Monday Newsbreak: 12/24

--A Daytona Beach woman was reportedly Tasered by a policewoman on November 26 after she stepped out of a Best Buy store (where she had been shopping) to take an emergency phone call about her daughter. Apparently, this American citizen committed the unspeakable crime of talking back to a cop and using some profanity. She was not in the least bit violent, but was still subject to having 50,000 volts thrown at her, causing her to crumple down to the pavement. The local police chief defended his subordinate's action (of course). It appears that Tasering is becoming a routine tool for the police to handle the populace. The incident, by the way, was reportedly caught on video, so it's more than one person's word against another's. The police will continue to slide downward in the public view as long as they flippantly use something that is as dangerous as Tasering.

--Much ado has been made that current University of Florida president Bernie Machen will receive a salary of $1.2 million this year. But in recent years, I've grown quite accustomed to the top "leaders" in our society, be they in business, education, entertainment, athletics, or politics, raking in obscenely excessive incomes, far out of proportion to their actual contributions. It appears to me that America is rapidly becoming an entrenched plutocracy (rule by the rich).

--NASA is delaying the launch of an important probe to Mars by two years, simply because of a conflict of interest discovered in their contracting process. Can you imagine anything like this happening during the Mercury-Gemini-Apollo era of the 1960s? Oh, and the delay is supposedly going to cost up to an extra $40 million! This is indeed a sad situation with our once-heralded space program.

--Organizations like CAIR (Congress on American-Islamic Relations) routinely rail in the US about "Islamophobia" and how we should be more tolerant and less bigoted about Islam. I agree with that suggestion on its face. However, the picture being painted here about this great and significant religion is one of unity, which is obviously not the case. Islam, as it is practiced across the world, is fractured into different conflicting sects, most members of whom only want to live in peace and unity. But many nevertheless practice hatred and violence toward fellow Muslims with whom they have doctrinal or political differences. Just the other day, Al-Qaeda urged attacks on Sunni Muslims cooperating with the Iraqi (Muslim) government. And if I'm not mistaken, a large proportion of the victims of Al-Qaeda terrorism have been adherents of Islam. Conflicts going on in places like Palestine, Algeria, Afghanistan, and Pakistan involve Muslims attacking Muslims. CAIR needs to refocus its attention on where the real persecution is coming from, without stepping back from its role as an advocacy group here.

--It looks as if perennial football know-it-all and all-around tough guy Bill Parcells is coming to the Miami Dolphins to kick some butt and straighten out the victory-challenged franchise. And if he gets tired of his new job in a couple of years (as is his pattern), I'm sure he'll once again be welcomed back into the television broadcast booth as an expert on the game.