[angelize56]

Eggy: One word comes to mind about Geraldo.....<b>moron</b>. I think he got more than his nose broke in that fight years ago! This is really no time to be kidding around....maybe he just does this as another publicity stunt. Take care, angel

[eggplant43]

It seems to me, that with Geraldo, it is always "About Me". How he can make a living as a "reporter" is beyond me. But then, I've never understood why anyone would buy the scandal sheets at the checkout stand

[angelize56]

Sorry I didn't see your reply right away...I was reading the Enquirer. Seriously....Geraldo has been an embarrassment since he dug up Al Capone's underground vault and found....nothing! I was embarrassed for him then! Now I'm ashamed for him! lol I never watch him. I like Bill O'Reilly and even Nachman now. Take care! angel

[eggplant43]

Article published Oct 15, 2002
Pianist: Church fired her for bar gig
Side job catered to largely gay clientele

As a church pianist, Donna Merritt spent each Sunday for the past year playing classic standards such as Amazing Grace, Love Lifted Me and Just As I Am – a song extolling the unconditional love of Christ.
But last Tuesday, Ms. Merritt found out the hard way that even if the love of Christ is unconditional, employment with Pine Valley Baptist Church is not.
Because she brought home less than $150 a week playing for the church, Ms. Merritt – a professional musician who is not a member of the church – took another part-time job around the same time playing weekends at Costello's – a downtown bar with a largely gay clientele. She said when Pine Valley Baptist Church pastor Glenn Bohannon found out about her side job, he called her to his office for a meeting, which took place Oct. 3.
"He said he had heard I was playing in a gay piano bar and that it didn't look good for the church pianist to play in that kind of environment," she said.
Ms. Merritt said she was stunned when Dr. Bohannon offered her a two-week severance package.
"I was hired for my skills and in my job description there was nothing that said I couldn't take outside work," she said.
Ms. Merritt said she told Dr. Bohannon that while the bar has a large gay clientele, there are also straight patrons who frequent the establishment.
But she said that didn't seem to make any difference. Five days after the meeting she was fired.
When contacted at his office on Monday, Dr. Bohannon refused to discuss Ms. Merritt's employment with the church.
"This is a personnel matter that is private to this congregation," he said. "This is a private institution that made a decision based on some information that we felt merited what we did."
He also refused to discuss what conditions the church places on employment.
But what happened to Ms. Merritt is not unusual, according to Bill Leonard, dean and professor of church history at Wake Forest University Divinity School.
"Whatever one's views might be, Baptist churches are free to hire and fire staff," he said. "That's part of Baptist congregationalism.
"Just to give you some background, Baptists have always raised questions about employment; even in the 20th century church members would be disciplined for going to bars and selling liquor," he said. "There was even a case I know of where a church member was disciplined for owning land where a grocery store sat that sold beer and wine."
Mr. Leonard said situations like the one involving Ms. Merritt raise the issue of where to draw the line.
"Would the church choose to examine the lives of its members?" he asked. "In order to be just, would the church be compelled to investigate whether its members go into bars?
In 2000, Mr. Leonard himself came under fire by fundamentalist Baptists for defending the university's decision to admit a lesbian student to the divinity school.
Costello's owner George Trifoli said he was baffled as to why the church would fire Ms. Merritt. He said she is a popular performer at his bar, where patrons ask for her by name.
Ms. Merritt said while the experience has undermined her faith in the fairness of other humans, she said as a Christian she maintains a strong faith in God.
"But it still hurts," she said.

[macataq]

post 69

[macataq]

and then

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next

[macataq]

and

[eggplant43]

How sad, is that you in the picture?

[eggplant43]

Mullen: Journalists at SUU Keep Up the Fight
Sunday, October 20, 2002


BY HOLLY MULLEN
SALT LAKE TRIBUNE COLUMNIST

CEDAR CITY -- In the cluttered office of the University Journal, life these days is measured in moments of "pre-banana" and "post-banana."
Pre-banana, the content of the twice-weekly Southern Utah University student newspaper, was driven mostly by campus news, professors' speeches and Thunderbird sports. A little ho-hum, frankly.
Then, on Sept. 5, Journal reporter Kelsey Blackwell wrote a story describing the challenges of getting condoms from the SUU Wellness Center.




