Edward Barrera

Newton Canyon and Sandstone Peak Malibu

2012-02-06T22:49:00.000-08:00

I've now decided this will be my outdoor blog. I will have another blog, not yet live, for healthcare. I just want to separate my passions so they won't get jealous.

On Saturday, Downward dog Dom and I woke early (OK, he drove and picked me up, and I was barely awake), and we headed to the Santa Monica hills. We did a quick jaunt up Newton Canyon. Long in miles, 9, weak in elevation gain, 1,000. But the view,

and the time, we returned to the car by noon, inspired us to hit another peak, the Sandstone Peak, which is the highest peak in the Santa Monica Mountains, at 3,111. The elevation gain, we took the short route rather than the Mishe Mokwa trail, which would have been a 6 mile trail hike, was about 1,200'.

We hit the summit, with about 1,000 visiting Japanese tourists, about 2 p.m. (I signed my first registry. Wooo-hooo!)

At the bottom at Neptune's waited my reward. (The one thing learned, remember landmarks for the return trip. We hit a wooden bridge on the way back that neither one of us remembered, and thought we took a wrong turn. I'm still not sure we didn't and missed a switchback.)

New Health Care Law Doesn't Help Emergency Care

2011-05-18T07:59:00.000-07:00

You wonder if anyone really thought any of this through:

"Conditions in emergency rooms may be worsened by the new health care law, several experts said. The law will expand eligibility for Medicaid, the government health plan for the poor. Often beneficiaries turn to emergency rooms for care, because many physicians do not accept Medicaid payments, said Dr. Sandra M. Schneider, president of the American College of Emergency Physicians.

Emergency rooms are required by law to provide treatment regardless of ability to pay. “People will have coverage, but there’s a concern that there will be nowhere for them to go,” Dr. Schneider said."

Uninsured Nursing Home Employees

2011-05-16T08:41:00.000-07:00

A pretaxed $25 monthly premium, even if it is poor coverage, doesn't really seem all that great of a burden. But having no health insurance options is a scandal.

"The Paraprofessional Healthcare Institute, a nonprofit group that studies the industry, says that 26 percent of front-line workers in nursing homes and 37 percent of those employed by home care agencies are uninsured."

Was Standard & Poor’s Playing Politics Today?

2011-04-18T11:20:00.000-07:00

The Standard & Poor’s rating firm cut the long-term United States debt rating to negative from stable today. Inexplicably, stocks took a nosedive, though everyone has known about the longterm debt problem. So why now?

Some say that S&P are playing politics, according to Steven Blitz, a senior economist for ITG Investment Research:

"S.&P. and all the rating agencies are still under a lot of pressure to reform and this action could help them by helping the White House scare the Republicans to engage in responsible political negotiation to reach some reasonable deal on deficit reduction and raise the debt ceiling rather than have the talks take on the aura of a hostage negotiation."

This, of course, is the same rating firm, along with others, that failed miserably before the financial crisis:

"The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations released findings from a two-year study this week, saying "inaccurate triple-A credit ratings" from Standard & Poor's and Moody's Investors Service introduced risk into the financial system and "constituted a key cause of the financial crisis."

Abuse of Government Power, Small and Large

2011-03-28T06:41:00.001-07:00

Two stories caught my eye this past weekend, both dealing with financial shenanigans. The large implication, G.E. avoiding millions in taxes, and the small one, a borrower jailed for lying about his income level, will most likely be ignored.

But deep within both were stunning examples of abuse of power, by the I.R.S. and Charlie Rangel:

"...Robert W. Nordlander, a special agent for the Internal Revenue Service. As Mr. Nordlander later told the grand jury, “Being the special agent that I am, I was wondering, how does a guy train for this because most people have to work from nine to five and it’s very difficult to train for this part-time.” (He also told the grand jurors that sometimes, when he sees somebody driving a Ferrari, he’ll check to see if they make enough money to afford it."

Nordander decided to go after a man, not because of any complaint or evidence, but because he wonders how a guy made his money.

