Given some of the recent discussions here, you might find this interesting.

Blount Today has contacted us to let us know that, due to problems converting their archives during a recent server upgrade, the Car Wars article was inadvertently not moved to the new server.

The problem has been corrected and Blount Today thanks those who called to alert them and apologizes for any inconvenience. Here is the new link to the original Car Wars story.

Hold on while we check with our lawyers

Today's Knoxville News Sentinel local section has an article about the recent dustups between the Maryville Daily Times and local officials

At issue are a handful of controversial decisions by The Daily Times during the past few months and the perception by County Mayor Jerry Cunningham, Maryville Mayor Joe Swann and Alcoa Mayor Don Mull that the newspaper's adherence to the standards of the newspaper profession had somehow loosened.

Read more at the link. BlountViews is mentioned.

The Maryville Daily Times responds to Blount Mayors:

We merely seek to cover the news and information relating to Blount County so that readers can draw their own conclusions and make intelligent decisions about the issues facing them. Doing these things makes us a positive force in the community to which we aspire every day.

There's lots more.

Mayor Cunningham has gone completely off the rails and is dragging Mayor Mull and Mayor Swann into the trainwreck.

Can't recall ever seeing anything like this before. It doesn't appear Cunningham actually wrote it, though. It has correct spelling and grammar and stuff.

It's gone from their website, but the big, bold, top of the front page headline in today's Maryville Daily Times says "ALCOA makes hostile bid for Alcan".

The problem is, the article is a slice and dice of a May, 2007 Alcoa press release.

According to an Alcoa spokesperson today, "This is old news from back in May. Alcan was already bought by Rio Tinto, and that happened months ago."

Memo to the MDT: If you aren't going to check your facts, at least check the dates on press releases you transcribe onto the front page.

UPDATE: Looks like this is an exact reprint of a May 2007 AP report.

UPDATE: The correction in Thursday's paper: "Correction: The Daily Times inadvertently published a dated Associated Press story in Wednesday's newspaper about ALCOA. While the information was correct at the time the story was originally issued, Rio Tinto has since purchased Alcan. We apologize for the error."

That's the front page, top of the fold headline in today's Maryville Daily Times. Which is unfortunate, because there are a lot more important things going on than this manufactured wedge issue made up by GOP strategists to further divide our nation and further confuse an already misinformed electorate.

From the front page of yesterday's Maryville Daily Times:

They Maryville Daily Times today retracted portions of a previous story regarding a controversial divorce case.

Here is the full text of the retraction.

This action followed four days after the husband's attorney wrote to the editor complaining about coverage of this and another case, suggesting there could be legal consequences for the paper. Here is the full text of that letter.

The original article about the divorce controversy is gone from the Daily Times website. The woman's attorney, however, had previously remarked on the case here in comments. His remarks are here.

Last night, her attorney reacted to news of the Dally Times retraction here in comments. His remarks are here.

At the center of this controversy is Blount County Circuit Court Judge W. Dale Young and his actions in this and two other controversial cases also covered by the Daily Times:

• Immigrant: Judge told me to go home

• Judge Young subject of judicial conduct review

• Protection case patience urged (KNS)

• Judge Young responds to Calixto appeal

• Mom’s religion dominates custody hearing

So now, everyone at BlountViews is up to date on all of these unfortunate situations. At this point, all of this needs to be settled among the litigants, their attorneys, the courts, and if necessary the Tennessee Court of the Judiciary judicial conduct review process.

If anyone has further discussion, comment, complaints, or evidence, it should be directed to the appropriate parties. They are:

Attorney for Mrs. Wright
Thomas F. Mabry
P. O. Box 52385
Knoxville, TN 37950
Fax 1-888-215-3119
Phone 1-865-271-9224

Attorney for Mr. Wright
Craig L. Garrett
Attorney at Law
607 Smithview Drive
Maryville, TN 37803

Judge W. Dale Young
Circuit Court - Division I
946 E. Lamar Alexander Parkway
Maryville, TN 37804
Phone (865) 273-5550
Fax (865) 273-5558

Tennessee Court of the Judiciary
Disciplinary Counsel
511 Union Street, Suite 600
Nashville, TN 37219-1768
Phone: 615-741-2687

The Maryville Daily Times
307 E. Harper Ave.
Maryville, TN 37804
Phone: 865-981-1100
F. Max Croster, Publisher, 865-981-1134
Larry Aldridge, Editor, 865-981-1115

A while back the Maryville Daily Times updated their website with some nice cosmetic improvements.

Now I wish they would add RSS feeds, at least for local news articles.

What we have now over there in the News-O-Rama column is a hack based on a Google News search turned into a dynamic RSS feed. It's ugly at best, and incomplete with incorrect headlines at worst.

It's not rocket science, or at least it shouldn't be if they have the right back end software.

If they need help, I recommend they get in touch with the guy who setup this website for a smaller local community newspaper. It's got all the latest bells and whistles, it's slick, and it's based on the latest state-of-the-art open source (and free) content management system.