Colorado journalists and politicians who fell in line and attempted the bogus “Food Stamp Challenge” probably didn’t anticipate that a Colorado blogger would call them out, and then call their bluff. But that is exactly what happened.

In June, Colorado Freedom Report’s Ari Armstrong challenged those in that state’s media and political class who swallowed the claim that Food Stamp recipients can’t get by on $21 per person per week (even though, as syndicated columnist Mona Charen and yours truly noted back in April, the right number is between about $27 and $36, depending on family size) to pay $10 to a charity of Mr. Armstrong’s choice for every dollar under $1,080 ($6 a day for 180 days) that he and his wife combined spent on food in a six-month period.

(Picky, picky — The Armstrongs were even tougher on themselves than they needed to be, as there are 184 days in the six-month August 2006 – January 2007 time period involved. They could have used $1,104 as their benchmark.)

Nonetheless, Armstrong had only two people take up his challenge:

The rest, including Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper, Denver Human Services Manager Roxane White, and Diane Carman and the editorial staff of The Denver Post, obviously don’t even believe their own propaganda. If they really believed that $3 per person per day for food is inadequate, then they should have happily accepted our challenge in order to prove us wrong.

In the process, Armstrong has provided a valuable service by showing just how bogus the nationwide “Food Stamp Challenge” has been from the very beginning — even at the incorrectly low $21 per person per week level. No one can seriously believe that Ohio’s Tim Ryan, Illinois’ Jan Schakowsky, Oregon Governor Ted Kulongowski, or any of the other publicity-seeking poseurs would have bet against Armstrong.

This case is closed — By showing that advocates won’t put their money where their overexercised mouths are, Armstrong has, uh, cooked their goose.

Nevertheless, to prove their point, the Armstrongs have revised their plans, and are going to get through the month of August — a period over four times longer than the seven days Food Stamp program expansion advocates carried out their “Challenge” — on $180 in food. Ari has pledged to fully document their results.

(Picky, picky — they could have used $186, which is 31 days times $3 a day for two people.)

He has named their new effort “The Liberty and Prosperity Challenge.”

I’m looking forward to seeing just how far under $180 they come in, and to the insights on how to economize that accompany their efforts. If form holds, Colorado’s media and political class will try to pretend that Armstrong doesn’t exist. Readers here know better.

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

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Previous Posts:
- June 30 — Coloradoan Issues a Real Food Challenge; Denver Media Run for Cover
- June 8 — Food Stamp Follies (Mostly) Continue, As Does Old Media’s Gullible Coverage
- May 22 — The Bogus ‘Food Stamp Challenge’ Spreads; Gullible Media and The Left Eat It Up
- April 28 — Food Stamp Follies: Oregon Governor’s Publicity Stunt, and the Reporting on It, Are Both Wrong on the Facts

Congrats to Justin at Right on the Right on Two Full Years of Blogging.

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iPod, therefore iMac? — “Apple didn’t make the top five in worldwide PC shipments, but in its home turf in the United States, the company boosted Mac sales year over year by 26.2% to 960,000 units, IDC estimates. Apple’s share of the U.S. market rose to 5.6% from 4.8%, or 760,000 units, a year ago.”

3-1/2 years ago (Q4 2003), Apple’s US market share was barely over 2%.

Context, though, requires noting that HP and Dell are the big cahunas: “Worldwide PC shipments increased 12.5% in the second quarter year over year to 58.8 million units, according to IDC. Hewlett-Packard(HP) continued to lead, increasing shipments by 35.5% to take a 19.3% share of the market. Dell remained firmly in second place with a 16.1% share, but shipped 4.9% fewer units.”

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In an administration that is supposedly a group of sellouts to the business class, the Bush Justice Department has a strange way of demonstrating its affection:

Quick: How Many CFOs Have Been Convicted?

While Enron, WorldCom, and Tyco offer the marquee examples of CFOs brought down in the past five years of legal action against accounting abuses, a report issued by the President’s Corporate Fraud Task Force calculates that at least 53 finance chiefs have been convicted since 2002.

