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"A Merritt Island man who was paralyzed when he answered a dare to do a belly flop in the Indian River has been awarded $76.6 million by a Brevard County jury. Timothy D. Hoffman, who was 20 at the time of the accident on Jan. 16, 2003, broke his neck when he sprinted down a dock in Port St. John and slammed headfirst into the bottom of the shallow river. The former construction worker is unable to move his legs or arms but has limited movement in his shoulders, said his attorney, Donald Van Dingenen of Winter Park. Hoffman's mother quit her job to take care of him. He lives in his parents' converted garage, requires assistance to eat and dress, and cannot use the bathroom normally, Van Dingenen said. His father is a construction worker who has to travel out of state to take jobs to support the family during the recession. A jury late Wednesday in Viera decided that Hoffman should receive $1.5 million for past medical expenses, $89,000 for lost earnings, $21.7 million for future medical expenses, $583,000 for loss of future earnings, and a whopping $52.8 million for pain and suffering. The judgment is one of the largest in Brevard history, Van Dingenen said. Whether Hoffman will collect, however, is questionable. The defendant, C&D Dock Works, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in May because of the incident, said its former owner, Charles Brunty. A judge in November 2007 ruled that the company was negligent. C&D was the general contractor on the job, to which Hoffman was sent by a temporary labor agency. Brunty said he hasn't worked for months and could not afford a lawyer, so no one defended the company in court. "There was no negligence on my part," Brunty said. There was a rail at the edge of the water, he added, indicating a potential danger. ...The accident happened while Hoffman was waiting for a sea wall to harden. Accounts diverge. In one, Hoffman's boss and co-workers put up money -- either $10 or $20, according to varying versions -- to goad him to enter the chilly water. In another, Hoffman offered to jump into the river in exchange for the money. It is undisputed that he fell about 10 feet into about a foot of water and landed on his head, breaking his neck between his fifth and sixth cervical vertebrae.

John Hawkins is a professional blogger who runs Conservative Grapevine, Right Wing News, and Right Wing Video.

The Senate version would give $802 million to National Parks, while the House version of the bill, being voted on today, would give a whopping $2.25 billion.

It might help that the National Parks Conservation Association’s Senior Vice President of Government Affairs, aka lobbyist, is closely connected to House Appropriations Chairman David Obey (D.-Ohio).

The NPCA's chief lobbyist is Obey’s son, Craig Obey. And Chairman Obey has a powerful role in distributing tax dollars for special projects and funds, like national parks, as the most senior person on the Appropriations Committee.

Think that might have anything to do with the billion increase in aid? The NPCA issued a statement yesterday that said the Senate's $800 million was "disappointing" and "called on Congress and the Administration to support the more aggressive national park investment included in the House bill."

I put an inquiry in with the NPCA's communications team to find out if Craig Obey lobbied for money in the stimulus bill.

With little notice and no public hearings, House Democrats would create a temporary new entitlement allowing workers getting unemployment checks to qualify for Medicaid, the health program for low-income people. Spouses and children could also receive benefits, no matter how much money the family had.

In addition, the stimulus package would offer a hefty subsidy to help laid-off workers retain the same health plans they had from their former employers.

Altogether, the economic recovery bill would speed $127 billion over the next two and a half years to individuals and states for health care alone, a fact that has Republicans fuming that the stimulus package is a back door to universal health coverage.

With all the talk of bailouts and stimulus packages necessary to preserve jobs, you'd think that when an opportunity arises for the Magic Obama to save some 90,000 jobs-- without going the bailout/stimulus route-- he would jump all over it. Indeed, the funds are already approved, simply awaiting the President's approval. Perhaps if they were so-called "green" jobs, or maybe in the abortion field it would already be a done deal, but instead, they are within the (gasp!) vital US national defense industry. From the website PreserveRaptorJobs.com:

Production of the world’s most advanced fighter aircraft, the F-22 Raptor, is in jeopardy. Your help is needed to urge the Obama Administration to save more than 95,000 American jobs and more than $12 billion in national economic activity. Keeping the production line of this model aerospace program open is not another bailout; rather, it simply requires that the new administration release funds already authorized by Congress to continue a successful program. By law, President-elect Obama must decide whether to continue the Raptor program during his first weeks in office.