Spokane7
59°
October 2, 2011 in Opinion
Smart Bombs: Frequently made mistake
Rather than field questions from the media on the Otto Zehm case, the mayor’s office decided to grill itself. This leads me to my own frequently asked questions on FAQs.
Should FAQs be issued by elected leaders?
Only if they want to look like they’re ducking important and obvious questions.
But aren’t journalists just angry because they didn’t get to spring their “Gotcha!” questions?
This misses the point. FAQs are fine for handling repetitive questions that have been answered many times. They’re awful when used as a first-time response, especially when the answers will be strongly disputed.
The mayor has said she won’t go into any details for fear that this would disrupt legal proceedings. So why bother?
Disrupt proceedings, eh? Like an assistant city attorney disrupting the U.S. attorney’s office probe, which became the basis for feds seeking a meeting with the mayor, council president and the city attorney? Wonder why that was rebuffed?
Good questions.
C-R-A-Z-Y. What’s this world coming to when radical clerics promoting rigid fundamentalism can’t be counted on to stand strong against society’s immoral and blasphemous enticements? First, a trove of pornographic videos is discovered on Osama bin Laden’s computer. Now, there’s news that the recently killed al-Qaida leader in Yemen had a hankering for prostitutes.
But, alas, all is not lost.
Faryal Bhatti, a Christian eighth-grader in a Pakistan school, was accused of blasphemy when she misspelled a word on an Urdu language test, according to the International Herald Tribune. Unbeknownst to the girl, the mistake yielded a slur against Islam. Apparently, this mistake posed a grave threat, because prayer leaders condemned the girl and male students called for criminal charges. Ultimately, school leaders expelled the girl for her innocent error.
So, the rigidly religious can relax (if that’s possible), because the world is still safe for radical fundamentalism and its hypocritical leaders.
Damned if he don’t. How can you tell President Obama wants to grab your guns? He hasn’t, that’s how.
You see, it’s part of the president’s massive conspiracy to get re-elected in 2012 by taking the gun issue off the table, according to Wayne LaPierre, president of the National Rifle Association, who laid bare the president’s purported plot in a recent speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference.
“So when he got elected, they concocted a scheme to stay away from the gun issue, lull gun owners to sleep and play us for fools in 2012. Well, gun owners are not fools and we are not fooled,” LaPierre exclaimed.
You sure could’ve fooled me, because during the 2008 presidential election, the NRA issued warnings that strict gun control measures were imminent if Obama were elected. You might recall that this led to a stampede on gun shops as fearful gun owners stocked up on weapons and ammunition.
Now gun owners are being told that the NRA knew all along that nothing would happen for at least four years. Perhaps they can petition LaPierre for refunds on their hasty purchases, and let him know that they won’t be fooled again. But I suspect they’ll cut him a fundraising check instead.
Don’t ask. Don’t tell. Before Congress changed the banking rules on “swipe fees” and overdraft charges, many consumers were hit with even higher costs. Every time you used your credit card, banks charged merchants a fee, which they either ate or passed along to consumers in the form of higher prices. But the new rule, which was implemented Saturday, limits how much banks can charge merchants for swipe fees. So banks are expected to make up the difference by directly charging consumers for using their debit cards. Bank of America has already announced its $5-a-month fee. This transparent arrangement has sparked consumer outrage.
So, where was the anger when the fees were hidden? Well, that answers itself. Consumers didn’t know.
Guess they preferred to be robbed blind.
Now that’s security. Last week I contrasted a local Ponzi scheme with Social Security, but I left out a significant difference. The people who lost money in the alleged Little Loan Shoppe scam will have Social Security benefits to fall back on. Good thing they couldn’t invest their Social Security contributions, too.
Smart Bombs is written by Associate Editor Gary Crooks and appears Sundays on the Opinion page. He can be reached at garyc@spokesman.com or at (509) 459-5026.
Smart Bombs: Greatest generation? Not us 
ChefGus/ John Olsen on October 02 at 6:04 a.m.
Thank you Gary for weighing in on the “Mayors” lack of up front and honest and informed response over a long period of time on the Police and Officer Involved Violence that seems so prevalent in the nation’s Police… and is mirrored here in our city… Testosterone driven rage underlying a large portion of it…. and Rage in response to minimal provocation is not ever necessary… Rage driven by fear of loss of control is not ever a pretty outcome… It is as if our citizens are trapped in a very bad, very abusive marriage… with the “Police” all too often playing the part of the abusive spouse…. ALL of the classic “symptoms and signs” are there… from the Abuse Cycle… to denial on the part of the Abuser…to the reticence of those being abused to speak out… to those that are in power and have an ability to recognize and speak out (The aware family members)… Our city leaders… including all on the city council and the county commission are culpable…. and continue to seem surprised that the Abuse is ending in the death of, and creating a life of fear for the “family”….. I could go on..but read any book on Emotional and Physical abuse and you will be amazed at the metaphorical parallels… best dr john
ChefGus/ John Olsen on October 02 at 6:07 a.m.
