Life Lessons, New Look & D.C. Horror

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Losing your job when you don’t do the work

Carrie Prejean lost her Miss California title on Wednesday for failing to fulfill her contract and for her unwillingness to appear on behalf of the Miss California USA organization. She claims there are other reasons. We honestly don’t care. This woman used up her 15 minutes of fame long ago and, frankly, if previous standards had been applied to her, she would have been fired when topless photos of her surfaced on the Internet weeks ago.

Businessman Donald J. Trump, who owns the pageant organization, initially supported keeping Prejean after her public comments in opposition to gay marriage. Trump, obviously, loves the media attention her comments drew. And ditto for the attention garnered by her scantily clad shots and equally skimpy claims that the wind had blown her top open.

But Trump is a legendary workhorse who won’t stand for someone skipping their commitments.

So Carrie, have you ever watched “The Apprentice?” Apparently not. Citing contract violations and her “unwillingness to make appearances,” the pageant organization fired Prejean this week.

We say the firing was long overdue. And Prejean seemed childish and clueless about her dismissal, giggling and saying everyone had been so nice to her. They had. She had been given chances beyond what anyone else could expect. And her pseudo-celebrity status will keep opening doors, we suppose.

But her behavior is a poor example for girls coming through the pageant system, or for anyone else who is watching. The only real lesson here is that even “beautiful people” get fired when they don’t come to work.

Congratulations to runner-up Tami Farrell, who now becomes Miss California.

Updated look to TriCities.com

Our partner Web site got a face-lift this week that moved breaking news items, information posted from the continuous news desk and the stories that are being talked about most to the top of the page. It makes the site look much cleaner and clearer for users.

If you haven’t gone to look, take a peek at http://www.TriCities.com. You can find local news stories, editorials and columns, letters and many other items, plus you can leave comments for other readers to respond.

There remains a searchable salary database of 25,000 area public officials on the site (keyword “salary”). Of course we want you to keep reading our printed newspaper, but the online version looks much cleaner and updated. Check it out.

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Violence, fear at Holocaust museum

An elderly gunman, who authorities said has a long history of violence and anti-Semitism, shot and killed a security guard inside the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum on Wednesday before being shot by other officers. The man, James Von Brunn, 88, was hospitalized in critical condition.

The guard killed was Stephen T. Johns, who had worked at the museum for six years. While so much attention is being focused on Brunn, including his previous conviction for trying to kidnap members of the Federal Reserve Board, we urge sympathy and remembrance of his victim, Johns.

As more information about von Brunn was publicized this week, it became obvious he was a genius, a loner and a hothead who had become increasingly agitated in recent weeks. He had even decided to give away his computer, after years of maintaining anti-Semitic writings online. Several agencies said they had kept tabs on von Brunn, but perhaps they thought he was less of a threat in his advanced age. Von Brunn, who spent decades in anger, still had plenty of venom and action left in him.

It simply is unforgivable to kill a person at the Holocaust museum – a place designed to teach others about “the dangers of unchecked hatred and the need to prevent genocide,” according to the museum’s Web site, and to do it while the museum was filled with schoolchildren and tourists.

If von Brunn survives his injuries, he deserves the strictest punishment possible. Johns was reportedly killed while opening the door for a man he believed needed help coming into the museum.

Last week, President Barack Obama visited the site of a German concentration camp at Buchenwald, where he said: “There are those who insist the Holocaust never happened.”

He added, “This place is the ultimate rebuke to such thoughts, a reminder of our duty to confront those who would tell lies about our history.”

Von Brunn was one of those deniers, and his actions are a reminder to the rest of us to be vigilant even today.