Scoop’s Views

The U.S. Coast Guard units in and around the Gulf Coast are certainly earning high praise from the news media, from over 40 people who have been rescued this morning, and leaders in various areas impacted by Hurricane Ike.

Now, at 2:32 p.m., with Hurricane Ike at a category 2 with 105 mph winds, many are surprised the Coast Guard is still doing rescues, as a notice, according to some, had been issued earlier saying rescues would end hours ago. They haven’t, and there are at least two people alive — at least — who were rescued in this extended mission.

Tags: Antalina, armed forces, Cyprus-flagged freighter, freighter, freighter Antalina, Hurricane Ike, hurricanes, National Guard troops, Osprey, rescue jumpers, rescue missions, rescues, Reserve forces, U.S. Air Force, U.S. Coast Guard

When Hurricane Katrina was heading toward New Orleans, Louisiana just over three years ago, many residents were shoo’ing off warning to evacuate the city and other areas. In the case of Hurricane Gustav, estimates were for severe flooding and possible levy breaks. In essence, pretty much a repeat of Hurricane Katrina. Fortunately, for taxpayers around country, as well as residents of the areas where the hurricane made landfall, the hurricane didn’t live up to its projections.

With Hurricane Ike bearing down on the South Texas to Louisiana coast, evacuation orders for many towns have been issued, including in Galveston, Texas, which saw 16,000 people die in a hurricane in 1901. Galveston now has 15-foot storm walls to protect the city, which is basically bowl-shaped, but the National Hurricane Center and the National Weather Service are saying storm surges could be as high as 20 feet – five feet over the storm walls.

Tags: BASF, chemical plants, Clear Lake Texas, evacuation orders, evacuations, flood walls, flooding, floods, Freeport, Freeport Texas, Galveston, Galveston Bay, Galveston Texas, Gulf of Mexico, Houston, Houston Texas, Hurricane Ike, Lake Charles, landfall, Louisiana, National Hurricane Center, National Weather Service, oil refineries, Pensacola, personal safety, pets, Port Arthur, refineries, responsibility, sea wall, seawall, storm walls, storms, surges, Texas, transportation, warnings, waves

With 2008 suicide rates expected to exceed last year’s all-time-high rate and threatening to top those in the civilian population, the Army is stepping up efforts to get Soldiers and their leaders to look out for each other’s well-being and to take the stigma out of seeking mental-health help.

Sixty-two active-duty Soldiers, most of them junior enlisted members, committed suicide so far this calendar year, Col. Eddie Stephens, the Army’s deputy director for human resource policy, told reporters today during a Pentagon roundtable. The armed forces medical examiner is investigating another 31 suspected cases to determine if they will be classified as suicides.

Tags: ACE, active duty soldiers, American Forces Press Service, armed forces medical examiner, Army family, Army Reserve units, Ask Care Escort, battle buddies, battlefield, behavioral health care, Brig. Gen. Rhonda Cornum, civilian population, Col. Eddie Stephens, Donna Miles, financial difficulties, intervene, intervention, junior enlisted members, leaders, legal issues, mental health help, National Guard units, National Suicide Prevention Week, occupational and operational issues, Pentagon, problems, relationships, risk factors, Shoulder to Shoulder No Soldier Stands Alone, soldiers, strength, stresses, suicide awareness training, suicide rates, U.S. Army, warning signs, weakness, World Suicide Prevention Day

With all the local, state, and federal resources – money and manpower – that were poured into Louisiana, especially New Orleans, it’s hard to think that anything more than prayer saved the city from being ravaged at least as bad, if not worse, than it was a short three years ago.

Despite all the money pumped into coordinating services and evacuations, an estimated 10,000 residents of New Orleans stayed in town despite the mandatory evacuation orders. It’s hard to imagine these people would test their luck and stay.

Tags: best interests, burglaries, contractors, coordinated plans, coordinating services, devastated, evacuations, Federal Emergency Management Agency, federal government, federal resources, FEMA, heartfelt thanks, holidays, Hurricane Gustav, Hurricane Katrina, hurricanes, looting, Louisiana, luck, maintaining law and order, mandatory evacuation orders, manpower, mayhem, money, New Orleans, prayers, storms, theft, total costs, wasteful spending

Hurricane Gustav is going to hit the United States unless there’s an act of divine intervention. Short of a miracle from Heaven, all computer predictions are showing Hurricane Gustav will hit somewhere along the Gulf Coast, anywhere from Pensacola, Florida on the Eastern side to Houston, Texas on the West.

