The actual fund-raising for this campaign has finished, but I think the concept and the page are great.
'Why did you steal 40,000 hotel coat hangers, knowing that hotel coat hangers are designed to be useless outside hotel wardrobes?'
Miles Kington
15 October 2002
A most extraordinary trial is going on in the High Court at the moment in which a man named Chrysler is accused of stealing more than 40,000 coat hangers from hotels round the world. He admits his guilt, but in his defence he claims that – well, perhaps it would be simpler just to bring you a brief extract from the trial. We join the case at the point where Chrysler has just taken the stand.
Normally, I'd post a story like this over at BitchQueen, my collection of "stupid human tricks", but this is far to hilarious not to share with everyone. Just go read it, ok? :)
In another transcript from the same trial, you can read the further adventures of Arnold Chrysler and the joys of hotel-style home decor.
The Salem Witch Trials remain a hideous -- yet disturbingly familiar -- mystery.
By Laura Miller
Oct. 29, 2002 | The Salem Witch Trials are America's original home-grown horror. The crisis happened over 300 years ago in a world very different from today's -- and to people seemingly very different from ourselves -- and yet so many of its elements keep cropping up again and again in our public life. A panic that spreads like a virus, intimations of a vile conspiracy, children and young women horribly abused, a fog of accusations, shocking confessions, sensational trials, reputations destroyed, culprits (or scapegoats) located and harshly punished, and an aftermath in which anyone with a conscience looks back and asks, "What just happened? Did we really do that?"
Salem, too, is a challenge to everyone, whether on the left or the right, who sentimentalizes or idealizes the Way Things Used to Be. Feeling nostalgic for the peace and safety of small town life? Convinced that what the world needs now is a return to Christian values? Think that the trouble with contemporary society is that we've lost our sense of community? Well, Salem was a small town, as Christian as they come, and it's got to be Exhibit A on the list of what sucks about living in a place where everybody knows your name.
As you may have noticed, I usually have a lot to say about the articles I link to - but this one says it so well, that I'm going to let it stand by itself. The rest of the article is quite good as well, but these first too paragraphs really hit home with me.
By: Michael Quay
October 28, 2002
We still have freedom of the press, right?
[...] And while millions of television viewers were glued to their television sets watching the real-life, drug-induced, disgusting habits of a top heavy woman named Anna Nichole, most of America missed the minuscule news coverage of more than 100,000 U.S. citizens converging on Washington D.C. to protest George Bush's relentless lust to go to war with Iraq. It was the largest anti-war gathering since the Vietnam War, yet the news media hardly noticed. There were protests of equal size in other U.S. cities, but again, no coverage. [...]
I have to wonder - is the problem that we don't want to know, or is it that the news media, rather than being guided by the principle of informing the public is instead guided by the principle of making a profit? Or is it that one feeds into the other?
I am frequently amazed as I scan through the headines to find things to write about at how much of the news goes either unreported by any of the 'major' players, or is seriously underreported. The anti-war march in Washington DC should have received major coverage - getting 100,000 people to do anything together is quite a feat, and that such a large group was organized indicates something about the strength of the concerns about the possiblity of war with Iraq. That, in and of itself, should be news.
I think, to a great extent, I have difficulty with the idea of the news media being a business like any other. That leaves it open to manipulation by the masses, which is much of what we see today. It's why we had nearly non-stop sniper coverage and why there was almost no reporting on the anti-war protest. It's why we get film footage of a dog being rescued from a boat after being lost at sea for a couple weeks, but in the time I've been watching the news today, I've seen no mention of a student being shot - though not killed - at his school. It's why earlier this summer we heard so much about Elizabeth Smart and so little about Alexis Patterson.
Entertainment broadcasting - be it dramas, comedies, movies, music videos, documentaries or what-have-you - is a fine business. We may not always get great quality entertainment out of it, but that's ok for entertainment. It shouldn't be ok for news, though. News should be handled as a part of the public trust - something that shouldn't be dependent on ratings or revenues for success.
Even in a republic, the people still have a voice - and it should be a very loud voice - in how this country is run, what policies we have, and why. But for that voice to be effective, we have to know what is going on. The news - tv, magazines, newspapers, radio, whatever - is generally the best way we have of finding out what is going on, but it becomes difficult to determine what is or isn't important, and what is or isn't reliable when much of the reporting is slanted by bias (liberal OR conservative) and much of the content is determined solely by popular fiat.
