Saturday Thumbs
Saturday, January 19, 2008 6:11 AM PST
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Thumbs up to those Beacon Hill Elementary students, who will be celebrating Martin Luther King Jr.'s legacy by observing, collecting and recording acts of kindness. And thumbs up to the Beacon Hill teacher Megan Yaroll and school staff who came up with the idea of challenging the students to record at least 2,500 such acts.
We couldn't have thought of a better way to mark this 20th anniversary of MLK Day, which will observed on Monday this year. Beacon Hill Principal Jane Robinson says it's a day to think about how to make the lives of others better. We're sure Dr. King would applaud that characterization of his day - and students' challenge.
Justice denied
A San Francisco man, Braxton Berkley, won't get his day in California's Supreme Court. He's being shut out of the California's high court because four of the seven justices own stock in oil companies that made the solvents Berkely says made him sick while he was working for Lockheed Martin.
The three justices without stock from the companies decided to dismiss Berkley's case rather than appoint four temporary justices to hear it, reasoning that a ruling made with a majority of temporary justices wouldn't carry much weight.
It's outrageous that a citizen would be denied access to the California Supreme Court because of the personal finances of a few justices. The priorities are all wrong here.
An altruistic spirit
We were big fans of the Peace Corps at its inception 40-some-odd years ago, and we remain fans to this day. Volunteers come to the program with a sense of adventure and a strong desire to make a positive difference in the lives of people they're assigned to work with. They generally do make that difference.
So it's good to learn that colleges and universities in this state are producing more than their share of these volunteers. The Associated Press reported this past week that, for the second consecutive year, the University of Washington has sent more of its graduates into the Peace Corps than any other university in the nation. One hundred and thirteen volunteers came from UW last year.
Gouging the captive consumer
AT&T this week was hit with a whopping $300,000-plus fine by the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission for overcharging on collect calls inmates at two Eastern Washington prisons made to their families. We know that the personal problems of prison inmates don't register very high on most citizens' sympathy meters.
But it wasn't the inmates that were hit with these big phone bills. It was their family members who accepted the collect calls. And the bills were outrageous. AT&T's billing agent was charging a $3.95 connection fee, plus 89 cents per minute and a 47-cent prison surcharge. It was only allowed to charge the $3.95 connection fee and 59 cents per minute.
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