6 MAY 08: THE DUCK'S BILL

The Columbus Museum apparently was the happiest place this side of Orlando Monday. Aflac shareholders gathered for an annual meeting. They gave the company's top executives a big vote of confidence. And I doubt a single person demanded foie gras -- you know, duck meat.

Aflac pumped up the media volume for weeks, promoting the big "say on pay" vote. Shareholders could have decided the executives are overpaid, and called for a cut. But think for a minute - if they really felt this way, wouldn't they have sold their Aflac stock and moved on?

The "say on pay" vote was described as a ground-breaker in the corporate world, and a first of its kind for big business. But when the results were announced at the Aflac annual meeting, 93 percent of shareholders supported the pay structure -- making this big moment for democracy land not far from a Cuban national election.

Aflac's latest annual report shows the insurance company has about 80,000 "registered common shareholders." Out of that number, only 2.5 percent were opposed to the executives' pay. C.E.O. Dan Amos can expect a call today from Mayor Wetherington, asking how he can do that well with a sales tax vote.

(Why do you think that 2.5 percent is opposed? Are those the people dying of something besides cancer?)

WLTZ reported the shareholder vote means a total salary of $13.8 million for Dan Amos. That means he could become the last person in Columbus driving a gas-guzzling Hummer or SUV.

Dan Amos briefed shareholders on Aflac's financial condition during the annual meeting. Based on the annual report, the company's stock dividend has doubled since 2004. It's now 80 cents a share - which I think is a better deal than one slice of a large pizza from Domino's.

Here are some other interesting things we discovered in Aflac's report:

+ The company now is selling cancer insurance inside Japanese post offices. So you should think about more than having your stamp canceled....

+ The company paid $865 million in income taxes last year. So every little grant to a public library goes directly to Schedule A.

+ While Aflac has a lot of sales in Japan, it has a "penetration rate" in the U.S. of only seven percent. People may know the ducks, but they're not handing over the bucks.

E-MAIL UPDATE: The Aflac shareholders meeting may have caused the Columbus Museum to make some surprise adjustments....

Richard ,I told you last week I was going down to the Columbus Museum this week end to see the Phenix City display..It consisted of the blood soaked suit that Albert Patterson was wearing when he was murdered. A security guard told me it was being removed ahead of schedule for an event in that area of the museum. I don't think I would want to view it during a reception..The log book of the jail showing the arrest of Hoyt Shepherd and movie posters of the "Phenix City Story."...I was disappointed after all the publicity...



However,I was thrilled to view a collection of old black and white photos of the Columbus and Phenix City areas.This was part of a show of collections of area citizens. What a surprise to see people I recognized. The owner of the photos was there showing them off to friends. He said come to the CVS on Summerville Rd near the Publix and look at others on the walls..



The Columbus Museum is a real treasure for this area..I hope Ft.Benning visitors are told about it at local hotels.

Well, it's no wonder that bloody suit was moved. Aflac sells supplemental death insurance, after all....

Another good spot to see old photos of the Columbus area is at the Burger King on Wynnton Road. One of them shows a group which came to Broadway from the Butler area for a parade in the 1910's. Their "float" was pulled by a horse - and there were no Circle K's to fuel that motor on the long path home.

Even though this is supposed to be a humor blog, readers want to keep commenting on two drownings:

Richard, The TV news did in fact interview the father of the two boys that drowned near Oxbow Meadows and I saw an unusual interview with their father. He was smiling and also chuckled as he spoke of his sons in the midst of this tragedy. The newspaper said that he was a truck driver for Dolly Madison and was in New York. There is no other way to say it but these kids were not properly supervised. If they lived with their Dad's grandmother she is probably a senior citizen and shouldn't have that responsibility in the first place.

The grandmother said Monday she warned the two boys not to go farther than a park. Yet somehow they wandered down the Riverwalk to an off-limits area for swimmers, even though they couldn't swim. Something like this happened when I was young - and I actually believed a neighbor boy, who said my nice shoes wouldn't get muddy in his wet backyard.

The father, grandmother and their neighbors are talking about starting a petition drive, to make the area of the drowning more secure. They think the answer could lie in barriers along the riverbank. But have you noticed how tall fences along the Rio Grande don't seem to keep illegal immigrants away?

I hear a voice of grief in the family's calls for the city to do something in terms of prevention. The emotion of grief naturally wants to blame others, when catastrophes or deaths occur. But sadly, a shooting occurred Monday night between youngsters at an apartment complex playground. Metal detectors at playground gates would get expensive after awhile.

We'll have to hold a couple of other messages for another day, and now move to other Monday headlines:

+ Muscogee County Sheriff Ralph Johnson told WXTX "News at Ten" he's looking for high school graduates, to work at the county jail. Get those budding football players ready for college, by having them shove inmates around for a summer.

(Sheriff Johnson says he decided to recruit high school graduates for jail jobs to "think outside the pool." And the pay IS probably better than a lifeguard would make....)

+ The grand finale of "Walk Georgia" was held at Lakebottom Park. There were souvenir bottles of water to drink, and fresh fruit for munching - but who decided to bring in barbecue pork sandwiches? Was this a plot to make people fat again, in time for the fall walking drive?

+ The "SEC Celebrity Golf Classic" golf tournament brought famous football names to Columbus. One of them was Auburn quarterback Brandon Cox, who's wrapping up his senior season by playing in six charity golf events. When you're ignored in the National Football League draft, there's not much else you can do.

+ The "Ask Men" web site ranked the Atlanta Hawks the eighth worst pro sports franchise. Wow - imagine if the series with Boston had NOT gone to seven games.

+ Instant Message to St. Patrick's School in Phenix City: It's nice to see you earned "honorable mention" in that "Drive for Green" contest. But I wasn't really surprised by that. With a name like St. Patrick's, "thinking green" probably is expected.

(And how nice to be honored on Cinco de Mayo -- and show how green-gos can go green.)

BUT SERIOUSLY: When I started working in radio news during college, one of my role models was Paul Harvey. So it was sad to learn Monday that his wife of 68 years had died -- a woman who quietly wrote a lot of his scripts, and came up with ideas such as "The Rest of the Story." Considering all she did behind the scenes, it's no wonder Paul called her "Angel" all the time.

The funeral for Lynne Cooper Harvey is today, in suburban Chicago. My sympathies are with the family - and even with this loss, may Paul Harvey still have many "good days" to come.

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