I don't yet know what I think should replace - or perhaps supplement - our current news industry, but I think there needs to be something that can exist without the pressures of ratings and profits, and have it's ownership so well distributed that no one particular viewpoint would be able to dominate. The news industry we have now isn't doing what needs to be done.
Draft Charter for Europe Points the Way to a Bigger World Role. A draft constitution for an enlarged European Union was unveiled on Monday, pointing the way toward creating a greater European presence on the world stage. By Paul Meller. [Headlines From The NY Times (10/29/2002)]
As the European Union plans its growth, the United States will need to re-evaluate our own position in the world as a whole. As noted in the NY Times:
With about 445 million citizens, the European Union will have a much larger population than the United States, something the drafters of the constitution want reflected in its role in international affairs.
Given the policy contained in Bush's recently released "National Security Strategy of the United States," states that America, as the world's strongers nation, "will never again allow its military supremacy to be challenged as it was during the cold war" (NY Times, Oct 26, 2002), we're either going to have to have an excellent relationship with Europe and learn to "share", or we may be in for a very serious fight.
"Almost every part of the Bush doctrine can be defended except that assertion," said Kurt Campbell, a Pentagon official in the Clinton administration who is now senior vice president of the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. "It not only says that we're Hertz," he said, "but that we're going to discourage strong market competition from Avis."
To much of the world, he argues, "the doctrine says: we know best." He continued, "At some point, even if you are democratic and wildly successful, we are going to discourage your growth."
I have to admit, I would not want to see the US be taken over by another country. While I may not like everything we do, and agree with even less of it, I do still realize that this is one of, if not the, best places to live in the world, an I enjoy the benefits of that. But I also don't think it is necessarily our place to keep everyone else "small".
If the European Union does grow to be significantly larger than we are, they, by rights, should be able to have the kind of an army that can defend themselves, should it be necessary. Yes, that might mean that they could be a potential threat to us, but I believe that its a threat that could be neutralized by maintaining positive relations with them, not by trying to restrict their 'homeland security' options.
Right now, the European Union is working on putting together the documents that will help form and shape what that will become. There is some talk of structuring it similar to how the US is, with the different nations being the counterpart for our states. It seems to me that during this time, while they're trying to figure out who and what they will become, rathering than issuing doctrines indicating that we will challenge anyone who dares to be as strong as we are, we should work with them to help ensure that whatever form they eventually take will be something we can work with, and not have to fight against.
When the Spam Hits the Blogs. The latest trick of bulk e-mail marketers is to hit the referral logs of popular weblogs, and the bloggers are hopping mad. By Michelle Delio. [Wired News]
Joy of all joys, spammers are now trying to use referral logs and automatically updated link-back listings as ways of spreading their own trash. So far, I haven't had any such problems on any of my blog sites (but then again, I don't have that much of a readership yet), and I very much hope that I won't. Unfortuantely, aside from not using the referral log or auto link-backs, I'm not sure what can be done.
It bothers me, though, that spammers can piggyback on the sites and materials we've created in order to try and reach an audience. It reminds me, in some ways, of the "Surf +" an "smart links" concepts, where browsers or browser add-ins could create additional links on any page being viewed that would link to other sites, generally commercial sites that had bought the right to be linked to a certain word. In that case, the Surf +/smartlinks proprietors were "piggybacking" on an individual's website, using it for adverstising, yet providing no compensation to the person who had designed and/or maintains the site. I wouldn't be very happy if someone came around and painted a billboard sign on my house - especially if they thought they didn't need to pay for it - and I feel no different about my website.
Whether it's filling a referral log/auto link-back with commercial links or adding links to words that have been sold to the highest bidder, the marketer and the advertisor are profiting off of my (or any other webmaster's) own work. We either need to be provided compensation for the traffic they receive as a result of our work (and have the option to opt-out entirely if we don't WANT our websites used for commercial purposes) or they need to find new tactics.
