Latest Comments

• Inside the secret industry of inmate-staffed call centers

  Thu Jan 12, 2012
  • For the past 13 years, I provided software/technical support to a prison work program. The inmates acquired marketable skills and had the opportunity to EARN money. Part of what they earned went to pay a portion of their room and board, and they got to keep part...just like real life.

• Michael Douglas' son gets 4½ more years in prison

  Wed Dec 21, 2011
  • I agree. This guy is mostly just hurting himself. Let's use the prison space for violent criminals, and put the self-destructive ones in treatment where they might have a chance of turning their lives around.

• Stifled by corporate America, the young turn to farming

  Wed Dec 21, 2011
  • My wife and I are retired, and living on a small farm in Missouri. We just learned that next year our health insurance is going up from $1500 to $1700 per month. I'm sure glad we don't have to count on paying for that with what we could make raising crops.

• Swallowed pen still works 25 years later

  Mon Dec 19, 2011
  • Sucker still worked after 25 years. Now that's what you would call a PERMANENT marker.

• US troops fear final spectacular attack in Iraq

  Sun Nov 27, 2011
  • "people dipping their finger in the purple ink saying they voted..." Dang! Maybe they should have tried that in Chicago. Then again, what kind of message would it send if they ever exhumed a body and its fingers were all purple?

• Congressional report calls for drastic changes at TSA

  Wed Nov 16, 2011
  • All of you people that are complaining about the TSA should shut up. Just look at the fine job they have done deflecting public ire away from the Postal Service. :)

• 16-foot python found in Florida had eaten a deer

  Fri Oct 28, 2011
  • I would consider Orlando to be populated, and the climate would be very favorable for pythons, just like it is for gators.

• 'Insane' even by Illinois standards? Union official to get $500,000 in pensions

  Wed Oct 12, 2011
  • Looks to me like a lot of cities/counties/states are going down. When I retired a few months back, I took the cash payout and am managing it myself. As my wife (Harvard MBA) says, "money now is better than money later--nobody can take the money now away from you."

• US Senate defeats Obama's jobs bill

  Tue Oct 11, 2011
  • I just wish someone would explain to me why, if Social Security is broke, is it a good idea to reduce its revenue.

• 7 rescued 20 hours after being tossed into choppy seas

  Mon Oct 10, 2011
  • I guess maybe they should have just gone down to their handy dandy communal store I Havana, and bought life jackets. "My family is planning a little fishing trip in our rowboat. We'll need 21 adult-size life jackets, and one for a four-year-old."