Texas attacks women’s health care

Texas will launch a new state-funded Women's Health Program banning any affiliates associated with abortion providers. In the ongoing anti-abortion hysteria, the state is revamping the program to ban Planned Parenthood as a health care provider solely because some of their clinics, which are not even part of the WHP, provide abortion services, and despite the fact that pregnant women do not even qualify for the WHP.

Gov. Rick Perry moved to take state control over the federal Medicaid-waiver program stating that because PP was a provider, the program was part of federal government’s “pro-abortion agenda.”

Texas already faces a dismal health care record with some of the highest rates of sexually transmitted infections in the United States and a large number—34 percent statewide and 66 percent in rural areas—of uninsured women of childbearing age as well as the third-lowest ranking in the country for primary care physicians per 100,000 residents.

Health care advocates are concerned that the lack of federal funds supporting the program—as $111 million in funding drops to $37.9 million—will result in less coverage to the over 1 million in need of reproductive health services statewide.

PP clinics provide cancer screenings and other reproductive health services to over half of the 130,000 women who access the WHP statewide. In a hollow reassurance, Texas Health and Human Services Commissioner Kyle Janek is "confident" the state can find providers to replace Planned Parenthood clinics.

Family planning clinics that still received funding faced budget cuts of up to 75 percent. While 25 family planning clinics closed, many existing clinics are now charging for previously free services, raising prices on some services, and restricting access to more expensive and effective methods of contraception such as intrauterine devices and subdermal implants.… Additionally, the poorest women who cannot pay are now being turned away from well-woman exams and denied birth control pills, while their visits would have previously been covered by public funds.”

In reality, the new WHP means women in Texas will have to jump through even more hoops to access care, and in many rural areas they will have no access due to lack of providers. A George Washington University study shows the lack of access to care under the new plan will result in more unwanted births and more taxpayer-funded Medicaid births, which translates into declining health and increased hardship for women and children.

And it does not end there. The bill ties the legislature’s hands by including what is called a "poison pill." If judges rule that the exclusion of Planned Parenthood is unconstitutional, then the WHP will be killed instead of being revised leaving many low-income women with no option for women's health services.Anti-choice advocates show once again that they are only "pro-life" until birth with a total disregard for the quality of life of the mother or the child beyond the womb, as they are the same forces slashing social services for the poor. The current attack on abortion rights is in reality an attack on women's overall quality of life, driving more women into poverty.

Obama needs to come clean on what happened in Benghazi

There is an urgent need for full disclosure of what has become the “Benghazi Betrayal and Cover-up.” The Obama national security team, including CIA, DNI and the Pentagon, apparently watched and listened to the assault on the U.S. consulate and cries for help but did nothing. If someone had described a fictional situation with a similar scenario and described our leadership ignoring the pleas for help, I would have said it was not realistic—not in my America – but I would have been proven wrong.

We now know why Ambassador Christopher Stevens had to be in Benghazi the night of 9/11 to meet a Turkish representative, even though he feared for his safety.  According to various reports, one of Stevens’ main missions in Libya was to facilitate the transfer of much of Gadhafi’s military equipment, including the deadly SA-7 – portable SAMs – to Islamists and other al Qaeda-affiliated groups fighting the Assad Regime in Syria. In an excellent article, Aaron Klein states that Stevens routinely used our Benghazi consulate (mission) to coordinate the Turkish, Saudi Arabian and Qatari governments’ support for insurgencies throughout the Middle East. Further, according to Egyptian security sources, Stevens played a “central role in recruiting Islamic jihadists to fight the Assad Regime in Syria.”

In another excellent article, Clare Lopez at RadicalIslam.org noted that there were two large warehouse-type buildings associated with our Benghazi mission. During the terrorist attack, the warehouses were probably looted. We do not know what was there and if it was being administrated by our two former Navy SEALs and the CIA operatives who were in Benghazi.  Nonetheless, the equipment was going to hardline jihadis.

Once the attack commenced at 10:00 p.m. Libyan time (4:00 p.m. EST), we know the mission security staff immediately contacted Washington and our embassy in Tripoli.  It now appears the White House, Pentagon, State Department, CIA, NDI, JCS and various other military commands monitored the entire battle in real time via frantic phone calls from our compound and video from an overhead drone. The cries for help and support went unanswered.

