Seven bucks for half an hour?
As far as that first post calling the Star a leftist rag...obviously he doesn't read it. And what, exactly, has Luis Diuguid or Mary Sanchez ever written that is offensive to anybody, except maybe to Rush Limbaugh?
As a freelance writer and video producer for many years I wrote press releases for magazines and newspapers and also did video news releases that got used by TV stations across the country. It was then and probably still is today, very common for newspapers to cut and paste entire sentences or even paragraphs from news releases. A good news release by a company or organization is written so it's easy to do that. That's what they're for. Companies pay writers to do that. They want their stuff used and there's no question of plagiarism--they give it to the media so it will get used. TV stations can take video news releases, voice it with their own person, maybe add an on camera standup opening and closing and they have a feature piece with little effort. Sometimes press releases provide legitimate information; other times they are simply cleverly concealed advertising. Point is, they're cranked out by the thousands, and news organizations use them.
Granted, a good rewrite person would do some checking and incorporate the info for the news release into his own story, but I seriously doubt that's done all that much anymore. Look at all those free ads for Apple the Star uses anytime there's a new thin silver or white product on the market. I think it's a safe guess to say much of the information comes from Apple news releases.
With all the continuing layoffs at the Star, as the corporate owners bleed the paper dry to satisfy their own insatiable lust for more and more money, I'd bet the plagiarism charge was simply an excuse to reduce the budget even more. Long time employees make more money--get rid of them and hire inexperienced people. That's the way news is going.
Bill Pryor
Not only is it a stupid idea, it takes more energy to produce ethanol than you get when you burn it, if you take into account the energy used in the production of the corn as well as the energy used to convert it to ethanol. All it is is a program to give taxpayer money to a few giant corporations who are involved in this. Without the corporate welfare, they die.
I've read that if you take into account the energy used in the production of corn, it takes more energy to produce ethanol than what you get out of burning the stuff. It's a misguided policy and all it does is transfer taxpayer dollars, in the form of subsidies, to the giant corporate farmers who are producing corn for ethanol.
Re: “U.S. Rep. William Lacy Clay says men don't like coins in their pockets, so we've kept dollar bills around”
We had half dollar coins and silver dollar coins for years and it was no problem. The reason the dollar coins haven't worked is because, thanks to the bitching from the vending machine companies, the government has made the things the same size, basically as the quarter. You feel for a quarter in your pocket you come up with a dollar. Make them like a half dollar and all would be well. Or nickel-size but much thicker like the British pound.