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Rev. Jim Lewis has a good post on performing his community service at his blog, Fig Tree Notes:
You may recall, from my last Notes, that I was arrested for trespassing when I refused to leave my congresswoman's office because of her vote supporting the president's plan to send more troops to Iraq. For that, the judge gave me the choice of paying a $50 fine or doing a day's worth of community service. I chose community service.
One e-mail I received after my sentencing read: "I thought you did your community service by sitting in congresswoman Shelley Moore Capito's office." Perhaps, but the judge wanted more than a pound of flesh; he wanted my full weight.
For my community service I chose to work on a Charleston garbage truck. The job seemed fitting, considering the fact that my congresswoman has contributed to the mess in Iraq by having been joined at the hip with Mr. Bush's war policy.
State Sen. Minority Leader Vic Sprouse recently called fellow right winger Chris Stirewalt's blog "well worth a read."
I wonder if Sprouse still feels that way after Stirewalt posted this:
Sen. Vic Sprouse, R- Kanawha, was once considered one of the most electorally-secure Republicans in the West Virginia Legislature, having vanquished two of the best-funded, most ambitious members of the plaintiffs' bar in Charleston: former circuit judge, Supreme Court justice and congressional candidate Margaret Workman and former congressional candidate and multi-term delegate Mark Hunt.
But now that Sprouse's very public estrangement from his former wife has made it to every corner of the Internet universe through he and his former wife's blogs (here and here) Both blogs have largely moved on to other issues and developed large followings in their own right. But the stinging, highly personal online war between the feuding spouses left its political mark.
Sprouse opted not to seek another term as Senate minority leader this session and now his would-be replacements are already lining up.
Soon to be former South Charleston Mayor Richie Robb has already announced his candidacy for Sprouse's senate seat, but now another Democrat has, tentatively at least, gotten into the race. Charleston personal injury lawyer Roger Decanio has announced to his colleagues on the plaintiff's bar that he has filed pre-candidacy papers with the Secretary of State's Office.
Followed by this:
Reader and Indians fan Don Surber thinks he can already make the call on Vic Sprouse's political future: "Vic is a dead man walking. No one will touch him after what he did to his third wife and his son. There are two sides to every story, but ditching a pregnant 24-year-old wife would require a story written by Shakespeare and edited by Homer to overcome -- especially when the baby is born with a bad medical condition."
Me: Maybe so. I don't know. It depends on whether anybody is willing to make political use of the sad story of the senator's marriage and disabled son. If enough voters know about it, it would sink him, but we in the media tend to overestimate the impact of such things.
We've always stayed away from such personal affairs in the past, but when right winger goes after right winger, we can't help but break out the popcorn.
Back to decent people. Steve Adams has a good post on State Police troopers being shuffled around:
The troopers in Pleasants and Wirt Counties were pulled out and ordered to report to Wood County a month ago. The theory behind the move was the SP could provide 24 hour coverage to all three counties. Wirt and Pleasants each had three troopers working eight-hour shifts, and sometimes a trooper was sick and would force the other two to cover.
Under the new plan, all troopers were to be centrally located in Wood County, with certain troopers assigned to take calls from Pleasants and Wirt Counties. There were three problems, if not more, with this plan.
Note to self -- we've got to fix the link in the sidebar to his blog and his new name for it, Feedback.
The Goat Rope blog has the fifth in a thoughtful series on human behavior:
As social animals, we are born with the potential for obedience which then is influenced by our interactions with the larger society. Whatever moral or other inhibitions we have when acting independently become secondary when we are acting as a part of a larger unit:
Therefore when the individual is working on his own, conscience is brought into play. But when he functions in an organizational mode, directions that come from the higher-level component are not assessed against the internal standards of moral judgment.
People in this situation do not see themselves as acting on their own but rather as agents for another person's wishes.
Feel free to pimp your own blog posts or any other blog posts you think might be of interest.
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