, when almost nobody was paying attention.

Interestingly the TOP story exposes public officials (lead by School Superintendent Hochman) still smarting from the May 1’st Override failure, eyeing tax money for a professional survey of citizens to discover how best to jam a tax increase down our throats.

According to today’s Gazette the Elementary Schools are $1.4 million and the Regional High School $300,000 in the hole for FY09. So rather than concentrating on filling that budget gap, Hochman and principal Mark Jackson (unless he designates his wife to handle it) will be preoccupied defending this ridiculous ‘Only In Amherst’ decision.

In a message dated 1/8/08 10:28:15 PM, mary.carey@att.net writes:

Hi Larry -- Do you have a comment on the decision to produce the Vagina Monologues that I can use in the Bulletin story. If they decide to cut out the parts you think are most offensive either because of the language or because they seem to condone pedophilia, would you think it is OK to produce a cleaned-up version (if that is allowed)?
Thanks!
--mary

In a message dated 1/9/08 7:58:22 AM, Amherst AC writes:
Hey Mary,
I will be a lot less inclined to unleash the Dogs of War if they do a cleaned up version.
Larry

In a message dated 1/9/08 9:10:25 AM, mary.carey@att.net writes:
What is YOUR ultimate goal, given the current situation, that is that the play will be produced and there may be certain things you can not do with it thanks to the copyright?

In a message dated 1/9/08 9:59:04 AM, Amherst AC writes:
My martial arts philosophy is don't engage in battle unless you are absolutely sure of your position and then if you think for whatever reason you will lose, do SOOOOOO much damage that the opponent will never want to deal with you again. (hand them a Pyrrhic victory)
Larry

In a message dated 1/9/08 12:56:20 PM, mary.carey@att.net writes:
D'oh. I didn't get a chance to include this.


In a message dated 1/9/08 1:17:03 PM, Amherst AC writes:
That's okay: That's why God invented blogging!

2 comments:

Larry O. said...

Revealing insight to DHG's practice of tabloid journalism.

O'Reilly said...

Budget group's motive questioned
Amherst Bulletin By Scott Merzbach
January 11, 2008

Weiss: "the minutes do not accurately reflect the tone of the discussions."

"I've been at the meetings, and I'm not hearing a preponderance of override talk,"

"It's not like we're sitting around and thinking, How can we get an override?"


Board member Anne Awad said she was also troubled by the dominance of override discussion and preparation, and she said the budget group should not be developing this sort of plan ...talk about developing "bulletproof" plan, convincing "swing voters," and the $80,000 to $100,000 cost estimates for hiring consultants to do a telephone survey.

Weiss said these are just ideas that were talked about at meetings.

File this one under: Budget Committee charts its own course on pursuit of Budget Overrride, Ignores Popular Vote, intends to committ taxpayers' dollars to accomplish the override.

Q: How do you know when Weiss is lying?
A: His lips are moving.