Al's Morning Meeting

All the same,WFAA-TV in Dallas, a station I admire, ran a piece showing how easy it would be for a predator to use something as innocent as a car decal bragging about a kid to track down information about a child. What sets this story apart is that the decals actually include the childrens' names on them.

Here is an excerpt from the story:

What proud parent doesn't love to show off their kids' accomplishments?

That's why window decals and yard signs that boast everything from soccer balls and tennis racquets to trombones and pom-poms are so increasingly popular in North Texas.

But [child advocacy groups and police] are warning that names placed on those innocent-looking signs could present big trouble.

Drive down almost any street in Texas and you're likely to see one of these: A symbol of pride for parents and their kids who are involved in sports or other school activities.

But those signs could be giving child predators a little too much information about your kids.

To illustrate how easy it would be for a sex offender to gain information about your children, we jotted down a few license plate numbers from cars that have window stickers. When we got to their homes, we found yard signs.

One window sticker and plate number led WFAA-TV to Julie McCready's house. When she answered the door, we told her how we found her and what we knew about her daughters, including their ages, their schools, their activities and in one girl's case, her position on the drill team.

"I'm surprised that you could get that information just based on the decals on the car with first names, and that you're able to easily, within an hour, come to my house," said parent Julie McCready.

The Plano mother who was troubled by the visit is considering making changes.

"It will make me think about having the decals on my car, as well as my daughter who's driving who has a decal on her car," McCready said.

The key in this WFAA story is the use of the child's name on the decal or yard sign. I would be especially interested if some enterprising journalist could find a solid example or two -- or ten -- of predators actually using this technique to harm children, as opposed to experts saying this sort of thing "could" happen.

---

Breast Cancer Rates Down

You might remember a big study a few years ago that warned women that taking hormone pills might contribute to a higher risk of breast cancer. Millions of women stopped taking hormones and, now, a new study says the breast cancer rate is dropping -- a lot. It declined more than 7 percent in 2003 alone.

The newest data, for 2004, will be out in April and I'm interested to see if the rate continued to drop.

Cable in Decline

MediaWeek reports that cable television is falling on hard times -- being edged out by new technologies:

Wired cable penetration hit a 16-year low in November, losing 2.6 million subscribers, according to a Television Bureau of Advertising analysis of Nielsen Media Research data for November 2006. Wired cable penetration fell from 64.8 percent to 62.1 percent with the number of wired cable subscribers dropping to 68.4 million from 71 million a year ago.

In contrast, the percentage of Americans receiving subscription TV programming via alternative delivery systems (including satellite TV) reached 24.5 percent in November, up from 20.8 percent a year ago. Direct broadcast satellite delivery, the largest component of ADS is now at 24 percent, up from 20.2 percent in Nov. 2005. In total, subscribers to alternative delivery systems to wired cable represents 28.5 percent of all subscription TV customers.

The magnitude of the trend varies by market. Among the top 50 markets, Albuquerque-Santa Fe, [N.M.,] ADS subscribers represent 47.5 percent of all paid TV customers, followed by Salt Lake City at 47.1 percent and Dallas-Fort Worth, [Texas,] at 45.3 percent.

Replacing Senators

Given the story of Democratic Sen. Tim Johnson’s illness and surgery, it might be worth taking a few moments to understand how succession works.

It is the 17th Amendment to the Constitution that sets out what happens when a senator cannot fulfill his or her duties in office.

The law sets down different rules for replacing senators and representatives. The sitting governor of the respective state has the sole power to select a senator's successor. Traditionally, the governor chooses somebody from his or her own party. When a representative dies or retires or goes to jail, voters choose a successor in a special election.

All of that applies if the officeholder actually leaves office. But if a senator or a representative is alive, but incapacitated, no part of the law gives the governor the power to step in.

In fact, as the Associated Press points out, history reveals senators who could not even come to work and still kept their offices. In 1969, another South Dakota senator, Republican Karl Mundt, suffered a stroke. Mundt continued to serve until his term ended in January 1973, even though he was unable to attend sessions. He was even stripped of his committee assignments by the Senate Republican Conference in 1972.

That is not, however, the case with the president. For him, the 25th Amendment is the authority. If a president gets sick, for example, and can't do his job, the VP can send a petition to Congress, allowing the representatives to decide whether or not the president is too sick to run the country.