US Supreme Court Upholds Campus Military Recruiting

What exactly did anyone think that would happen when a college or university accepts federal money? Hardly a difficult decision when colleges and universities accept approximately $35 billion a year.

The Supreme Court ruled unanimously Monday that colleges that accept federal money must allow military recruiters on campus, despite university objections to the Pentagon’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy on gays.

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote:

“A military recruiter’s mere presence on campus does not violate a law school’s right to associate, regardless of how repugnant the law school considers the recruiter’s message”.
(AP)

Washington Post: Court Upholds Campus Military Recruiting

Others covering story:
SCOTUS, Court upholds “Solomon Amendment”
Ace of Spades, A Victory for the U.S. Military

Hollywood’s Oscar ratings down. What a Shock for the Academy Awards?

Weak television ratings for last nights Academy Awards. Who could not have see that coming? No one had seen the movies that we nominated for best “motion picture”. Thus, why would any one watch an awards show about movies no one knew about, better yet, no one cared about.
(Reuters)

Note to Jon Stewart: Washington Post’s Tom Shales urging him to “keep your ‘Daily’ job.”

GretaWire: Dompig on Greta’s Interview, “these things don’t mean anything to us.”

From todays GretaWire comes the following disturbing and puzzling statements from Gerald Dompig. As Greta Van Susteren states, I to can only hope this was misquoted. If not this just proves what has been the problem with this investigation from the outset. There is no shame in asking for help when one is not experienced in handling a situation. It is better than the alternative and that is what exists today and what is described as the Natalee Holloway investigation.

So now direct statements of a suspect when answering questions in an interview whereas the individual most likely, or we should say hopefully, has been interrogated with the same cannot be used. Seems that the ALE wants to use nothing derogatory to Joran Van der Sloot in this investigation. “We have a serious investigation.” If you had searched the Van der Sloot property one might have been able to have said this. At this point I am not so sure.

However, we to like Greta have to believe that Gerald Dompig did watch and has looked at the interviews. If not, all, both Americans and Arubans should be scratching their heads.

If I were the Aruban police, I would take our two-hour plus interview and compare it to all the other statements given in the case by Joran and others. I would look for inconsistencies — not insignificant ones due to time and memory issues, but big ones that undermine credibility. Likewise I would look for consistences and evidence which might corroborate what Joran said to us in the unedited interview. My goal would be to determine if Joran was lying or telling the truth.

I received an e-mail over the weekend from a known and reliable source who said that Aruban Deputy Police Chief Dompig said he had not watched Joran’s unedited interview with us and said, [lifted quote from the e-mail to me] “these things don’t mean anything to us. We have a serious investigation. We wouldn’t use it in the investigation. Aruban courts will not use it.” If this is indeed Dompig’s view, it is a flawed investigative one and should alarm Arubans and anyone else interested in finding out what happened to Natalee. Our interview should be important to Dompig — it will tell him for certain whether Joran is lying (if it establishes inconsistencies with previous Joran declarations and evidence in police custody) or telling the truth (in which case they need to change the direction of their investigation.)

I hope the e-mail I received with Dompig’s quote is wrong — a misquote. If not, this is serious. It would suggest to me that ego is getting in the way. I hope I am dead wrong on this. This is an important investigation. I am hoping that Dompig is just making those statements publicly to distract (in other words for a good investigative reason) but behind the scenes is studying the Joran interview carefully. My guess is that he IS studying the interview. This would be extremely basic investigation — Investigation 101.
(GretaWire)

Natalee Holloway Legacy casts doubt on Spring Break and Scrutiny for Aruba

Destination Under Scrutiny – Aruba – One Happy Island?

One of the legacies of the mishandled case of the disappearance of Natalee Holloway:

But, not to second guess Island Officials, I do think that Aruba misjudged the media attention and did not effectively present the efforts undertaken there to provide a full picture of their response to the still unfolding unfortunate situation. This is an extremely sensitive issue in Aruba, and the situation goes beyond normal “Damage Control” for Destinations beset with natural disasters, such as hurricanes and tsunamis. One incident, one individual continues to roil the once gentle waters.

It is very easy to become embroiled in the debate on whether or not the Holloway case has been handled appropriately in a legal fashion. Beyond the media frenzy and the political sensibilities (US versus a sovereign entity and even the Alabama boycott), the net result is that the story has “legs”, and, Aruba, as a Destination, will continue to be affected. And, we, the Consumer, are left buffeted by the media wind, therefore, becoming very circumspect with a travel decision.

