I have been having an email conversation with "Phred" who describes himself of being a "member of the Republican wing of the Republican party"

Phred asked if he could send me some links to pictures of "some other gruesome crimes not committted by US forces".  Not being the real squeemish type, I wrote back and said "sure, bring 'em on".  He sent me several links to photos from past atrocities from past wars and uprisings - most I had seen before.  I wrote back, "what's your point?"

Phred explained, "Gee I guess that what went on at Abu Ghraib has no moral equivalence with Berg or so many more heinous acts in modern times, yet is being hammered 24-7 by CNN far out of proportion to its actual gravity. Hopeless point , huh ?"

No, Phred, not a hopeless point - just a bad one.  All of the links he sent were of Nazi atrocities and the like.  NONE of them were of American atrocities, so no, we have no "moral equivalence" to Abu Ghraib - it's kinda new to us. We are supposed to be better than that - either in practice... or in keeping it secret if coercion is absolutely necessary. 

My guess is Phred figures that since other countries are jumping off roofs, the U.S. should take the leap as well. 

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Still no credit to my reporting, but the N&R's Matt Williams did a good job covering the big stink over at Cone Mill's White Oak Plant.in this morning's edition.

Matt got to the root of the problem and found that the City of Greensboro is probably going to cite Cone Mills and the state is probably going to fine Greensboro, not for the nasty aroma, but for discharging too much phosphorus into the City's waste-water treatment facility - apparently for a long time.

City water reclamation manger Arthur White says they noticed the elevated levels earlier this year, "We had some problems with it, but we didn't know where it was coming from, ...We wish they would have told us earlier."

Dumping high levels of phosphorus is understandably a finable offense, but apparently creating a foul odor for several weeks or months is considered part of the price the public must pay for industry.  If I were to have created a smell that foul in my back yard and kept feeding the aroma daily for weeks on end - I am confident that the City would have something to say about it pretty quickly.

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