Our Benghazi mission personnel, including our two former Navy SEALs, fought for seven hours without any assistance other than help from our embassy in Tripoli, which launched within 30 minutes an aircraft carrying six Americans and 16 Libyan security guards. It is understood they were instrumental in helping 22 of our Benghazi mission personnel escape the attack.

Once the attack commenced, Stevens was taken to a “safe room” within the mission. It is not known whether his location was betrayed by the February 17 Martyrs Brigade, the local force providing security to the consulate, which had ties to the Ansar al-Sharia terrorist group conducting the attack, and to al Qaeda. Unbelievably, we still do not know how Ambassador Stevens died.

The Obama national security team, including CIA, DNI, State Department and the Pentagon, watched and listened to the assault but did nothing to answer repeated calls for assistance. It has been reported that President Obama met with Vice President Joseph R. Biden and Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta in the Oval Office, presumably to see what support could be provided. After all, we had very credible military resources within striking distance. At our military base in Sigonella, Sicily, which is slightly over 400 miles from Benghazi, we had a fully equipped Special Forces unit with both transport and jet strike aircraft prepositioned. Certainly this was a force much more capable than the 22-man force from our embassy in Tripoli. 

I know those Special Forces personnel were ready to leap at the opportunity. There is no doubt in my mind they would have wiped out the terrorists attackers. Also I have no doubt that Admiral William McRaven, Commander of U.S. Special Operations Command, would have had his local commander at Sigonella ready to launch; however, apparently he was countermanded—by whom? We need to know.

I also understand we had a C-130 gunship available, which would have quickly disposed of the terrorist attackers. This attack went on for seven hours. Our fighter jets could have been at our Benghazi mission within an hour. Our Special Forces out of Sigonella could have been there within a few hours. There is not any doubt that action on our part could have saved the lives of our two former Navy SEALs and possibly the ambassador.

Having been in a number of similar situations, I know you have to have the courage to do what’s right and take immediate action. Obviously, that courage was lacking for Benghazi. The safety of your personnel always remains paramount. With all the technology and military capability we had in theater, for our leadership to have deliberately ignored the pleas for assistance is not only in incomprehensible, it is un-American.

Somebody high up in the administration made the decision that no assistance (outside our Tripoli embassy) would be provided, and let our people be killed. The person who made that callous decision needs to be brought to light and held accountable. According to a CIA spokesperson, “No one at any level in the CIA told anybody not to help those in need.” We also need to know whether the director of CIA and the director of National Intelligence were facilitators in the fabricated video lie and the overall cover-up. Their creditability is on the line. A congressional committee should be immediately formed to get the facts out to the American people. Nothing less is acceptable.

Top 10 strategic technology trends for 2013

Gartner highlighted the top 10 technologies and trends that will be strategic for most organizations in 2013.

Gartner defines a strategic technology as one with the potential for significant impact on the enterprise in the next three years. Factors that denote significant impact include a high potential for disruption to IT or the business, the need for a major dollar investment, or the risk of being late to adopt.

A strategic technology may be an existing technology that has matured and/or become suitable for a wider range of uses. It may also be an emerging technology that offers an opportunity for strategic business advantage for early adopters or with potential for significant market disruption in the next five years. These technologies impact the organization's long-term plans, programs and initiatives.

“We have identified the top 10 technologies that will be strategic for most organizations, and that IT leaders should factor into their strategic planning processes over the next two years,” said David Cearley, vice president and Gartner fellow. “This does not necessarily mean enterprises should adopt and invest in all of the listed technologies; however companies need to be making deliberate decisions about how they fit with their expected needs in the near future.”

Mr. Cearley said that these technologies are emerging amidst a nexus of converging forces - social, mobile, cloud and information. Although these forces are innovative and disruptive on their own, together they are revolutionizing business and society, disrupting old business models and creating new leaders. As such, the Nexus of Forces is the basis of the technology platform of the future.

