• BURNT TOAST to state officials in New Hampshire who are allowing historic sites—such as the farm where poet Robert Frost lived and wrote and the home where orator Daniel Webster was born—to fall into disrepair. The primary reason such treasures are not being adequately maintained is New Hampshire’s curious insistence on funding state parks and historic sites solely through user fees, which, at present, fall far short of meeting budgetary demands. It is “a formula for failureâ€? and puts important sites such as the Frost Farm at risk of being lost forever. more…

• BURNT TOAST to the Sudanese government (again) for asking “African Union forces monitoring a shaky truce in its Darfur region to leave the country by Sept. 30â€? and for simultaneously rejecting “a U.N. Security Council resolution passed Thursday that calls for the deployment of more than 20,000 U.N. troops and police to Darfur to replace the cash-strapped and ill-equipped AU mission.â€? This development does not bode at all well for this troubled region and could lead to an escalation of the conflict and suffering there. more…

• BURNT TOAST to the classification-happy Bush administration for spending “an unprecedented $7.7 billion to mark documents secret last year.â€? Interestingly, even though “the number of decisions to classify documents declined by 1.4 million last year to 14.2 million [nearly 9 percent], the cost of classifying those documents rose by nearly 6 percent.â€? Gee, I wonder if Halliburton received a no-bid contract to provide classification services. more…

• BURNT TOAST to medical staff at an unnamed hospital in Kolkata, India, for their lack of common sense and humanity in treating a pregnant HIV-positive woman who sought an abortion. As reported by Reuters, the woman “was forced to abort her own fetus after staff…refused to help her.â€? That is beyond reprehensible. more…