No ‘Osbournes’ here

By Jennifer J. Foster

I just sent a thank you e-mail to the powers-that-be at Columbus, Ga.-based Fox affiliate WXTX for their decision to forego airing “Osbournes: Reloaded” tonight following “American Idol.“

From Fox Network’s Osbournes site:

All Aboard the Crazy Train!

Hop aboard the “Crazy Train” when Ozzy, Sharon, Jack and Kelly Osbourne turn another television convention upside down and inside out with their new series OSBOURNES: RELOADED premiering after AMERICAN IDOL Tuesday, March 31 (9:00-10:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX.

The series will also venture off-stage with recurring segments including “Osbourne in the USA,“ where members of the family go to work in places such as a fast-food drive-thru; “Osbournes Meet the Osbournes,“ where the family goes cross-country and lives with other Osbourne families; and the “Littlest Osbournes,“ where pint-size, potty-mouthed versions of Sharon and Ozzy recreate moments from their early days…in all their four-letter glory.

“Pint-size, potty-mouthed versions of Sharon and Ozzy.“

Aren’t the regular-size, potty mouthed Sharon and Ozzy enough?

Seriously, little kids swearing up a blue streak. Funny? No. Stupid? Yes. But most of all, sad.

The pilot of this show was so bad that even “Entertainment Weekly”—not exactly known as the banner-waver for moral conservatism, modesty and prudishness—even “EW” called it “repulsive, repellent, ridiculous.“

It seems so often these days that it takes the formation and deployment of an angry mob to protect community standards. I wanted WXTX to know that I appreciated the station’s decision to turn that trend on its head and take a leadership role in helping us uphold those standards.

Don’t get me wrong: I’m all for the First Amendment. But what’s appropriate for late-night cable programming isn’t necessarily what’s appropriate for prime-time network programming—especially when it follows a show like “American Idol” and at an unusual time (8:20 p.m. Central time) specifically keyed to hook “Idol’s” young audience.

Ozzy Osbourne made his name as a musician, but his modern fame—and that of his family—is not about that. The family’s battles with drugs and alcohol are well documented; many of Ozzy’s young fans actually tune in to laugh at how disoriented and disheveled he is as a result of all those years of frying his brain.

I don’t think it’s funny. I don’t find any humor at all in someone who is as famous for unintelligible, profanity-laced ramblings as he once was for music.

Thank you, WXTX.

See also:

Fla. Fox affiliate refuses to air Osbournes show

More tax headaches for Obama Administration

By Jennifer J. Foster

OK, this is just getting to be ridiculous.

From FoxNews.com:

Health and Human Services nominee Kathleen Sebelius has corrected three years of tax returns and paid more than $7,000 in back taxes after finding “unintentional errors”—the latest tax troubles for an Obama administration nominee.

The Kansas governor explained the changes to senators in a letter dated Tuesday that was obtained by The Associated Press. She said they involved charitable contributions, the sale of a home and business expenses.

Sebelius joins President Obama’s first HHS nominee, Tom Daschle; Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner; Labor Secretary Hilda Solis and a handful of other West Wing picks to run into post-appointment tax trouble.

Seriously, did anyone read those gargantuan questionnaires required of potential appointees?

And seriously, I want to know who decided that the failure to pay taxes in a timely and accurate manner wasn’t a deal-breaker for working in the White House and running the country.

Apparently, that person, whomever he is, is in good company: Most of the United States Senate appears to agree with him.

No more ‘War on Terror’

By Jennifer J. Foster

... Well, at least not in the linguistic sense, anyway.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has news on the vocabulary front. From the Associated Press:

The top U.S. diplomat told reporters Tuesday that the Obama administration has quit using that line to describe the effort to fight terrorism around the world.

“The administration has stopped using the phrase and I think that speaks for itself,“ Clinton said.

OK. Let’s break this down.

Obviously, ongoing terror efforts remain in the world, and they remain focused against the West—particularly the United States, as the leader of the Pakistani Taliban told the AP earlier today. (How’s that for current?)

Only fools would think that “terror” no longer exists.

So ... are we just not waging “war on” it anymore?

The story about this development goes on to say that “even close U.S. allies suggested (the phrase) was overly militaristic and perhaps counterproductive.“

I’m not exactly what you would consider a hawk in traditional terms. I’m all for diplomacy, in as many places and with as many tools and for as long as it is—well, let’s use their standard—“productive.“

But obviously, terrorists—such as the dude who vowed a few hours ago, “Soon we will launch an attack in Washington that will amaze everyone in the world,“ for example—aren’t going to be swayed by diplomatic efforts.

