Chief White House Calligrapher Gets Paid $96,725 Per Year
With the White House closing its doors to public tour groups in order to save money for the sequester, it's worth remembering some of the other costs the White House incurs annually.Like the "Chief Calligrapher," Patricia A. Blair, who has an annual salary of $96,725, and her two deputies, Debra S. Brown, who gets paid $85,953 per year, and Richard T. Muffler, who gets paid $94,372 every year.
In all, the White House appears to employ 3 calligraphers for a yearly total of $277,050.
Despite sequestration, there's been no announcement of the White House scaling back on calligraphers.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/chief-white-house-calligrapher-gets-paid-96725-year_706521.html
Remind Me Again, Why Does the White House Need a Chief Calligrapher?
The White House may no longer offer public tours because of “the sequester,” but it will still employ three professional calligraphers for a yearly total of $277,050. That’s some expensive handwritin’.
(Image: White House History)
I’m a traditionalist who appreciates pomp & circumstance and I enjoy fancy penmanship as much as the next girl, but I couldn’t help but wonder why we pay a single person more than $95,000/year to do this job. Here’s my simple budget solution: Send Valerie Jarrett over to the local Hobby Lobby store, have her meander a bit around the art supplies section and ask for volunteers. Boom: Problem solved.
Fun fact: When I worked as an intern in the Bush White House, we recruited volunteers with good handwriting to make out invitations to the vice president’s Christmas parties. (Yeah, Chief Justice John Roberts — that invitation was addressed by ME.)
Allow me to leave you with this question to ponder: If President Obama can use an Autopen machine to sign important legislation into law, why can’t we use one for calligraphy?
Bonus: Since Michelle, Sasha and Malia Obama are all staying at the White House rent free, why don’t we just recruit them to be tour guides? Man, I am just FULL of solutions today.
CDC Warns Of Spread Of Deadly Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria
An antibiotic-resistant family of bacteria continues to spread throughout the U.S. health care system and is now prompting warnings from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.The bacteria, Carbapenem-Resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE), kill up to half of the patients who get the bloodstream infections from the disease. The disease has evolved a resistance to carbapenems, also called last-resort antibiotics.
In addition, the CRE bacteria can reportedly transfer its resistance to other bacteria within its family. The transfer of resistance can create additional life-threatening infections for patients in hospitals, longer-term health care facilities, and possibly otherwise healthy people, according to the CDC.
“CRE are nightmare bacteria. Our strongest antibiotics don’t work and patients are left with potentially untreatable infections,” said CDC Director Tom Frieden, M.D., M.P.H. “Doctors, hospital leaders, and public health, must work together now to implement CDC’s “detect and protect” strategy and stop these infections from spreading.”
According to numbers from the CDC, almost 200 hospitals and long-term care facilities across the nation treated at least one person infected with the CRE bacteria. The CDC’s Vital Signs report said that the percentage of CRE increased by fourfold over the last decade and that one particular form of CRE, a resistant form of Klebsiella pneumonia, has increased sevenfold.
Still, according to the CDC said the disease is preventable by: enforcing use of infection control precautions, grouping patients with CRE together, having facilities alert each other when patients with CRE are transferred, and using antibiotics wisely among other recommendations.
The CDC said the disease can be controlled through coordinated efforts. It cited a long-term care facility in Florida that worked with the CDC and dropped the percentage of patients getting CRE from 44 percent to zero.
http://miami.cbslocal.com/2013/03/05/cdc-warns-of-spread-of-deadly-antibiotic-resistant-bacteria/
No more golf for Obama until White House tours resume, Gohmert says
In response to an announcement by the White House that it will end public tours due to sequestration, Rep. Louie Ghomert, R-Texas, filed an amendment to the House GOP’s six-month continuing resolution that would prevent President Obama from using federal dollars to go golfing, a favorite pastime of his, until the tours are reinstated.Gohmert’s amendment to H.R. 933 states:
“None of the funds made available by a division of this Act may be used to transport the president to or from a golf course until public tours of the White House resume.”
http://washingtonexaminer.com/no-more-golf-for-obama-until-white-house-tours-resume-gohmert-says/article/2523336
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