The other:

"[Charlie] Rangel and Mr. Immelt stood together at St. Nicholas Park in Harlem as G.E. announced that its foundation had awarded $30 million to New York City schools, including $11 million to benefit various schools in Mr. Rangel’s district. Joel I. Klein, then the schools chancellor, and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, who presided, said it was the largest gift ever to the city’s schools."

This was after Rangel, who was at the time chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, had been deciding if a tax break that G.E. was exploiting should continue. He was against it and then he was for it.

So one man goes to jail for doing something that he might not even have done, lying about income to borrow money, and Rangel stays and Immelt becomes an Obama advisor.

New York Politics

2011-03-24T05:23:00.000-07:00

The New York Times scored on confidential state budget negotiations. The back room deal is usually kept secret until finished, then lawmakers 'vote' on what has already been decided. But the Times gives a glimpse.

New York might get a federal health care law waiver. Which (suckers) states are actually following the law?

New York City wins and upstate loses on congressional seats.

Rep. Anthony Weiner will overshadow anyone running for mayor of New York City, including City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, Controller John Liu, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer and Public Advocate Bill de Blasio.

New chief for Housing Preservation and Development, which supervises affordable housing projects.

And lastly, why does anyone care about what Donald Trump says? Birther, philanderer, etc. It's all about creating controversy. He's not running.

First day of classes

2011-01-28T12:01:00.000-08:00

Why would a student ride a bike to Brooklyn College on a snow day? I have no idea. But here is the result.

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Online Classes Help Ease Unemployment

2011-01-25T05:23:00.000-08:00

Paying people to do your homework or papers is a time-honored endeavor. With online classes, it makes the task that much simpler. This Craigslist poster seems to be preparing to become a teacher -- in early and special education. Nice way to achieve that goal. Pay someone else to do it.

Acting Like a Reporter Without All That Messy Ethical Stuff

2011-01-24T10:35:00.000-08:00

Daniel Cavanagh is a Brooklyn blogger who has taken on the noble challenge of covering a small, isolated community that really doesn't want to be covered. He exposed a charity organization's illegal dumping and an annual Halloween activity that has neighborhood kids throwing eggs, potatoes, rocks and shaving cream cans at buses, cars and any random people strolling by.

This is important news gathering and shows how the power of the Internet allows anyone with a computer to cover communities that don't have local coverage -- just don't call it reporting. At least according to Cavanagh:

"I did not identify myself as anything because I didn’t, and still don’t, classify myself really as anything."

Which of course makes things so much easier when you're reporting on an event. No need to get the other side. People will talk to you, despite the fact that they don't know you could be posting what they said. Some people, including me, would call that unethical behavior by a person who is acting very much like a reporter.

Others, like Jeff Jarvis, say, eh, the rules of journalism don't apply. "He's just a member of the community who's writing about his community."

Newspaper Prepares to Spam Residents, Using Public Records Request

2011-01-23T07:29:00.000-08:00

The Charlotte Observer recently forced city officials to release a list of email addresses of residents. The paper did it through a records request. But this wasn't done for journalistic reasons but commercial ones. The paper’s Director of Strategic Products and Audience Development asked for the addresses, which is a subscriber list for city email alerts. Some official is annoyed:

"...I must let you know I am borderline outraged. I had a solid reputation while in office of complete openness as relates to media....That said, if the Charlotte Observer is going to use the law in an attempt to gather information not relevant to the public’s right to know, I fully support the elected bodies doing EVERYTHING possible up to and including stretching and interpreting the law such that you are excluded from as much information as possible. You do not have a right to information from private citizens who engage with or contact the government. When I held elected office I understood and accepted that I had freely given up much of my privacy but as a private citizen my information is sacrosanct."

First, any member of the public, not just the media, is allowed to see public records. Yes, even the business side of a newspaper. It's the public's right to know, not the media. Second, are you telling me the city doesn't have a law or some mandate that city-sponsored subscriber emails can't be used for commercial purposes? If not, time to do that.

