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Carl Strock THE VIEW FROM HERE
Carl Strock can be reached at 395-3085 or by e-mail at carlstrock@dailygazette.com.
Of dogs and
prize money:
Look again
    I was deeply touched last week by the story of the boy in Scotia being reunited with his dog, accompanied by a large photo of the dog, a pit bull, licking the boy’s face. The photo was prominently displayed both in this newspaper and in the Times Union — slobber, slobber, right on the old kisser — and was a real heartwarmer, on a par with stories and photos of “therapy dogs” comforting nursing-home residents and helping children to read.
    Apparently the boy’s family couldn’t afford to bring the dog with them when they moved up here from Florida and so left it behind, whereupon a couple of generous dog-lovers came to the rescue and flew the animal up on their own.
    Big story, big picture, undoubtedly inducing many people to say, “Aaawwwww, isn’t that sweet?”
    Too bad we didn’t have a picture to accompany the teeny-weeny story that ran the next day on a back page under the little headline, “Family dog kills 8-month-old boy,” which emanated from Brooklyn and had to do with a Doberman pinscher chomping on a baby’s head. That would have been a picture and a half, I bet.
    That story ended with the line, “Neighbors said the dog was docile and friendly and would allow them to pet it,” which is a standard element in killer-dog stories, I’ve noticed.
    The dog is always docile and friendly until all of a sudden it acts like a dog instead of an indulged child, and reality takes a bite out of somebody’s face.
    To refresh your memory: Dogs in this country bite about 333,000 people a year seriously enough for the people to go to emergency rooms. They kill somewhere between 16 and 26 people a year, most of them children, depending on which study you consult. Most of the bites of children are to the face, neck and head.
    The leading killers are pit bulls and Rottweilers.
LOTTERY PRIZE
    And then there was the other heartwarming story about the Latham woman who won a big Lottery prize. Do you remember her and do you remember how big the prize was?
    It was $18 million, according to this newspaper and every other newspaper I’m aware of, and according to the state Lottery Division also, which handed out the prize with the usual hoopla. You had to read down into the fine print to learn that the winner “chose the lump sum payment,” which was not $18 million but closer to $10 million, before taxes, and that after taxes it would be $6.76 million.
    So how does it get announced that she won $18 million?
    Well, like this: The Lottery Division lets you take your money either in a lump sum or in payments spread over 26 years. If you take the annual payments, they figure how much those payments would add up to with 26 years’ worth of interest, at U.S. Treasury bill rates, and they call that puffed-up hypothetical amount the prize.
    In this case, they knew the winner was taking her money up front. They knew the up-front amount was $9.9 million. They knew that both the federal and state governments (meaning themselves) were withholding taxes from it, so that she would receive not $18 million or $9.9 million but $6.76 million. Nevertheless they announced via press release, “Latham Lotto Winner Collects $18,000,000 Prize Check,” and the news media faithfully followed suit.
    I have observed this dereliction in every newspaper I have ever monitored, including The New York Times. I have railed against it but to no avail. I might as well insist that dogs are animals. Nobody listens.

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In this case, they knew the winner was taking her money up front. They knew the up-front amount was $9.9 million. They knew that both the federal and state governments (meaning themselves) were withholding taxes from it, so that she would receive not $18 million or $9.9 million but $6.76 million. Nevertheless they announced via press release, “Latham Lotto Winner Collects $18,000,000 Prize Check,” and the news media faithfully followed suit.