In Trail of Red Flags, an Ex-Friend's Warning to the Authorities Stands Out. A former friend of John Allen Muhammad said on Sunday that she drove him to a backyard gunsmith last fall to have a semiautomatic rifle made shorter and silent. By Charlie Leduffand Dean E. Murphy. [New York Times: National]
Between all of the missed clues before 9/11 and the missed clues we're learning about now regarding the sniper, I'm beginning to think that maybe the TIPS program that John Ashcroft wants so badly isn't such a threat after all.
According to the New York Times, there are now at least three separate occasions on which the federal authorities were warned about John Allen Muhammad and concerns that he may be planning something dangerous. As one FBI spokesperson commented, they do get a lot of tips all the time. When you get three tips, however, on the same person, it might it not be prudent to check them out?
Two of the calls were made post-9/11, one from the operator of a homeless shelter who was concerned that Muhammad might have ties to a terrorist group, and one from a former friend who provided details to the FBI about modifications he wanted made to a gun. Also during this time, which was roughly December of last year, Muhammad was involved in a domestic disturbance at the homeless shelter involving Malvo and Malvo's mother. Malvo and his mother were turned over to the INS, and a hearing was set up for Malvo that was scheduled to take place in November of this year.
Sadly, it seems that too often after a major crime, it turns out that law enforcement had been warned - generally more than once or even twice - that the eventual perpetrator is someone who should be looked at as a possible source of concern. Given how often it seems that a truly dangerous person slips through the cracks, and given that the reason usually given is that they receive so many tips, I have to wonder if the problem is that they're too incompetent to tell the difference between the ones they should be worrying about and the ones they apparently are worrying about - or maybe if they actually are preventing a lot more crimes than we know about by following up on the tips that they do.
The bad thing is, I'm not sure which of those possiblities is more frightening
And now, this breaking news report on something
By HOWARD TROXLER, Times Columnist
© St. Petersburg Times
published October 23, 2002
[...] ANCHOR: And now here's a roundup of other news. There's war with Iraq, the midterm elections for control of Congress, a reeling economy, forgotten corporate scandals and the World Series. Okay, that covers that. Now back to our round-the-clock coverage. Wait a minute . . . we're hearing now that there might be a new fact in the case. [...]
Howard Troxler may say that he's not trying to be funny at a time like this, but good satire can make you laugh while pricking you with some very sharp points, and this commentary succeeds at both quite well.
I chose to excerpt the above paragraph because it just rings far too true. The whole piece is lie that, this was just my favourite bit.
Sniper Suspect Obtained a Rifle Despite a Restraining Order and Gun Laws. Under federal law, John Allen Muhammad was barred from buying or possessing a firearm because his second wife had taken out a domestic-violence restraining order against him in March 2000. By Fox Butterfield. [New York Times: National]
As with most things, my views on gun control tend to lean towards the left. I think that Americans should have the right to keep and bear arms, but that the government has the right to maintain records of who has what in order to help track down criminals - for example, the suggestion of maintaining ballistic fingerprints of guns. Yes, they can be altered, and no, they won't be foolproof, but they could help with solving crimes much faster than they're solved now - and, as in the case of the sniper, might help prevent some deaths or other crimes. I don't see that it's such a significant intrusion on the right to own guns that it should be discarded out of hand.
Implementing better gun control measures, however, doesn't mean that we have to create a whole raft of new laws. I'd be happy with making sure all current laws are properly and fully enforced as a starting point and see what is needed from there.
Muhammad was initially arrested on illegal gun posession charges related to a gun he had actually sold back in 2000. See, in March of 2000, Muhammad's second ex-wife had taken out a domestic violence-related restraining order against him. The restraining order not only precluded him from making contact with his ex-wife, it also meant he was not allowed to own or possess any firearms. In May of 2000, he sold a Bushmaster rifle. It was his posession of that rifle between March and May of 2000 that was the basis for the firearms charge against him. Frighteningly, it took until May of 2002 - over 2 years after the order was issued - for it to be listed in the main FBI database. During that time, had anyone done a background check outside the state of Washington to see if it was ok to sell Muhammad a gun, they would have not have been notified of the restriction placed on him because of the restraining order.
What's worse, the gun he used to kill his 10 victims and would 3 others, was shipped from the Bushmaster factory in June of 2002. It is not known yet where or how he came to be the owner, but in all liklihood, he either slipped through the cracks (which there are far to many of to begin with), obtained the gun by giving false information for use in the bakground check or he purchased it at a gunshow where no background checks are required.