I have no way of knowing… but I’d lay “even money” on a bet that Mayor Verner does not even yet realize how she is involved in this “abuse” cycle….. I had a dear friend who worked the King County Crisis line with me twice a week… and one day “Heard her story” being told to her by a woman on the other end of the line… and had an “Epiphany” that she too was in an abusive marriage…… it finally came to her consciousness that she’d been stuffing all of the “truth” in her own life…. j
greenlibertarian on October 02 at 9:27 a.m.
The anti-gun Brady Center has said Obama did more in support of NRA issues in ONE year, than GWB did in his entire term.
Gun nuts are delusional.
misjustice on October 02 at 9:32 a.m.
Chef, as you know, those of us that venture onto the SR threads are frequently told to stuff it by those committing the abuse; we are constantly told that the problem is us, the citizens, not them, the abusers. If we weren’t so out of control they wouldn’t have to hurt us. Classic.
And while the current Mayor was not in office when Otto was killed she certainly had/has the power to uncover the lies, to address the cause of the abuse, and to oversee the remedy. Instead, she has failed to use her power to force the remedy and for that, I blame her.
richard on October 02 at 10:45 a.m.
When do you know that the cat is out of the bag; so to speak?
When the only way left to defend the Obama administration is to declare that Obama has not taken guns from Aamericans.
That is very telling.
But what Gary failed to do, while on the subject of guns, was to underline the fact that he - through his head of Justice - got into the gun-selling business … to Mexican drug cartels - which to date have resulted in the deaths of around 145 people, including a border patrol officer.
Again, very telling of the state of affairs in American, 2011. And the state of media’s love affair with Barack Obama.
I am glad, however, that Gary has finally come to understand the costs to American consumers, AKA, taxpayers, who end up paying for those damn once-a-month $5 fees for use of debit cards. He declares that we are being “robbed blind”.
Now, if Gary could also figure out that “taxing the “greedy, filthy rich” (business owners) has the identical effect of (robbing us blind) when those costs of higher taxes are imposed on us.
Actually, I am sure that Gary does understand that these two scenarios have identical outcomes (the costs are passed on to “us”).
There is also a difference between the two scenarios. Those damnable $5 per month fees are going to the “greedy, filthy rich” … while the higher taxes on those same greedy bankers is going to… .the Obama adminstration; where it will serve the dual purposes of “stimulating” the economy (again) AND funneling these funds into his weakening base (unions, Goldman Sachs, ACCORN-like community organizers, etc) so he can have a do-over in 2012.
I have to think this last scenario is a whole lot more than just “robbing us blind”; but I am understandably restrained from being too explicit on a public forum. I will simply leave it to the readers imagination.
greenlibertarian on October 02 at 9:03 p.m.
http://www.bradycampaign.org/media/press/view/1218
ChefGus/ John Olsen on October 03 at 7:01 a.m.
MisJ… beg to differ slightly with you… the “Current Mayor” was actually in office, and had taken her oath…. serving with Mayor West/Hession as a City Council member…. and it is my distinct feeling that City Council of Spokane is also complicit “Los Todos”/All of them… by failure to investigate and to act… and there are some very “good” people on the City Council.. truly are… but in a real world… I would “Courts Martial” the whole f bunch… in that sort of venue or perhaps a Federal Trial we could and might actually face the reality of our government and the loss of the effectiveness of our Constitution over time……
This “complicit” act currently in Yemen with the whack job on the American Citizen makes one wonder, if a Drone could come in the front room window of my home too?? Patriot’s act is an abhorrent piece of legislation, signed again by our current “agent for change” in whom I am so very very deeply disappointed…. Captain John
misjustice on October 03 at 9:55 a.m.
Chef, you don’t have to beg, my friend! I understand you putting a fine point on my comment(s).
Probably the ONLY good thing to come from Otto’s homicide is the bright light that has exposed the cover-up/corruption/misfeasance that infects City Hall and the SPD.
“This town needs an enema!”
estatetracker on November 06 at 11:59 a.m.
FAQ’s are just that, but asked by whom and for what end—then becomes the underlying question.
More often than not FAQ’s are those questions being asked by the author of the FAQ in an attempt to reframe the problem that led to the question instead of building and arena of discourse where genuine questions and answers might lead to a solution of the underlying problem.
FAQ’s are rabbit holes meant to diffuse, difflect, and subvert an understanding of the issue at hand—a pedagogy to opress.