Casino Wars!
Ulster County legislators recently postponed voting on a measure that would let host communities approve or reject casino proposals as a groundswell of opposition to a gambling resort for Saugerties’ Winston Farm, site of the Woodstock ’94 concert, continued to surface at local meetings. A resolution on the “Home Rule” option, sponsored by Saugerties’ four representatives to the county Legislature and Majority Leader Michael Stock, R-Woodstock, whose district includes part of West Saugerties - would prohibit the county from entering into casino negotiations with an Indian tribe without support from the proposed host community.
In 2003, the legislature entered into just such an agreement with the Modoc tribe of Oklahoma after a series of closed-door sessions headed by then-Legislative Chairman Ward Todd, who now serves as director of the county Chamber of Commerce.
The Winston Farm proposal by the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma, which includes the building of a casino, hotel, entertainment center and golf course, is publicly opposed by town of Saugerties Supervisor Greg Helsmoortel and village of Saugerties Mayor Robert Yerick.
The legislative postponement was due to changes proposed for the legislation that would include removal of a public referendum option for casino approval.
Legislator Richard Parete, D-Accord, has since questioned what effect the resolution would have on the three-year casino contract with the Modoc Tribe of Oklahoma to build a gaming hall in the southern Ulster County town of Wawarsing, which was planned to bring the county $15 million per year if the casino were built.
“What’s the legal ramifications?” Parete asked. “We didn’t give the Wawarsing residents, the Rochester residents, the Hurley and Marbletown residents, which would be impacted most, the opportunity to have a say for the Modoc tribe.”
Saugerties-based opponents of the casino have formed a group called No Saugerties Casino Inc, who hosted a forum on the issue that drew about 250 people to a recent informational meeting on gambling options. At the event, a state assemblyman on recent panels overseeing gambling issues in Albany said it would be “several years” before the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma could get the state and federal approvals necessary to realize their plans to build a casino at the Winston Farm, or any other place in New York state.
Gerentine, R-Marlboro, told attendees that the county, through the Ulster County Development Corp. is holding a forum on casino gambling July 13 to help the Legislature make a decision that takes into account the impact on all of Ulster County, and that local input will be included.
“We’re doing it through UCDC to try to get the politics out of it,” said Legislature Chairman Richard Gerentine. He noted that the agency has invited two groups of speakers to the July 13 event to present the pros and cons of casino gambling.
The first group will include public officials and others from two communities in the Northeast that have Indian casinos: the town of Verona, N.Y., where the Oneida tribe’s Turning Stone Casino is located; and the town of Ledyard, Conn., home of Foxwoods.
The second group will comprise members of state and national organizations related to casino gambling, including the National Council on Problem Gambling and the Coalition Against Casino Gambling in New York on the anti-casino side, and the American Gaming Association and the National Indian Gaming Association on the pro-casino side.
The UCDC recently came under fire for getting politically involved in the review process for Dean Gitter’s Belleayre Resort proposal for the Shandaken area, when it put in a letter to the governor on the agency’s behalf without full board approval.
A fact-finding panel made up of Ulster County and local municipal officials, academics, social service providers and law-enforcement officials has meanwhile been formed by the development corporation. The Ulster County Legislature’s newly appointed Casino Impact Committee will meet for the first time June 16 to begin analyzing the potential effects of an Indian casino in the county. Legislator Wayne Harris, R-Clintondale, will chair the panel. The other members will be Legislators Michael Berardi, D-Ulster; Brian Hathaway, R-Bloomington; James Maloney, R-Ulster; Robert Parete, D-Boiceville; and Joseph Stoeckeler, D-Ellenville. Another Republican legislator will be appointed to the committee shortly so that the membership will include four Republicans and three Democrats.
Later, Gerentine called the Home Rule resolution Saugerties legislators have planned to submit for the Legislature’s June 9 session “premature,” arguing that the impact on the entire county, and not just the host community, should be considered in any such decision.
A pending state bill put in by Senator John Bonacic and Assemblyman Kevin Cahill that would authorize the establishment of three Indian casinos in Ulster and Sullivan counties includes a provision requiring county approval of casinos, but not town approval, making the counties’ positions more crucial from a legal perspective than the local view.
Some have suggested that in its current weak financial position, the county might be swayed into favoring a casino by the $15 million the Seneca-Cayugas have offered the county to form a casino compact for the Winston Farm proposal. Gerentine, however, said the county’s decision on the casino proposal will be made independently of the county’s balance sheet.

