SOME KENTUCKY BROADCAST THOUGHTS

The Courier-Journal recently ran a story that its market had the 7^th highest number of TV commercials for attorneys among top markets in the US.  When I mentioned this to a Lexington TV executive his answer was..."Only because Lexington wasn’t surveyed!”

My daughters tell me a local radio station, and one in Louisville, have  been playing nothing but Xmas music since the day after Halloween.  This is beyond stupid; it is UNAmerican. If true, (there is no way I will search the local dial to find out; sorry—maybe on 12/15…) I hope their staffs are getting hazard pay...and psychological counseling.

I was watching the PBS NewsHour tudder night when it was interrupted constantly by the loss of both video and audio.  I started counting the dropouts and when I got to 60 called KET. The receptionist said its picture was clear, so I called Time Warner cable, which I how I got the program.  A nice lady answered, in Florence, Ky., which means after business hours TWC appears to have NO ONE locally to answer our calls. She did NOT know of the problem, but checked and, in time reported “massive outages in N. Ky., S Indiana, Louisville and Lexington.” When I asked didn’t TWC monitor its channels for such problems the answer was “No, we depend on viewer calls to alert us.”

Which, IMHO, is a helluva way to run any business.

LFUCG, are you listening?

How many channels does the SEC Network have? I have seen references to: SEC, SEC overtime, SEC alternative, SEC secondary, and several more.  I THINK it only has two, but given the various references, by different names, on local TV and in print, I am not sure. Can our local media not get together (with the network) and agree on the same set of terms to avoid viewer confusion…and more watching for them?

I'm just sayin'...

THANK YOU KIM DAVIS

For helping us, once again, at least think about “nepotism”..the practice of hiring relatives for jobs, just because you can.

The Rowan county clerk, at the heart of the marriage license for same sex couples  issue, helped refocus on that issue. While elected, she got her start in the clerk’s office when her mother, the former clerk, hired her. Kim returned the favor by hiring her son.

A recent report by the Kentucky Center for Investigative Reporting, published in the Herald-Leader, points out no one keeps track of nepotism in the Commonwealth but its investigation showed 75 of our 120 counties allow it, and at least 50 have. State law gives local governments the power to set their own rules here.

That’s a baddd idea.

In too many cases there are obvious conflicts of interest, the building up of local political dynasties, and in four cases, outright stealing of public funds was found to be the case. In a dozen other counties, some variation of violation of state laws took place by those hired in a “family way.”

The report quotes one of our better legislators as pointing out some poorer counties use nepotism as a “state sponsored jobs program.”  And thus each hire is at least one vote keeping this obsolete practice.

Given the “real” problems the state has..pensions, roads, education, etc..I’m not holding my breath for any changes in the next legislature…indeed, Kim Davis may well spark bad changes in our laws..as the popular heroine she is to some.

But it’s a bad tradition, and Kentucky will just not come into its full potential until it’s eliminated and by a statewide law banning the practice.

I'm just sayin'...

OUR OLDEST ALLY…SOME HISTORY

Yes, France is our oldest ally, and we Americans share the Paris tragedy, too.

Back in the days of our Revolution, France came to our aid at a crucial time. Wise old Ben Franklin, the colonies representative in Paris, had worked years trying to get France, Britain’s arch enemy, to enter that war on our side.

The king finally did so, and as British Gen. Cornwallis faced Washington’s troops at Yorktown, up sailed the French fleet, cutting off Cornwallis’ retreat or resupply.  He surrendered; the war was effectively over and America was a new nation.

We have repaid that debt during WW I & II, as allies should and over the years France and the US have often stood united..in war but also in times of tragedy and need.

“I am Charlie!”  Remember those signs during another Paris terrorism event earlier this year.

France has been attacked more than any other nation because it is free and open. “Liberty, equality, fraternity”—it’s national motto means something, but it has made France an easy target for the disaffected, and the barbaric.

Lexington has a direct connection to France. Our Sister Cities program, 2^nd oldest in the US, has been “twinned” to Deauville, for over 50 years. You can’t have travelled there, as I have a half dozen times without going thru Paris. And you discover in Deauville, a part of Normandy, people still remember the Yanks who liberated them. Deauville students place flowers on GI graves every June 6^th, D-Day.

France’s culture and love of Liberty speaks to many of us. As one guidebook said, on my first trip there, “France is everyone’s second home.”

Vive La France!

A FEW POST ELECTION THOUGHTS:

1—The utter dependence of the major state media on polls, and the utter failure of those polls was never more clear than in Bevin’s win over Conway.
In recent weeks in Canada, polls got wrong the election of their Prime Minister (our President); in England polls got wrong the election of the new leader of their Labour Party (and possible future Prime Minister); in Poland polls got wrong the election of their new President.

And in Kentucky…

So the 4 major media outlets behind the Blue Grass poll thanked the polling firm, said “Goodbye” and we will now try to come up with something new (and  we pray that it will be better!) But they are still relying on polling despite the abysmal failure here.  Who was it who said something like “Insanity is to keep on doing the same thing and hoping for a different result?”

2---The grandfather of all modern political blogs is the old “Washington Merry-Go-Round” of Drew Pearson.  Mr. Pearson, a gentle Quaker, exposed the foibles of public officials, from minor to criminal. For newly elected office holders he gave them one free ride on his Merry-Go-Round for their first mistake.
In an interview with WUKY-FM I said I would do the same for Gov.-elect Bevin. It only took 24 hours.
Then, Mr. Bevin broke his promise, saying he wouldn’t release his tax returns after all.
That’s his free ride. Now, let’s wish him well as he struggles with the much tougher and more important problem of what to do with the needy people on Kynect.

I'm just sayin'... 

CNBC, WE GOTCHA!!!

If you didn’t watch the last GOP presidential debate on the CNBC cable channel, lucky you.

It was bad.

It gave journalism a bad name, and the GOP candidates are rightfully complaining, and want changes in debate rules.

Basically, the complaints center on the questions asked by the CNBC panel. Now, this channel specializes in business and economic news, not politics and it was obvious panel members were not familiar with things they should have known. There were questions asking one candidate to assess the “morals” of another!  Ho, boy.

Of course, the candidates complained about “gotcha” questions. Well, one man’s gotcha is another man’s legit news story...so count me out here..although a few of the questions here bordered on truly irrelevant, and at times even irreverent.

At one point, I loved it, Gov. Christie objected..."We’re talking about fantasy football?  Come on?” Yup, while immigration and tax policy were ignored.

Debates are important and different ground rules are to be expected...but there is a minimum level of competency required of sponsors and panelists…a level not found in the CNBC debate.

That said, let me object to several recent Kentucky debates, where one candidate for governor, Independent Drew  Curtis was excluded. Wrong. That is NOT the function of sponsors or journalists. The state sets the requirements, by law. If they are faulty, change the law. (Sponsors used polls to determine who would be in..flying in the face of 3 recent major polls in Canada, England, and elsewhere that were totally wrong…here one point would have made the difference whether Mr. Curtis was admitted or not..and that one point was well within the margin of error of all the polls used.)

At the same time, I have to be sympathetic to sponsors who blanche at candidates like the late Fifi Rockefeller or Jerome Hamlin...who entered the race for governor for the most spurious of reasons...and to the Toledo TV station who, last week, did an interview with a legal candidate  for mayor...whose answers indicated she was certifiable, and ended by talking in tongues.

Somewhere between CNBC and Drew Curtis there is a happy medium. We journalists need to seek it…NOW...and not wait til the next election shows up OUR problems..or by abdicating our responsibilities, we let the candidates take over.

I'm just sayin'...