To some Robert Hartwig is a “man of integrity”, others (like me) think he is a sociopath. Behavioral economist Dan Ariely solves the mystery for us all on his blog. Thanks teach! 🙂
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Alternative New Media for the Gulf South
To some Robert Hartwig is a “man of integrity”, others (like me) think he is a sociopath. Behavioral economist Dan Ariely solves the mystery for us all on his blog. Thanks teach! 🙂
sop
On this wet, cold and getting colder January day, the Mississippi State Supreme Court turned on the heat — and the otherwise dignified Chief Justice William Waller, Jr. gave the State’s hitch-up-your-britches Governor a wedgie when he officially broke the news:
The Mississippi Supreme Court, in a unanimous ruling, said Friday that Gov. Haley Barbour does not have the constitutional authority to cut the budget of the state’s court system.
Governors have been legislatively enabled to cut the budget to ensure Constitutional compliance; however, the State law says the governor can’t cut any program’s budget by more than five percent until he has cut every program’s budget by that amount.
The Supreme Court’s En Banc Administrative Order says that compliance with the Constitution also includes exempting the courts from the Governor’s cuts citing provisions for separation of power.
The State Fiscal Officer’s authority to make budget cuts pursuant to Section 27-104-13, or otherwise, is limited to “agencies” and “the Mississippi Department of Transportation,” and does not extend to the judiciary, which is constitutionally-established as a separate branch of government, rather than an “agency.”
The Order points to the distinction between a “separate branch of government” and an “agency”; however, in terms of the State budget, the distinction is between “units of government” and “arms of government”, more commonly known here as “general fund agencies” and “special fund agencies”.
Special fund agencies represent two distinctly different arms. One is the arm of the federal government and the other is actually called just that – other special funds and boy are they ever Continue reading “Well, someone had to, so here it is – Mississippi’s State Budget 101”
Kevin Allman at Gambit has the skinny here is a snippet:
And here’s Brownie showing how he takes responsibility later in the same story:
“People get beaten up and thrown under the bus all the time,” he notes. “You’ve got the choice of letting the bus run over you three times, and wallowing in that, or getting up and moving. And my choice was to get up and keep moving.”
If your radio doesn’t pick up signals from Denver, you’ll have to wait until June, when Brownie’s book Deadly Indifference: Hurricane Katrina, 9/11, Disease Pandemics and the Failed Politics of Disasters hits bookshelves. And if you’re shaking your head that Michael “FEMA” Brown would actually have the temerity or boneheadedness to write a Katrina book called Deadly Indifference, you don’t know Brownie.
Thank God I don’t live in Denver.
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New Orleans sports radio legend Buddy Diliberto always promised he would wear a dress if the Saints ever made the Superbowl, secure in the knowledge (as he would sometimes say) that it would never happen in his lifetime. By all accounts Buddy D was a fun loving guy so I’m certain he’d appreciate the spectacle of Sunday’s “Bunch-of-Men’s Dress March”. There is a Mississippi connection as Buddy D’s son Chris of Ocean Springs plans to attend to make good on his Dad’s promise to the Who Dat Nation. James Jones at the Sun Herald filed the story:
Longtime WWLÂ radio personality Buddy Diliberto promised to wear a dress if the New Orleans Saints reached the Super Bowl.
Unfortunately, Diliberto died before seeing the Saints finally make it.
Chris Diliberto will honor his late father’s promise to Saints fans this weekend in the Crescent City before the team heads to Miami for Super Bowl XLIV and a date with the Indianapolis Colts.
Chris Diliberto, of Ocean Springs, was in Gulfport Tuesday night to pick out a dress to fulfill his dad’s promise. Former Saints quarterback Bobby Hebert and Abdul D. Tentmakur of Vancleave, who both work for WWL 870 AM, will also wear dresses. Continue reading “Gentlemen, grab your dresses. Saints parade and the soul of New Orleans”