Caught My Eye…

It’s Friday and that means it is time to end your week with another exciting edition of “Caught My Eye!”

Reminder: “Caught My Eye” goes well with a glass of wine or with your favorite microbrew (especially on Friday afternoons).

If you are a first-time visitor, this is my weekly column where I take a quick look at some of the stories I did not have time to write about during the week. Often I throw in some sarcasm and poke fun at people just to make you smile.

Today I write about Daines and Obamacare, Barry Beach, Brad Molnar, Brown v. Board of Education, Werfel/Wuerffel, IRS, Top Baby Names of 2012, Making Montana Proud, and much more!

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Thursday Numbers

Welcome to my weekly column called “Thursday Numbers!” I’m glad you stopped by!

If you are a new visitor, this is where I take a look at the numbers that are in the news (in descending order) and provide commentary (sometimes with a little sarcasm).

DISCLAIMER: By reading this column you may be able to use the information to impress your family, friends, and co-workers. Please consider yourself warned.

This week I write about the highest-earning athletes, Powerball, salaries for university presidents, unemployment, Barry Beach, Montana Department of Justice, anesthesiologists, deer and bus, satisfaction, shampooers, Trevor Runyon, IRS and Obama, BAC, and much more!

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Barry Beach: Justice Denied

On Tuesday the Associated Press reported that the Montana Supreme Court had ruled 4-3 that “a judge was wrong to release Barry Beach from prison two years ago and order a new trial in the 1979 slaying of a teenage girl.”

The opinion from the Montana Supremes is pretty absurd. Barry Beach does deserve a new trial.

The ruling means Beach will probably go back to prison after being out since December of 2011. He had served about 29 years of the 100 year sentence and had been free awaiting a new trial for almost 18 months. Beach found out about the Montana Supreme Court decision from a reporter. This all seems pretty brutal, but that is pretty much the method of operation for the justice system in Montana.

In case you are wondering what this is all about, it started in 1979 when someone killed 17 year-old Kim Nees near Poplar, Montana. Barry Beach was convicted of that deliberate homicide on April 13, 1984. In May of 1984, he was sentenced to 100 years in the Montana State Prison without the possibility of parole. Beach was given a new evidentiary hearing in November 2008 and was released from prison pending a new trial in December 2011. I happened to catch a story about it on Dateline NBC that aired in 2008. I have followed and written about the case since then.

In my opinion, Montanans should face the fact that our state has one of the most incompetent State Supreme Courts in the country. That incompetence seems to trickle down into the state district courts as well. These judges, who are elected to office, are certainly better politicians than they are judges or attorneys and that’s part of the problem with the justice system in Big Sky Country. Shameful is one of the more merciful words I can use to describe the people who occupy these courts.

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When It Rains…

Yesterday I wrote about five issues the Obama Administration owns and will have to defend during the mid-term elections of 2014 and the Presidential election of 2016. You can read it HERE.

Now there are six issues. It’s very hard for a Presidential Administration to juggle six issues.

The Associated Press (AP) reported yesterday “The Justice Department [DOJ] secretly obtained two months of telephone records of reporters and editors for The Associated Press.” The AP claims the records obtained listed outgoing calls from their offices in New York, Washington and Hartford, Conn.

The fourth estate was just slapped across the face, and it probably hurt a little more since it came from the Obama Administration.

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Obama: One Tough Spring

Spring is in the air. It’s a time of renewal with new flowers sprouting from the ground, gardens being planted, and the aroma of fresh-cut grass encircling the neighborhood.

I doubt many in the Obama Administration have stopped to take in the sights and sounds of spring. To say the spring of 2013 (so far) has been tough on the Obama Administration would be an understatement – and summer is still over a month away. That means people will be paying attention for a while longer before school is out and they head off on vacations.

You can bet that some of these issues will stick around and have an effect on the 2014 mid-term elections and some will be the topics of the Presidential race of 2016. Here are the top five issues that the Obama Administration (as well as Democrats) now own and will have to defend for the next few years:

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The Sunday Message

The writer Rudyard Kipling once said, “God could not be everywhere, and therefore he made mothers.”

Happy Mother’s Day 2013!

Take a few moments today to thank your mother for all that she has done for you. Call her! For those of you like me whose mother is no longer living, thank God for the time you had with her.

Proverbs 31:26-30 (NIV):

She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is on her tongue. She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness. Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her. “Many women do noble things, but you surpass them all.” Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.

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Caught My Eye…

It’s Friday and that means it is time to end your week with another exciting edition of “Caught My Eye!”

This is the 145th edition of the almost award-winning column!

“Caught My Eye” is my weekly column where I take a quick look at some of the stories I did not have time to write about during the week. Often I throw in some sarcasm and poke fun at people just to make you smile.

Today I write about Medicare Provider Charge Data, Closing Overseas Bases, Pro-Fracking, The National Policy Institute, Hitting Your Target, Manti Te’o, Jack Bauer, Bono, Mayor Bloomberg’s favorite state, birthdays, and much more!

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