Today’s Sacramento Bee has a very interesting article about a sharp rise in calls to the State Department of Personnel Management asking for grief counseling assistance for state employees dealing with suicides of co-workers.

The Bee writes:

California government departments  in 2009 made 33 requests for “critical incident stress debriefings,” in which counselors meet with employees traumatized by the suicide of a colleague.

In 2008, the state made 14 such calls. In 2007, when the Department of Personnel Administration began tracking the incidents, government departments made 18 requests for such grief counseling.

The data are drawn from such a relatively small population and over such a brief period that it’s impossible to determine any trends, said mental health experts interviewed by The Bee. Identifying a single cause for the kind of hopelessness that leads to suicide can be next to impossible.

But it’s clear, they said, that the state’s unprecedented labor unrest – on-again, off-again furloughs that cut state worker pay nearly 15 percent, fractured labor relations with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, rising public disdain for civil servants – has increased tension for a group of people who tend to value security and predictability in their work.

Read more »

Look out JNOV, the City of Philadelphia is demanding that all bloggers based in the City of Brotherly Love hock up $300 a year for the privilege of writing a blog – even if the blog makes no money.

[Philadelphia CityPaper: Pay Up]

The Beeb is reporting that more than 20 million residents in Pakistan have been forced out of their homes due to the widespread flooding that has left more than one-third of the country under water and an estimated 2,000 people drowned.

Cholera and other water-borne illnesses are widespread, with the World Health Organization (WHO) estimating that more than 200,000 people are suffering from acute diarrhea and about that many people also experiencing acute respiratory problems.  Another 3.5 million children are at risk of water-borne illnesses, according to the United Nations.  The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that a quarter million farm animals have been killed to date in the flooding and 700,000 hectares of farmland are destroyed.  The Pakistani government has been unable to respond to the crisis, with more than 6 million citizens living in the open countryside with no potable water or food.

The weather forecast for the coming weeks is more rain during the monsoon season. Read more »

Wow, it’s been a crazy day, what with right wing blowhards dying, gay marriage in California put on hold yet again, and more pandering with Muslim cultural centers two blocks from the World Trade Center just like titty bars.  And Tom DeLay skated!

You know what I need after a long day of craziness?

I mean, besides a martini or three?

Time for some puppy cuteness! Tonight is courtesy of Stinque’s Caribbean correspondent, baked.

Read more »

Following up on his mini-rant last night about the Obama Administration’s sell-out to BP, Stinquer DodgerBlue provides us with a full rant and more details about the deal with BP.

Last week, BP cut a deal with the Obama administration that means that you and I, as taxpayers, are now in business with BP and have a financial interest in having BP pump as much oil as it can from the Gulf of Mexico, off Alaska, and everywhere else in the U.S.

How did this happen?  Read more »

As much as Barry might be pissing most of us off with his “recalibration” of his remarks on the separation of church and state or his calculated change in his position on gay marriage from that of ten years ago, let’s take a step back and just enjoy this moment of a kinda-dorky/kinda-cool dad sincerely celebrating when his awesome daughter Sasha made a hole-in-one on the first hole of a miniature golf course during their photo-op visit to the Florida Panhandle.

Even that lump of coal I call my cynical heart melted a little bit at this.

Read more »

Last night President Barack Obama, addressing a crowd of Muslims in the White House observing the holy month of Ramadan, said that under the First Amendment’s separation of church and state, a Muslim community center and mosque  has the right to build where they want to. Obama’s comments echoed the stirring speech given last week by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg defending the concept of religious tolerance.

The shrieks of Republican blowhards and politicians are increasing and no doubt will reach a crescendo tomorrow morning on the Sunday talkshows.

Read more »