Conservative talk show host Michael Reagan, son of late President Ronald Reagan, is the newest addition to the pages of The Times of Acadiana. We could care less if he's conservative or liberal ' his writing's just awful. Michael does not have the gift of communication that his father did; consider the sweeping stereotypes and fact-challenged writing in recent Reagan columns:
"The illegals that come here for a job or for some other reason don't come to become American citizens."
Hmm, we didn't know that Reagan knows the motives of every illegal alien who enters the United States.
From a recent column on Barry Bonds:
"Forget about the fact that long before he ever used a single strength-enhancing drug he was a stand-out star on the baseball diamond. Wrote Boston Herald baseball columnist Tony Massarotti: 'Barry Bonds was a Hall of Famer long before the steroids and he is still a Hall of Famer now.' In my book, that's what counts. Barry Bonds is a baseball player. If he's not a really nice guy, that's another story. What matters in baseball is the ability to play the game well. ... That's what counts in the game. This whole steroid use business has been grossly overplayed â?¦" Â
Tell that to the millions of parents trying to educate their kids about the dangers of steroids and the pitfalls of cheating.
And the kicker, from a column on earthquake insurance in California:
"â?¦ The generous Mayor [Ray] Nagin did not stop there. He urged those [New Orleans] residents to take advantage of a buyout program that would pay them up to $150,000 for their property. Need I tell you who's going to foot that bill? It won't be insurance companies ' most of the residents in the affected area didn't have flood insurance. â?¦ Here in California we don't worry about hurricanes, broken levees or blizzards. We worry about earthquakes. â?¦ We can protect ourselves from having to pay the ruinous cost of rebuilding our homes after a massive quake by buying earthquake insurance, just as the people of New Orleans could have protected themselves from Katrina by buying flood and windstorm insurance."
Data compiled by the office of Donald Powell, federal coordinator of recovery and rebuilding in the Gulf Coast region, shows that two out of three New Orleanians ' 67 percent ' carried flood insurance, compared with a national rate of approximately 5 percent.
It will be interesting to see if new TOA Managing Editor Gene Williams will ever see fit to actually edit Reagan's columns. ' Scott Jordan
REVETT LEAVING KXKC
Lafayette's top rated morning radio program, The Breakfast Flakes, is about to be reduced to a single flake ' Scott Daniels.
Renée Revett, Daniels' talented co-host for the past 14 years at 99.1 FM KXKC, is relocating to Houston after May 5, where her husband has landed a new job. A replacement has not been named.
Never taking themselves too seriously, the smart and informed morning show personalities often had their listeners in stitches with their lively format, which also made them popular with country music stars, a number of whom they've befriended over the years (Revett counts Billy Dean and Brad Paisley among her closest). "I've met everyone, [including] Willie Nelson and Garth Brooks. Kenny Rogers came and sat in on my show Feb. 24. On March 2, Clint Black played guitar and sang," notes Revett, who also served as program director during her entire tenure at KXKC.
The 45-year-old says the move will allow for some much-needed R&R. "I've been getting up at 4:15 since 1986," she says. Revett plans to take up golf and continue to do voice work ' keeping some Lafayette clients.
The Comeaux High grad's radio career dates back to 1977. In the near term, she'll be returning to Lafayette regularly to plan her 22-year-old daughter's wedding and says her heart will never be far from the Hub City. "I'll always have a connection to Lafayette. I can't imagine becoming a Houstonian," she says. "I think I'm going to be a Louisianan who lives in Texas." ' Leslie Turk
MAY 20 This post by blogger CB Forgotston draws parallels between Gov. Bobby Jindal and two individuals he probably doesn't want to be aligned with: President Obama and former governor Edwin Edwards. CB says Jindal's trying to jack up the debt ceiling (an Obama play, according to CB) and buy votes from GOP leges who normally wouldn't go for that (an Edwards play, CB says).
MAY 20 Here's a post in the Baptist Message from an alumnus of Louisiana College. The author, Larry Burgess, calls on the leadership of the private school to take care of some pressing problems. Physical plant issues are critical and unaddressed, some faculty make so little they need government health care, and there is an atmosphere that does not encourage honest discussion, he writes. It's time to get things back in order, he says.
MAY 20 This post in Gambit tells of a benefit concert scheduled to raise money for the 19 people shot during a Mother's Day second line on Frenchmen Street in NOLA. Among them was Gambit blogger Deb Cotton, who spoke frequently about violence in the city and reported on the city's second line culture. Gambit's foundation, along with other NOLA non-profits, also is selling t-shirts to raise money for the victims.
MAY 20 Blogger Robert Mann is critical of the personal interest some legislators take in their work here, sharing the comments one NOLA solon made in explaining his decision to vote against a bill that would require people to stop discriminating against female workers. His wife might lose some salary, so he was going to have to vote against the equal pay bill, Conrad Appel said. Appel and everyone who heard him should have been ashamed, but they weren't, and that's what is wrong in that building, Mann argues.
MAY 20 American Press columnist Jim Beam writes about the budget again here, urging kudos for the House and its efforts to try to fix the budget as opposed to passing on a flawed and messy rubber-stamped document as it usually does. The Senate already is poo-pooing the effort, but instead Senators should be trying to find a way to improve it as well, Beam argues. He also has some predictions in here from LABI and CABL.
MAY 20 Here's a link to the photo gallery from Tulane's graduation this past weekend. Dr. John and Allen Toussaint played together and received honorary degrees. The Dalai Lama was so entranced by their performance he got up from his seat and walked across the stage to stand next to them. He even participated in a second line with his own personal, saffron-colored umbrella. To the graduates, he urged them to think about creating a peaceful, hopeful life and society.
MAY 20 This Picayune story questions the rhetoric of NOLA officials who say the city, aside from having a "murder problem," is safe. The talking points generally are that the criminals are killing each other, but everything else is OK. The police chief there says that even Lafayette is more dangerous than NOLA. But crime experts interviewed here say that NOLA's numbers indicate one of two things: either people are so used to violence they don't report it, or somebody's "fudging the numbers."
MAY 20 The Advocate's Mark Ballard writes about some of the background maneuvering that took place during the development of budget alternatives in the Legislature. From Rep. Joel Robideaux being called a "tax and spend liberal" to robo-call influence, Ballard lets us in on some of the work that happens behind the scenes but usually doesn't make it into the Advocate's daily coverage of the session.
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