News-Record.com

The following comment is posted on JR's blog:

"Dear Allen Johnson and News & Record Letter to the Editor monitors:

"The following is a summary of personal attacks by The Liberal Conservative on other bloggers JUST for the month of January.

"These type of attacks stifle real conversation or debate about issues.

"The News & Record once had a policy prohibiting personal attacks on its blogs. There have been a few people banned from the blogs due to ignoring these warnings and taste guidelines.

"I question how one blogger seems to continue with these attacks with no actions by the News & Record.

"Please bring civility back to the Letters to the Editor blog. It has become a cesspool where folks who wish to offer their opinion often leave and don’t return due to being personally attacked and mocked.

"In the spirit of equity for the others who have been banned from this blog, please act accordingly with this poster:

"Personal Attacks by The Liberal Conservative January 2008

"You are a GOP hack. 1/31/08
"you're a real mental midget there Hugh 1/29/08
"You continue to be the one dimensional mouthpiece for idiots across America 1/29/08
"You are pathetic 1/28/08

A Greensboro native and former schoolmate of mine at Dudley High School, Valerie Bailey, has created a multi-media black history calendar that you ought to check out.

Valerie, a lawyer by trade, now lives in Florida but her heart is still in Greensboro. She has invested a lot of passion and energy into the calendar project. And it shows.

Among her narrators are Natalie Cole, who provides the voice-over for a section on the Charlotte Hawkins Brown Historic Site in Sedalia -- as well as former N.C. A&T Chancellor James Renick..

You can connect to it here. Once you're in, click on Feb. 1.

For the first time in a Guilford County public school, a campus-based sheriff's deputy has used a Taser on a student.

The incident occurred Wednesday afternoon in the deputy's office at Northeast Guilford High School. The student involved subsequently was arrested and taken to the Guilford County Jail.

Sheriff's deputies who serve as school resource officers have carried Tasers for two years, the same as other off-campus officers.

Here is the story the News & Record has posted.

We have wrestled with the issue of Tasers in schools and the question even became an emotional campaign issue in the last election for sheriff. Some contend the high-voltage stun guns are dangerous and potentially even fatal.

Some studies dispute those contentions, including one at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center. But the body or research still is limited and far from conclusive.

That said, the student in question did not cooperate with the officer and made what could have been construed as a threatening move, according to the officer's account, by refusing to be searched for weapons and reaching into this pocket.

Better that he used a Taser rather than a handgun.

Would pepper spray have been a better alternative? It's easy to second-guess an officer in a situation that requires a split-second decision.

He says the pepper spray would have affected all of the people in the room, not just the student.

As Sheriff BJ Barnes has assured, he would do in the past, the incident should be reviewed thoroughly and involve input from school officials.

The idea of Tasers in school will remain one that evokes questions and unease.
But times have changed. It wasn't that long ago that the need for armed officers in public schools at all would have been questioned.

Sad to say, not anymore.

I meant to post this earlier, but I won't let another day go by without a nod to a reporter's reporter, Jim Schlosser.

Schlosser retired last week after 41 years with the News & Record.

Appropriately, a reception on Wednesday in his honor was touching and funny and even a little bit irreverent.

I had the privilege to say a few things about Jim and here' a little bit of what I shared:

Jim has always has found great joy in his work. I'd come early on some days to discover him already here, scooting around the newsroom, primed for the next story .. curious, fidgety, excited ... as if he were some recent J-school grad logging his first shift on the job.

He has always had a great respect for what he does.

He has always had a respect for the people for the people about whom he writes. They've never been a means to an end. Every one of them was equally important and every one of them had an interesting story to tell.

He has always a had a keen ear and eye for a news story.

He has a nose for a local connection that defies time and space. We could send him to Mars and he'd find somebody there with a connection to Greensboro.

He knows and loves his hometown. As a fellow Greensboro native, I see that every day in what he does and how he does it.

He genuinely loves what he does. Always has. Always will.

And he has helped to remind me, day in and day out, what a wonderful job this is and what a privilege it remains to get the chance to do it.

This week's column.

How much does outgoing Guilford County Schools Superintendent Terry Grier make?
It depends on whom you ask.

According to a recent News & Record story, Grier is paid $226,932.94 a year, plus benefits and other perks that bring his total annual compensation to $372,193.57.

According to an editorial in the same edition, Grier is paid $202,903 a year, plus perks and benefits.

Both figures came from the same source: Grier's employer, Guilford County Schools.

"So, which is it?"we asked school officials.

Both, they said. And possibly neither, depending on what you include in those figures.

Or what you leave out.

Uh, come again?

