News opinion 2008-07-05 Andanh.com

Cable barriers will help save people’s lives Thu, 3 Jul 2008 11:05:47 -0500
Recently a stretch of Interstate 65 between Barren County and Hart County has been the scene of several deadly accidents that have claimed too many lives and we are glad plans are in the works to help reduce these accidents. On Wednesday, Gov. Steve Beshear and state Transportation Secretary Joe Prather announced that the state will spend $10.8 million to add cable barrier cables to highways in five counties. There will be 10.5 miles of the barrier cable added on Interstate 65 from the 52.4 mile marker in Barren County to the 62.9 mile marker in Hart County. This specific section of Interstate 65 was chosen after engineering studies listed it among the most likely for crossover accidents. This area of the road has seen too many lives taken, most recently a March 19 accident, in which five people were killed after a crossover crash. Hopefully these barriers will prevent future accidents and tragedies on this dangerous section of the interstate. Several family members of those killed in the crash attended the event and Beshear told the families that the barriers wouldn’t do anything for their loss, but would do something to prevent other accidents from occurring. These barriers can be effective in preventing accidents, as evident from a study in other parts of the state where barrier cables have been struck 385 times and prevented vehicles from crossing into opposite traffic. It was welcome to hear Prather say that these cables will be put on other dangerous roads in Kentucky in the future. They have been proven to work and anything we can do to save lives and reduce crashes in crossover accidents is something all motorists can get behind.

What Mr. Clark? Thu, 3 Jul 2008 11:06:53 -0500
WASHINGTON — Being shot down may not qualify one to be president, as retired Gen. Wesley Clark infamously said recently. But what men do under fire might tell us about the character we may discover in a president. Clark’s precise words, aimed at undermining John McCain’s executive experience, were: “I don’t think getting in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to become president.” In fairness, Clark also praised McCain’s heroism, saying that he honored his service as a prisoner of war and even that “he was a hero to me.” Predictably, Republicans were outraged and Democrats were outraged at the GOP’s outrage. For his part, Barack Obama performed the political minuet of condemn ‘n’ distance. He condemned the remarks and distanced himself from his surrogate/general. McCain made a few tepid remarks, but mostly let others put Clark in his place. And, though McCain is clearly content to use the iconic image of his younger pilot self for campaign purposes, he also has shrugged off his heroism. “It doesn’t take a great deal of effort to get shot down,” McCain himself is fond of saying. As the news cycle churns, Clark’s comment was yesterday’s chum. It was in poor taste, yes, but it wasn’t the first time he had expressed similar thoughts. National Review’s Byron York blogged in March that Clark viewed McCain’s combat experience as inferior to Hillary Clinton’s qualifications for office. “If you look at what Hillary Clinton has done during her time as the first lady of the United States, her travel to 80 countries, her representing the U.S. abroad, plus her years in the Senate, I think she’s the most experienced and capable person in the race,” York quotes Clark as saying. Ahem. Well. So much for that. Now that Clark is a military adviser to Obama, he apparently is still skeptical about McCain’s qualifications. Let’s concede that surviving torture doesn’t necessarily endow one with presidential mettle. And, fine, being shot down doesn’t qualify one to direct the executive branch. But Clark misses the point of McCain’s story. McCain isn’t a hero because he was tortured. He’s a hero because he declined an offer by his captors to be released, refusing to leave his fellow Americans behind. It may not take much effort to get shot down, but it must take a considerable act of will to consign oneself to more deprivation and torture. It must take a level of courage unknown to most to place concern for others above one’s own interest. Surely self-sacrifice, courage and loyalty figure somewhere in the calculus for selecting a president. We can make no similar analysis of Obama, since he hasn’t fought in any wars in his lifetime. But we have been given a glimpse at how Obama responds to external pressures and where he draws the line on loyalty and self-sacrifice. When it comes to family and friends, it seems Obama is first a survivalist. A few months ago, when the Rev. Jeremiah Wright first came to national attention, Obama was nearly demure when he said: “I can no more disown (Wright) than I can disown my white grandmother.” He may not have disowned his white grandmother, but Obama didn’t exactly paint a sympathetic - or loving - portrait of her either. He essentially threw her under the bus, saying that she had made racist remarks while he was growing up, a statement that served only to highlight Obama’s own remarkable transcendence. After several weeks of balancing his professed love for Wright with the controversial statements of his chosen father figure and spiritual mentor, Obama eventually left his church of 20 years. But why then, after all those years, did Obama finally find the door? What changed was the degree of his self-interest. As long as Wright was helping Obama burnish his bona fides within the African-American community, it didn’t matter that the minister’s rhetorical flights of fancy bordered on paranoid, racist delusion. Only when Wright became a potential obstacle to Obama’s ambition - by saying that Obama was simply behaving as a politician - did Obama show Wright the underside of that very busy bus. Clark is right that getting shot down doesn’t qualify one to be commander in chief. But it is relevant to wonder with whom one would rather share a foxhole.

