New York Times on 9/11 Fund (registration required)

I did not really like it when the U. S. established a victims compensation fund for the 9/11 attacks. There has never been a victim's fund set up similar to this before. There are over 6500 people a day who die. While certainly this terrorist attack was tragic, why do the people who died in it get compensation while people who got hit by a truck, or robbed and killed, get nothing? How about Oklahoma City victims, or the U. S. S. Cole victims?

So I remember, we set up the compensation fund to bail out the airlines. They cannot afford to operate their businesses, much less pay to defend themselves against lawsuits. American taxpayers are not only going to bail them out for having a horrible business plan, but we are also going to bail them out for letting lax security exist for years, when people in the FAA have been warning them about the consequences of such actions for years. Republicans complain about supporting people mired in poverty, saying that were not communists. Everybody must be able to support him or herself. Well, maybe except for huge corporations, with CEOs making millions of dollars a year. We will support them. But that is another entry all together.

Now we have a victim's fund established. I don't hear much in the way of thanks. I hear about people taking advantage of it. I hear about people complaining it is not enough. The people we are giving money think we are not doing enough. They forget to be grateful. If they sued, they would spend the rest of their lives trying to get money from bankrupt airlines. Many seem to not be happy. They forget that the families of the 6500 people who die a day in the U. S. are not happy, and they are not getting anything.

Now I read about the Cantor Fitzgerald company, who lost many employees in the terrorist attck.. They are unhappy about the distribution to high wage earners. This would be people who earn more than $230,000 a year. Kenneth Feinberg, the funds special master, has made it clear that while people earning $230,000 a year will get about $4.5 million dollars, he does not think that people earning more will get much more than that. Cantor Fitzgerald is not happy? With $4.5 million, most of their families will be living the American dream. I don't see them clipping coupons and sending their kids to trade school. Sure they would rather have their family member back, but so would the 6500 families who lose somebody everyday, but will not be receiving $4.5 million. Many of them will be clipping coupons and sending kids to trade schools.

Overlawyered.com had a good suggestion for such high wage earners:

We might add that if top-earning families want to feel secure in their living standards in case of disaster, the logical (and socially desirable) course is for them to make provision in advance through privately purchased insurance -- which we suspect most of the higher-ups at places like Cantor Fitzgerald did in fact have in place.

I have been thoroughly disgusted by the greed I have read about regarding the victim's fund. I think we have set a very bad precedent by setting it up. Losses of life will now be followed by requests for victim's funds. How can the government be expected to set up funds whenever a tragedy occurs? We can barely afford to bail out all private enterprises.

Where does the most greed exist? With the victim's families or the companies? We think the terrorists had a dark side?

7:12:51 PM    comment []

I was never this lucky!

I had teachers in school I would have begged to be kidnapped by! "Please take me out to Las Vegas, fill me with booze, and make me have wild sex with you!" C'mon Miss Hadden! Pleeeaaasssseee!!!"

The boy's mother said at the hearing that her family "went through hell," and that the teacher "violated him (the student) and you violated us"

The male student was at the back of the courtroom yelling, "Mom, shut up! It was really cool!"

Of course this is a double standard. If the teacher was male, he should be strung up. Since the teacher was a female and the student male what was the harm? The boy is better off for it.

The boy's father has volunteered to chaperone the teacher's and boy's next trip."

9:39:41 AM    comment []

Master's members keep quiet.

Members of the Augusta National Golf Club, home of the Master's, have almost all refused to comment on the issue of female members. They have all referred reporters to club spokesman Hootie Johnson. There may be a clause in their membership agreement instructing them to do just that.

While Martha Burke of the National Council of Women's Organizations cannot stand that, I have no problem with it. A private club with no public funding that pays taxes should be able choose their members. Co-ops in New York do it, so why not a private golf club?

Lou Holtz, recently invited to be a member, addressed the controversy this way:

"My wife has played there and so did a thousand other women last year. I don't know where the no-women policy is. . . . I don't want to hear 'no women,' because my wife has played there."

My question to Martha Burke would not be about why this issue is more important to women than spousal abuse, or women in Afghanistan being systematical repressed, or any other hundreds of topics that I would find more important. It would be, "How much in tax revenue will her little crusade cost the U. S. and the State of Georgia?" The Masters is a "for profit" golf tournament. It pays taxes on the revenue it generates. Since all sponsors have been dropped to keep them from being badly portrayed by Ms. Burke, is her organization willing to make up the lost tax revenue?

9:39:38 AM    comment []