Thursday, April 3rd, 2008.  Hmmmm.  What’s been happening in the world?  American Idol, I read, is down to their Elite Eight … or is that Dancing With the Stars?  One of ’em, anyway.  Baseball is underway … and the Red Sox won yesterday, while the Phillies are off to an 0-2 start.  (Nothing to worry about there – the Phils always do this at the start of the season!)

On a far more serious note, I noticed a story on MSNBC this morning indicating that the two young men indicted in the tragic murder of Eve Carson, the UNC student body president, were apparently both cases that were seriously mishandled by the department of probaton/parole.

This is tragic any way you look at it … but I fear that, as is the MO of our bureaucracies these days, the individuals lowest on the food chain will take the hit.  As with Abu Ghraib, no one’s taking a look at those higher up … and at the organizational culture that they created/fostered.  And no one is looking at the larger picture – at the budgeting and fiscal priorities that leave front line workers with impossible demands and accountabilities … and ever-dwindling resources to address them.

What happened here is happening in systems in every state in this country … not just in probation/parole, but also in education, in health and mental health care … you name it!  We need leadership that is willing to look at the complex issues involved – not just self-righteously and disingenuously decry what has happened, hang some underling out to dry, and then move on. 

This sucks.  It’s an individual tragedy of incalculable pain and loss … and it is a systemic tragedy that gets obscured by the particulars over and over again.

Finally, on a more positive note, here is a wonderfully thoughtful piece by Alice Walker about why she supports Obama.  It is most definitely worth a read!