Overly militaristic? I don’t think so. They are at war with us. What’s counterproductive is to call it anything less than it is.

The purpose of prison

By Jennifer J. Foster

If visited CNN’s web site at all today, there is no doubt you saw the lengthy feature story about four members of the Manson “family.“ The story has been prominently displayed for about the last 24 hours.

I read it, and I hope you will, too, if you haven’t done so already. It is a look at what the lives of four Manson “family” killers are like more than 30 years removed from their crimes and what their chances are for parole.

(The short answer to the latter: Infinitesimal, but not impossible.)

But the CNN story is useful for more than just the narrative, the window it provides into who this man and these women have become. Perhaps without meaning to be, it is actually a thought-provoking piece about the purpose of prison.

The story details how these for “family” members have taken responsibility for their actions, bettered themselves and renounced their ties with Charles Manson, the mastermind of the 1969 crimes that were so heinous, they became part of American pop culture.

They are described by prison officials as model inmates. One member of the “family”—Charles “Tex” Watson—is an ordained minister. Susan Atkins has terminal brain cancer. Her requests for a “compassionate release” have been rejected, even though she is bedridden. The other two women profiled for this story are both active in servicework through their prison.

CNN appears to inject some editorial commentary into the story here:

After three decades behind bars, Manson family members Atkins, Watson, Patricia Krenwinkel and Leslie Van Houten have repeatedly been described as model prisoners who have accepted responsibility for their crimes.

Parole boards, however, continue to reject their bids for release, and a debate rages over whether the four should ever be freed.

In pressing for her early release, Atkins’s attorney James Whitehouse (who is also her husband) notes that even though her condition continues to deteriorate, “there is still a very real chance the Parole Board will nonetheless insist her release would be a danger to society.“

And there’s the hook for the philosophical debate underlying this story: Is the purpose of prison simply to keep dangerous people away from the rest of us? Is it also to rehabilitate criminals in hopes that they can be returned to society? Or is it also something else—to provide justice, i.e., recompense, for whatever they have done?

Yes, yes ... and yes.

If the purpose of prison was simply to keep dangerous people away from society and to rehabilitate and return to society those criminals who “straightened up,“ then Atkins’s request for early release would be a different story. In fact, her medical condition wouldn’t enter in to the discussion at all. It would be irrelevant. If she had been rehabilitated, then she wouldn’t be a danger to others. Her release—and the release of the other three “family” members profiled here—would be noncontroversial.

But protection and rehabilitation aren’t in themselves the total ends of prison.

As attention turns to whether they should be paroled, it is perhaps easy to forget that they were originally sentenced to death for their crimes. They are only eligible for parole because their sentences were commuted to life in prison in 1972, when the U.S. Supreme Court struck down capital punishment laws.

Let’s put that another way: The jurors who spent weeks hearing, seeing and weighing the evidence of these murders believed that these crimes were serious enough that these four people should pay for them with their lives. Rehabilitation was beside the point; jurors decided that justice demanded their lives for the ones they took. They certainly never intended for them to walk in freedom again.

SIDEBAR: If you are old enough to remember the Manson Family murders in 1969, you don’t need any reminder of what those killings entailed. But if you weren’t around then, you can find—and see—all you need to know here. Be forewarned: The story and the images are graphic and disturbing—as was what happened to the Manson “family” victims. END SIDEBAR

It was chance that the killers’ death sentences were commuted. But that circumstance does not in any way lessen the debt that juries decided they owe society for their crimes.

Over the past 30-plus years, they have paid that debt the only way they can—by mentoring other inmates, being model prisoners and contributing what they can to the outside world.

And they should continue doing those things for the rest of their lives ... right where they are. They may have reformed in prison, but the lives they took so brutally can never be restored.

Justice will not be served until they pay with their own.

So much cooler online

By Jennifer J. Foster

President Obama will hold a town hall meeting today, but it’s unlike any other he’s done before.

This one’s online.

Obama is continuing his efforts to reach out to voters directly, without the “filter” of mainstream media.

SIDEBAR: Remember back during the campaign, when Obama and the mainstream media were engaged in a torrid love affair? Alas, young love ... END SIDEBAR

Anyway, Obama will make his pitch to Americans, urging them to get behind his gargantuan budget. He needs to build support for this, his first major domestic policy effort, because all his other domestic policy efforts seem wrapped up in it: In addition to economic recovery, the president wants to spend—er, invest huge amounts of money in infrastructure, alternative energy development and health care reform.

This town hall follows on the heels of an op-ed Obama wrote to THE WORLD earlier this week.

If you’re interested, check out the event here. It starts in about five minutes.

Let’s see whether President Obama’s hard sell on the budget is so much cooler online.