Courier circulation manager heads west

Courier Circulation Manager Michael Kenny will be leaving the homestead come the end of June, for parts west. Mr. Kenny, a Loyola College graduate and circulation manager for the past four years, is taking part in a family move to the land of 100 degrees F.

In those four years, Michael, who had never considered doing circulation before in his life, has done an incredible job at the task. To say he will be missed is to say nothing. All the best to Mike and the Kenny clan.

Feature from Yahoo on national politics

Yahoo looks like it posted a well-cited story about the national scene.

Presidential poll from May 6...kinda interesting

Alright, well, the hits keep coming. An interesting Newsweek poll. Click into the headline and check it out if you're interested in the national-level polls. What do they mean to local races? Who knows?

An interesting post from Kentucky on Prez race

The quote was from USA Today. It's from February, but I think it says something about where that publication is going, for whatever that is worth in the scheme of things. Click into the headline and go there.

The ‘Greatest Generation’ started with families

There is no time in personal schedules anymore.

Experts point to the divorce rate, the drug crisis, the downward trend of church attendance, the amount of family quality time per day and the crime rate and it would be too easy to be cynical.

But, the fact remains that people make the time for what is important to them. If family and relationships were all that important to people then I think people would make the time.

Jobs are perilous these days, and there are darn few of them. The private sector has become a study in ‘Darwinism meets sheer luck of the draw’ and there is little security out there. If someone was looking for something to feel bad about then all they have to do is pick up a newspaper and they are good for the rest of the day. Yet, our personal challenges can be much more difficult to surmount than any strong of ‘bad news headlines.’

During the 1950s, society itself revolved around the nuclear family. Saturday was a time when families spent the day together, whether it was at home or somewhere else. Many places did not open on Sunday, because families were at church. The workday actually ended at 5 p.m. and 40 hours was about what anyone could do and spend any amount of quality time with their spouse and children. The idea was that there are some things more important than making money, and though money was important so was holding together families and communities.

My organization is about as ‘family friendly’ as any of them are these days. I am proud of the fact that the employees working at Courier have rarely missed those important school plays, soccer games or parent-teacher conferences on our account.

But the actual work of creating homes, and not just residences, comes with the individual. I am at least as guilty as the next person of putting work ahead of home more than I should have. The excuse was that I was working toward something. In working toward something in the future, though, and not concentrating on what someone already has brings a hazard. Because someone can work so hard that the home they are working toward in that future is actually a residence for one. Being in a family is a team event. Like any other team, miss more than your fair share of practices and games and the team moves on without you.

The balance between work and personal lives is an all-important level. As frightening as the private sector is today (and it is), without family and the support there all the work in the world isn’t worth a nickel. But without enough nickels to make the bills, the best of families can stretch and fail. The truth of balancing work and personal lives is a hard one, and it is a narrow road. Community helps in creating a sense of well being, and the neighborly relations our fathers or grandfathers had with the people on their block is perhaps too much for a private sector that begins its needs at 40 hours per week from people.

Yet somehow, some way the critical balance between making a dollar and making a life has to be there or neither endeavor is going to be worth all that much.

“The Greatest Generation” was indeed great because those people knew how to work together, live together and how to attend to business and home with some sense of order. The rules have changed, without a doubt.

But there will not be another “Greatest Generation” without husbands and wives sustaining strong relationships, building solid families and those family units creating productive, concerned communities to be a support system for the towns we all live in.

Everything begins and ends with families. And families begin and end with the investment of time and energy. This isn’t news to anyone, but there’s at least no harm in a reminder that may make people pause long enough to consider if they are doing everything they can to safeguard the most important investment, which is not in their portfolio, but is inside their home.

Wind Energy: Pie in the Sky?

The energy issue is killing this country, this state and peoples' individual wallets. Something has to be done to start making a difference. Why not wind? Energy alternatives have started coming out of the science fiction pages with the mainstream hybrid cars. Home heating and cooling may well be solved in an environmentally friendly way by using wind or solar power.

Click on the headline to go to a very good Asbury Park Press article about it.

"Jersey Guy" may have legitimate point about trooper

I think a lot of Craig Carton's work on the Jersey Guys radio program. The recent controversy wherein a NJ state trooper may have overstepped his bounds is something that is serious and speaks to the worst parts of abuse of power. If something like this can happen to Craig Carton, it can happen to anyone.

Will Seward has an informative post on it. Click on the headline and go there.

Couple burned alive for practicing 'Black Magic'?

Chalk this one up to the odd and or unusual. Click on the headline.

Imus has his hand out in lawsuit

Don Imus made remarks he knew were wrong. He apologized for the comments, and his apology was largely accepted. But that still doesn't mean he should not be fired. He was fired by his company for venturing into the area of racism, and anyone with any degree of common sense knows what that is.

Now he wants to sue his company because he was fired. Why was this guy a celebrity in the first palce again?

U.S. economic activity could look a lot better

The latest jobs report isn't going well. The U.S. economy isn't doing well. Does politics and the economy have something in common? Even though that sounds like a lay up, the correlary there is actually a lot more speculative than people might think.

I believe jobs and the direction of the Federal Government have something in common. If this country is dedicated to spending a disproportionate amount of its money abroad, and borrowing a lion's share of its money abroad, then economic activity at home is going to suffer.

Reinvestment into the country to U.S. small business is the only real way for government to help stimulate U.S. economic activity. That doesn't seem to be something that is going on all that much today.

Entrepreneurs forge town out of wilderness

What's "small government"? Click on the headline and check it out.