Volunteer Fair!
A large number of representatives from the Route 28 corridor’s many volunteer organizations gathered for a special luncheon this past Sunday, June 5, as the first steps in what Onteora teacher Jim Ulrich, the gathering’s organizer, hopes will lead to a special; Volunteer Fair for the region that will help spur greater community awareness and interaction. Among those in attendance at the luncheon, held at the Reservoir Fellowship Hall in Glenford, were members of various churches, American Legion posts, Trout Unlimited, garden clubs, the Oddfellows, senior citizen groups, Olive Matters, fire departments and ambulance squads. 27 organizations were represented, all total.
Ulrich said the idea was to get everyone talking… and to set up a five-person steering committee to plan further such gatherings and get the ball rolling for the Volunteer Fair. He added that the idea for the luncheon, and the Fair, came from Olive resident Susan Beattie, who has attended similar Volunteer Fairs as part of her job with the American Cancer Society.
Geographically, all gathered said they want to reach out to those spread out along the entire Route 28 corridor, and not just in single towns.
A follow-up meeting is being planned for July. For further information, call Ulrich at 657-8314.

Larry Shurter...
Larry was born to Jesse Shurter and Anna Traver on September 27, 1917 in Samsonville. He had one sister, Olive.
Larry began working as soon as he was big enough – about 9 years old. He helped his father cut and sell ice in the winter. During the summer he worked at the water powered sawmill and gristmill that the family began building shortly after they settled in the area in the mid 1700’s. When the 1928 flood took out most of the mills and the waterwheel, the family went to combustion engines exclusively. Larry soon became a seat-of-your-pants mechanic and discovered the thrill of his life; speed.
He also discovered that he loved to travel. In 1933 he and a family friend, Carlton Locke (Carlton’s father invented the modern shutter while working for Kodak and Carlton had a nudist colony on the stream in Samsonville) headed cross-country to California. A few years later they made two trips to Florida in an American Austin Bantam that Larry later restored. By this time Larry had built his own “road job, a sleeker, faster 1920’s Star Touring car”. Family and neighbors were less than thrilled.
1938 was a big year for Larry; he married Mavis Miller, built his own racecar – a midget, and began racing at the Bearsville Track in Woodstock. Mavis and Larry toured many tracks. He drove for other car owners and Mavis showed her love of racing by developing into a detailed record keeper who often drove to and from tracks towing the trailer and midget(s). Larry had worked all day and this was his chance to rest a bit before getting on the racetrack.
He was drafted into Military service in the winter of 1943 and became a Motor Sergeant in the 312th Medical Battalion of the 87th Infantry Division (under General Patton). He was awarded 3 Bronze Stars. For the rest of his life Larry continued to be in contact with and visit some of the men in the 312th and rarely missed an annual reunion.
His racing career took he and Mavis up and down the east coast and landed him at the Stadium “Tropical” in Havana for winter racing in 1947.
In 1948, they went to 95 race events at 13 different tracks and Larry drove fourteen different midgets. He qualified for the main events a majority of times, which meant he competed in at least 3 races per program. He switched from midgets to stockcars in the 1949 and won his heat qualifier and main event his first time driving stocks at Middletown. He had more career stock car wins, but favored the open cockpit midgets. He said, “Racing a stock was like trying to race a lumber truck compared to the light touch it took to race a midget.” He also said that the camaraderie of midget racers was lost in the stocks.
In 1950 and ’52, Larry raced the family sedan in the Daytona 500 on the Beach. In the 1950 run on the beach, a young couple lost their footing on the dunes over the south turn and rolled into Larry’s path. He damaged the car avoiding them and took 25th position. In the 1952 race, Larry was up with the leaders until sand got in the shifting lever and he couldn’t take it out of high gear, finishing 12th.
Larry was a member of NASCAR, the Central States Racing Association Inc., American Racing Drivers Club, United Stock Car Racing Club, the National Old Timers Racing Club, Atlantic Coast Old Timers, North East Stock Car Old Timers, and the Living Legends of Auto Racing. He was a former commander of the VFW Post 9595 and a member of the American Legion and Elks.
In 1961, Larry retired from racing to become President of Onteora Speedway and soon after Larry and Mavis became owners of Shurter’s Inn in Olivebridge. They sold it several years later and Larry continued with Shurter Lumber & Piling Company that he co-owned with his father, Jesse. He last cut in the summer of 2004.
His son, Larry Jr. in 1971 and his wife, Mavis Miller in 1976, predeceased Larry.
After Mavis’s death, Ruth Faulkner and Larry began seeing each other and have been companions for 27 years. Larry and Ruth traveled a lot in their motor home, going to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and Daytona 500’s, some of the NASCAR circuit and the 87th Infantry reunions.
Larry was a hard worker. He was modest, believing that his accomplishments spoke for themselves. He was known for his humor, his strong will and his generosity. He donated lumber to families in need, and to the completion of the VFW 9595. He extended credit to young families who needed lumber for their homes. He was one of the last of a generation representing the history and traditions of Samsonville and the Town of Olive.
Survivors include: his companion of 27 years, Ruth Faulkner; her children, Jenny, Susan, Larry, David, Butch, Louise and their children, and his special joy, Shealia; daughter, Raecine and companion, John; and family members; Rodney Shurter Sage; Sarah (Miller), Jim and Jeff Vansteenburg; Doris (Miller), Jim and Linda Glass.