Can Obama possibly rescue Bush’s legacy? Thu, 3 Jul 2008 11:06:54 -0500
Breaking news! The ultimate White House insider plans a tell-all book about the Bush years. Boasting unprecedented access to the president’s thinking, it will run counter to almost everything we’ve been told about Bush’s radical presidency. Who will be the latest to break the code of silence after former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan? George W. Bush. At least that’s what went through my mind listening to the president during a meeting with a small group of journalists in the Oval Office on Monday. The session, maddeningly and often foolishly punctuated by long, off-the-record musings and soliloquies, mostly dealt with foreign policy. That’s hardly surprising. At the end of their run, presidents usually become preoccupied with world affairs - an area in which they have a much freer hand. On Capitol Hill these days, the only way a Bush proposal will see the light of day is if it arrives concealed in a pizza delivery box. Dressed in a pale blue suit with a crisp blue tie, the president seemed to be in high spirits as he discussed developments in North Korea and other diplomatic initiatives, crushing my hopes for a poignant “Bush in winter” column. “When I write my book,” the president teased, people will understand how much behind-the-scenes diplomacy went on during this administration. I’m sure he’s right. In fact, if only a fraction of what he had to say was accurate, then the conventional bleats about unilateralism, war lust and cowboyishness will go down in history as the excessive caterwauling of an imaginative and hyper-partisan opposition. Indeed, President Bush’s reputation is not as solidified as his detractors and fans think. If Iraq becomes a stable and democratizing nation, his presidency will look much better than it does today. But if Iraq Balkanizes or Lebanon-izes, then Democratic rhetoric about the “worst foreign policy blunder in U.S. history” will gain descriptive heft. Only time will tell. But whether it is ultimately deemed a failure or a success, there is one inconvenient fact of the Bush presidency that should prove dismaying to those who’ve invested so much in demonizing it: It isn’t that special. Many of its supposedly radical features fit neatly in the mainstream of American presidential history. Extraordinary rendition? That practice (in which we send suspected terrorists to foreign countries to be interrogated under laxer rules) began under President Clinton. Aggressive interrogations, for good or ill, surely predate 2001. Holding prisoners indefinitely at Guantanamo without benefit of a trial? As terrorism expert Andrew C. McCarthy notes in National Review, we were doing that under the first President Bush and under Clinton to innocent Haitian refugees, who got even less due process than we give captured enemy combatants. Even the invasion of Iraq will probably seem to historians, in part, a continuation of trends begun in the Persian Gulf War and extended by Clinton’s (and Britain’s) attacks in 1998. On the domestic front, Bush broadly expanded federal spending on education, signed campaign finance reform and orchestrated a huge expansion of health-care entitlements with his prescription drug benefit. Whatever the merits of those policies, it’s unlikely historians will see them as a radical, right-wing break from the Clinton years. The more interesting question is how radical a break from the Bush years the next president will represent. If John McCain wins the election, the continuity will be more obvious. McCain would inch leftward on most domestic issues, and rightward on a few. He doubtless would continue the efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, though his methods might vary. The larger question is about Barack Obama, who at times promises revolutionary, if not messianic, change. With a potentially huge Democratic majority in Congress, Obama might indeed produce a radical change from the Bush (and Clinton and Bush and Reagan) years on domestic issues. But what about Iraq? A growing chorus of foreign policy experts, including Timothy Lynch and Robert Singh (co-authors of “After Bush: The Case for Continuity in American Foreign Policy”) and the New Yorker’s George Packer, are starting to argue - much as Obama’s own foreign policy advisors have for a while - that his foreign policy promises will not survive contact with post-election reality. Already, Obama is changing his tune from his old, irresponsibly heated rhetoric about “immediate” withdrawal to talking about the need for policies that would adapt to the improving conditions in Iraq. Given Obama’s ideological leanings and inexperience, there’s clearly plenty of potential for him to make costly mistakes. But odds are he, too, would come to realize that America needs to win the war on terror and succeed in Iraq. Hence the greatest irony. A successful Obama presidency would have the unintended consequence of making Bush’s memoir a success story.