Gartner predicts that by 2013 mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most common Web access device worldwide and that by 2015 over 80 percent of the handsets sold in mature markets will be smartphones. However, only 20 percent of those handsets are likely to be Windows phones. By 2015 media tablet shipments will reach around 50 percent of laptop shipments and Windows 8 will likely be in third place behind Google’s Android and Apple iOS operating systems. Windows 8 is Microsoft’s big bet and Windows 8 platform styles should be evaluated to get a better idea of how they might perform in real-world environments as well as how users will respond. Consumerization will mean enterprises won't be able to force users to give up their iPads or prevent the use of Windows 8 to the extent consumers adopt consumer targeted Windows 8 devices. Enterprises will need to support a greater variety of form factors reducing the ability to standardize PC and tablet hardware. The implications for IT is that the era of PC dominance with Windows as the single platform will be replaced with a post-PC era where Windows is just one of a variety of environments IT will need to support.


The market for tools to create consumer and enterprise facing apps is complex with well over 100 potential tools vendors. Currently, Gartner separates mobile development tools into several categories. For the next few years, no single tool will be optimal for all types of mobile application so expect to employ several. Six mobile architectures – native, special, hybrid, HTML 5, Message and No Client will remain popular. However, there will be a long term shift away from native apps to Web apps as HTML5 becomes more capable. Nevertheless, native apps won't disappear, and will always offer the best user experiences and most sophisticated features. Developers will also need to develop new design skills to deliver touch-optimized mobile applications that operate across a range of devices in a coordinated fashion.

Philanthropy Is Not Only Pink

Pink is everywhere this month. There are pink ribbons, pink lights on buildings and yes, even NFL players wearing pink shoes. It seems those nonprofits working in the breast cancer arena own the month of October and the color pink.

But did you also know October is National Bullying Prevention Month, as well as LGBT History Month, National Book Month, National Spina Bifida Awareness Month -- the list goes on and on. Most months if not weeks have a designation for a specific cause, disease, activity, etc. The overall purpose and goal is to raise awareness and most likely increased financial support. The task of launching a philanthropic effort similar to this is huge. Much work and financial support is needed in order to achieve this level of visibility and then many will wonder if the effort was worth it. By having a designated month, some people might believe you have to wait for that time of year to roll around in order to ask others to get involved.

I believe differently. I believe philanthropy is everywhere. I believe we are all philanthropists. I also believe some of us want to share ideas while others are waiting to be asked to become involved. And I believe philanthropy is not just about asking for money.

Here are some examples of others who are doing their part to raise the level of awareness around what is possible and the idea that all of us are philanthropists. Last week my friend Allan from high school posted this on Facebook: "Inviting all my friends to, once a week, post one thing you are doing to improve your community or world, etc. It can be something small, but it may give me and others ideas to imitate." The responses are wonderful! People share how they re-use plastic grocery bags for covering food before it is refrigerated and covering plants before the freeze. They tell how they make a commitment to buy honey locally and shop at farmers' markets. Some tell about being a coach for a girls hockey team while others share they recycle bottles and cans.

I love it. One simple request that will cause others to pause and think about what they can to improve their community.

My childhood friend, Marcy, on her 49th birthday sent a request to 50 of her friends. She asked us to do something each week for someone else or our community and track it to share back with her on her 50th birthday. She asked us to imagine what each of us could do that would result in more than 2500 acts of kindness throughout the year. It would be like throwing a stone in a pond and watching the ripple effect. Marcy's simple request is the catalyst prompting many to increase their activities to help others. The response she has received is amazing and I know I am keeping track of what I do each week to share with her.

Tom's Shoes is a catalyst in a big way. When you purchase a pair of shoes, the company will donate one pair to a child in need. Imagine the impact as more than one million pairs of shoes have been donated so far. All of us make purchases of shoes as well as other items. You can make a conscious commitment to shop at companies similar to Tom's Shoes that make giving back a part of their business practice.

Some might state that real action to change the world requires much time and money -- and in some instances they are right. To be assured, there are more than 1.5 million nonprofits registered in the U.S. and 100 more asking the IRS for tax-exempt status every day. But you don't need a formal organization to begin making a difference. You simply have to start and take that first step to getting hooked on the idea of helping others and giving back. In today's busy world, I often hear that people don't have time or money to give. I would counter by saying be more creative with what you have. Think about the skills you possess and if you could volunteer "virtually," such as a lawyer reviewing a contract or a graphic artist designing a brochure for a cause. You never have to leave your office or home to provide these services. If your skills aren't as easily transferred to the virtual realm, think about donating an hour or two of your time to a nonprofit event such as a gala's silent auction. Many attendees would bid on one hour of "free" service from a plumber or chimney cleaning service. For those on a limited budget: become creative. Many of us dream of going on a vacation, why not try a voluntouring vacation this year? You could travel to a location where you would volunteer to help restore a temple, church, castle or even an ecosystem part of the time, then vacation the other part and often receive the benefit of a tax deduction.