What is missing from the economy today -- our economy -- is a sense of rugged individualism. This is a good story about people who created a town, built a living and a way of life, out of hard work and common sense.

World is introduced to the 10 comers for GOP nod

The Republican Party had a candidates' event. It was very nice. It gives people a chance to see where people stand. Democracy is a good thing.

Click on the headline to go there.

Alyssa Passeggio joins Courier staff

Georgian Court University graduate Alyssa Passeggio has become our new staffer. She is a Monmouth County resident who has a journalism background from GCU. She will be beginning on May 21st and covering the communities of Highlands, Atlantic Highlands, Aberdeen, Matawan and Union Beach.

Blue Tulip reaches out to support the Monmouth SPCA

MIDDLETOWN TOWNSHIP (MONMOUTH COUNTY) -- Mrs. Susan Pilla is a Middletown resident who is working with Blue Tulip as its public relations person. She is helping to promote a May 19th event at the Blue Tulip, 459 Route 35 (next to Whole Foods), between 11 a.m. and 3 p.m.

The store will give 15 percent of its proceeds to the Monmouth County SPCA on that day. Animals will be available at the store for adoption and the community's support is being requested by Blue Tulip.

For more information, call the store at (732) 345-0021, or go to their Web site by clicking on the headline.

CAPTION: Another shameless way to publish a photo of my 10-year-old Old English bulldog, Winston.

McGreevey's wife on Good Morning America

Diane Sawyer just hosted a segment on Good Morning America involving Dina Matos McGreevey and her views about former Gov. Jim McGreevey. Apparently, Mr. McGreevey is teaching ethics in college these days. Mrs. McGreevey made it clear she wasn't a fan of his and offered that she did not know about Mr. McGreevey's orientation at the time of their marriage, or even afterward.

While how Mrs. McGreevey processes this is no doubt of some value in this discussion, what is being lost is that the man put a foreign national in charge of the state's homeland defense effort. The foreign national did not have any real qualifications for this job, or even the stated intent of remaining in New Jersey. Mr. McGreevey found himself some random person abroad, brought them back for unwholesome reasons, and then reportedly engaged in an affair with this person
(subsidized by the taxpayers).

Mr. McGreevey is not, in my opinion, fit to hold a discussion on ethics let alone teach anyone anything. I cannot believe that one single administrative charge of impropriety did not arise from his tenure in office. Today, McGreevey is being hailed in some corners of the media. The fact he is gay is some shield he is holding up hiding the reality he was a lousy governor, and some of his actions were patently done to solicit personal relationships. Some icon.

New York: Not among the most polluted cities

For all those commuters out there...good news. New York is not in the Top 10 most polluted cities. Click on the headline and go there.

Weeklies are changing with the times

The weekly news market is an interesting one in Northern Monmouth. To say it is crowded is to say nothing. I have not heard of a weekly news market more competitive than Northern Monmouth County. In many ways I think this is very good for the readers.

The Greater Media newspapers, the Two River Times and maybe one or two of the garage papers have something to say. Certainly, Courier tries very hard. But the net result on the sales and marketing front is that reps are often tripping over each other in the towns. There are a few ways to look at this situation, but there is an unavoidable fact that more and more people are getting their information and news from the Internet. Where's that going? Beats me.

There has to be something that bridges the "old world" of weeklies to the new one, which is still taking shape in many ways. Technology is playing an ever-increasng role. But embracing technology without the traditional principles of journalism behind that technology puts readers at a disadvantage. Not everything can be lost to what is new. I think it is the responsibility of weeklies to keep changing and adapting though. Inevitably, Mr. Darwin says things that cannot adapt tend to go away. I think he's right.

The change is not a comfortable one. Questions about bloggng, digital recordings, and a host of other new 'gadgetry' are there for a generation of weekly newspaper editors and publishers who, in some cases, started their careers on word processors or even typewriters.

As for the Internet and the ad market: There's a wild card for you. Weekly newspapers are going down a road that is new and I think many folks, this paper included, are trying to make sense of it on the way. Fun? Not at all. But not all change is a day at Six Flags.

Evolution of news keeps marching on

Greater Media Executive Editor Greg Bean discusses the evolution of the news business in his recent editorial. I like it. It's very true.

In Courier, typewriters were actually still being kept around in 1998, when I got there. Was someone thinking computers might go away? Perhaps they could be a fad?

The typewriters are gone. Technology is here to stay and just keeps on evolving. It's an interesting transition for us 'old timers.'

Seward is right about McGreevey

Jim McGreevey was the worst governor in the history of the state. I had heard, in college, that it was almost universally agreed at one time that 19th century Garden State Governor Robert Howell was given that 'honor' by some academics somewhere.

Well, all records were made to be broken, and just like Babe Ruth surrendered his season homerun mark to only-legitimate comer Roger Maris, in '61, Gov. Howell must take a bow and bid his place in history farewell.

James McGreevey was and is a disgrace. He is an unabashed disgrace, who works hard at making sure everyone knows he is a great big disgrace...by writing about it in books, teaching his wisdom from the lectern and giving many interviews.

McGreevey's problem was not his orientation, but his abuse of office in granting office to unqualified persons for reasons that are best summed up as 'personal.' His conduct was epically bad. I do not believe that whether someone is gay or straight should be an issue of office. His problem was patently being a poor steward of public trust. He should not be rewarded with prosperity for what he did to government in this state.

Will be back on Monday

Way too nice of a weekend to do an update on the news. Will be back first thing on Monday with more postings.

Have a great weekend.