Seymour Hersh, the Knights of Malta and the Military Elite

2011-01-18T14:29:00.000-08:00

The investigative reporter Seymour Hersh exposed the abuses at Abu Ghraib and has won nearly every journalism award, including a Pulitzer for uncovering the My Lai massacre. But he is also known to peddle in gossip and innuendo. Is this one of those times? At a speaking engagement in Qatar, where the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service has a branch campus, Hersh unloaded some strange theories about the Knights of Malta and members of the Joint Special Operations Command.

"...Many of them are members of Opus Dei," Hersh continued. "They do see what they're doing -- and this is not an atypical attitude among some military -- it's a crusade, literally. They see themselves as the protectors of the Christians. They're protecting them from the Muslims [as in] the 13th century. And this is their function."

"They have little insignias, these coins they pass among each other, which are crusader coins," he continued. "They have insignia that reflect the whole notion that this is a culture war. … Right now, there’s a tremendous, tremendous amount of anti-Muslim feeling in the military community."

The Knights of Malta became a religious and military organization during the First Crusade, with the mission to defend the Holy Land from Islamic forces. Of course, who knows if Hersh was just riffing. He once reportedly said "If the standard for being fired was being wrong on a story, I would have been fired long ago." So maybe he is not all that worried about people listening.

Driving Ski Slope on 95

2011-01-13T18:18:00.000-08:00

That's snow on top of that truck. Chunks kept falling off and hitting cars. Chucklehead.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Social media shocks the media; Long Island developers, not so much

2010-11-27T14:15:00.000-08:00

Stealing from Jack Shafer, I call bogusity on this AP social media trend story.

"Opponents of building developments are taking a page from birthday party planners and flash mobbers, employing social media sites like Facebook to coalesce their cause — and the industry is sitting up and taking notice."

As evidence to back up that claim, the writer uses as his primary example a Facebook page built by mommy bloggers against a Huntington Town development. He also throws in a few random examples throughout the country. Unfortunately, the trend story here is an old trend story, at least as it concerns Huntington:

"[One lawmaker] withdrew his support because Huntington Democratic Party insiders wanted to take the housing issue off the table so Republicans couldn't use it against the Democratic incumbents in the elections next year. Councilwoman Susan Berland, who had straddled the fence for months, finally came out against the AvalonBay proposal this summer. She wanted less density."

Well, at least one developer wasn't taken in.

"We've been very nervous," developer Mitchell D. Rechler said. "The good news is you can get the facts out, but what we've also seen is that the facts can continually get buried with misinformation.

"Do you really want to … respond to every single comment that comes through? Is that the best way to dedicate your time and money? I don’t personally think so."

But I guess it's easier to give credit to mommy bloggers than it is to blame typical, myopic politics.

White Islip and Heroin

2010-10-07T11:14:00.000-07:00

Two terms I've lately heard used about West Islip.

I moved to West Islip when I was eight. Moving to the suburbs from Kew Gardens, Queens was a culture shock, not least because all the people around me were only white faces. The first black kid I saw at school was at Beach Street Junior High. He was beat up and soon migrated to another school if I remember correctly. Others called the town "White Islip."

But that was 30 years ago. I see more diversity, blacks, Latinos, than I ever did before. But the numbers don't lie. According to the latest census numbers, we're still more than 90 percent white. But then again, several towns around us -- Bayshore, Brightwaters, Babylon Village, North Babylon and Lindenhurst -- are all predominantly white.

What that means, I'm not sure. Maybe that things don't really change that much in the suburbs. Or do they?

There has always been drugs in West Islip. It was never hard to find, especially among the rich kids. But the latest drug people say is rampant is heroin. But, unlike the census numbers for whites, the crime numbers don't back it up. Police blare an uptick in heroin arrests and others to an uptick in overdose deaths in Long Island but those could be linked to numerous reasons. One of which is a greater focus on the drug.

A study that came out a few years ago show a flat line when it comes to heroin usage in New York and Suffolk County. It doesn't break it down to towns. Off the record conversations with police say people should be more worried about illicit prescription drug use rather than heroin.