Accompanying the article was a full-color photo illustration of a banana sheathed in an electric-blue condom. Mind you, it wasn't some thumbnail-size photo buried in a corner of the paper. This healthy specimen of a banana took up three-quarters of the back page.
Boom. The post-banana era was ushered in. Life as a quiet little campus rag was over.
A controversy exploded, pitting SUU President Steven Bennion against the paper's faculty adviser, Paul Husselbee. Bennion criticized Husselbee in a Sept. 9 letter for the "offensive graphics, questionable headline and one-sided article." He hinted the feature could undermine donations to the college, principally a $40 million fund-raising drive targeted toward scholarships. Next, university trustee Dane Leavitt waded in, sending a letter to Bennion noting an adviser's right to "exercise editorial discretion."
Journal editor Tasha Williams felt like the walls were closing in. A few days after the story ran, she issued an apology in the paper. This pleased the establishment, but caused a greater uproar among students than the initial feature ever did.
"Then we really got letters," Williams says. "We got a couple after the story, but nothing like after the apology."
The 20-year-old Williams, a junior with a double major in communication and political science, has her eye on law school after graduation. Good thing. It will simply supplement what she is already learning about rights and responsibilities.
Williams insists the staff had no intention of tweaking the conservative community. They just wanted to be real.
"We were sitting around trying to come up with an illustration for Kelsey's story, and it just came to us, like, 'Hey, let's put a condom on a banana.' It's a pretty typical way of showing how to use a condom. They do it in clinics. They did it in the movie 'Never Been Kissed.' "
No one thought twice, Williams recalls. "This is a college. Expressing yourself, that's what you do."
Correction. That is what college students are supposed to do. It gets a little dicey when they actually take all that John Stuart Mill and Jean Jacques Rousseau and Thomas Jefferson stuff and put it to practical use.
The day after the printed apology, Williams' political science professor devoted the 90-minute class block to a lively discussion of the First Amendment.
Classmate Mark Justice took the debate a step further and formed a group called SAFE, or Student Association for Free Expression.
The group now counts about 50 members and hopes to show what it perceives as persistent efforts by the university to thwart free speech.
For her part, Williams, a Woods Cross High School graduate, says acceptance comes a bit easier at home in North Salt Lake. "My mom, she's great. She says 'keep it up.' "
She does keep it up.
The day of this interview, Williams handed over the latest edition of the Journal, pointing to a story based on a Texas study comparing the risks between smoking and sex for young adults.
The article included a student-generated photo illustration: a male and female wrapped around each other, their feet sticking out from under the bedsheets

[eggplant43]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Posted on Tue, Oct. 22, 2002



GOVERNOR'S OFFICE: Ventura ponders 'Madame Governor'

BY JIM RAGSDALE
Pioneer Press

Minnesota has never had a female governor, and Gov. Jesse Ventura said Monday the thought has occurred to him that he could change all that by leaving office a few days early.

Ventura, who is not seeking re-election, is scheduled to leave office when the new governor takes office in early January. But he said he has mused about voluntarily stepping down a few days early and making Lt. Gov. Mae Schunk the governor until the new man takes office.

"I just thought it would be fun, the last week, to leave early and make Mae the first female governor of the state," he said. "Then they'd have to give her a portrait, and everything else that would go with it. I just thought it would be kind of humorous…. Mae, being the trouper she was, she looked at me and said, 'Governor, whatever you'd like.'"

In an interview with reporters after a judicial appointment, Ventura also tried to prod candidates running for his job to declare their intentions on fixing the budget deficit and provided a glimpse of the life he envisions after Election Day.

He added that he is not really likely to quit early and said he thought of stepping aside to make way for Gov. Schunk as a last joke on the reporters who cover him.

Still, he said, he hasn't completely ruled it out, and won't finally decide until the moment arrives.

After Ventura's comments, Schunk said she does not believe that is how a woman should become governor of the state. She said she wants Ventura to remain in office until his successor is sworn in.

"I don't want the governor to resign his governorship to make me the first woman governor," she said.

"I do not believe that's the way a governor should come to office, especially the first woman governor…" She said that although she has always been prepared to take over in case of illness, "I don't want him to resign to give me this kind of honor. I want him to continue with the honor that he has, of having been elected governor of Minnesota."

"It was just a thought in passing," Ventura said. "You know, when you become a lame duck, you have more of those thoughts…. I just thought it would be fun to go out with a bang, and give you something to write about…. I thought it would be nice to get Mae's portrait here at the Capitol."

Ventura also re-emphasized his position that the candidates to succeed him need to say how they will balance the state's budget and deal with an expected deficit in the next two-year budget period.

Ventura said it will be impossible to reduce spending on state programs without drastically cutting back state services. He said a 10 percent cut in the state Corrections Department, for example, could mean shutting down a prison or changing prison sentences. He said fears of terrorism mean people look to government to protect them.

"I find it very interesting that everyone is out there, still maintaining that it's time to cut government, and yet it's government that protects us in time of war," he said.

Ventura has said he will make an announcement after the election about his plans for the future. He said speaking engagements are "the only thing I have now."

He said that he may accept pay for some speeches before he leaves office, and added that it would not be prohibited as long as the groups hiring him are not registered lobbyists in the state of Minnesota.

[angelize56]

BERLIN (Reuters) - A cat saved its family by raising the alarm after it touched off a fire, German police said on Monday.

Mimi the black-and-white cat was playing in the family kitchen in the northwest town of Luedenhausen when a misstep switched on an electric oven, which ignited papers stacked next to it.

But Mimi then awoke the family by meowing loudly and pushing heavy objects on the floor.

"Mimi saved the family. There would have been a major fire had she not raised the alarm," a police spokesman said.

[Firejay]

While this is a nice story, it doesn't replace the need for properly installed smoke detectors and common sense to keep combustibles away from any type of heat source.

Sorry, but it's all the fire training I get.

Originally posted by angelize56:
BERLIN (Reuters) - A cat saved its family by raising the alarm after it touched off a fire, German police said on Monday.

Mimi the black-and-white cat was playing in the family kitchen in the northwest town of Luedenhausen when a misstep switched on an electric oven, which ignited papers stacked next to it.

But Mimi then awoke the family by meowing loudly and pushing heavy objects on the floor.

"Mimi saved the family. There would have been a major fire had she not raised the alarm," a police spokesman said.

[angelize56]

FJ: Couldn't agree with you more! My smoke detectors are working fine! Have you run across fires set by pets? Take care and have a great day! angel

[eggplant43]

It's amazing what the animals who share our lives are capable of. I live with a wonderful cat, Cosmo, who greets me each morning at the pc when he awakens. I always look forward to the ritual. I'd expect the same kind of alarm from Cosmo if something like this were to happen.