Grumpy Editor

Memorial Day remembers fallen U.S. troops

Today’s observance means more than backyard barbecues and store sales, reminds Grumpy Editor who is taking the day off.

Originally called Decoration Day, many people observe Memorial Day by visiting memorials and especially Veterans Administration national cemeteries where commemorative events honor about one million American men and women who died in service during wartime periods.

Survey: Seniors’ buying power falls 24 percent in decade

While inflation in April was heralded last week as the lowest in 44 years, a Senior Citizens League tally a few days later disclosed elders have lost 24 percent, or about one fourth, of buying power since 2000, notes Grumpy Editor.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported "continuing stability" of the consumer price index (CPI) last month for all items, less food and energy, resulted in a 0.9 percent increase from a year earlier, the smallest since January 1966.

On the other hand, the annual survey of senior costs by the Senior Citizens League found that “since 2000, the Social Security Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) has increased average benefits just 31 percent while typical senior expenses have jumped almost 63 percent, more than twice as fast.”

To further smack seniors, they are “receiving no COLA this year for the first time since the automatic COLAs introduction in 1975 and are forecast to receive no COLA again next year," SCL mentioned.

"This study makes clear what millions of seniors already know too well: for every $100 worth of expenses they could afford in 2000, they can afford just $76 today," declared Daniel O'Connell, chairman of Alexandria, Va.-based SCL. "What has long been a difficult situation for seniors is quickly becoming a dire one."

It should be pointed out that unwavering reports in media have labeled inflation as “tame.”

The study examined the increase in costs of 29 key items between 2000 and 2010 with 20 of them exceeding the COLA, said SCL, which lists 1.2 million supporters.

Among increased expenses affecting seniors’ wallets since 2000:

Apartment rental, up 38 percent.
Heating oil, 150 percent.
Electricity, 50 percent.
Natural gas, 63 percent.
Auto maintenance/repair, 41 percent.
Dental, general visits, 40 percent.
Out-of-pocket medical, 44 percent.
Potatoes, 10 pounds, 67 percent.
Movie ticket, 39 percent.
Personal care services, 31 percent.

For the full list, go here.

National Guard troops to U.S.-Mexico border a PR stunt?

Announcement that the president is ordering 1,200 National Guard troops “to boost security along the U.S.-Mexico border” received heavy front-page treatment yesterday with headlines such as “Obama Reinforces Border,” observes Grumpy Editor.

Some readers undoubtedly envisioned rifle-toting, steel-helmeted troops soon patrolling 24 hours a day in efforts to plug the porous border and nail drug carriers and illegal entrants.

Not so, however.

Most editors, not seeking solid details, went along with the basic White House announcement.

But it caught the attention of Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.).  From the Senate floor he declared the presidential order was “clearly a PR stunt,” pointing out the troops will have desk jobs.

Sure enough.  The troops will not act in a law-enforcement capacity. 

Their tasks will be to work on intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance support, analysis and training.

The National Guard will --- for an undetermined period --- supplement the Border Patrol and Customs until additional agents are recruited and trained for the vast border that extends from California through Arizona and New Mexico to Texas.

“A military official said details were still being worked out on the troops’ orders and destinations, adding that the timing of their deployment was not yet clear,” according to Associated Press.

Also there was no indication on types of National Guard units to be called up and their home states.

In other words, no official input on who, when or where.

Obama directs Biden to Arlington on Memorial Day

With President Barack Obama planning to be in Chicago next Monday --- Memorial Day --- rather than in Washington where, traditionally, the U.S. president speaks at nearby Arlington National Cemetery and lays a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, some veterans and talk show hosts are raising eyebrows, notes Grumpy Editor.

Vice President Joe Biden will fill in for the president at the Arlington ceremony while Obama is slated for remarks at the Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery, about 50 miles south of Chicago.

Obama made his way to the San Francisco Bay area on Monday to raise money for the re-election campaign of Sen. Barbara Boxer (D., Calif.). 

The president remains in California through today, then heads to Chicago for a family vacation through Memorial Day.  He works in a visit to Louisiana on Friday.

Word from the American Legion, which represents 2.5 million veterans, says a president being absent from Arlington on Memorial Day is nothing unusual.

“President Obama is not the first president to miss Memorial Day observances at Arlington,” John Raughter, American Legion communications director, informs Grumpy Editor.

On several occasions, President Bush asked Vice President Cheney to fill in, he adds.

And as a reminder to all Americans, Raughter says the American Legion hopes “all Americans will use the day to reflect on the supreme sacrifices made by so many of our nation’s heroes.”

By the way, Arlington’s the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, also known as the Tomb of the Unknowns, is guarded 24 hours a day, 365 days a year and in any weather by Tomb Guard sentinels.  The Sentinels, all volunteers, are considered to be the best of the elite 3rd U.S. Infantry (The Old Guard), headquartered at nearby Fort Myer, Va.

Mongolia’s frigid winter takes out 17 percent of livestock

As eyes continue to be focused on Gulf of Mexico’s man-triggered oil spill and how it is affecting bird and sea life plus business in the region, another disaster is gripping herders and millions of farm animals in Mongolia following a nature-made extremely frigid winter, notes Grumpy Editor.

Perhaps the development is missing from most newspaper pages because there is an absence of global warming there.

Aftereffects of its worst winter in memory are reeling the country that saw temperatures plunge to 40 degrees below zero at a latitude equal to Seattle, Montreal and Paris.

Andrew Jacobs, writing for the New York Times News Service, reports the severe winter has socked a whopping 800,000 herders.

Using figures from United Nations relief officials, he lists the animal toll:  About 17 percent of livestock in the nation, almost the size of Alaska, has perished.