Carving the perfect pumpkin?

The seeds and pulp leave a slippery mess, and there’s always pressure to design the spookiest pumpkin on the block.

For those who don’t want to bother with the timeless Halloween custom, there is a modern solution: stick an iPad in the window instead.

In a world where there are apps for everything, the tradition of pumpkin-carving has indeed gone digital.

It’s as simple as downloading an app like “Carve-a-Pumpkin.” Most are free or available for a small price and allow users to select a virtual pumpkin to carve freehand or from a series of pre-made designs.

When completed, it can be shared as a photo, e-mail or on the Internet via Facebook or Twitter. And, yes, some people opt to display their glowing electronic handiwork for Trick-or-Treaters to see.

“Instead of something rotting on your doorstep, you can actually create an infinite amount of designs,” said Scott Steinberg, the U.S.-based author of The Modern Parents Guide series and a frequent commentator on technology trends.

The apps are touted as a fun activity for small children — a safer way for little hands to “carve” a Jack-’o-lantern than with a butcher knife.

The technology comes as kids and even toddlers are increasingly accustomed to tapping on Mommy’s cellphone or Daddy’s tablet.

“We’re entering what I call ‘Generation Tech.’ These are the kids whose first word is literally ‘iPad.’ By the time they are two years old, they are used to interacting with smartphones and tablets,” said Steinberg.

When it comes to Halloween, the apps don’t end there. Technophiles can use their computers and phones to locate a haunted house or find out what their face looks like “zombified.”

There’s even “geo-location” apps for parents to track their little ghost or goblin as they trick or treat.

One such product, dubbed “Trick or Tracker,” keeps mom and dad updated on their child’s whereabouts as they traipse the neighbourhood on the spookiest night of the year.

The parent selects an interval of time — say, 10 or 15 minutes — and receives a text message with location details as each interval passes.

The app is billed as a way to offer peace of mind for the parents of older children who may be on their own for the first time.

“Technology is shaping all aspects of our culture — even Halloween,” said William Burkleitner, editor of the Children’s Technology Review.

“The apps are just one more way to play with the theme of ghosts and scary things.”

But some, like culture and communications professor Maria Bakardjieva, can’t help but wonder if the technology comes at a cost to children raised on apps and the latest gizmos.

The University of Calgary instructor is quick to say that she doesn’t view an iPad app as “a big monster that will steal the spirit of Halloween.”

But she disagrees with the notion that it’s a better experience for a child to create a digital pumpkin rather than physically dig into a sticky, pulpy gourd.

“There are things in life we have to teach children to do with their hands and bodies. You can’t bury them into the virtual world: they need to develop skills in different areas and contexts,” said Bakardjieva.

Meanwhile, police caution that the existence of things like geo-location apps can sometimes lull parents into a false sense of security.

“Don’t rely 100 per cent on technology,” said Calgary Police Services Const. Kathy Macdonald. “You still have to give your kids lots of practical tips that have worked in the real world since people started to go out trick or treating.”

That includes planning your child’s itinerary in advance, making sure they don’t wear masks that obscure their eyesight and equipping them with a flashlight, whether it’s the traditional kind or something like an iTorch, according to Macdonald.

It does raise the question: could a digital Jack-O-Lantern one day eclipse the humble orange fruit that has graced doorways on Oct. 31 for decades?

The Lady of the Lake recap

He releases Snow and throws her into the forest alone where Lancelot finds her. A defensive Snow is prepared to fight until she realizes that Lancelot is there to help. He tells her that the king’s men are on their way to Ruth’s cabin to kill Charming. So the two race to save Charming & his mother but they arrive too late. Charming is able to defeat the all of king’s men but Ruth gets hit by an arrow in the process.

Charming then comes up with the idea to take his mother to the healing waters of the lake. As they make their way, Snow tries to comfort Ruth. The subject of childbirth comes up and Ruth tries to use an amulet blessed by a gypsy to determine the sex of Snow’s future children. If the amulet swings north to south, it’s a boy. If it swings east to west, it’s a girl but when she tries this on Snow, it barely moves forcing Snow to admit the truth about King George’s curse. Snow’s only hope is that the lake waters will heal her too.