Unless Hurricane Gustav’s path is suddenly diverted, or unless Hurricane Gustav falls apart and becomes little more than a tropical storm or depression, it’s more than likely at least one of the many oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico will receive some damage, but likely all of the platforms will be closed down in advance of the storm.

Tags: computer predictions, crude oil, divine intervention, Florida, gas prices, gasoline, gasoline prices, Gulf Coast, Gulf of Mexico, Houston, Hurricane Gustav, Louisiana, New Orleans, Northeast Philadelphia, oil, oil barrels, oil companies, oil platforms, oil prices, Pensacola, Philadelphia, price per gallon, shale, Texas, Tropical Storm Hannah

Earlier today, around 2:10 p.m., miscommunication between a Congressional staffer, as well as workers at Cleveland’s City Hall, led to news reports from the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the Associated Press, and CNN, among other news outlets, to prematurely report the death of U.S. Representative Stephanie Tubbs Jones, 57, who was serving her fifth term in Congress.

This evening, at 6:12 p.m., however, the Congresswoman was pronounced dead about 24 hours after being taken to the hospital by ambulance. She would have celebrated her 59th birthday in 21 days, on September 10.

Tags: aneurysm, aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage, Barack Obama, Bethany Baptist Church, brain aneurysm, Carib News Multi-National Business Conference, Case Western Reserve University, Central State University, Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland Heights Ohio, Cleveland Heights Police Department, Cleveland Ohio, Cleveland Public Schools, Cleveland State University, Delta Sigma Theta, Democratic National Convention, Dr. Gus Kious, East Cleveland Ohio, Flora Stone Mather College, forum on electoral reform, hematoma, Hillary Clinton, Human Rights Campaign of Cleveland Equality Award, Huron Hospital, Huron Road Hospital, Marcus Garvey Award, Mervyn Jones, National Bible Association Capitol Hill Distinguished L, Notre Dame College, Stephanie Tubbs Jones, subarachnoid hemorrhage, superdelegate, U.S. Congress, U.S. House of Representatives

Ohio Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones, the first black woman to represent Ohio in Congress, remains alive – despite several news reports around 2 p.m. today to the contrary, as well as information in Congress around 1 p.m., saying she had passed away.

Jones has been hospitalized for about a day now, as a result of a brain aneurysm in what doctors describe as an “inaccessible” part of the brain. Many news outlets had reported she had died from a brain aneurysm she suffered Tuesday evening while driving, according to the Cleveland Plains Dealer and CNN. She will celebrate her 59th birthday in 21 days, on September 10.

Tags: Barack Obama, brain aneurysm, Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland Heights, Cleveland State University, critcal condition, Democratic National Convention, Democrats, East Cleveland, forum on electoral reform, Hillary Clinton, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Huron Hospital, Stephanie Tubbs Jones, super delegate, superdelegate, very limited brain function

There are at least a handful of people arguing the U.S. government needs to “do more” to regulate online pharmacies. Sure, that may be true, but right now, face the facts: most in Congress are older people who are technologically-challenged. In fact, look at legislation about most any aspect of life and you’ll see most of it is at least 10 or more years behind the times. I won’t even touch on the health care crisis in the U.S.

In a story on CNN.com, one woman cried to the cable news channel that she found her husband on their marriage bed, dead, in a pool of vomit. He allegedly died from what the woman — the widow — declares was an accidental overdose of drugs the now-dead husband received from an online pharmacy.

Tags: American Fork, anonymous, carisoprodol, Carmen Catizone, clinics, CNN.com, dead, death, depression, drugs, Elavil, European Medicines Agency, European Union, fitness, Health, husband, Illegal Drugs, Kareem Tannous, Long Island, Mental Health, Mood Disorders, Nancy Fitzpatrick, National Association of Boards of Pharmacy, online pharmacies, online pharmacy, pharmaceuticals, Prozac, Rusty Payne, Science and Technology, side effects, Soma, Sweden, Technology, U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Utah, Valley Stream, Websites

MSNBC is reporting former Republican Sen. Phil Gramm is stepping down as co-chairman of Republican John McCain’s presidential campaign.

