Logan Lann

National

Crumbling Mining Town

Summary

Galena, Kansas, named for lead ore, was originally built as a mining town. It now sits on the mines it was built for. Slowly but surely, the mines have been crumbling under the town. Under the police impound yard, two or three cars fell into a mine tunnel. The rear end of the town’s bar was swallowed up into a hole. Town leaders plan to dig holes throughout the mine shafts from the surface to assess which shafts need to be filled in. The Kansas Department of Health and Environment says that filling in the mines may take twenty years and sixty million dollars.

Opinion

The fact that the people who first built the town built it on the mines it was built for seems stupid. One might think that planners could build a town in a place that will hold it. It is good that town leaders want to fix the town by filling in the mines, but sixty million dollars of state and federal money seems like a lot for a town of three thousand people.

National

Old Strong Lost Woman

Summary

Doris Anderson, seventy-seven years old, was lost on a hunting trip in the Wallowa Mountains of Oregon. She was stranded in the woods for two weeks. She was not dressed for cold weather and had no survival supplies. The temperature dropped to thirty degrees, and her body temperature dropped to ninety degrees. The doctor she had in the emergency room, Dr. Steve DeLushmutt. He said that she was in “amazingly great shape” and that he had “never seen anything like it.”

Opinion

This is a tough lady. She went two weeks in the wilderness. I don’t think that I could do that. It is good that she was finally found. This just goes to show that good health is invaluable. More people should be in shape. It is good that she was found when she was, because she might not have made it much longer.

International

Russian Oil Tax Evasion

Summary

Oil tycoons Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Mikhail Gutseriyev had tax evasion charges brought against them by the Kremlin. Khodorkovsky was investigated in 2003. He tried to fight the charges and was put into a Siberian prison. Gutseriyev is presumed to have fled the country. He was beginning to feel the heat at the end of 2006. He announced on July 30 that he was selling his company to Oleg Deripaska, a metal company owner and friend to the Kremlin. On August 24, an international warrant was issued for the arrest of Gutseriyev, two days after his son died. He is still thought to be at large.

Opinion

Gutseriyev used to work for a state run company, but decided that he would start his own company. Capitalism is great, but if Russia is going to make their relatively new freedom in society work, which is still unstable, they need to obey the law of the land, including taxes. Gutseriyev should be found and brought to justice. Rumors exist of Russia soon reverting back to communism. The system of government now, though technically free, does not seem to be working really well. They need to get their act together.

International

Polish Murder

Summary

Krystian Bala is the author of a novel where a man brutally murders a woman. He was also convicted by a Polish court of planning and leading a murder similar to the one in the book. Authorities are unsure if others were involved and who, but they know he planned and led it. He killed Dariusz Janiszewski, a man he thought to be having an affair with his wife. His character in the book gets away with the crime. Bala’s murder occurred in 2000, but the authorities received a tip five years later from someone who had read the book and saw the similarity in the two murders. Bala will receive twenty-five years in prison.

Opinion

It is ironic that Bala wrote a story of a character who got away with murder, but it was this story that prevented him from getting away with murder. The Lord works in mysterious ways sometimes. I think it is horrible that someone could murder another, especially so brutally. I could never comprehend how one could be capable of taking another’s life without just cause. It is a horrible thing.


(No hyperlinks because information comes from newspapers.)