What it all boils down to, though, is that he should not have been able to obtain a gun, and yet he did. This is a serious problem.
As the above-cited article notes, both the gunshow loophole and the 2+ year delay in getting information entered into the FBI's database could be resolved, but political opponants are blocking them.
As for why it took so long to enter the restraining order into the F.B.I. computer, law enforcement officials said it was not unusual for the process to take months or longer.
A Justice Department study last January estimated that there were two million restraining orders around the nation, but that only 590,000 had been entered in the system.
A bill that would give the states $375 million a year for the next three years to catch up on the backlog passed the House of Representatives but has been stalled in the Senate by opposition from Republicans.
In recent years bills to close the so-called gun show loophole, in which a background check is not required when a gun is bought at a gun show, have faced strong opposition from the National Rifle Association. None have passed.
If it turns out that the gun was bought at a gunshow, maybe it will finally be enough to give Congress the balls to stand up to the NRA and close that loophole. There's no excuse for it, and if it is costing us lives (which I believe it is) there's no justification for continuing it. And hopefully Congress will also realize that a 2-year backlog on getting information entered into a database to help ensure that the wrong people don't get guns is also unjustifiable, and need to be corrected as soon as possible.
In just a few days we have an election where all members of the House of Representatives and 1/3 of the Senate will be chosen by their constituants. Perhpas this should be an issue to take into consideration when casting your vote. The problem isn't limited to the DC area - it could happen anywhere - and something like it is almost guaranteed to happen again if the loophole isn't closed and the database isn't brought - and kept - current.
WashPost: Almost everything sniper pundits told media was wrong. So much for the so-called experts. Paul Farhi and Linton Weeks write: "The important question is, was the orgy of speculation harmless -- or was there a very dangerous undercurrent to it? By saturating the public's consciousness with phantom images of thirtyish white men, did the media profilers distract attention from a more general and possibly open-minded search for the perpetrators?" A CNN senior veep says: "We have no regrets. . . . I think we were very responsible." (Washington Post)
- Kurtz: Unreleased info aired on TV news helped crack case (WashPost)
- CNN confirms it considered using "C.S.I." actors as pundits (NYT/r.r.)
- No TV pundit got even the broadest outlines of the story right (Newsday)
- Rosenberg praises CNN reporter Arena for saying, "I don't know" (LAT/r.r.)
- Rosenstiel: Washington media were "responsible, restrained" (WashTimes)
- Powers: Bare-bones wire stories epitomize new world of news (NatJournal)
- Journalism prof says media were aiding, abetting sniper (MSNBC.com)
Several excellent articles on the abundence - and incorrectness - of much of the profiling done on TV during the sniper chase. From Jim Romenesko's MediaNews
First Worm with a EULA?. ErikRed1488 writes "There is a new virtual postcard from Friend Greetings, owned by Permissioned Media that prompts you to install their software to view the ... [Slashdot]
Now this is a clever trick. Since most people don't read the end-user license agreement (EULA) for software that they install, people who get this software will most likely install it without realizing that they're giving permission to Permissioned Media to send out mails to people in their Outlook address book and install whatever other software they may want to in the future.
Technically, this isn't a worm or a virus - it's advertising software designed to monitor user behaviour and deliver targeted ads using the information gathered while monitoring. According to the Permissioned Media site, the software is bundeled with several different programs, including .mp3 players, screen savers, shopping programs and others.
Two years ago in Missouri, the former Democrat Governor, Mel Carnahan, was killed in a plane crash shortly before the 2000 elections. Since they were unable to get a new official candidate on the ticket in time, Carnahan's widow, Jean, agreed to accept the Governor's appointment to the Senate to serve her husband's term should he win the election. Which he did - beating John Ashcroft (and I've never ceased wondering why on Earth Bush would want to appoint a man to his cabinet who not only could not win as an incumbent in a state that often leans Repubican, but couldn't even beat a dead man).
Even though I'm a Kansan, I live close to the Kansas/Missouri borderline, and much of the news coverage here is focused on the Missouri side of that line. I recall it being a difficult time - not just for people close to the Carnahans, but also for the citizens of Missouri in general. Mel Carnahan was a very well-liked man and his death was a shock to a great many people.