It is a shame Aruba was not at the forefront with a strategic Crisis Management focus. Millions are spent on Brand Marketing, but their reputation has been tarnished. A first rate publicist or Public Relations Firm should have been retained as the “story” rocketed. Catch up and changing perception are tough assignments! The response will be debated for years. I am still curious about Aruban effort to date.
(Hospitality Net)

Safety on minds of students, parents as spring break nears

At night, Murphy and her friends will go clubbing. Though having fun is their No. 1 priority, being safe also is high on their lists.

“Always have someone with you,” Murphy said. “Never let go of your drink. Always know, if someone’s leaving, where they’re going and how long they’ll be gone.”
(Wasau Daily Herald)

Spring break safety

“You have to think that incidents like Natalee Holloway raise your consciousness about what you’ve been teaching your children,” psychotherapist Carla Trusty-Smith says. “It’s unfortunate that something like this tells us we can never be too careful.”
(Burlington Free Press)

Joran Van der Sloot; To Get or Leave Your Shoes, That is the Question.

AKA: “Joran’s Really Big Shoe” or “Lions … Tigers and shoes, oh my”.

The tale that Joran is telling regarding his shoes makes no sense what-so-ever to a “reasonable” individual. According to Joran, Deepak and Satish dropped Natalee and him off from the road near the Marriott. That is where Joran took his shoes off. They walked to the beach directly in front of the Marriott and that is where Joran states he took his shoes off by the water.

Joran also seems to be so concerned about getting sand in his shoes that he also has no problem with the same shoes to leaving them on the beach losing them forever. Believable? (Hat Tip: TxChic)

Joran Van der Sloots comments from Part 1 of his interview with Greta Van Susteren regarding where he left his shoes when Natalee Holloway and he were dropped off at the Marriott.

VAN SUSTEREN: So where did you park?

VAN DER SLOOT: If you drive by right by the last Marriott Hotel so we took a left and you can drive right to the end of the road there and we stopped there, so you’re basically still at the hotel and that’s where — where we got out of the car and I told Deepak that “I’ll call you later to pick me up” and he said “OK,” and he left and we walked on the beach.

(Hat Tip: Klaasend)

And, I mean there were people there. There were couples there on the beach as well. I mean we walked by other couples. It’s not — that beach is — it’s a very busy beach. There’s a lot of people there even at nighttime.

VAN SUSTEREN: On the beach you weren’t directly in front of the Marriott, you were a little bit north of the Marriott is that right, you call it the Marriott beach but you weren’t directly in front of the hotel?

VAN DER SLOOT: At that point, we were basically almost directly in front of the Marriott Hotel.

VAN SUSTEREN: Did you cut through the hotel to the beach?

VAN DER SLOOT: No, no. You didn’t really cut because you’re right at the — the right side of the Marriott Hotel, all the way at the right. She didn’t really cut through — through the hotel but you were walking on the hotel property where there’s beach chairs and all that stuff.

VAN DER SLOOT: Well, we got at the beach. We walked up. I took off my shoes. We walked to the – to the ocean and that’s where we sat down as well. That’s where I left my shoes and then we started walking. And I asked her, you know, let’s – we can walk toward your hotel because there were a lot of people there too.

And she wanted to walk the other way, so towards the – starting to go towards the lighthouse. And, so we started walking – walking in that direction, more towards the fisherman’s hut and, yes, we were holding hands, talking and kissing, just having a good time.

Joran later states that he does not go back and get his shoes because he does not want to be confronted with having to deal with Natalee Holloway asking him to stay. This is not believable in the slightest as where Joran first claims to leave his shoes by the Marriott and the Fisherman’s Huts where he was picked up by Satish are not even close to each other. Natalee and Joran would have had to have walked up the beach for at least 15 or 20 minutes to reach the Fisherman’s Huts.

The question still remains, why didn’t Joran just go back to the Marriott where Deepak had originally dropped both he and Natalee off and get his shoes? The Marriott was in the same direction that Satish had to drive Joran home. Joran stated he knew he was missing his shoes when he got into the car with Satish. A “reasonable” individual would have just asked Satish to stop for 5 minutes at the Marriott, after all it is not like Deepak & Satish have not chauffeured Joran around Aruba all night.

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