Follow the money Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:03:00 EST
Even if you just read the headlines, you know that Seven Counties had been forced to cut people and programs that are supposed to help the mentally ill and disabled, that public defenders must sue to get the help they need in taking on poor clients, and that state police are scaling back patrols and setting up checkpoints to cope with the impact of gasoline prices on an inadequate budget.

A great American patriot, Osi Onyekwuluje Thu, 03 Jul 2008 23:26:00 EST
When did you come here?

10 things that might surprise you about the Constitution Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:07:00 EST
As we celebrate the Declaration of Independence and the nation's founding, it is also a time to think about the Constitution. Here are 10 things about it that you may not know.

Singing under the stars Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:08:00 EST
Early in July 1946 Iroquois Amphitheater reopened. It had been closed at the beginning of World War II because of gasoline rationing. At that time, it was considered pretty far from town and gas-consuming.

July 4 wish list Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:04:00 EST
As we celebrate the Fourth of July, let us be thankful for what we have as a nation and hopeful that we can improve.

Readers' views Thu, 03 Jul 2008 04:11 EDT

Underage riders on scooters pose danger on roads

To legally ride my motorcycle on public roads, I had to prove I could operate it safely to receive a license from the state. I have to have proof of insurance and display a license plate. I wear a helmet because I choose to. I have to obey all traffic laws as if I was in a car.

No problem, but why do I see almost every day kids way too young to get a license riding scooters in the middle of traffic? Is there a different law regarding scooters from motorcycles?

These kids . some look younger than 12. are shooting through turning lanes, doing 15 mph on New Circle Road and generally endangering themselves.

Amendment wasn't always first on rights list Fri, 04 Jul 2008 03:18 EDT

As we celebrate the nation's founding, it is also a time to think about the U.S. Constitution. Here are 10 things about it that you may not know:

. The entire Constitution applies only to government. That means students at a private university have no First Amendment right to peacefully demonstrate on campus, while students at a public college have such protection. If you work in the private sector, you cannot wear a button supporting a candidate while on the job if your employer objects.

. From 1791, when the Bill of Rights was ratified, until the 20th century, those amendments restrained only the federal government. Any state could abridge those fundamental rights. In 1937, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the murder conviction and death sentence of a man Connecticut tried twice for the same crime, in violation of the Fifth Amendment's double-jeopardy clause. The court said the amendment didn't apply; he was executed.

. When Congress proposed the Bill of Rights, what we know today as the First Amendment was listed third. It moved up to its exalted position only because the first two amendments were not ratified at the time.

Unfinished business: going back to Iraq Fri, 04 Jul 2008 03:18 EDT

I am proud to be deploying again to Iraq. I believe in this mission, and I have served in it already. I've been out of active duty from the Army for 20 months, but recently received mobilization orders for at least another 400 days there. I am honored and blessed to have another chance to be a part of this vital mission.

We have made tremendous progress in Iraq because of President Bush's courageous commitment to stand firm. He has been abandoned by many politicians, but he has not wavered. Someday people will consider him a great president because of this. He ordered the surge just when it looked like the Democrats were going to bring us defeat last year, and the results have been extraordinary.

The surge has saved American lives, with our casualties down in May to the lowest monthly number of the whole mission. Just over a year ago, there were more than 60 suicide bombings a month in Baghdad. Now there are fewer than 10. All other measures of violence have dropped just as dramatically. Anbar province had been written off as lost to al-Qaida in Iraq a couple years ago. Now Anbar goes for weeks at a time without incident.

Our offensives against the terrorists have been extremely effective. Between October and December, 258 senior al-Qaida in Iraq leaders were killed or captured, and now we average 32 a month.

City's call on CentrePointe Thu, 03 Jul 2008 04:11 EDT

Around Kentucky D3

Busines

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Lottery D3

Obituaries D4

Weather D12

Your Health D12

Make it a double ... Thu, 03 Jul 2008 08:08 EDT

Publisher’s Notebook: Growing old gracefully a matter of attitude
Athough I've had to endure a lot of old man, senior citizens jokes the last couple of days, I'm pretty stoked about turning 50.

CHEERS and JEERS: Welcome to Barren’s greatest week
Everything has fallen into place this year to make this the best week to be in Barren County.

Fourth offers many escapes
By the time most of you sit down to read this, the weekend will be upon us.

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