| Monday, June 29, 2009 |
| News blast: Billy Mays dead, Madoff sentenced, white firefighters prevail |
 The celebrity deaths are coming fast and furious, folks. Loud, exuberant Pitchman Bill Mays has died at age 50 of an apparent pulminary embalism. (Medical examiner press conference just wrapped up in Tampa.) Apparently he hit his head during a plane's hard landing, but the medical examiner says the bump on the head was not the cause.
In even bigger news ...
Bernie Madoff gets 150 years, after a morning of angry testimony from his victims. Bye, Bernie!
A weekend coup shakes up Honduras, before that country's president could hold a referendum that would bust the country's term limits. From the Economist:
THE scene was reminiscent of many in the 20th century, when military coups against democratic governments were sadly common across much of Latin America. At dawn on Sunday June 28th a group of soldiers barged into the residence of Manuel Zelaya, Honduras’s president, disarmed his guards, dragged him to an air base and flew him to exile in San José, Costa Rica. The army silenced the state television station, cut electricity supplies and the bus services in the capital, Tegucigalpa, and sent tanks and planes to patrol the city. “I was brutally taken out of my house and kidnapped by hooded soldiers who pointed high-calibre rifles at me,” said Mr Zelaya. “But until the next elections, I will continue to be the president of Honduras. Only the people can remove me.”
The toppling of Mr Zelaya took the region by surprise. Honduras, although small, poor and ravaged by corruption and violent gangs, has seemed a more solid democracy than, for example, neighbouring Guatemala. Mr Zelaya, a Liberal, alienated the leaders of the country’s main political parties last year by joining the leftist Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas, an alliance led by Venezuela’s populist president, Hugo Chávez. Yet Mr Zelaya’s policies have been only mildly social-democratic, such as an increase in the minimum wage. The Bolivian government reacts strongly to the coup, and for good reason ...
Back here in the States, a group of white firefighters have prevailed in the New Haven promotions case. The Supreme Court ruled for Frank Ricci and 19 other firemen, saying the city was wrong to throw out a test that would have led to promotions for them, but none for African-American firefighters who also passed the test, but not with a high enough score. Somewhere out there, Pat Buchanan is mourning the loss of a 2010 election issue. Justice Kennedy was the swing vote:
The court ruled that New Haven was wrong to scrap a promotion exam because no African-Americans and only two Hispanic firefighters were likely to be made lieutenants or captains based on the results, the AP says. The city said that it had acted to avoid a lawsuit from minorities.
“Fear of litigation alone cannot justify an employer’s reliance on race to the detriment of individuals who passed the examinations and qualified for promotions,” Justice Anthony Kennedy said in his opinion for the court. He was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel Alito, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas.
In dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said the white firefighters “understandably attract this court’s sympathy. But they had no vested right to promotion. Nor have other persons received promotions in preference to them.” Justices Stephen Breyer, David Souter and John Paul Stevens signed onto Ginsburg’s dissent. The significance of this case now is that the conservative members of the court have reversed Judge Sonia Sotomayor, their very likely soon-to-be colleague. The right will make hay. It's what they do. But the real issue will continue to be affirmative action, and Frank Ricci has become the issue's new poster boy.Labels: news and current affairs, Ricci case |
posted by JReid @ 12:11 PM   |
|
|
|
|
