Saturday 5 November 2011

Andy Rooney

Andy Rooney has passed.

I have this short list of journalists and news people that I have respected over the past fifty-odd years.

There's Paul Harvey, who knew how to explain a pretty difficult story in 90 seconds or less.  He preached to you on Saturdays and gave a dose of Americanism that you needed.

There was Harry Reasoner who gave out straight facts and real news.  He wouldn't have touched Brittney Spears with a ten-foot pole or ever even mentioned Bigfoot.

There was Frank Reynolds from ABC, who could sum up a big mess in forty words, and leave you relaxed because it really wasn't as big a mess as the other dimwits were portraying a story.

And then came Andy Rooney.  He didn't really cover news....he just picked out topics and gave you the 1948 view of reality over a modern-day topic.  For some reason....his 1948-view was precisely what we needed.

To be honest, we are coming to an end-point where there just aren't any more journalists.....just wannabe folks who pretend to be journalists.

The Missing "Juans"

The Feds came to Bama this week....and said they had a legal interest in knowing possible civil rights violations.  The curious thing....this new investigation involves Bama schools.  They want to know just about everything you can imagine in statistics....with every single school in Bama.  All of this has to deal with the anti-illegal law that Bama put into play earlier this year.

The Bama legal folks stood up and said they would be ok with providing this info....once the federal government lawsuit is finished (one way or another).  The Feds, for all general purposes, have said that the state lacks the authority to have a anti-immigration law.

I'm guessing this week....there will be a court-ordered deal where some federal judge says the legal request by the Attorney General is legit, and Bama should comply.  Bama will quickly walk up to another Federal judge and likely get a stay on this deal.....until a third federal judge can determine if the request is really valid or not.  You would get the impression that federal judges are kept busy these days having read, re-read, and then lay out various interpretations of the law.  No more goofing off or playing golf on Thursday afternoon.

I sat down and looked at what data the Attorney General was requesting.  It's a pretty big request.  They want every single public school in Bama to report with a list of alll enrolled students as of the last week of September.  Then they want another list of all kids who left from the school since the school year started.  Then they want the reason why the kids quit or left since school started.  Then they want a list of all kids who have at least one unexplained absence since the end of September.  Then they want the school to list the race of each kid in school  Then they want the original country of origin of each kid in school.  And then they want the English language ability of each kid on a list (the most difficult one, because some kids don't speak true English).

Having grown up in the Bama school system....allow me to offer some insightful analysis.  There were three folks in the head office of my school.  There was Mr "Joe" (the principal), Mr "Little Joe" (the vice-principal), and Wanda (the secretary).

Seventy-five percent of Mr "Little Joe's" job was discipline.  I think he literally walked from 0730 in the morning from one mess to another.  Any kid with a infraction....ended up in his office....and he dealt with them in a pretty precise fashion.  If you had to have an investigation....he was the guy running it.

"Mr Joe"?  He was generally there to handle teacher complaints or parent complaints.  I think he could pretty well fill in half the hours of the day in private meetings and sorting various problems out.

"Wanda"?  She was there to sign every note that a kid brought in from the parents to explain why they were out for five days.  Her signature was vital....otherwise, it wasn't legit.  Wanda just signed them.....she never kept a single copy or reported to anyone.  The kid would take that note around to his teachers throughout the day to explain things.  Odds were....he only gave the home-room teacher a look, and maybe one teacher throughout the rest of the day.

So I looked back at this list of data.  Personally, it'll shock me if most schools maintain some kind of data listing like this.  Frankly, they might have to go back to the kids and ask some stupid questions.  I can imagine this scene of "Mr Little Joe" confronting me and asking me my country of origin, and I respond England.  I'd likely stand there and grin.....and he'd likely be at a point of weakness....and just accept that.  My other associates?  Some might have been more creative and said they were originally from Russia, Mongolia, or maybe even Iceland.  By the end of the day...."Mr Little Joe" would have returned and spent four hours putting this all into some spreadsheet, or he might have found some 10th grader that he'd just give them a school project and hope they did it right.

The unexplained absences?  Hopefully, the 2011 "Wanda" keeps a copy of these notes.  If not, then you have to visit every single teacher.  So, you can imagine this listing.  Donny stayed out two days.....hauling soybeans to Lawrenceberg for his dad, the farmer.  Karl stayed home one day helping his dad dig up the septic tank.  Lynn spent half a day out....getting a tattoo removed that Mom never blessed in the first place.  Bobby was out for a full week....attending a alcohol rehab session in Montana.

So you can imagine 1526 schools (I checked) across Alabama.  You can imagine 1526 spreadsheets being sent to the Attorney General's office.  From this list....over 730,000 kids are listed.  You can imagine ten lawyers trying to analyze this massive amount of data.  They start asking stupid questions....why are so many guys out hauling soybeans?  Why are 122 students in some kind of alcohol rehab episode?  Why are 16 kids missing and having their tattoos removed?   Why are forty-four kids from Mongolia?  Where did these 1,226 Icelandic kids come from?

I can imagine these ten idiot lawyers sitting in a DC office for an entire week....and then coming to this conclusion....none of this data makes any sense.  So they try to associate every single Latino out of this list.  Somewhere down the line....they end up with this list of 2,323 Latinos who fell off the Bama listing.  So they search now for the 2,323 Latino kids.

You can imagine these fancy lawyers showing up in some Bama community and asking stupid questions about what happened to Juan.  No one trusts the guy.  So there's no information flowing.  The DC lawyers spend three weeks in Bama trying to track down the 2,323 missing "Juans".  By the end of this episode....there's not much to reveal.  However, the lawyers will all note that they gained eight pounds during this period.....eating mostly high-on-the-hog.  They also met some fine Bama gals, who gave them their phone numbers.  They got invited to a Auburn football game.  They also ate some fine catfish over at the Catfish Cabin.  They were entertained by various guitar pickers and banjo players.  They got religion via some revival that they attended.  They sipped some great spring water in "dry counties" where alcohol is forbidden.  And they were stopped at least twice each and asked by Bama law enforcement what country of origin they are.....and if they could produce an ID.

For some reason, I don't see much coming out of this episode.

Only in Bama.