Book Bans?
According to the American Library Association, which asks school districts and libraries to report efforts to ban books - that is, have them removed from shelves or reading lists - they are on the rise again: 547 books were challenged last year, up from 458 in 2003. These aren’t record numbers. In the 1990’s the appearance of the Harry Potter books, with their themes of witchcraft and wizardry, caused a raft of objections from evangelical Christians.
Judith Krug, director of the library association’s office for intellectual freedom, attributed the most recent spike to the empowerment of conservatives in general and to the re-election of President Bush in particular. The same thing happened 25 years ago, she said. “In 1980, we were dealing with an average of 300 or so challenges a year, and then Reagan was elected,” she said. “And challenges went to 900 or 1,000 a year.”

Railed Out…
The state has abandoned any chance of finishing a fleet of seven Turboliner trains that were supposed to become the workhorses of a high-speed rail corridor envisioned by Gov. George Pataki between New York City and the Albany area. In a settlement reached last month, the state Department of Transportation agreed to pay Super Steel Schenectady $5,525,000 to end the project, cover any remaining costs and move four unfinished trains into storage at a nearby industrial park. The payment is to supplement nearly $64.8 million already spent on Super Steel’s work on rebuilding the 1970s-era Turboliners, including three completed trains, which Amtrak has mothballed in Delaware and claims are not suitable for service.
Any remaining hopes that the $185 million high-speed rail program announced
by Pataki in 1998 would come to fruition crumbled last year as Amtrak sidelined the only two reconditioned trains to be put into service – citing problems with air conditioning and other issues — and later moved all three completed trains in its possession to Delaware for storage. Last August, the state DOT sued Amtrak in federal court, claiming the railroad had failed to deliver on its promises to run the trains and complete track work necessary to allow the trains to reach their top speeds. The project was supposed to shave 20 minutes from the two hour and 20 minute travel time between Rensselaer and New York City.

