Thursday, December 31, 2009

Benign Neglect 2009


The Little Rock media, both social and unsocial, have taken stock of the state of our state for 2009. Northwest Arkansas got off easy, probably because the metropolitan Punditry of Pulaski find us easy to ignore in their view of the world, but we can be thankful whatever the reason.

Longtime political observer and cultural critic Bob Lancaster's 2009 Best and Worst of Arkansas in the current issue of the Arkansas Times let's us off easy, at least as easy as one can when mentioning Chickendale. "Business Week magazine said in November that Springdale was the best town in Arkansas for raising children. Maybe so. At least Springdale police don't taser 10-year-old girls." The rest of us up here? We are not worthy.

Blake Rutherford's Think Tank offered an assessment of the Best and Worst of 2009 Politics and Blogging. In the only nod to our little corner of the state, he did give the Most Notorious Arkansas Political Figure award to Benton County's State Senator Kim Hendren. Hendren's national media attention from his unapologetic characterization of U.S. Senator Charles Schumer as "that Jew" would be hard to top.

Never fear, my friends. We will get much more attention in the Worst rankings of the 2010 retrospectives. It is an election year.

10 comments:

  1. .
    "Chickendale!" we the metro faithful of this town are taking umbrage at your deliberate misspellings. Lest you forget the town has swallowed up Tontitown plus Knob Hill and other smaller towns and is thus properly referred to as

    ..............Chickenopolis.

    .

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  2. .

    While on the subject of Chickenopolis local bloggers will be pleased to learn that Springdale FOI has spun off a new, improved blog site. Insider info has begun to flow. Seems Web, aka, Chicken-a-la-King has already issued warnings to the faithful not to visit the site.

    click on eLwood.

    .

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  3. Jonah, we need something new to discuss

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  4. .

    Boozman hits the campaign trail

    Protecting Americans Against the Threat of Terrorism

    Recent events prove that more than eight years after 9/11, the threat of terrorism here in the United States is still very real. Preventing terrorist efforts in our country is a continuous and daily effort, but the attempted bombing of a United States bound airplane on Christmas Day has exposed failures in our security.

    Because of little more than luck, this terrorist attack attempt failed, but it serves as a reminder that there are people in our world who want to harm our country and its citizens....

    Like many of you, I am concerned about the transfer of terrorists held at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility to U.S. soil. I have voted to keep the terrorists in the facility at Guantanamo Bay, not on U.S. soil, and have worked to prevent funding from being used to transfer the detainees currently housed there to the U.S. (That's Boozer's favorite vote "NO")

    (Now the pitch)-
    By passing the Keep Terrorists Out of America Act, as well as H.R. 4127, which would require terrorists and illegal enemy combatants who are not U.S. Citizens be tried in military tribunals and not civilians courts, we can prevent the transfer or release of terrorists and illegal enemy combatants into the U.S. and prevent them access to civilian courts.

    And that's all the news in the HOMELAND.

    .

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  5. Aub is right. Your neglect may be benign but there surely have been issues you consider worthy of your wise comment in the past 26 DAYS,

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  6. Aub is right. Your neglect may be benign but there surely have been some issues you wanted to comment on in the past 26 days! I come to this site several times a day to read your wise words with a view we can't get anywhere else.

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  7. possible topics: another ice storm is on its way...what's the new disaster plan look like?

    Biker festivals...an examination of how they're in fact subsidized by taxpayers. Police OT, clean-up costs, A&P conflicts of interest.

    Sex slave commerce in NWArk.

    We miss the old Iconoclast

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  8. Apologies for not meeting expectations. Between a divorce, a pink slip, and an unexplained rash, our staff has been distracted of late. Just got the prescription refilled for 100mg of Fukitol, so we should be back in bidness soon.

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  9. Fukitrol? If I had been given a prescription for that a few years ago, I wouldn't owe all that child support and alimony and stray lawsuit judgments for never showing up at the wedding or the second date.
    Does it counteract the effects of viagara and all those crap drugs the hormone-deprived pansies take? Any man who can't find a woman to put a stop to a four-hour erection desires to walk around with his hat over his crotch the rest of the day.

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