Tags: co-chairman, former Republican senator, John McCain, McCain for President, nation of whiners, Obama for President, Phil Gramm, Phil Gramm resignation, Phil Gramm resigns, presidential campaign, resignation

In the Prince George County jail, Ronnie White, 19, who was being held in solitary confinement at Prince George’s County Correctional Center the died of strangulation and asphyxiation — meaning someone strangled him to death — but he also had two broken bones in his neck, according to autopsy findings. When a person is in solitary confinement, access is restricted, and only a few guards have access to the prisoners. In this case, no one knows what happened. Supposedly.

A few hundred miles north, in Brooklyn, New York — the bastion of manners and friendliness, to be sure — a woman died on the floor of the Kings County Hospital emergency room on June 19, 2008, after she keeled over and fell out out of her chair, landing face down on the floor. She thrashed about on the floor for awhile, then became still, emergency room video shows. In this case, no one, including other patients and people in the emergency room, including what appears to be another woman who was siting across from the 49-year-old deceased woman, did anything to help the woman — even after she collapsed to the floor.

In Missouri Illinois, a young guy, named Nicholas Sheley, 28, is being sought as a “person of interest” in the murders of at least several people. Police are wondering if the murders are the work of a serial killer.

Tags: abuse, asphyxiation, Baltimore, Brooklyn, Brooklyn New York, chief executive, civil rights investigation, constitutional democracy, Corporal Richard Findley, correctional center, Cpl. Richard Findley, day in court, death, died, doctors, eight-grader, emergency room, ER, FBI, Jack Johnson, jail, killing others, lawsuits, Mental Health, murdered baby, neglect, nurses, patients, people sitting nearby, Prince George County, prison, prisoners, rampages, restricted access, Ronnie White, solitary confinement, stolen, strangulation, Texas, thrills, truck, U.S. Department of Justice

Just as the folks in Baytown, Texas about the alleged actions of a 14-year-old student at the town’s Cedar Bayou Junior High who allegedly murdered her newborn infant son immediately after birth, according to police reports. She allegedly killed her newborn son by stuffing toilet paper in her infant son’s throat after he had cried his first — and what would be his last — cries in life, according to police and media reports. After allegedly stuffing her newborn son’s mouth with toilet paper, the unidentified eight-grader then allegedly submerged her baby boy in the toilet, then flushed the toilet, drowning him, according to Baytown Police Lt. Eric Freed, who was quoted in several media outlets as saying.

The girl, who secretly gave birth in the junior high school bathroom, according to police reports, then, after the baby boy was born alive and cried, she allegedly killed her son in cold blood.

Tags: adolescents, bathroom, Baytown Texas, capital murder, Cedar Bayou Junior High School, charged as a juvenile, Colorado, Columbine, drownings, drug overdose, drugs, eight-graders, execution, fetus, flush head in toilet, full-term infants, full-term pregnancy, gagging, gamers, Gerald Yoakum, guns, illegal activities, illicit, killings, knives, movies, murders, not an accident, online gaming, PlayStation, police, Police Chief Roger Clifford, Police Lt. Eric Freed, preemie, premature infants, PSP, reasonable doubt, rescue, shootings, snipers, stabbings, students, suffocation, suicide, SWAT, teenagers, television, toilet paper, uterus, video games, violence

Poor Amy Winehouse. Her daddy says she has emphysema, but her publicist, you know, the well-paid folks who are responsible for creating and maintaining the public image — a performer’s persona — says that the 24-year-old British singer does not have emphysema, but does have only 70 percent lung capacity, as well as nodules and other issues with her lungs. In essence, 30 percent of Amy Winehouse’s lungs are little more than trash.

Tags: Amy Winehouse, British singers, Brits, crack, crack cocaine, drugs, emphysema, entertainers, Entertainment, illegal drug use, illicit drugs, lung capacity, motivation, self-destruction, self-respect, self-responsibility, singers