Bad Recruits
Faced with a long, tough war in Iraq, the U.S. Army is stepping up its recruitment activities in high schools, which landed them in some hot water locally of late, and begun battling to keep the new soldiers it has brought into the force.
Because more of the new Army recruits are washing out of the service before completing their first enlistment, which typically runs three or four years, the Army has told battalion commanders, who typically command 800-soldier units, that they can no longer bounce soldiers from the service for poor fitness, pregnancy, alcohol and drug abuse or generally unsatisfactory performance.
Army officials say the move isn’t unprecedented. The service made a similar decision in 1998, when the strong economy and lack of a clear mission left the military struggling to meet recruitment goals. There was also a secret program that moved people directly from jails into the services during the later years of the Vietnam War.
In March, 17.4% of all new Army recruits failed to make it through training. Another 7.3% didn’t finish their first three years with their unit. The Army’s goal is to keep training losses below 12% and first-term enlistee losses below 5%.
On a local basis, Rondout Valley High School students recently objected to participating in a physical education “boot camp” led by members of the National Guard, leading to a loud school board where parents objected – and were booed by others who support all the military does… that ended p being covered by the Mainstream Media.
The root of the problem were two days of classes conducted in late April by the National Guard at the school’s invitation, where activities included running in place, relays, stretching exercises and a ball toss meant to simulating throwing a grenade into a back of a vehicle. Parents said some students who refused to participate received an “unprepared” mark for that day. They then requested the district make parents aware of “opt out” forms for all such programs.
One of the requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act is that all student information be made available for military recruitment purposes or the school district lose federal funding. A growing number of districts nationwide have started protesting the regs by refusing funding.
On a similar front, a growing number of organizations are concerned about privacy rights regarding a Department of Education plan that would require colleges and universities to place personal information on individual students into a national database maintained by the government. Submissions would include every student’s name and Social Security number, along with sex; date of birth; home address; race; ethnicity; names of every college course begun and completed; attendance records; and financial aid information.
Such detailed information is now provided only for students receiving federal aid, giving the department only a partial picture of higher education nationwide. The new approach, department officials say, would not only complete the picture but also help track students who take uncommon paths toward a degree.
Jim Dempsey, executive director of the Center for Democracy and Technology, said: “Once a database is created for one purpose, regardless how genuine or legitimate it is, it’s very, very hard to prevent it from being used for law enforcement or intelligence purposes. If the F.B.I. comes calling, it almost doesn’t matter what the privacy policy is. They’ll get the information they want.”

End of Oil?
The Exxon Mobil Corporation, one of the world’s largest publicly owned petroleum companies, has quietly joined the ranks of those who are predicting an impending plateau in non-OPEC oil production. Their report, The Outlook for Energy: A 2030 View, forecasts a peak in just five years. They report that the majority of non-OPEC producers such as the United States, Britain, Norway, and Mexico, who satisfy 60 percent of world oil demand, are already in a production plateau or decline. Natural gas production, despite a near doubling of drilling activity, is flat or decreasing both in Canada and in the United States—which has prompted prices to triple over the past few years.
With non-OPEC oil production reaching a plateau and frontier resources not viable, ExxonMobil proposes that increased demand be met in two ways. The first is greater fuel efficiency. The other way ExxonMobil believes demand will be satisfied is from vastly and rapidly increased OPEC production.
The report suggests that conventional petroleum production will soon—perhaps in five years, ten at best—no longer be able to satisfy demand.

