Don’t panic
As preliminary bidding began for Knight Ridder, the second-largest newspaper publisher in the U.S., the New York Times quoted UGA journalism professor Conrad Fink about investor expectations: “The rising tide of shareholder expectation has reached unreasonable proportions,” he says. “And the market is panicked about newspaper stock in an unreasonable way…There’s a fear that this is a dying industry, when in fact it’s an industry that has an unrivaled mandate, a franchise, in hundreds of cities across the country and in local news, and it has some of the strongest brand names in the country.”
Safety needs
New Latino immigrants account for the highest rate of pedestrian fatalities in the South, due to limited access to vehicles or public transportation and a poor pedestrian infrastructure, says the Chicago Tribune-City. “You end up on the road because there’s no side of the road you can walk on,” says Stephanie Bohon, a UGA demographer who studies immigrant issues, in the article. “These people are walking under hazardous conditions. They know they’re taking a risk, but they haven’t many other options.”
Meat monitoring
The USDA’s recent suggestion to inspect fresh meat differently than heat-treated meat may risk going against the 1906 Meat Inspection Act, but Michael Doyle, director of the Center for Food Safety at UGA, notes that inspecting meat based on risk makes sense, says the Des Moines Register. Reallocating inspectors based on risk would coax companies to improve sanitation on their own: “If the industry doesn’t want to do that,” he says, “then from a public health perspective their product would be considered a whole lot riskier.”
Iraqi human rights
While some experts are growing concerned over the militant segments of the Shi’ite Muslim majority’s role in the new Iraqi government, UGA religion professor Alan Godlas assuages fears. He tells Voice of America that “it would be wise for anyone to have concern, but there’s no cause for alarm.” The Iraqis’ repression of recent decades will also lead them to respect human rights, he adds: “Having gone through the tortures, the Iraqis are very sensitive to wanting to avoid having a government that’s violating human rights,” he says. “Nevertheless, given the volatile situation we can expect that there will be abuses. I think we should be horrified at any reports of torture, but I’m optimistic that these will be exceptions.”
Snail skeptics
Researchers are fingering the common periwinkle snail as the culprit in disappearing salt marshes in Georgia and across the South, saying that they’ve attacked the rare healthy stands of grass left after drought. But some scientists are skeptical that the snail’s role is so prominent. Merryl Alber, UGA marine ecologist, is quoted in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “Snails may have exacerbated the problem,” she says. “But I don’t think they had a major role. There are a lot of pressures on Georgia’s salt marshes. And the drought we had from 2001 to 2003 was a once-in-a-hundred year event, so we really don’t have anything to compare it to.” |
