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Police investigate shooting in Algiers
This comment is in regards to the cover article on the crime issues that face New Orleans. While I thought the article was much needed and covered the frustrations over how to deal with crime in our city, it seems to me that the perspective is flawed. How can you solve the crime facing our beloved city, if you dont face up to the issues of poverty and rebuilding? How can you continue to fault the police department, and the mayor and district attorney, if you cant look your own self in the face, where the extremities of wealth sit next to the woes of poverty (white and black)? How can you talk about these issues when youre city cares more about the tourist dollar and fixing up the warehouse district than putting the money into the rest of the city, that still stands silent with abandoned houses and failing hospitals and infrastructure? While I most definitely believe the police are doing a better job, especially in regards to more community involvement and the beats cop walking the streets, they have to do a better job of getting the news to the people, and that includes this newspaper and mostly the television news that sometimes verges on entertainment rather than covering the news that actually matters.
Pick 'n' roll: Friday's best NBA bets
New Orleans went on a tear in January at 12-2 straight up and ATS. Maybe not talked about as much is the Hornets' tendency to go over the total lately too. The over/under went 9-5 in January while New Orleans found its shooting touch and scored fewer than 100 points only three times during the incredible winning spree. The biggest factor in the turnaround is that the Hornets are now getting contributions from everyone on the floor and bench. New Orleans has been whipping the ball around, making teams dizzy while they chase it, and the first guy who's open just drains the shot. Even guys like 6-foot-9 reserve forward Ryan Bowen. He averaged 6.5 points in 14.8 minutes in the four games before a loss to Golden State on Wednesday. "Teams are just leaving me wide open," Bowen told the New Orleans Times-Picayune.
'Grump' travels the planet to find bliss
He visited the country during winter and said he found a certain beauty in the cold and the darkness. Such a chilly climate usually encourages warm relationships, Weiner found. "The cold inspires people to cooperate, traditionally. If you go back a few hundred years, people in cold climates have to cooperate or they die together. It's that simple," he said. Weiner found a different flavor of happiness in Switzerland, where he discovered people are content partly because everything runs like clockwork. Simple pleasures like trains arriving on time contributed to national happiness, he said. But there may be a much sweeter reason why Switzerland is a happy place. "The Swiss eat a lot of chocolate, and let's not forget that," Weiner said.
Dale Jr. completes NASCAR's perfect start
No shootout winner has gone on to win the Daytona 500 that season since Dale Jarrett did it in 2000. Also, let's not forget that Saturday's race featured only 23 cars for 70 laps. Among those not eligible for the race since they didn't win a pole last year or have never won this race were: Defending Daytona 500 champ Kevin Harvick, Matt Kenseth, Kyle Busch and Jeff Burton, among others. Still, Earnhardt's perforamce was impressive. So what did we learn from Saturday night? 1. These guys can drive these cars. No doubt these cars don't handle as well. It will be interseting to see what happens with a 43-car field but the worries about a chaotic race went unfulfilled. There was a four-car crash but you're going to have that in restrictor-plate race.
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