They arrive at the lake only to find it bone dry, an unintended side effect of Charming killing the Lady of the Lake earlier. Lancelot, however, finds a small seashell full of water which is their one glimmer of hope.

From this point on, it’s pretty predictable. Ruth wants Snow to take the potion and Snow is totally against it but everyone knows that Snow will end up with the water anyway, otherwise Emma wouldn’t exist and the curse wouldn’t be broken. So Snow decides to fulfill Ruth’s dying wish of getting married to Charming with Lancelot acting their ordained minister. Snow and Charming drink from a cup of love and are married just as Ruth dies. Through the amulet Snow discovers that she can conceive and that she has Ruth and Lancelot to thank for it. She never tells Charming about King George’s curse or Ruth and Lancelot’s gift.

Flash forward to present day Fairytale Land. We last left Emma, Cora and an unconscious Snow in the haven’s dungeon. Snow awakens and is horrified to learn that her cellmate is Cora and she warns Emma that Cora is much worse than Regina ever was but Emma is still not convinced. She has this I-can-take-care-of-myself complex meshed with her unwillingness to forgive her parents and her disbelief that fairytales are real. She’s a mess right now trying to pretend that she’s got it together and Snow can tell.

A rope is let down into the makeshift dungeon. The leader of the haven has requested an audience with Emma & Snow. He turns out to be Lancelot. He greets Snow happily while Mulan (Jamie Chung) and Aurora (Sarah Bolger) watch from distance. Mulan is content to follow orders but Aurora is still seething with vengeance from Phillip’s death. Against Mulan’s warning she readies a dagger from under her cloak.

Snow, Emma & Lancelot talk and Snow reveals that she knows where another portal is but she doesn’t divulge the location for fear of Cora hearing. So Lancelot sends her and Emma off with his best warrior, Mulan, to find the portal otherwise known as the wardrobe that carried baby Emma to Storybrooke.

After hours of walking, Mulan finds the perfect place to camp for the night. She and Snow go off to find firewood and leave Emma alone, which does not sit well with Emma. She leaves to find Snow and happens upon her as Snow is being attacked by Aurora. Mulan breaks up the two and a brash Emma shoots her gun in the air to ward off Aurora. Big mistake! The gunshot alerts the ogres, who are blind and rely totally on their hearing to hunt. The group splits up and Mulan and Aurora take off in one direction while Emma and Snow go in another. Emma makes yet another mistake while running and falls over a branch. The ogre corners her and knocks away her gun. Snow whistles to get the ogre’s attention. He turns to face her and she shoots him right between the eyes, saving Emma. It seems Emma has finally got the chance to see how badass Snow used to be and apparently still is.

They arrive at the castle and Emma is flabbergasted at the life she could have had. As they look around, Mulan and Aurora leave to guard the main gate. Shortly afterwards, Lancelot arrives to Snow’s surprise. He seems mighty interested in the portal, which is something that Snow picks up on instantly. He shrugs it off saying that he just wants to send Snow home to her husband and Emma home to her son, Henry. Busted! Snow draws her sword towards Lancelot. There is only one person who Emma told the name of her son to in Fairytale Land, Cora. The jig is up and Cora reveals herself. She also reveals that she killed Lancelot long ago and assumed his identity to infiltrate the haven.

She throws Snow up against a wall and trips Emma up with a carpet. Quick thinking Emma, starts a fire in the portal to protect Henry from Cora. Cora then turns the fire into a fireball and hurls it at Emma. Mulan’s sword deflects the fireball just in time. Cornered, Cora disappears and the fire completely destroys the portal.

The four women decide that the haven has to be defended from Cora and they make Snow their leader. Emma in the meantime is happy to discover the truth that her mother only gave her up to protect her. She finally lets her guard down and accepts Snow has her mother and that fact that she now has someone who is going to look out for her. They all leave to return to the haven.

As soon as they do, Cora reappears and gathers the dust from the burned portal into a flask. The flask glows red signifying that there is still magic left and unfortunately for Storybrooke, they might be getting a visit from Cora in the near future.

Getting worse, or just easier to notice?