That includes nearly 8 million cows, yaks, camels, horses, goats and sheep, Jacobs reports.

“Even if the spring rains arrive soon,” he mentions, “500,000 more animals are expected to succumb in the coming weeks.”

The United Nations estimates the current disaster may prompt as many as 20,000 herders to abandon their nomadic life and flee to the city, he adds.

Charlie Sheen’s new pay beats bankers, baseball players

While President Barack Obama has called some bank executives’ pay “obscene” and grumbled that some baseball players are making even more “and don’t get to the World Series either,” he hasn’t yet commented on Charlie Sheen who last week cemented a deal to earn a new salary of just under $2 million for every “Two and a Half Men” episode on CBS, notes Grumpy Editor.

Sheen more than doubles his $850,000 per episode salary to remain television’s highest paid actor.

Under a new contract, Sheen’s pay goes to between $1.8 million and $1.9 million per episode.

When one figures a half-hour sitcom contains about 22 minutes of finished work, that’s pretty nifty pay.

“Two and a Half Men,” produced by Warner Bros. Television, is wrapping up its seventh season.  It remains the most watched sitcom of the season, averaging 14.7 million viewers.

And the show will be airing for two more seasons.

But there could be an interruption in production. 

Sheen, 44, is scheduled for a July 21 jury trial stemming from assaulting his wife last December.  He is charged with menacing, criminal mischief and assault.  Menacing, the most serious charge, carries a possible sentence of one to three years in prison.

California spends $529 million on prisoners’ special care

Getting limited media coverage is a California report, released this week, that a whopping $529 million was spent on prisoners’ acute or surgical care by outside medical providers in the 2007-08 fiscal year, finds Grumpy Editor.

Imagine, go to jail and, with a medical problem, no worries with deductibles, copayments and hassles about coverage with insurance companies.

The cash-strapped Golden State tallied about one third of its 170,000 inmates received specialty care during that last reporting period.

Of those, 1,175 prisoners accounted for nearly 40 percent of specialty care spending, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

Final year of health care for one of those inmates cost the state $1 million.

Health care ranked as a significant part of overall cost to house inmates in prisons, the report said.

Health care to inmates was classified in two versions:

•  Primary health care provided by medical staffs within the state’s institutions.

•  Contracted specialty health care through outside medical providers.

White House grinds out messages via 69 staffers

Want to guess what operation has a huge communications staff --- busy on all fronts --- using old and new techniques to get messages out, asks Grumpy Editor.

Is it IBM Corp., Apple Inc. or AT&T?

None of the above.

The White House “message machine employs 69 people who are directly involved in some part of the communications effort, at a cost to taxpayers of at least $4.3 million a year,” revealed Steven Thomma in a McClatchy Newspapers article distributed this week.

More people are involved in getting out presidential messages now than in the two prior administrations.

With all that incoming clutter, now you know why some editors can’t locate the latest weather report when on deadline. 

For laid-off PR folks in the private sector, Washington seems to be the place to go these days.

The 69 people “don’t include communications staffs at the National Security Council or Vice President Joseph Biden’s offices or support staff who are paid out of different accounts,” added Thomma.

Also not included are PR staffers at the many other federal departments and agencies scattered throughout Washington.

Thomma pointed out President Barack Obama’s public imagery management “uses a blend of old and new techniques and technology in an effort to cut through a polarized partisan landscape and a dizzying array of modern mass media that abbreviate attention spans and fracture public attention.”

Social Security recipients face another financial swipe

A new congressional report making print and broadcast rounds takes another financial swipe at seniors with mention of reducing the annual automatic Social Security cost-of-living increase by one percent each year, notes Grumpy Editor.

The cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) decrease is among several proposed “tweaks” in efforts to fix Social Security’s future shortfall, figured at $5.3 trillion over the next 75 years.

Not mentioned in news stories:  Seniors already have been “tweaked” this year, with no 2010 Social Security cost-of-living adjustment, the first since COLA went into effect in 1975.

Senate Special Committee on Aging chairman Sen. Herb Kohl (D., Wis.) said other options being considered, including various taxes, could bolster Social Security finances for future generations of retirees.

While talking more taxes and clipping COLA for 53 million current Social Security recipients, no suggestions or assurances were offered on how to keep the government’s hands off future funds intended for seniors and the disabled.

What most media and Washington easily forget is that Social Security trust funds built up a $2.5 trillion (yes, trillion) surplus in 25 years.

But that money has vanished.

That’s because the federal government borrowed Social Security trust funds over the years to spend on other programs.  To repay Social Security, Washington now must start seeking money from public debt markets, adding to annual budget deficits.

The Senate panel’s report will be sent to President Barack Obama’s deficit reduction commission.

 

NBC’s ‘Law & Order’ lives on, switching to Los Angeles

Judging from headlines over the past few days, long-running “Law & Order” is gone from NBC’s fall prime-time TV lineup.  Finis, scrubbed, the end --- or is it, asks Grumpy Editor.

Examples of newspaper headlines:

 

    Verdict is in:  NBC guilty of killing “Law & Order”

    “Law & Order” run ends after 20 years

 

However, it seems the long-running program is merely being transplanted by series creator-producer Dick Wolf to Los Angeles from New York.

Meanwhile, “Law & Order: SVU” continues on Wednesdays.

Full title of the upcoming version is “Law & Order: Los Angeles.”

For those who seek to bypass the mouthful title, insiders already are labeling it LOLA.

It will bring a new cast and new scenery.

But themes and stories will follow earlier "Law & Order" formulas on the General Electric Co. network.

Those craving for older “Law & Order” episodes, which started on Sept. 13, 1990, still will be able to view the many reruns on broadcast and cable channels.

Last of the current New York-based productions airs on Monday night.