Today, we learn, that Senator Paul Wellstone, Democrat in Minnesota, has been killed in a plane crash, shortly before the 2002 elections. Even more tragic, it sounds as though his wife and possibly children, were killed as well.
Wellstone has been a big target of the Republicans this year, largely because he has a reputation as one of the most liberal Senators currently in office. While I know that this year's race has been tight and that - given the slim margin of control in the Senate - each race is cruical to each party, I hope that we won't be hearing of any tasteless jokes or expressions of relief that Wellstone is now "out of the way". While it may sound somewhat outrageous that I would express any concern about that at all, what's worse is that I'd feel the need to express the same concern, even if has been a popular Republican that had died. I have that little faith in the humanity of all our politicians.
I do want to extend my condolences to any who knew and loved Senator Wellstone and his family. No loss is ever an easy one. I also wish to extend them to the citizens of Minnesota. Having seen how a death like this - right before an election - can cause a great dea of confusion. I hope that you will all be granted the comfort you need, and deserve, by Whatever or Whomever you hold sacred.
Bare bellies provoke a wobbly. Last week a group of angry young women stormed the offices of The Newcastle Herald to protest against columnist Jeff Corbett and his opinion of female midriff fashions, "belly blubber" and "horribly deep navels"... "At an age when girls should be striving to be pleasing to the eye, the male eye, these young women were going to serious lengths to expose an acre of wobbling excess. Haven't they looked in the mirror?"... Then he described exposed bellies as a form of terrorism." [Daily Rotten]
Ok, I'm a fat woman, so when I read an article like this, I tend to take more offense than others might. But more than anything else, the assertion Corbett makes that there should ever be a time when girls should strive to be pleasing to the male eye, bothers me.
It's true that for most "love" relationships there needs to be some physical attraction - but that need should pass fairly quickly, as the physical body is one of the most changable aspects of a person, making it very unstable to build a relationship upon.
Unfortunately, there are so many sources of pressure on women - especially young women - to conform to a certain body-type that we've seen a grave increase in eating disorders. Anorexia is becoming almost commonplace as young girls stive to be pleasing to the male eye, as is bulimia. There are even "support" groups now for people who think they have the right to choose to be anorexic if they so wish. I know many, many times I prayed and wished that I could be anorexic because I was so desparate to lose the weight I had gained - not so much so that I could be attractive, but so that people could quit being cruel to me. Had I been a weaker person - and there are many times I've wished for that as well - I can easily see that I would have killed myself long before now.
Many will say that being fat is a choice - and that all one needs to do is eat less and exercise more to lose it. Speaking from personal experience, however, I can tell you it's not that simple. There are many reasons why a person will gain or carry extra weight. But you know what? The whys of it shouldn't matter. A fat person is still a person, with all the intelligence, emotions, spirit and such as any other. I someone is not attracted to fat people sexually, that is, of course, their progative. What I disagree with is with the constant message being presented by society, the media and peers that it is some kind of moral failing or social wrong to be fat.
An Angry Telephone Call Provided One Crucial Clue. The first real break in the sniper case came last Thursday in an angry phone call from a man claiming responsibility for a murder-robbery in Montgomery, Ala. By Eric Lichtblau and Don Van Natta Jr.. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
Today has been filled with good new about the sniper case, and everyone is spending a lot of time patting themselves and each other on the back. But just wait, in a couple of days the criticism will start - did the police do all they could? Did the media say or do enough or too much? Should some clues have been recognized as important long before they were?
The story of how the pieces fell together is interesting, if a bit convoluted. The first piece of the solution came about on October 8th when a policeman in Baltimore noticed a man sleeping in his car - a blue Chevy Caprice - and made note of the car and its license plate. At the time, no one recognized the car as being significant. I suspect this will be the point over which there will be the most fingerpointing - people saying that he should have realized at that point what he had, thus ending the killings nearly 2 weeks before he was actually caught. Unless there is other information I'm not aware of, however, I don't see that the office can be faulted. There had, early on, been one report - one - of a dark Chevy Caprice being seen at one of the crime scened, but by the 8th, the focus for a possible vehicle had shifted to a white van or white box truck. Add to that the conventional wisdom (and stated by profilers) that the suspect would be a white make in his 20's or 30's, and I think it's understandable why a cop might not have been overly suspicious of a black man in his 40's in a dark Caprice.
