Not so traditional high school graduate

The Trib has a story this morning about Lucille Keppen, a 92 year old inmate in a state prison who is going to receive her GED next month. Keppen is in prison for shooting and seriously injuring her neighbor in 2002. She shot him because he had stop spending time with her. Apparently Stephen (Baard) Flesche (her neighbor) a Vietnam veteran would spend a lot of time with Keppen, and he was helping her with religious issues that Keppen was going through. Apparently when he stopped coming around, she shot him, and watched him walk and struggle away until he fell to the ground. She thought that once she shot him he would immediately fall like in the movies: "He kept on walking and walking. I remember seeing movies where when someone gets shot they curl up and down they go. He didn't, he just kept walking and walking. Then all of sudden, he got weak and the Bible flew and down he went. I said to him, 'I just hope it hurts, because you hurt me so deeply.' " Now the Red Tribune has ran an article about this woman's accomplishment of finishing her GED... I have to say that I can't believe that I wasted my time reading this, but wow the Trib has really reached a new level. This is unbelievable. I am all for forgiveness and the celebration of education, but how about we run a story on someone a little more worthy of such notoriety. I know for a fact that my mom and sister have children in their programs that would be highly more deserving of acknowdlement when they graduate from high school or get their GED. I love the ocasional story about the 90 year old man or women getting their high school diploma. Often they are followed by a story of hard ship or war (as was the reason that Keppen never finished high school). This story would have been great if Keppen had not shot a man. http://www.startribune.com/462/story/466174.html

Valleyfair will re-open Wild Thing today. After being shut down a few weeks ago because of cars breaking away from the rest of the pack. Here is my question: Does anyone want to ride Wild Thing anymore? The state of Minnesota doesn't require routine inspections on Valleyfair rides, and that is something that doesn't sit well with yours truly. Have you been to Valleyfair lately? In the summer time when the weather is nice, and you want to spend a great day at Valleyfair riding a few rides and checking out the water park, you don't want to have to worry about your ride falling apart. The real issue I think is who is in charge of these rides. Valleyfair has a great summer internship program for students, but when my car is flying off the track at 70 mph, I don't want a freshman from the U of M taking the controls.

President Bush is pushing both the Senate and the House to come to some agreements on the immigration bill. The bill which passed through the Senate, has a long way still to go. I have to admit that I am getting rather tired of this subject, but I'm going to continue to look into it. I truly believe that any legitimate bill has to have proper sanctions written in for big businesses who violate laws and use illegal aliens for cheap labor.

All U.S. and allied troops serving in Iraq will undergo "Core Values" training in how to operate professionally and humanely. This is in response to the allegations of mis-conduct and murder of 24 Iraqi civilians last year. The conclusion is that some officers lied to cover up the abuse. This is still all speculation at this point, but this is not good for the U.S. military. The media is having a field day with this (is anyone surprised), and no matter what happens, the military is already vilified for it. If and when these allegations prove to be true and there is evidence to support who is responsible those people should be punished to the fullest extent of the law (with with the military at the helm you can be certain that they will be). That is where it should end, but the media will continue to drag their own military who is defending their freedom to even speak in the mud. What happened is terrible and needs to be addressed, but that is no reason to drag all those who are risking their lives through the mud.