Well, okay, first a bit about Nashville. ABC obviously has a lot of hopes for it – the network deliberately ran back-to-back new episodes of Modern Family last night so the new show could have the best possible lead-in. The pilot, while filled with exposition and other forms of pilot shorthand (always necessary to set up every relationship and conflict in a few seconds) was quite juicy, sort of a combination of the ABC soap form with the epic, politics-infused style of The Good Wife. Like Smash last season, it’s an attempt to build a large-scale cable-style series but with at least some characters who are basically good, and therefore more accessible to a large audience than the average cable character.

Whether it takes off like The Good Wife or goes downhill like Smash will depend a lot on future episodes, and particularly whether it can do a good job balancing the political aspects of the story – which look to be more heavily emphasized in the next two episodes – with the show business backstage stuff. But it does start with one advantage over Smash: while that show made virtually everyone a good person at heart (except one minor character that nobody liked), Nashville is founded on a more solid, classic All About Eve foundation with one “good” character and one “bad” character at the centre of the action. The Hayden Panettiere character is not all bad, and her backstory with her mother is going to be expanded on in the weeks to come. But by opposing the basically good Connie Britton with the basically mean Hayden Panettiere, the show does establish a basic rooting interest that a lot of shows simply don’t have.

Anyway, back to the trivial detail. In the pilot of Nashville there’s this scene where Connie Britton is driving her daughters in a car, and finds to her horror that they are fans of Hayden Panettiere’s music. (These kids today, following these manufactured pop idols.) This is a pilot, remember, where the budget is higher, there’s more money and time for location shooting, and everything looks slicker than in the series that follows. But the scene in the car looks like a classic rear-projection automobile scene that could have been done in the ’50s, with the blurry backgrounds and the angles that make the car look very much like a couple of chairs propped up on a soundstage. (I suppose there’s always the chance that it could turn out to be a real car, but it sure didn’t look real.)

Was this a problem? No. Blurry rear-projection is just one of those things you accept; if you’re worried about that, then the show already has bigger problems. So this isn’t about Nashville specifically. But like the infamous boat scene in the pilot of Ringer last year, it left me scratching my head about why green-screen scenes look like this. TV has come so far technologically in so many ways, and that includes the use of CGI – you may remember the video from a few years back that showed how seamlessly TV shows use digital backgrounds to make locations look different or bigger. But when it comes to driving scenes, there are more of these ’50s-style shot now than there have been at any time since the days when The Dukes of Hazzard would cut in to the Duke Boys in front of rear-projection plates. So why would the technical standard of TV improve in so many areas, but decline in the one specific area of green screen projection?

The best answer I can give to my own question is that maybe the increased availability of green screen has made shows more willing to use it when they don’t necessarily need to. In Old Hollywood movies, a lot of scenes would be shot in front of plates either because it was easier, or could keep everyone in the studio where the producer could keep an eye on them, or just because they were shooting a lot of retakes after everyone came back from the location. The production style of modern TV sometimes seems similar. In an era of rising costs and tightening budgets, shows may be more inclined to keep shooting indoors where it’s possible, or where using a real car might complicate the schedule (for example, in a scene involving children, whose scenes are always hard to schedule).

The other possibility is that there’s just something about HD video shooting that makes moving backgrounds stick out more than they did a decade or so ago, when most shows used film. (I don’t know if shows today use real video for these backgrounds or if they create them digitally; if they’re digital, that might explain why they don’t look quite right.) Whatever the reason, it’s kind of a relief to realize that TV still hasn’t advanced to the point that every single bit of technological trickery can fool us. After all, if they ever reach that point, they’ll be able to progress to the next stage: digitally replacing the actors in front of the green screen.

Flying car takes out MAX TransitTracker

Everything was in a metal box. It was just sitting there –completely exposed – at a busy Northeast Portland intersection.

On Tuesday, TriMet officials said they never imagined that a car traveling 80 mph would literally fly over the curb and destroy aging equipment needed to send out real-time arrival information used daily by tens of thousands of MAX commuters.

But that's exactly what happened at the Rose Quarter station last Thursday. As a result, Oregon's largest transit agency says it could be three or more weeks before the popular TransitTracker service for light-rail riders is back online.

MAX riders, meanwhile, are asking why TriMet didn't do a better job of protecting crucial communications gear, especially since replacement parts for the 16-year-old device are no longer available.

