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Lasting benefits of 'magic mushrooms' Are top swimmers doping? U.S. tennis player's amazing rant against female tennis stars DNA tests sniff out mutts' breeding Court rules in favor of Second Amendment gun right What makes someone an adult? Get high before you fly Man loses 75 pounds on McDonald's diet High school girls make pact to get pregnant The smartest (and dumbest) dog breeds June 06 July 06 August 06 September 06 October 06 November 06 December 06 January 07 February 07 March 07 April 07 May 07 June 07 July 07 August 07 September 07 October 07 November 07 December 07 January 08 February 08 March 08 April 08 May 08 June 08 July 08 June 06 May 06 April 06 March 06 February 06 January 06 December 05 November 05 October 05 September 05 August 05 July 05 June 05 May 05 April 05 Blog RollAsk The Californian Editorials Entertainment Eye of Bakersfield Faith Forum Fired Up! Inside Sports Neighbors Right Thinking Sound Off Talk of the Town 
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The six Muslims kicked off a flight last fall because of 'suspicious' behavior are now suing the airline and threatening to sue the passengers who reported their activies. One of the men is a local imam.
Now I understand suing the airline, but the passengers? That's pretty scary.
If these passengers end up tied up in court, experts are rightly asking if it might have a chilling effect on passengers speaking up about potential terror suspects.
What do you think?
(Someone in our...
We've got a Q&A up this morning on 'tree butchery,' which is apparently the term for the practice of dramatically trimming trees that is pretty popular here in Bakersfield.
The article suggests you hire a certified arborist and avoid 'topping' a tree, which is where you basically lop the top off. It also warns folks to avoid hiring a tree trimmer who leaves a card at your door or offers really cut rats ($20-30.)
All good advice (even though there are only three certified arborists...
The Flying J refinery on Rosedale Highway has proposed increasing its capacity by 50 percent to meet rising diesel and gasoline demands, as well as making it a more viable operation.
The new fuel, meeting California's strict standards, would go directly into local markets.
"This refinery is profitable but (expanding) is something that's necessary to ensure its long-term viability," said Gene Cotten, its general manager.
While the facility uses up to date pollution control...
Chuang Chuang, a panda in Thailand, watches pandas doing it on a big screen, but he just doesn't seem interested.
CC is a panda at the Chiang Mai Zoo where keepers would like him to mate because pandas apparently have very low rabbit instincts.
Pandas could help us all in population control.
But the zookeepers are hoping CC will get some sort of impression from watching lovey-dovey peers.
If not, perhaps there's some panda genes we can pass on to all teenagers.
Posted by...
I've been reading the stories about the eight fired prosecutors and wondering where the meat is.
Then Monica M. Goodling, senior counselor to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, refused Monday to testify in the Senate about her involvement in the firings.
She invoked her right against self incrimination.
She's also the Justice's liaison to the White House.
That's certainly smoke. Some meat is certainly cooking in a fire somewhere. Because someone who knows the ins and outs...
A story by T.J. Banes of the Indianapolis Star was about men who were content to move to another city because their wives got a new job.
The story said this was a growing phenomenon in today's society, even to the point of men becoming house husbands so the wife can pursue her career.
In any marriage, that becomes an interesting question.
Would you be okay with that?
Posted by Steve E. Swenson
A Bakersfield pharmacist, who lost his wife and child in a Nov. 24 crash on the Truxtun Avenue Extension, has filed a $50 million claim against the City of Bakersfield, alleging the design of the road is unsafe.
Magdy Aboelghar, 49, and his attorney, Charles Brehmer of Bakersfield, allege the median is more of a "launching pad" than a deterrent to crashes.
Aboelghar was in the car when his wife, Mona, 43, and child, Abdalla, 19, were killed in a crash with a Nissan Frontier...
A U.S. District court judge struck down a law the made it a crime for web sites to allow children to see porn.
The judge ruled there were less intrusive ways, such as software that can block porn, for parents to protect their kids. Libraries, for example, already use such software.
The 1998 law, known as the Online Child Protection Act, was challenged by the ACLU and sites such as Salon.com, as an unconstitutional infringement on free speech rights.
Salon was happy with...
A University of Maryland study found a surprising result — mothers spend more quality time with their children than mothers did 40 years ago during the height of the June Cleaver era.
Surprising because more mothers work now than they used to. And they got activities coming out of their ying yang. Where do they find all the time?
Less house work. (That's maybe another topic).
But the study says mothers spend 14.1 hours a week nurturing their young-ins, compared to 10.2...
Some professions aren't supposed to rat you out — doctors and lawyers, for example.
But what if they could take advantage of the anonymity of blogs to tell the truth about patients and clients?
Such an issue was raised in a story by Detroit Free Press reporter Margarita Bauza on medical blogs.
One doctor complained, for example, about an 18-year-old who on Christmas day had her third baby.
The story suggests the doctor or perhaps, a hospital employer, could wind up in...
And, if so, is that a bad thing?
The question comes up in a study that says today's college students are 30 percent more narcissistic and self-centered than the same age group in the early 1980s.
The experiment examined 16,475 college students' responses to the Narcissistic Personality Inventory between 1982 and 2006. Led by Professor Jean Twenge, students were asked questions such as, "If I ruled the world, it would be a better place because," "I think I am a special...
Kern County planners finally put the brakes on development in west Bakersfield where roads are already clogged with houses that shouldn't have been approved earlier.
And now it appears some developers will try to force their additional problems on the community anyway.
