Day: December 7, 2009

Pennsylvania Newspaper Association Award Winner Dies Of Swine Flu

Liza Northrop Beale, the general manager of The Almanac, a weekly newspaper in Washington, Pa. died Saturday of complications related to the H1N1 virus. She was 49 and lived in Peters Township which is suburban Pittsburgh.

Mrs. Beale won a first-place 2009 Keystone Press Award from the Pennsylvania NewspaperAssociation for niche publication production, along with top honors for weekly editorial writing.

She was also the editor of Southpointe Today and Suburban Living.

She is survived by her husband, William.

Anti-Mullah Protests Draw Tens of Thousands

Not sure you’ll be seeing this on the evening news (or in tomorrow’s Inquirer) but protests have broken out today across Iran against the ruling mullahs. They reportedly involve tens of thousands of people. Anti-Mullah Protests Draw Tens of Thousands

Twitter feeds show the crowd is unbowed despite beatings, tear gas and gunfire.

“Our Nation is Awake it Despises Dictatorship” says GreenRebelion. Green in this case is the color of the revolution and has nothing to do with environmentalism.

“I don’t know about other cities but Tehran is Green today,” said Manic77, who also noted “Students chanted anti Coup until midnight in Tehran Uni dormitories”

The patriotic freedom-lovers are also placing videos on YouTube for the world to see and the dinosaur propagandists to ignore.

Anti-Mullah Protests Draw Tens of Thousands

SEPTA Workers Watch Your Pensions

During the SEPTA strike I sympathized with Transport Workers Union Local 234 chief Willie Brown’s late demand for a forensic audit of the organization’s pension fund — a demand which eventually disappeared from the table.

Well, the Commonwealth Foundation is reporting that SEPTA’s two largest pension fund (SAM and City Transit) were funded at 71% and 61% of accrued liabilities – underfunded even by government standards – as of June 2007, which is, of course, before the massive decline in the market which hit all pension plans hard.

So SEPTA workers fear for your retirements. Taxpayers fear for your wallets.