During a 90-minute telephone interview, school officials deciphered what each set of numbers means, and why one doesn't jibe with the other. With an adding machine whirring madly in the background, Chief Financial Officer Sharon Ozment said Grier's actual salary is so hard to pin down because it contains so many components. For instance, he makes $18,000 a year as a lecturer at UNCG, money that is paid by the local business community, not taxpayers. And his car allowance has been converted to salary.

Occasionally, I'd ask a question and Ozment and another staff member would put me on hold and huddle, like a Quiz Bowl team.

She conceded: "It's convoluted. And confusing.”

No kiddin'?

We're running an editorial Thursday morning about the Grimsley students suspended for their part in a December brawl.

The students' parents want them to be reinstated, presumably earlier than their suspensions call for.

I understand these parents' concerns. And I hope these parents were as involved and concerned about their children before the violence that thrust the school into a state of fear and chaos.

I also agree that mediation is a good idea to resolve the differences between the rival neighborhoods. And the students need to learn a hard lesson about the consquences of violent behavior.

But I can't automatically support all of these students returning to Grimsley. Some may be better served in an alternative school setting.

Meanwhile, I am encouraged by members of the Grimsley community coming together to address the root causes of fighting and other disciplinary problems. I hope the parents of the suspended students are involved in that effort as well.

The City Council likely will decide City Manager Mitch Johnson's future today.

I predict there are more votes to keep Johnson on the job than not, but that's not the point.

The council should come to terms on a constructive way to manage the manager and not turn this into a major distraction and impediment to city government getting things done.

As Councilman Mike Barber has said, both sides are right. Johnson does not deserve all of the aspersions cast his way, nor does he deserve personal attacks. But he can and should do better.

The council needs to clearly define what "better" is -- and Johnson, for his part, needs to manage his bosses better. He needs to realize that a key to his effectiveness, and professional survival, is managing a council that's very different from the previous one.

He also needs to create a stronger leadership team around him and to groom qualified successors for key positions.

He needs to manage communication with the public and the media better.

And he needs to grow another layer of skin. He can't obsess with all the hits is taking over the Wray flap. He has a city government to run.

Meanwhile, let's please not turn this into a political circus.

I am a satellite TV subscriber, which has its advantages and disadvantages.

One advantage is the NFL Sunday Ticket, which allows me to watch my beloved Packers every week.

One disadvantage is that I can't see new episodes of HBO's superb series, "The Wire," as soon as digital cable subscribers can.

They have HBO On Demand, which allows them to see new "Wire" episodes a full six days before I'm able to.

I have to pledge them to secrecy so they won't spoil the outcome for me. Lately, though, I've gotten a buddy to record the On Demand episodes, so I only have to wait a day.

There is a lot to like about the latest and final season of "The Wire"

One story thread involves cops inventing a make-belive serial killer of homeless people to get more resources directed to crimes against the poor. You see, these street poeple actually were killed but not by the same person. A detective plants eviidence on the bodies to make the killings look related, otherwise no one would care. (The premise: Serial killers are sexier to the media and politicians.) It works like a charm. The mayor is outaged. Local TV and newspapers eat it all up.More money and personnel suddenly become available to cops working in the inner city.

Another thread involves a reporter for the fictional Baltimore Sun who fabricates many if his stories. Unaware that the he is a figment of one cop's imagination, the reporter actually publishes an interview with the serial killer who does not exist.

Good stuff.

But I am disappointed with what they've done to my favorite character, Omar, a scarfaced anti-hero who robs drug dealers and who happens to be gay.

For some odd reason, they've made Omar almost a super hero. Even when breaks his leg improbably leaping off a high-rise balcony, he limps around making hits on the bad guys.
As a drug kingpin says, incredulously."That's some Spiderman s---t."

And it does not belong in "Wire," whose beauty is supposed to be its gritty realism.

Just got off the phone with Mike Barber, who was upbeat about the City Council's decision Thursday involving City Manager Mitch Johnson.

Barber said he was encouraged by the council's ability to disagree without being disagreeable.
People spoke their minds forcefully, he said about the council's closed sessions.

They also listened to one another.

Barber called Thursday' process "good government."

How did he know that?

Because of the public reaction, he said, chuckling.

"I know it was good government because we made everyone unhappy."

This week's column:

Shortly before the pivotal Democratic primary in South Carolina, a white voter told a National Public Radio interviewer he was supporting Hillary Clinton because he wasn’t "ready" to support Barack Obama for the presidency.

What exactly does that mean, "not ready"?

The man didn't say. And the interviewer didn't ask.

So we were left to assume that the voter wasn't prepared to support a black man for president.