Warming Trend
Mayors of more than 150 cities ranging from Los Angeles to Atlanta have signed an agreement pledging to move their communities toward the greenhouse-gas reductions laid out the Kyoto Protocol. California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger - a pro-business Republican - proposed cutting the state’s greenhouse-gas emissions by 25 percent, proclaiming: “The debate is over ... and we know the time for action is now.”
“If this continues, when you add it all up, it will be significant activity on climate change even without a national policy,” says Pietro Nivola of the Brookings Institution in Washington. “Very often that is the way policy works: When enough major states take action, then eventually the central government follows.”
That action has already begun. Nine states in the Mid- Atlantic and Northeast have already established a regional greenhouse-gas emissions-trading program. The mayors of 158 American cities - including 10 of the 30 largest - have signed the United States Mayors Climate Protection Agreement, an initiative launched by Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels.
Meanwhile, indigenous leaders from Arctic regions around the world called on the European Union recently to do more to fight global warming and to consider giving aid to their peoples. In their first visit to EU headquarters, leaders representing the eight-nation Arctic Council met with officials at the European Commission and several EU lawmakers to push their campaign, warning their way of life was at risk. The Arctic region is home to about 4 million people, including more than 30 different indigenous groups. A recent study undertaken by the Arctic Council said the effects of global warming on the world’s polar region were getting worse and could open up the risk of flooding and erosion as the polar ice contracts.
Created in 1996, the Arctic Council comprises Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, Sweden and the United States.

Adoption Info?
An analysis of more than 50 years of international data found youngsters adopted from abroad are only slightly more likely than nonadopted children to have behavioral problems such as aggressiveness and anxiety. And they actually seem to have fewer problems than children adopted within their own countries.
The results are generally reassuring for international adoption - a growing trend involving more than 40,000 children a year moving among more than 100 countries, the researchers said. The authors of the American Medical Association study pooled results from 137 studies on adoptions by parents living in the United States, Canada, Europe, Australia, New Zealand and Israel.
The analysis involved studies on adoption between 1950 and 2005, involving more than 30,000 adoptees and more than 100,000 nonadopted children. During that time, adoption has evolved from being a “shameful secret” to being celebrated and often very visible, especially with the relatively recent phenomenon of white parents adopting Chinese children. In the United States alone, parents have adopted more than 230,000 children from other countries since 1989.
Internationally adopted children had a 20 percent higher chance of being disruptive than nonadopted children, and a 10 percent higher chance of being anxious or withdrawn. They also were twice as likely as nonadopted children to receive mental health services - results that the authors said were much better than expected given these children’s often troubled early start in life. Children adopted within their own countries had an 36 percent higher chance of being anxious or withdrawn than the international adoptees did, and a 50 percent higher chance of being aggressive or disruptive, the study found. These children were four times more likely than nonadopted children and twice as likely as internationally adopted children to receive mental health services. Also, domestically adopted youngsters had a 60 percent higher chance of having behavior problems than nonadopted children. Reserachers have theorized that children adopted domestically might suffer from the instability of living with different foster families before getting adopted.

Koran Troubles
The Pentagon report detailing incidents in which U.S. guards at Guantanamo Bay prison desecrated the Koran is creating another public relations challenge for President Bush. After first accusations appeared in Newsweek several weeks ago, the White House responded with a verbal offensive against the media. But when the Pentagon described a series of cases of U.S. personnel mishandling the Koran last week, the White House downplayed the issue.
Joe Lockhart, former press secretary for President Clinton, said that when a news organization - such as Newsweek - makes a factual mistake, White House officials are tempted to try to discredit the entire story. “I think on this issue, they fell into a trap… They saw a way to push back on a damaging story by making it look like it was just out-of-control journalists, and now they’ve had to admit that it has happened. While the news organization got an example wrong, they got the practice right. I think certainly the public is within their right, in this case, to believe they were misled.”
The White House has declined to answer questions about whether it issued misleading statements, whether the credibility of the Bush administration had been tarnished or whether the Pentagon report would hamper Bush’s efforts to spread democracy in the Middle East.
Meanwhile, President Bush said recently that the U.S. economic expansion was solid, with thriving small-business and factory sectors, despite a report showing weak payroll growth. He did not mention a recent report from the Labor Department showing U.S. employers added only 78,000 workers to their payrolls in May, the weakest job growth in nearly two years.
Bush urged lawmakers to pass some of his priorities, including a broad energy bill and the U.S.-Central American Free Trade Agreement, or CAFTA.