Developer Matt Wade calls it unfair for the county to drop the whole metropolitan's area's traffic troubles on the heads of 13 developers. There's always been traffic problems, he says.
Of course, that's the point....
In the latest example of how males of the world get females to do silly things, like wear high heals, teens and young 20-somethings are into "hooking up," casual sexual encounters with no strings attached.
A Washington D.C. author, Laura Sessions Stepp, wrote a book, "Unhooked," which suggest these arrangements are not good for girls.
She says hookups can be damaging to young women, denying their emotional needs, putting them at risk of depression and even sexually...
Today the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments on the "bong" case in which an Alaskan student unfurled a banner proclaiming, "Bong hits 4 Jesus," in order to get a little attention back in 2002.
High school student Joseph Frederick got some attention all right and now the nation's highest court will determine if the school had a right to take down his banner, and whether the principal can be held personally and economically liable for infringing on free speech.
...
College is theoretically a place where people go to get smart.
But apparently, a whole lot of students do a lot of dumb things while they are there, such as binge drinking and abuse of legal and illegal drugs.
A new study says almost half of U.S. college students dabble one time too many in alcohol, marijuana, sedatives, painkillers and stimulants.
Well, where else are you going to learn about this stuff?
And who is calling the kettle black?
Of the few times I've been hung...
Dear Ken,
I don't know you from Adam. Only what I read about you in the newspaper.
And that's not real good, Ken.
You were elected to a PUBLIC job, Ken.
This is not the CIA. This is the Bakersfield City Council.
And you make decisions which have public impact. Part of the rules is you are to disclose who gave more than $10,000 to your business as a certified public accountant.
You...
Gov. Schwarzenegger is expected to sign a bill today to move California's presidential primary up from June to Feb. 5.
That will mean that when California's voters cast ballots for presidential candidates, it won't be a foregone conclusion who they will be.
It will also mean California will have an extra primary election in 2008 and succeeding years, because the June primary will also be held.
And, of course, the state will be subjected to more political ads on television. Oh boy.
...
The shooting death of a man Tuesday at Valley Plaza is yet another example of criminals invading the place where I go to buy underwear.
Bakersfield police reported that Officer Eric South helped chase a man who stole a knife from Merlo's Cutlery, but the man stabbed South in the arm as South tried to arrest him.
South shot the man who later died in Kern Medical Center.
In recent years we've had a stabbing death in the parking lot of the mall and a shooting death inside the...
As a preface for this blog, let me just say I love the Mad Greek Cafe in Baker.
That's as close to a Greek house as I've ever been in.
But there's been quite a controversy at DePauw University in Indiana over one of its sororities, Delta Zeta, kicking out some of its members, allegedly because they were not attractive enough.
"We at DePauw believe that the values of our university and those of Delta Zeta sorority are incompatible," school President Robert G. Bottoms wrote in...
KERO and CNN have stories on a local soldier who is getting flak for a sticker he's put on his truck. Check out the KERO story here.
The sticker reads "Lord please forgive me, I have committed sins for our freedom."
Some folks are up in arms over the sticker, arguing killing during war isn't sinful.
What do you think?
One of the things I liked about Bakersfield was you could get around relatively easily on its roads.
That's coming to an end and a story in Sunday's paper by reporter James Burger says the worst is yet to come.
The story says at a critical juncture 15 years ago, the City Council didn't raise new home fees enough to cover the need for building main thoroughfares.
And the residents didn't help themselves by failing to pass Measure I, a half-cent sales tax, in November 2006.
That...
No doubt that in recent years, car bumpers have become attractive.
But they don't help much in keeping repair costs down in minor collisions of up to 6 mph.
A study on midsized cars found a few that kept damage under $1,500, but most were more expensive with some exceeding $4,000 damage.
That's compared to $86 for a 1981 Ford Escort.
These are the kind of crashes you get in a parking lot. My son bumped his 1965 Ford Mustang in a parking lot a few years back. Total cost to fix,...
Why did it take 30 years for Americans to break off their love affair with rap music?
Rap sales slid a whopping 21 percent from 2005 to 2006, an Associated Press story reported.
At the risk of sounding like my parents who didn't like rock'n roll, I have always equated rap music with porn — after a couple minutes you get the entire picture and it just gets boring.
Plus, dancing to it is contrived.
The AP story begins,
Maybe it was the umpteenth coke-dealing anthem...
This question comes up because a 15-year-old girl spent 5 WEEKS!!!!!!! hiccuping until it finally stopped on Wednesday.
News agencies reported:
She sipped pickle juice, held her breath, breathed into a bag, even went to a neurologist, but for more than five weeks nothing would stop a 15-year-old girl's rapid hiccups – until they finally just stopped on their own.
After trying countless remedies and attracting national media attention, Jennifer Mee of St. Petersburg, Fla....
A Santa Rosa high school freshman was being razzed by classmates about her conservative Mormon upbringing when she retorted, "That's so gay."
The school, Maria Carillo High School in Santa Rosa, gave the girl, Rebekah Rice a warning and noted it in her file.
Her parents have sued the school saying their daughter should not have been disciplined in the 2002 incident because the phrase was in widespread use, meaning that's so silly, and it should not be equated with hate speech....
What's with Republicans announcing candidacies on late night comedy shows?
Did Arnold start a trend?
Arizona Senator John McCain announced his intention to run on the David Letterman show Wednesday night.
Is the message here that this is funny?
On a personal note, I like McCain as a person. He's warm and gracious and much more down to earth than most politicians I have ever met.
Doesn't mean I will vote for him; only that I would find it pleasant to have dinner with him...
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