For a while, though, he had plenty of company. Lots of black South Carolinians weren't so keen on Obama's campaign, either. In the beginning -- which wasn't all that long ago --Obama significantly trailed Clinton among black Democrats in the Palmetto State. Some said they admired Bill and Hillary Clinton for doing well by black people, though I'm not sure what that tangibly means.

After all, it was George W. Bush who appointed Colin Powell, then Condoleezza Rice, as secretary of state, and who, for a time, had both in his cabinet when Rice was his national security adviser. (What was it, again, that the Clintons did for their black constituents while in the White House?)

Other black voters said they liked Obama well enough but saw his campaign as a lost cause.

Better to go with a winner than a guy who was destined to fall short, they figured.

But somewhere along the way the idea of a black man as a serious contender for the presidency caught fire. Obama is now the Democratic front-runner, and Clinton is bracing for what could be her last stand in Texas and Ohio.

To be sure, the race is still close and could come down to the Democratic Convention (which means the May 6 North Carolina primary still could make a difference and John Edwards' choice of whom to support definitely will).

None of this may matter, according to the premise of a slim but provocative book titled "A Bound Man: Why We Are Excited About Obama and Why He Can't Win"by Shelby Steele.

Given our continuing struggles with repeat drunk-driving offenders, would North Carolina consider what a lawmaker in Washington is proposing?

If a bill there becomes law, the state will assign specially marked license plates to DUI offenders as a punishment and as an alert to other drivers.

Once his driving privlieges were restored, the offender would have to have the flourescent yellow tag affixed to his vehicle for a year.

It is not a new idea. Convicted drunk drivers in Iowa, Minnesota and Oregon already get special tags, or at least specially marked tags. Minnesota assigns specially numbered plates to offenders. and Oregon requires a special sticker.

Ohio offenders get yellow tags with crimson numbers.

It's tempting to go along with such a policy as a deterrent and as a warning to other drivers.

But there are problems.

What if a spouse needs to share the same vehicle?

What if such cars become targets of vandals or vigilantes?

What if the offender lives in a multi-car household and decides to use a car without the tag?

Further, there's no data to suggest that the tags are an effective deterrent.

So, it's not all that surprising that opposition to the Washington legislaiton includes Mother Against Drunk Driving.

Former Councilwoman Sandy Carmany laments word that she is being drawn out of her district in the City Council's redistricting process.

This week's column.

This column typically outlines what we're planning for the editorial pages during the state and local campaign seasons.

But, first, a word about what we are not going to do.

As we initially announced last fall, the News & Record will not endorse a candidate in the 2008 presidential campaign.

This decision followed several months of discussions among the editorial page editors in our parent company, Landmark Communications Inc.

And it aligns with our continuing efforts to concentrate on local news and local issues, where we believe our impact is strongest and most helpful to readers.

In state and local races, we have access to, and ongoing contact with, nearly all of the candidates. It's not uncommon, day to day, for us to be able to sit down with these folks in person or to reach them by telephone.

I would like to say the same of Sens. Clinton, Obama and McCain. Maybe our messages didn't get through.

... You now can at our blog, "Your Voice at the Table," which will feature one of each day's editorials for your reactions.

On Mondays, we'll post the entire "Short Stack" for your responses, each item as an individual entry.

We'll contimue to ask for your input on editorials in progress, but we thought you should be able to weigh in after the fact as well.

Some of you have been searching for an opportunity to comment on our comments. We hope this addition scratches that itch.

Some commenters have had it up to here with letters from social work students at UNCG.

We get these letters every year. They are a class requirement, I'm told.

And they can create drama ... for us and the students, some of whom tend to call in a panic near the end of the semester because they're worried their letter didn't make the cut.

The professor(s) involved has fixed that now, apparently ... this year's deadline was Feb. 22. And the students tell me they're writing to other papers as well, including their hometown papers.

But is it just me, or are there more social work majors today?

My policy on these letters is pretty much the same as with others. They are chosen (or not) on their individual merit.

I do bend the rules slightly, however. We do not typically run letters that are construed as campaign letters ... that is, letters that are written as part of an organized group effort. But that rule is aimed primarily at letters that cover a single subject and are written from a single point of view and a single agenda in mind.

These UNCG letters are not.

We make similar allowances for letters wrrtten by public school classes; we choose the best for publication.

The social work students' letters can be especially interesting, since these students often relate to what they've seen in the field as social services interns. These front-line experiences inform what they write, and help the rest of us better understand what's going on out there.

Also, I'm appreciative of any effort that gets young people reading newspapers and thinking about issues.

I've not alway been as heartened by some reactions to the letters, such as some mean rebuttals to a student who wrote about the impact of having a father in prison.