Ditch The ATM!
Miami-Dade County’s elections chief in Florida has recommended ditching its ATM-style voting machines, just three years after buying them for $24.5 million to avoid a repeat of the hanging and dimpled chads from the 2000 election, instead suggesting the county switch to optical scanners that use paper ballots, based on declining voter confidence in the paperless touch-screen machines and quadrupled election day labor costs.
Fifteen of Florida’s 67 counties chose touch-screen machines after the 2000 election fiasco. The machines have caused problems during at least six elections, including the September 2002 primary, when some polls could not open and close on time and Democratic primary results for governor were delayed by a week.

Trade Wars…
European Union has filed a counter complaint at the World Trade Organization claiming Boeing Co. receives illegal aid - launching a new trade war with Washington.
The move reactivates a legal process at the WTO that was frozen by the EU when it entered negotiations with Washington in January to try to cut aid to U.S.-based Boeing and its European rival Airbus. It is also a reaction to Washington’s recent decision to abandon months of talks and take the EU to a legal panel at the WTO over Airbus subsidies.
The EU has blamed the United States for escalating the dispute into a full-blown trade war. The United States is asking for a removal of all state subsidies for businesses.
Airbus is 80-percent owned by the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. Britain’s BAE Systems PLC owns the remainder.

Trust Us?
Trust in a bottle? It sounds like a marketer’s fantasy, like the fabled fountain of youth or the wild claims of fad diets. Yet that’s what Swiss and American scientists demonstrate in new experiments with a nasal spray containing the hormone oxytocin.
After a few squirts, human subjects were significantly more trusting and willing to invest money with no ironclad promise of a profit.
The researchers acknowledged their findings could be abused by con artists or even sleazy politicians who might sway an election, provided they could squirt enough voters on their way to the polls.
Other scientists say the new research raises important questions about oxytocin’s potential as a therapy for conditions like autism or social phobias, in which trust is diminished. Or, perhaps the hormone’s activity could be reduced to treat more rare diseases, like Williams’ Syndrome, in which children have no inhibitions and approach strangers fearlessly.
Oxytocin is secreted in brain tissues and synthesized by the hypothalamus. This small, but crucial feature located deep in the brain controls biological reactions like hunger, thirst and body temperature, as well as visceral fight-or-flight reactions associated with powerful, basic emotions like fear and anger. For years oxytocin was considered to be a straightforward reproductive hormone found in both sexes. In both humans and animals, this chemical messenger stimulates uterine contractions in labor and induces milk production. In both women and men, oxytocin is released during sex, too.
In the experiments, the researchers tried to manipulate people’s trust by adding more oxytocin to their brains. They used a synthetic version in a nasal spray that was absorbed by mucous membranes and crossed the blood-brain barrier. Researchers say the dose was harmless and altered oxytocin levels only temporarily.

Teens Thwarted!
The number of adolescents nationwide looking for summer jobs is abating. Last summer, the teen employment rate was the lowest since 1948, with only 36 percent of those ages 16 to 19 holding jobs, down from 45 percent in 2000. This year, although some economists say an improving economy may boost the prospects of older teens, the latest forecast shows no budge in the overall summer employment rate.
Competition from older workers and foreigners has squeezed the market for job-hungry teens. This comes as companies, operating with ever-leaner staffs, are less prone to take on the role of mentor for young people with little or no experience.
In a parallel trend, many teens have opted out of traditional jobs in retail and recreation for unpaid internships or to enroll in sports and music camps or other activities that might buff their college applications. But for thousands of adolescents who look for work to no avail, especially those from low-income families, a dearth of summer jobs means more than a scramble for cash.
The teen employment rate typically falls with national recessions, but it is not expected to recover this summer despite an improved economy. It is attributed, in part, to immigrants and older workers turning to hourly work. Employers often perceive older workers to be more mature or reliable and still available long after teens have returned to school.

