I generally refrain from offering uninformed opinions about today's national and international events after seeing how much of the information we are fed is either distorted, politicized, anonymously sourced or peppered with inadequate context.
Besides, there is so much happening behind the scenes to affect decisions made at the highest levels (including negotiation strategies) that it's often an exercise in futility to accurately analyze what's really happening.
I'll make an exception today because of the way information contained in a "wire reports" (from The Washington Post and Associated Press) story about Iran was played on page 5A of a recent Sunday paper.
Headlined "U.S. cyberattacks struck Iran systems, sources say," the story began by saying President Trump approved the action by the U.S. Cyber Command following Iran's downing of a U.S. drone off that nation's coast.
But it was the revealing quote from former Trump White House cyber official Thomas Bossert I found buried at the end of the article that caught my attention: "Our U.S. military has long known that we could sink every [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps] vessel in the strait within 24 hours if necessary. And this is the modern version of what the U.S. Navy has to do to defend itself at sea and keep international shipping lanes free from Iranian disruption."
I'm still not certain that's information you and I and the world needed to know. Nonetheless, in these tense and uncertain times, it was reassuring to realize that the overwhelming capacity to defend ourselves if necessary has apparently existed for some time.
About this transition
Claire Leheny of Sherwood wrote the Voices page not long ago to express unhappiness with the Democrat-Gazette's necessary switch from newsprint to electronic delivery.
Like others (including me), Claire had grown over the years to love and enjoy her mornings with the daily paper waiting to be explored. Who could blame her? After all, the printed pages are all she's ever known. Now that is changing.
Except for Sunday editions and the Northwest edition, the Democrat-Gazette has been forced, out of economic necessity, to change its daily delivery to the Internet. Subscribers are being provided with iPads and teams willing to train readers on those device, all courtesy of the paper. Publisher Walter Hussman is spending some $12 million to hopefully retain and add valued readers of the future.
As with all radical changes in society of late, ranging from satellite GPS, to delivery drones, smartphones and self-driving vehicles, this move wasn't made by choice, but rather to preserve our vital statewide newspaper.
I try to imagine Arkansas without a statewide paper to cover and dig into everything from daily state, national and international news events to Razorback sports and beyond. Can you?
I've written previously about this era of forced transition at the paper and how I, too, wish it wasn't happening. I'm certain Hussman and his officers feel likewise. This was not a choice but an ultimatum rooted solely in economics and survival. The Vindicator of Youngstown, Ohio, just announced its closure as of Aug. 31 after 150 years as a daily.
So again I ask readers to join the movement and make personal adjustments to keep the paper alive and thriving into the future. The publisher is doing all he can to retain this invaluable source of daily information. The rest is up to us to adapt, even as much as we might love our newsprint and wish it could be different.
SRT-100 radiating
Now that two Arkansas physicians have SRT-100 skin cancer-treatment machines in their offices, one in Paragould, and the other at Helms Dermatology in Russellville, I checked to see how effective they have been on patients.
Having been treated with SRT's low-level skin radiation during a stay in Santa Fe, I knew it only had taken a few weeks to make the ugly basal cell on the tip of my nose disappear and never return.
So I began, well, let's name it a worthy crusade to hopefully bring this technology from Sensus Healthcare in Florida to Arkansas doctors who treat basal- and squamous-cell skin cancers as well as keloid scarring. It is not meant for treating the much more serious melanoma cancers.
Radiation therapist Terri Hinson with the Helms practice told me she's treating an average of 20 patients daily: "I can hardly keep up." She's impressed with the results.
"We've had really good success," she said of their machine installed in March. "Our patients also still look amazing during their follow-up visits." She said the majority of patients are older men and women.
It's Ledbetter!
My apologies to Little Rock attorney and former state Rep. Sam Ledbetter, who I mistakenly referred to as Sam Perroni in a recent column citing key players who'd spent years opposing the wrongheaded location of C&H Hog Farms in our Buffalo National River Watershed. While Sam Perroni is also a Little Rock attorney (and I hear a fine one), his name sounds nothing even remotely close to Ledbetter.
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Mike Masterson is a longtime Arkansas journalist, was editor of three Arkansas dailies and headed the master's journalism program at Ohio State University. Email him at mmasterson@arkansasonline.com.
Editorial on 07/02/2019