The letters are a useful learning experience all the same. For us and the authors.

In a Sunday column, Eddy Landreth of the Chapel Hill News takes N.C. State fans to task over a classless display of a photo of bloodied, broken-nosed Tyler Hansbrough from last year's Duke game.

Landreth writes:

The N.C. State baseball player who walked on the court with a poster of Tyler Hansbrough bleeding after Gerald Henderson of Duke broke his nose should be suspended for a game.
So should Wolfpack baseball coach Elliott Avent for allowing it.

State fans cheered and chuckled over the display.

And, yeah, I'm a UNC grad, but even if I weren't, I'd have to say Landreth's got a point.

Even before the scheduled news conference this morning by a group of African American ministers, some readers already are responding to the ministers' allegations that the Greensboro Police Department destroyed records related to the Nov. 3, 1979, clash between Klansmen and Nazis and anti-Klan demonstrators.

This came in this monring's e-mail from a retired police officer:

Why is it that almost everytime I open my News-Record there are always stories that are about racism? I, for one, am tired of these stories. If it isn't Mr. Pitts throwing out his racist stuff, it is the News-Record. It's sickening.

Now people want to bring the Klan thing back up. Maybe if the commies had not advertised a 'Death to the Klan' rally, and had not dared the Klan to come, this incident would never had taken place. I blame Johnson and his CWP for 90% of what took place. I was a detective in Davidson County when the incident went down. If Johnson is a preacher, then anybody can be one. He is a criminal as far as I am concerned. Now these three preachers. How many are black? Are they to be at a black church by the way?

So now they are saying the police destroyed the documents. So what? It's just another way for them to hit Chief Wray again. One thing I have often thought about. Blacks want to make a big deal of a photo lineup that had all black pictures. If the suspect is black, do you show white pictures? Racism. Wray got railroaded by the blacks. Now the so-called preachers are going to name the person who gave the go ahead to destroy the files. Who gives a damn? This is kiddy corps.........the so-called preachers that is. By the way, I have not read anything else about the two black male officers that wanted to have this home for troubled teen females. Where does that stand? But it sounds a little fishy that these two men want a home for females? Blacks are not the only ones that suffer from racism. But it is always about the poor black person that is the victim. Greensboro is not far from being another Winston-Salem.


Lewis Saintsing
Capt. Dets/Vice
Retired

Also, the Rev. Albert Som Pim-Pong, who took a trip to Israel with former Chief David Wray, remains a staunch defender of the chief and said he planned to run footage of Wray's baptism in the River Jordan by one of the ministers at Tuesday's news conference, the Rev. Greg Headen, and another black Greensboro minister, the Rev. Howard Chubbs, on Community Access TV show this afternoon.

The ministers, by the way, say they don't know whether Wray was aware of or involved in the alleged destruction of the documents.

If indeed the documents were destroyed there has to be some compelling reason. If not, there is a big problem.

But I'm not jumping to any conclusions yet.

Mark Binker reports in the Inside Scoop that a book on civil rights sites has prematurely buried Greensboro downtown civil rights museum.

Two points: Sloppy reporting by the book's authors and negative exposure for the Greensboro museum, which may be stalled but does indeed still stand, despite the book's observation that "the Woolworth's where the famed Greensboro sit-in took place no longer exists."

I would best describe Brenda Bower's call to our offices the other day as "politely exasperated."

She wanted to know if there's anything we could do to clarify that her name is Brenda Bower without the "s."

Brenda Bowers with the "s" is a semi-regular letter writer and frequent blog commenter. Problem is, says Brenda without the "s," is that her almost namesake often expressed opinions that not only aren't hers but criticize people with whom she regularly works, including Police Chief Tim Bellamy.

Brenda Bower is a transition counselor for the school system, many she helps students from detention centers re-enter the classroom.

She also is the daughter of former Guilford County Sheriff Walter "Sticky" Burch.

Fellow church members, co-workers, even her mother has confronted her about what they've read in the paper, even though it was written by Brenda Bowers.

We've had cases of people with the same names being confused, as in Greensboro Grasshoppers General Manager Donald Moore and another Donald Moore who is a frequent critic of the coliseum.

But never, so far as I can recall, a case of names that are almost identical.

Didn't people read closely enough to see the letter writer's last name had no "s"?

Apparently not, I guess, if even Brenda Bower's mother is confronting her.

"I just don't want them to think I've gone off the deep end," she said.

What to do?

As I told Brenda Bower, I don't believe this warrants a correction or a clarificaition, but she could write a letter to the editor delineating the difference in their names and viewpoints.

Or she could ask her friends and familty to please read a little more carefully, I guess.