Representative William Jefferson How strong is the case against Louisiana's Representative William Jefferson? According to numerous press accounts, after videotaping Jefferson receiving a $100,000 bribe from an FBI informant, the government executed a search warrant of his home and found $90,000 of that money hidden in his freezer. In another case, a Kentucky businessman pleaded guilty to paying Jefferson $400,000 in bribes for official favors; and one of the congressman's key staff members has already entered a guilty plea to aiding and abetting the bribery of a public official.

 

It’s been almost a year since the Supreme Court decided in Kelo v. New London that bureaucrats may seize homes and businesses through eminent domain and transfer the land to private developers in the name of economic progress. Although the Constitution says government may only condemn land for “public use,” the court held that this term means the same thing as “public purpose” or “public benefit.” Thus whenever a city council thinks it would benefit the public to snatch a house or small business and give it to Costco or Home Depot or any other company, they may do so, and courts will not intervene.

Americans reacted with outrage to the decision, and urged state officials to pass laws protecting them from eminent domain. But so far this backlash has achieved mixed results.

Justice Antonin ScaliaOn March 28, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia took his seat at the nation’s highest court to hear Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. His task, along with the other justices, was to determine whether Salim Hamdan, a captured enemy combatant, should be afforded a fair and basic trial. The court would hear, for the first time, arguments from both sides over whether Hamdan should be afforded basic due process rights as a war-time detainee – an outcome that would establish a dramatic precedent in American law governing times of war.

The lawyers for Hamdan knew they were facing an uphill battle. But the problem wasn’t in their argument. It was in persuading a justice who had already made up his mind about the issue.

 

The president’s recent prime-time address focused on illegal immigration, and has provided America with a unique opportunity to discuss this polarizing, hot-button issue in a rational way. While I support the idea of temporary National Guard assistance to secure the chaos at the border, we know that such action only briefly treats one symptom of a much larger problem.

I recently found myself in Atlanta. Most conventioneers take the taxi from the airport to downtown, but since I was traveling on the largess of the Company, a buck-75 MARTA train ride felt more responsible than a $20 cab fare.

And so it was that I emerged from the caverns beneath Peachtree Plaza, squinting into the afternoon sun, searching among the canyons of steel and cement for my hotel.

“Where ya headed?”

He was five-foot-nothin’ and dressed in the somewhat ragged attire we used to discourage the kids from wearing in public. 
My article that ran in this publication three weeks ago about how the city of Davenport was marketing itself has led to a significant response, and it’s running about six-to-one in support of what was said (23 positive and four negative). (See “Davenport Marketing Can’t Overcome City’s Deficiencies, River Cities’ Reader Issue 577, April 19-25, 2006.)

Interestingly enough, during one telephone call from a rather prominent Quad Citian providing me with feedback, I learned of an effort to develop a comprehensive “commerce” effort for the Quad Cities. This effort would involve private enterprise funds, and would combine the efforts of all of the cities’ major chambers, including DavenportOne. This was confirmed by a second person.


Kevin Krause showed last week that he knows how to orchestrate good drama, and that he has a decent sense of humor. Not since Boston Red Sox General Manager Theo Epstein made his escape in a gorilla suit last Halloween has a simian played such a major role in baseball shenanigans.

When Krause, president and general manager of the Swing of the Quad Cities, sent in the team’s mascot to deliver a check for $367,000 to Mayor Ed Winborn, he knew that the absurdity of the situation would make people forget some of the serious issues that had been raised recently.

sharpe2 Free Radio Berkeley and KBLT-Los Angeles are two of the more storied pirate-radio operations of the late 20th Century. Stephen Dunifer and Sue Carpenter fought federal regulations and, for a time, ran their own radio stations without a license.  Pirates still flourish in some corners of the country, but the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is often quick to pull the plug.
A close friend of mine is a police officer in one of those Minneapolis suburbs that remind one so much of Bettendorf or Pleasant Valley. Not much crime, mostly helping neighbors with accident reports of fender benders, directing traffic at high-school football games, chasing kids home on Saturday nights.
Economic development and education are intrinsically linked; one is not successful without the other. Public education relies on tax dollars produced by a good economy, while economic growth cannot occur without a strong, well-educated workforce.

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