On Twitter, the comments were scathing: "Bad planning." " "Need bollards maybe?" "A single point of failure taken out by a car crash? Did the Galactic Empire build this?"

Rider Matt Seeman tweeted directly to TriMet: "So basically your systems are so fragile that one accident takes them out for 3 weeks? Classic."

Of course, it was an extraordinary crash. Police say the driver of the car suffered a "medical situation" after exiting I-84 west and taking the freeway ramp leading to the Rose Quarter.

Approaching Northeast First Avenue and Holladay Street, the car flipped end over end, TriMet said. It crossed through a pedestrian walkway in the middle of the Rose Quarter MAX station. The vehicle then flew across the MAX tracks, over the curb on the north platform, knocked out a pedestrian railing and smashed into the TransitTracker box.

Still, images taken by Google Maps last fall show the TransitTracker equipment box was completely exposed to any vehicle jumping the curb from the street. "The box was in a location believed to be far enough removed from automobile traffic that no one ever expected a car could get into that area," said TriMet spokeswoman Roberta Altstadt.

Now, the transit agency is scrambling to find new equipment that will work with the system. In the meantime, TriMet's online trip planner will display scheduled arrival times for all MAX stops. It will not, however, adjust for variations, as does TransitTracker.

It could be worse. In 2005, a homeless man pushed a flaming shopping cart into an analog relay room on the New York City Subway, damaging archaic 80-year-old wires and cables beyond repair. Initially, the city said it could take five years before the A and C trains would run normally again.

Eastside Records is back in business in Tempe

Eastside Records, an independent store that closed its doors in 2010 after 23 years of providing Valley music geeks a place in downtown Tempe to dig for rare LPs and 45s, is back in business at a new location.

"I really do love doing it," Pawlicki says. "But I'm kind of exhausted just from working day and night to get the place open."

Asked if he thinks this location will be around longer than the temporary location that opened near the Yucca Tap Room last December as the Ghost of Eastside Records and closed again in May, Pawlicki says, "I put a lot more work into this -- a lot more money and effort -- so it could be more permanent. It matters how things go personally for me in the next year, but I do like the location."

Pawlicki says the decision will be made when summer rolls around.

"I've lived here since I've been 13," the 50-year-old Pawlicki says. "And I would just like to live somewhere else. But I do like this spot. A lot. The whole vibe of this area is really nice. So if I stay, I'll stay right here. With it sitting between the campus and the light rail station, there's an amazing amount of young people walking around, which is a pretty cool thing."

As to why the original store closed in 2010, Pawlicki says, "Another guy owned most of the place and I think he just honestly didn't want all the work anymore. All the tax work. All the paper work. These places, no matter what you do with them, it's a labor of love. You don't make a lot of money. You make enough to pay your friends, have a good time and hopefully pay your bills. They're not big money makers. You've gotta love doing it. And I honestly think the other guy doing it had just stopped loving it. At that point, it's just a lot of work."

Pawlicki was still considering trying to open a store in the Los Angeles area when the Ghost of Eastside Records closed in May.

"I went out there about eight times last year, just to try and learn the place again and look at the little neighborhoods," he says. "The basic thing that happened is I thought of this four or five years ago when just tons of the independent stores closed down out there. But in the time I've been looking to do this, about 10 stores have opened up. So basically, every hip little neighborhood already has a store. I thought I was gonna go out there and compete with maybe six to eight stores. And it was more like I would be competing with 20 to 25. That kind of threw me, to be honest. It was a good idea I had but a lot of other people also had the same idea who were probably already living there and were able to act on it faster. Where to put a store is a real tricky thing."

"I can remember six different record stores being in this area back when they were more happening," Pawlicki says. "And just the dynamics of what they're doing with downtown Tempe, they're putting up all these new buildings and there are gonna be a lot of people from 18 to 25 walking around here all the time. Even more so next year than now, this area is just gonna have tons of young people living right across the street from me."

"It's really gone that way," Pawlicki says. "I have nothing against CDs but most young people know they don't have to pay for those. Kids actually come in and buy cassettes more than they buy CDs. Vinyl is absolutely the thing. These places have become a lot more boutique-y and a lot more specialized. Pretty much all the stores you go into, other than the really big stores, vinyl is really the emphasis, absolutely, at this point. Punk and hip-hop kind of kept it alive, but it's really come back. Probably 80 to 90 percent of our sales will be vinyl."