By Denise Ross

From the files of stuff you couldn’t dream up, South Dakota’s own Larry Pressler has a post in the Obama administration. If that’s not awesome enough, it’s on a commision that I - at least - would not have imagined possible. It’s the Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad.

It’s the “abroad” part that gets me. Seems like that maybe ought to be a private non-profit or something. Must be the South Dakotan in me.

 In any case, here’s what came out in a White House press release:

Spread the word

Hide Sites

By Denise Ross

I thought of the angry, pitchfork-bearing villagers demanding that Stephanie Herseth Sandlin and Tim Johnson hold town hall meetings during the August recess when I heard about the congressman who spent a summer vacation on a deserted tropical island.  

Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., sought to test ought his survivor skills by living on fish he speared himself and coconuts after being dropped off by “the military” (ah-hem; taxpayer money?) to a tiny Pacific Island. Read more about it and see a photo slideshow in The Hill.

This story has quickly spread in the national press, so you might have already heard about this. I hadn’t until a relative from Arizona asked me how this amounted to news. Oh, honey, this one’s irresistable.

Commenters on the various stories I’ve read either love the guy for his independent spirit or revile him for being, well, a duty-shirking flake. I’m leaning towards the latter crowd but probably would feel fine about the congressman’s little vacation if he hadn’t turned over his photo album and diary to the media. Maybe he and ballon boy’s dad ought to share that island for awhile. A long while.

I think this would be a career-killer for any South Dakota politician. Am I wrong?

Spread the word

Hide Sites

By Denise Ross

There’s a battle brewing between the telecom giant of yore and the tech giant of now, AT&T and Google, over little old us. AT&T is demanding that the FCC require Google to stop blocking some calls to rural telephone numbers on the relatively new Google Voice application.

Last Friday, the FCC launched an inquiry into Google Voice’s blocking of calls and began an review of whether the application should be regulated as a traditional telephone service, also known as a common carrier. Google has rejected such claims, saying in a blog posting that Google Voice is a Web application and not a telecom service.

That is from the Washington Post’s tech blog. Read it all here. AT&T claims that Google has blocked calls to an ambulance service, a community center and a tribal center. (Out here in the sticks, we are more expensive to connect up to the grid. Ergo, phone companies - including AT&T - have tried but failed to find ways around the rules that say they have to connect to the more expensive numbers.)

Spread the word

Hide Sites

By Denise Ross

When Sen. Tim Johnson penned a column earlier this week touting the good things the “climate change legislation” would mean for South Dakota, one might have gotten the impression he was referring to what’s come to be known as the cap-and-trade bill that’s been passed by the US House and awaits action in the US Senate just as soon as everyone gets back to DC after the August recess.

Well, I heard from Johnson’s office after I posted his column. They want to avoid any confusion and say Johnson refers in his column not to the bill that has passed the House but to a future bill that will be rewritten in the Senate. The bill will “get a completely fresh start” in the Senate, said Johnson’s spokeswoman. (Sounds like a good old-fashioned hoghouse in the state Legislature. The folks in Pierre always knew they could teach Washington a thing or two.)

Spread the word

Hide Sites

By Denise Ross

Can anyone tell me why Facebook (for me) has suddenly turned all Chinese? Or, more importantly, how to fix it?

I can’t even log in right now, since the only language I know is English. (I tried to learn French in college. It didn’t take. I can ask you if you’re eating ham in the library bathroom, however.)

Spread the word

Hide Sites

By Denise Ross

Marc Tobias, longtime close friend and adviser to former Gov. and US Rep. Bill Janklow, showed up on a TODAY Show segment today, talking about how most of our house locks are not really locks. (The car that Janklow was driving when he had his career-ending traffic crash in 2003 was registered to Tobias.)

But there’s more. First, here’s the TODAY Show video:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Meanwhile, when I did a Google search to make sure I remembered how to spell his name (I did), I came across a slew of online items about Tobias, including his own official site. (The official site doesn’t say, but last I knew Tobias operated out of Sioux Falls.) Then there’s something titled “The Marc Tobias Effect,” as his work exposing security weaknesses is at the center of a controversy in the lock world.

Spread the word

Hide Sites

By Denise Ross

Due to my (infrequent) Facebook use, I now know that Brendan Johnson’s birthday was Wednesday, and Scott Heidepriem’s birthday is Thursday.

All I really wanna know is, who bakes the cake?

Pity they don’t have access in Sioux Falls to the fabulosity that is Rapid City’s Piece of Cake.

Happy birthday anyway, guys!

Spread the word

Hide Sites

By Denise Ross

Y’all remember Arnold Garson of Sioux Falls Argus Leader fame? Now he’s Arnold Garson of the Louisville (Kentucky) Courier-Journal, and he’s picked a fight with Jeff Jarvis, a pretty big kid on the new media block.

Garson did not bother to research or check his facts and instead chose to libel me just because we disagree and I dare to criticize newspapers’ stewardship of journalism. Who does he think he is - a blogger?

…

I think he’s wrong about newspapers. His first big defense of the state of their business is that they’re better off than car dealers and Realtors. That sure as hell ain’t saying much.

Read it all here. (For what it’s worth, you might think the commenter “Alex” is me, but I swear it’s not. She does make me feel less lonely in my exasperated heartbreak over the self-inflicted wounds slowly killing newspapers, tho.)

Spread the word

Hide Sites

By Denise Ross

After an historic election, some serious personnel shuffles in the Rapid City Journal newsroom and the birth of my first baby, the old Mount Blogmore team finally got together so I could collect my bet winnings - dinner and wine at Botticelli’s.

None of us could quite remember the exact terms of the bet - whether we differed over whether Hillary would get the nomination or when the election. I won in any case, as I said no way. Kevin and Bill said, yes way. And, necks bowed all around, we had a wager. Sometime back in 2007. The much blogged-about pay-off finally took place on Saturday night - once Bill got back from France, Kevin didn’t have a dinner party to attend and I could line up Grandma and Grandpa to babysit. Whew.

So here’s the photographic evidence:

                                                      (Photos by Mr. Hoghouse)

Kevin Woster, my former Mount Blogmore mate - and the only one of the original clan still left on the Mount, serves me salmon. Mmmmmm. At right are honorary Mount Blogmore-ite Bill Fleming and his wife, Susan Turnbull.

Incidentally, I often ribbed Woster for being a Reisling drinker, but on Saturday NPR had a nice piece about how Reisling is really pretty good. And then I had some of the dry Reisling at dinner, and I think I might have more of that in the future. Not so bad, Woster. Not so bad.

Bill Harlan, who now works at the super-cool Homestake lab, serves me the most delicious cheesecake I’ve ever eaten. Lemon. Super mmmmm.

Spread the word

Hide Sites

Photos by Mr. Hoghouse

Here are more photos from Wednesday’s tea party event in Rapid City, with special attention paid to the plethora of signage.

Spread the word

Hide Sites