Blind Beliefs
Religious devotion sets the United States apart from some of its closest allies. Americans profess unquestioning belief in God and are far more willing to mix faith and politics than people in other countries, AP-Ipsos polling found. In Western Europe, where Pope Benedict XVI complains that growing secularism has left churches unfilled on Sundays, people are the least devout among the 10 countries. Only Mexicans come close to Americans in embracing faith, the poll found. But unlike Americans, Mexicans strongly object to clergy lobbying lawmakers, in line with the nation’s historical opposition to church influence.
The polling was conducted in May in the United States, Australia, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, South Korea and Spain.
Nearly all U.S. respondents said faith is important to them and only 2 percent said they do not believe in God. Almost 40 percent said religious leaders should try to sway policymakers, notably higher than in other countries. In contrast, 85 percent of French object to clergy activism - the strongest opposition of any nation surveyed. France has strict curbs on public religious expression and, according to the poll, 19 percent are atheists. South Korea is the only other nation with that high a percentage of nonbelievers. Australians are generally split over the importance of faith, while two-thirds of South Koreans and Canadians said religion is central to their lives. People in all three countries strongly oppose mixing religion and politics.
In Spain, where the government subsidizes the Catholic Church, and in Germany, which is split between Catholics and Protestants, people are about evenly divided over whether they consider faith important. The results are almost identical in Britain. Italians are the only European exception in the poll. Eighty percent said religion is significant to them and just over half said they unquestioningly believe in God. But even in Italy, home to the Catholic Church, resistance to religious engagement in politics is evident. Only three in 10 think the clergy should try to influence government decisions; a lower percentage in Spain, Germany and England said the same.
The poll found Republicans are much more likely than Democrats to think clergy should try to influence government decisions.

Delay TV
House Majority Leader Tom DeLay accused NBC recently of slurring his name by including an unflattering reference to him on the NBC police drama “Law & Order: Criminal Intent.” DeLay’s name surfaced on the show’s season finale, which centered on the fictional slayings of two judges by suspected right-wing extremists. In the episode, police are frustrated by a lack of clues, leading one officer to quip, “Maybe we should put out an APB (all-points-bulletin) for somebody in a Tom DeLay T-shirt.”
In a letter to NBC, DeLay wrote: “This manipulation of my name and trivialization of the sensitive issue of judicial security represents a reckless disregard for the suffering initiated by recent tragedies and a great disservice to public discourse.”
NBC responded, “The script line involved an exasperated detective bedeviled by a lack of clues, making a sarcastic comment about the futility of looking for a suspect when no specific description existed… It’s not unusual for ‘Law & Order’ to mention real names in its fictional stories. We’re confident in our viewers’ ability to distinguish between the two.”
Producer Dick Wolf, creator of the “Law & Order” franchise, took a swipe at DeLay in his own statement, saying, “I ... congratulate Congressman DeLay for switching the spotlight from his own problems to an episode of a TV show.”
The flap came as ethics questions swirling around DeLay mounted with a Texas judge ruling that a political action committee formed by the congressman violated state law by failing to disclose $600,000 in mostly corporate donations.

On The Record
The Washington bureau chiefs at seven major news organizations are pressing the White House to curtail the use of background briefings, which administration officials regularly hold on the condition that the officials not be identified in news reports. In an e-mail message sent recently, the bureau chiefs urged other Washington editors to object to such briefings as soon as the administration, executive agencies or legislators schedule them. “Please ask your reporters to raise objections beforehand in hopes of convincing the official to go public,” they wrote. “Ask them to explain why the briefing has to be on background.”
The message followed a meeting the bureau chiefs had at the White House with Scott McClellan, the press secretary for President Bush. McClellan said that he would end the use of background-only briefings — if White House reporters would stop using anonymous sources in their reporting. He said that “people in the heartland” feel that “anonymous sources use them to hide behind efforts to generate negative publicity.” Bureau chiefs contend that the background-only briefings force them to use sourcing that is, essentially, anonymous, reducing their credibility.

