Good morning to all. Special greetings to those of you visiting folo for the first time — we hope you’ll like it and stick around to pitch in with us on this bodacious work-in-progress!
We’ve got so much Scruggs news to digest from overnight, and so much known to be coming today, that even if I could, I might not report new developments at this point.
Instead, let’s take this small opportunity between feeder bands to work on getting our heads around yesterday’s landfalls. If you’ve come-to this morning with new questions or insights, or just something else you want to point out, here’s a fresh thread dedicated to the purpose.
Some announcements too:
I so much appreciate all the email tips and queries y’all send. If ever you need to reach NMC off-blog for similar purposes, his folo-dedicated email is nmisscommentorATgmailDOTcom. (You see how hard he works for us, on top of his own busy law practice, so he may not be able to respond instantly; but he’s very diligent about answering ASAP. Please do, though, think twice about whether I might be able to help you about as well before adding to his overload.)
For new arrivers needing orientation to this incredible story, I’m working on a special page we might call “Scruggsiana for Dummies” (except folo’s always fresh out of dummies, d’oh). Anyhow, I’m pulling together some links to previous posts for a quick-and-dirty overview. Look for that soon.
Meanwhile, riddenword (folo’s webmaster) and I are working on improving these premises, trying to maintain their coziness-factor while adding some much-needed elbow-room. So watch for a new folo in 3-column format with better legibility and other new amenities one of these days very soon. Much as I love this place, we’re quickly outgrowing it. If you have requests for features you’d especially like included, let me know at lotusflowahATwidoutaDOTnet and I’ll see what we can do (we’re limited to free software at this point, so some bellz&whistlez will be beyond our means to provide). As always, we’ll do our best for ya.
One feature you can expect to see shortly is a folo tip-jar (and possibly a voluntary annual-subscription button too).
Here’s my situation: When I early-retired seven years ago, my CPA and I thought I could do so safely. Developments since — investment-portfolio damage, what four ‘04 hurricanes did to hazard-insurance and property-tax rates in Florida, astronomical premium hikes for health coverage (etc., etc.: all the things you’re looking at too) — have proven our forecast laughable. With some egging-on from friends, I recently decided to give blogging a try as a way to earn either a small living or at least something to retard the steep drawdown of my savings. I knew it was a long-shot (very) and that it would take quite a while to gain a large enough readership to draw advertisers’ attention (if ever I could — many most bloggers, even the excellent ones, don’t).
Then up popped the devil — well, Dickie Scruggs anyhow — and all of a sudden, wonderful readers and commenters started swarming this little joint. So now it seems slightly more possible that blogging might actually make a plausible profession for me just BEFORE I have to quit (or severely cut back on) it and hire-out as some other kind of worker.
I’ve never attempted fund-raising (or any other facet of entrepreneurship) before, and it doesn’t come naturally to me. I could sure use your guidance if you have some to share: Would those of you financially able be willing to help support this blog via donation or subscription? Would you prefer I seek advertisers? If subscription sounds reasonable to you, what rate would you recommend?
Let me stress: as long as folo exists, it will be a free read. But to keep it existing much longer, the proprietor must monetize it to some extent. The thing needs a “feeder band” of its own to hang in here, I guess you can say.
Anyhow, if you have thoughts about any of this, please jump on the email and share them with me.
Thanks,
lotus
Lotus, if folo were a newspaper, I’d be subscribing anyway. I don’t live in the affected area for Scruggiana, nor am I a lawyer. But I do have an affinity for clean government. So I’ll be happy to chip in for a course of therapy with your fine community’s sterilizing sunlight.
I could live with advertising as well, though the more intrusive forms might discourage readership. JMO, FWIW, YMMV, etc.
Thanks for this fresh spot, lotus, and for introducing the term “feeder bands”.
All of our thinking is “fed” and it’s always wise IMHO to make sure you know what you’re eating. My comments in first thread below – which was the last of several NMC posted in the late night/early morning – are an example of my doing just that.
Several hours earlier and many threads below, a comment was made about the need to guard against getting “caught up in the story” – and I took that comment to heart. It’s all too easy to do – and as NMC wrote as we shut down last night, we can only guess about many things at this point.
I took that to heart as well and have copied my 11:24pm reply to the risk of getting “caught up in the story” below as “food for thought” today.
“…the alternating periods of dissonance and harmony here at folo are the sounds of reasoned, informed discussion – trust me, no one here gets to be comfortable in their thinking too long.”
Bring out the ads Ms Lotus and anything else you need to keep Folo goin’.
"Scruggsiana for Dummies "
Will it have pichures?
I like pichures…
I think I have the basics down but tryin’ to keep up with y’all is a bit much for a part timer. Maybe Scruggsiana fer Dummies ain’t such a bad ideer.
Dang, you guys are GREAT.
Busted, I been working on that thing all morning, and if we can find us some open-source pitchers, you’ll have ‘em, m’man!
Fresh news upstairs, didja see?
Miss Flowah:
Every now and then, in other venues, I sit down and deliver myself of a post or comment, and once I hit submit I look up and find I’ve just spent a couple of hours I didn’t have on my puny efforts.
