NPR News Today 1-26

Listened to Morning Edition today, 8-9.

Good news , for a change, from Israel/Palestine. Israel, reacting to Abbas's actions, has ended targeted killings. Excellent! Elections will be going on for municipal positions in parts of Palestine. People have a good feeling about the elections. The question is whether Abbas's more moderate party will prevail or whether Hamas will make headway and continue with terrorist actions from many places. It all sounds good, but NPR pointed out that no one is sure yet if the Palestinians want a state next to Israel, or if they are intent on taking over the whole area, meaning no Israel.

Interesting report on contractors in Iraq, specifically looking at KBR. Despite dangers people are applying for these jobs in huge numbers (1600 apps a month according to a spokesperson). Interviews with job candidates and workers made it seem mostly about the money, but the spokesperson from KBR said that for successful candidates weren’t so much about the money as about being patriotic, as about helping the war effort. Yeah, right. Sure. Not about the money. OK.

<>Here is a question NPR threw out there: Can we protect domestic air carriers from missile attacks, and if so, is it worth the expense? No conclusive answer.

Opening statements were today in the Scrushy trial. Scrushy, as head of HealthSouth, had his lawyers claim that he knew nothing of the fraud there, and that his subordinates lied to him. To back this up, lawyers pointed out that the poor, misled man has only a Respiratory Therapy degree – how was he supposed to understand those complicated financials? Scrushy’s accusers claim that the culture at HealthSouth was one of driving employees to lure investors through deception. Ultimately, this trial is all about making the company look like a better investment than it really was, and who is responsible for perpetuating false statements.

<>Good interview with Tom Ridge. I thought NPR did an excellent job with Ridge – they asked tough questions but were not antagonistic or clearly biased. They were looking for answers, but not trying to force the answers to go in one direction or another. Interesting questions included homeland security’s primary objective (preventing a catastrophic incident, determining potential targets and developing a plan to keep them safe), how much money is enough to spend on fortifying certain targets, the effectiveness of the color code system, and the balance between safety and civil liberties. One interesting exchange involved the color codes and how much they were influenced by politics. Ridge, natch, assured NPR that threat levels had nothing at all to do with politics. Ridge also admitted that they don’t know the enemy well, and that is a real problem. I felt the interview questions were fair, and did not appear to attack the Bush administration. They were not softball questions, but they were fair.