Vounteer State Blogging Balkinization

Thus far South Knox Bubba has done a good job of keeping Tennessee bloggers unified under the Rocky Top Brigade banner. But now I’m getting a whiff of Volunteer State factionalism in the air.
Bill Hobbs is calling for Nashville bloggers. Meanwhile, Brock at Dark Bilious Vapors is working on a fancy icon for Memphian bloggers.
What could this mean? Might we be headed toward a contentious civil war blogging supremecy? And what about the Knoxville bloggers? And the south of Knox wannabes? Are the K-Towners going to be left in disorganized obscurity while the sister cities coalesce?
Stay tuned.

TDOT “HELPs” Motorists

TDOT to the rescue:

A Tennessee Department of Transportation program in the state’s largest cities to provide roadside assistance to accidents and breakdowns is helping ease traffic congestion and improve safety, officials say.
The program, called HELP, came to the aid of more than 92,500 motorists during the fiscal year that ended July 1, according to a recent annual report. That was up 9 percent from the previous year, TDOT spokeswoman Kim Keelor said.
. . .
The program costs $5.1 million a year, making the average cost of each HELP stop about $55, the report shows. HELP truck operators in Chattanooga, Knoxville, Memphis and Nashville offered assistance ranging from boosting batteries to transporting stranded motorists to rounding up cattle that escaped from a livestock truck.
The distinctive neon-green HELP trucks operate on assigned routes in the core areas of each city. The program strives to clear an accident or breakdown site quickly, because national statistics show as many as 20 percent of collisions on interstates and other controlled-access highways result from an earlier incident still congesting traffic.

A good program, I think. But one I’ll hopefully never have to use. It never ceases to amaze me how much traffic can slow down around here merely because there’s a vehicle sitting harmlessly on the road’s shoulder.
Speaking of easing traffic congestion, whose bright idea was it to shut down two lanes on Kingston Pike for a long, long time? Sheesh.

Selling Scary TV News

Oh brother. This is a couple weeks old, but it illustrates why TV news continues to be so bad:

New CNN president Jonathan Klein is taking his “Security Watch” seriously. Klein has encouraged producers and correspondents to prepare stories that fit under the “Security Watch” banner, and anchors have been careful to “tease” the segments on-air.
On Monday morning, ‘Inside Politics Sunday’ was reprimanded for not promoting the feature correctly, two CNN insiders told TVNewser. Kelly Wallace referred to CNN’s Security Watch twice while introducing segments, but apparently didn’t include the correct final sentence. The show was fined $5,000 for the error.
(For the record, here’s what anchors are apparently supposed to say: “Remember here at CNN we always have the latest stories about your safety and security,” Paula Zahn said last week. “Please stay tuned to CNN day and night for the most reliable news about your security,” Wolf Blitzer said on Tuesday.)

There you have TV news priorities: management penalizing on-air people if they don’t use the proper buzz words to promote the terrorism coverage.
Imagine if someone put that kind of effort into adding facts and context to their reporting.