In what is becoming a great year for fifth anniversaries of corporate enforcement activity, the tally of convicted CFOs appeared in the task force’s review of its own first five years in business. It said that there have been 1,236 convictions in all in such corporate cases, including 214 chief executives, 23 corporate counsels or attorneys, and 128 vice presidents. The task force gave itself significant credit, noting that it “has compiled a strong record of combating corporate fraud and punishing those who violate the trust of employees and investors.”

In addition to the convictions, the task force noted, more than $1 billion dollars in fraud-related forfeitures has been distributed to victims of corporate fraud over that span.

Quick: During which administration did the crimes of many, if not most, of these execs take place — espcially the big ones?

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This report from Dayton TV station WHIO alleges confusion about the credit monitoring process put into place by the State of Ohio as a result of the mid-June data theft (HT to an e-mailer):

The letters are from the Ohio Department of Administrative Services and not the tax department or from Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland.

People like Bill Burnett, of Miamisburg, are upset that the data was compromised in the first place. He is even more upset that the letter asked him to send his personal information to a company in Texas for identity theft protection.

State authorities said they are getting calls from taxpayers, too, asking if the letter is for real or if it is a scam.

State officials said if the letter comes from the Department of Administrative Services, it real, and yes, they are advising people to send in an application for identity theft protection.

The company that the state is buying the service from is in Texas.

Though the state is obviously in an awkward situation no matter what it does, it seems to me that the letter should have come from the governor himself, with news reports announcing a guv-signed letter. Of course, some people would be skeptical of a letter like that, but I believe that their number would be lower, and that the rate of people signing up for the needed protection would be higher, because of the authority behind such a letter.

As to Debix, the company in Texas the state has chosen for the year of free credit monitoring — I think the state should have insisted that the sign-up portal for those affected have a lot less (or no) promotion of Debix’s paid protection products. How convenient it is for Debix that it gets to aggressively push its products to a captive audience of hundreds of thousands.

The key paragraph:

But, “Am I going to walk? Oh yeah, for sure,” said Tim, who is 50. “I mean, I’m only one guy. Everyone did all this for one guy. I want to walk again to show everyone.”

From Arlington Heights, Illinois:

Posted Sunday, July 15, 2007
Officer who was hit by drunken driver begins to heal

Tim Sheehan awoke from a nine-week coma a White Sox fan.

He didn’t know his wife or three children. He didn’t know why he was in the hospital or why he was in so much pain.

His family wrote, “A big White Sox fan” on the patient form next to his bed.

Nurses, trying to help him connect with his life before the coma, chatted about the 2005 World championship.

Still hooked up to monitors and tubes and unable to speak, Tim shook his head. “No way,” he thought. “I love the Sox, but my team hasn’t won a championship for 80 years.”

It was April 2006.

On Feb. 15, 2006, Sheehan, an Arlington Heights police officer, was starting his 10:30 p.m. shift at Northwest Highway and Euclid Avenue, when a drunken driver hit Sheehan’s squad car dead on.

The impact crushed the right side of Sheehan’s body, breaking most of his bones from his pelvis down. It damaged his brain, affecting his speech, memory and vision.

Sheehan’s had 10 surgeries, with more coming. Fifty-three pieces of metal have been put in his body to repair the broken bones.

Gone is any memory of the accident and the weeks before it. He has no memory of being extracted from the crushed metal and rushed away.

A few blocks away, the phone rang at the quiet Sheehan home.

Tim’s wife, Maryann, answered.

Maryann remembers everything.

Around 10:15 p.m. Tim left for his shift. A few minutes later, he flew in the back door and grabbed his flashlight off the kitchen counter.

Their daughter, Katie, 17, slept upstairs. Sons Mark and Mike were at college.

Tim smiled at his wife, busy at their computer, and ran back out.

Fifteen minutes later, the phone rang. Maryann saw “Village of Arlington Heights” on the caller ID and thought, “What did Tim forget now?” Outside, sirens wailed.

Maryann picked up the phone, still sporting a tan from their Bahamas vacation – their first trip without the kids. Red and white tulips Tim gave her for Valentine’s Day sat on the kitchen table.

“Maryann, Tim’s been in an accident,” an officer said.

Go here for the rest of the story.