Good Grief
Doctors have recently identified a condition they’re labelling complicated grief, a condition more severe than grief and different from depression that affects as many as 1 million people a year. It’s a condition that some doctors are hoping will soon be recognized by the American Psychiatric Association.
“There is a tendency with bereavement to think that anything should be normal. People see it as a private time,” said Dr. Katherine Shear, a psychiatry professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. But with complicated grief, Shear said the feelings of disbelief, loss and anguish don’t go away, eventually affecting every part of a person’s life.
Left untreated, doctors said, complicated grief can lead to depression, suicide or suicidal thoughts, substance abuse and even illnesses such as cardiovascular disease and cancer. Researchers estimate that 10 percent to 15 percent of the surviving relatives of people who die naturally could experience complicated grief. People emotionally dependent on the person who dies are at greatest risk of suffering complicated grief.
Researchers found that 51 percent of patients treated with a therapy developed just for the symptoms of complicated grief showed improvement. Meanwhile, 28 percent of complicated grief sufferers who underwent a treatment commonly used for depression showed improvements.

Classroom Bias?
Concerned that public schools are becoming sites of liberal indoctrination, conservative activist groups have started generating a wave of efforts to limit what teachers may discuss and to bring more conservative views into the classroom. After all, they say, if related campaigns can help rein in doctrinaire faculty on college campuses, why not in K-12 education as well?
So far this year, at least 14 state legislatures have considered bills aimed at colleges that would restrict professors and establish grievance procedures for students who perceive political bias in teaching. Concerns include multicultural lesson plans that go into detail about the Muslim faith, attitudes regarding the military, and views of history. Activist means of achieving change include a move to publicize whenever a teacher “tries to shove his ideology down someone’s throat,” the denouncing of world history books that go into too much detail about Islam.
These proposed remedies will spawn their own set of problems, some observers say. Teachers who are “ideologically coloring a subject” in any direction are troublingly out of line, but “the risk is that teachers will feel even further restrained than they already do,” says Patricia Sullivan, director of the Center on Education Policy, a Washington think tank that advocates for public schools.
Current events discussions, for instance, would become next to impossible in such an environment, Ms. Sullivan says. “[It would be] very difficult to not cross the line.... A teacher could very easily in a course of normal conversation express views, and I just don’t know how you regulate that.”
Some observers envision liberal and conservative families lining up in pursuit of separate educations. Because ideological policing of the classroom may prove impossible, support could grow for vouchers for values-driven education, says Michelle Easton, president of the conservative Clare Booth Luce Policy Institute in Herndon, Va.
“Our primary approach is to promote school choice, because then parents can pick little right-wing schools, little left-wing schools, little traditional schools - whatever they want for their children,” Mrs. Easton says. “Then you get the government out the business of, ‘You can’t do this, you can’t do that.’ “

CWC Grants…
The Catskill Watershed Corporation (CWC) Board of Directors on May 24 authorized reimbursement of stormwater control costs for a Windham business and a Lexington summer camp, and also approved six low-interest loans valued at more than $1.8 million to businesses in Delaware and Ulster Counties.
Reimbursement of up to $12,025 to Timber Lake Corporation was approved to help pay for design and construction of an infiltration system for collection and treatment of roof runoff from a new arts and crafts building at Camp Timber Lake on Broadstreet Hollow Road, Town of Lexington.
Among loan recipients were Peak Trading, a Hurley-based supplier of stage rigging and climbing gear, who will refinance existing debt and provide working capital; Brian Batista and Sara Loughlin, who will receive a loan to help them purchase Phoenicia Motor Village on Route 28 in Phoenicia, which they will then improve to include five cottages and five motel rooms; RSJB Enterprises of Hurley, who will renovate a former church it is purchasing at 151 Sheryl Street for conversion to the Country Meadows Child Care center, a facility that will accommodate 42 children following the Montessori educational philosophy; and a loan to Kings Town, Inc. for a new stone crusher, cone crusher and related elevators for use at the company’s quarry on Route 28, Town of Kingston.
The CWC has also refurbished its website. Check it out at www.cwconline.org.