I can’t even begin to imagine the hours and hours and hours you and NMC and some of your other folo-wers have donated to the general cause of understanding this complicated story.
So – I’d be mighty happy to kick in some dollars to keep this enterprise going.
On entertainment value alone, folo is definitely worth at least the price of a movie every now and then!
ld
As far as suggestions for improving the blog, this reader needs an “edit” option so’s I can fix some of my more comical typos.
ld
Lotus, most of us are new at blogging. But FOLO is very important to me, I spend $80.00 for high speed over dial up, beats the hell out of quilting, and besides I’m looking for P L BLAKE..i’M here just tell us what we need to do.
Lotus, do you have a PayPal account?
If you do, you wouldn’t even need a tip jar for now. You could just link to your account there – or just tell us your account and we go there and Presto! I can be more than just a reader here.
ld
BTW, if you think setting up a PayPal account might be beyond a Flowah’s technical capabilities, let me tell you that some of the folks who do that at eBay seem otherwise like they wouldn’t have gotten past the second grade at Central Elementary.
You can do it!
ld
Hey Lotus, I’ll even “click” on the ads to keep ur sponsors happy!
wooabby, you already make me happy, but I sho wouldn’t mind some happy sponsors too! Thankya, man.
LD, no, I don’t have a PayPal account, and want not to commingle folo LLC funds with personal ones. Ignorant as I am of tax stuff, I skeered of putting a foot(-petal) wrong.
I’ll be sending you something in a bit that may help work things out.
See what you think before moving on in this direction.
Hi Y’all,
Just a quick observation. Anyone else notice that Langston’s plea deal exempts him from Federal prosecution for any and all crimes prior to his corruption indictment? Compare Patterson who only got an exemption from prosecution for any other crimes arising out of or related to the indictment.
One can’t help but wonder what other crimes Langson may have committed that made him want/need that exemption, and what else he’s being given a pass on in exchange for his testimony. Let’s just hope it’s not a murder. He’s also exempted from forfeiture so even if he receives the full 250k fine he’ll turn a 750k profit from his confessed crime with the government’s blessing.
It’s been illuminating to watch Whitfield, Teel, & Minor get a pass on prosecution by the state, not to mention the Harrison County jailors. Without federal prosecution we’d have no prosecution in this state, and – as witnessed by Langston’s deal – even federal prosecution hardly qualifies as a deterrent. State prosecution should be a piece of cake where, as here, the Defendant has already admitted the substance of the crime.
Murder, except in a few very specific situations, isn’t a federal crime, so they probably can’t be giving him a pass on that.
Sometimes, you have to make a deal with the devil to get to heaven. I’m betting that whatever, or whoever, Langston has the goods on, it is big, and we haven’t seen any of it, yet.
Well it’d be PL! and who ever GODFATHER is.
lotus, i personally don’t like ads, they are irritating and distracting. howzabout some pithy t-shirts or hats. what about a spin-off syndicated radio talk show? like lakewobegon only with lawyers, politics and jack daniels? you might have to invest in some voice altering technology though.
i will be happy to pitch something into the tip jar.
i was looking at patterson’s plea and wondering what a “section 381.2 of the u.s. sentencing commission guidelines manual” is. it was penciled in down at the bottom as an asterisk.
Hey, emyMac!
Y’ont pithy t-shirts and hats, hey? I heard a rumor last week that somebody’s selling “FREE DICKIE SCRUGGS” t-shirts somewhere online. Meant to see if I could run that down but forgot it again until just now. HAW!
I, too, will contribute in whatever manner you work out, lotus. I don’t mind ads, and I’ll click on them, too, to make your sponsors happy.
“When I early-retired seven years ago, my CPA and I thought I could do so safely. Developments since — investment-portfolio damage, what four "04 hurricanes did to hazard-insurance and property-tax rates in Florida….”
I recommend a fee only financial planner Lotus.
Re: Insurance in Florida all hell is breaking loose down there today. It is being widely reported that Allstate will be banned from your fair State. It seems that just like Dickie Scruggs, insurance companies feel theyt can ignore lawful subpoenas. Check this out from today’s St Petersburg Times.
“TALLAHASSEE – Unless there’s a last-minute deal, Florida will try something today it has never done before: pull back the curtain on the property insurance industry at a public hearing. Regulators will start with the state’s third-largest insurer, Allstate Floridian.
In what is shaping up as the insurance equivalent of a heavyweight title fight, Allstate officials will face a panel of state regulators, including Office of Insurance Regulation general counsel Steve Parton, to explain how they set rates, and their relationship with rating agencies, hurricane-modeling companies, reinsurers and trade associations.
For months, Gov. Charlie Crist has accused the industry of price-gouging, profiteering and collusion after 31 companies, including Allstate, Travelers and USAA, did not lower their rates as much as regulators expected.
The reductions were supposed to be substantial. Following special legislation last January, Florida expanded its state reinsurance fund to allow private companies to reduce rates an average of about 24 percent.
Instead, 31 companies are seeking to raise rates an average of 13 percent. Near the higher end is Allstate, which wants to raise rates an average of 42 percent. The initial request was denied in November, just one day after Allstate made its pitch, and the company is appealing.”
magnolia – you were looking for pl – did you ever find what you were looking for?