The next "break" in the case came once the police and the sniper began their odd communication. Apparently, the sniper called the police but the operator initially thought he was a crank caller. He told her to check "Montgomery" if they wanted to verify that he was who he said he was, but since much of the killing had taken place in Montgomery County, MD, they cops didn't initially realize what the caller was referring to. And interesting detail that the article provides is how the cops finally became aware of what it was the caller was referring to: Apparently feeling that the police weren't taking him terribly seriously, he placed calls to two priests to see if he could get them to give a message to the police. In an interesting bit of irony, the police contacted one of those churches the day after they received the call as they thought the killer might be a parishoner (though I've yet to find out why that is). In the process of discussing that possibility, the Monsingior told the police of the call he had received, which specified that the police should be checking in Montgomery, Alabama.
Once they called law enforcement officials in Alabama, they learned of a shooting that had taken place there in late September, and that there had been an unidentified fingerprint found at the scene. The local police in Alabama did not have access to the federal fingerprint files, and so they weren't able to make a match, but the federal officers working on the sniper case did, and traced the fingerprint to to the 17-year-old suspect. That is what led them to search the home in Tacoma.
As they gathered more information about the sniper, one of the things that cropped up was the description and license number of the car from back on October 8th. Once the police scanners and news media began broadcasting that number it was essentially just a matter of time. At 3am, a trucker pulled into a rest stop, noticed the car, realized the license number was a match and called the police.
While I still think the media has spent far too much time on this story and too much time in not only useless, but - as we can now see, misleading - speculation, I do have to give them props for having gotten that license plate number out. That made it possible for the trucker to realize that he had found the car and facilitated the arrest of the suspects.
I have to wonder, though, if we hadn't been hearing so much about the "standard" profile of a serial killer, or speculation on what the killer might be like, if people would have been more open to a wider range of possible suspects that could have ended the killings sooner. I think one big quesation that will need to be answered is how the "white van/truck" became so much a focus of the investigation. I suspect that because white vans and trucks are rather popular, and becuase the media had made several mentions of a white van or truck that witnesses were somewhat primed to see a white van, so if, in the confusion after the shooting, a white van happened to be in the area (which isn't that unlikely an occurrance), people would remember it.
Hopefully, this will be the end of the matter, and there are no other people out there who were part of the killings. And hopefully, as the post-mortem is done on how the investigation - and, just as importantly, the coverage of the investigation - was handled, both law enforcement and the media will learn the kinds of lessons that can help catch the next person who goes on a killing spree even faster.
Gunmen hold Moscow theater crowd
Audience held hostage after mid-performance raid
BREAKING NEWS
Moscow, Oct. 23 — Up to 30 armed men seized a Moscow theater in the middle of a performance on Wednesday, firing shots into the air and taking the audience hostage, the Federal Security Service said.
From the scant information that has been received so far, the kidnappers seem to be speaking in a Chechnian language, and have allowed children and Muslims leave. Other captives have been allowed to use their phones.
This is a story I'd like very much to learn more about, but CNN, MSNBC and FOX NEWS are, of course, still covering the sniper story. This actually manages to create an intersection of 2 of my recent complaints - that American's are far too self-centered and care little about what happens outside our borders, and the obsessive coverage of the sniper story.
Why is something like this given such a low priority just beause it happens away from our shores? 1,000 people under threat and being help hostage should, one would think, be a major story, regardless of where the incident is taking place.
For Bush, Facts Are Malleable
Presidential Tradition Of Embroidering Key Assertions Continues
By Dana Milbank
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 22, 2002; Page A01
President Bush, speaking to the nation this month about the need to challenge Saddam Hussein, warned that Iraq has a growing fleet of unmanned aircraft that could be used "for missions targeting the United States."
Last month, asked if there were new and conclusive evidence of Hussein's nuclear weapons capabilities, Bush cited a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency saying the Iraqis were "six months away from developing a weapon." And last week, the president said objections by a labor union to having customs officials wear radiation detectors has the potential to delay the policy "for a long period of time."
All three assertions were powerful arguments for the actions Bush sought. And all three statements were dubious, if not wrong. Further information revealed that the aircraft lack the range to reach the United States; there was no such report by the IAEA; and the customs dispute over the detectors was resolved long ago.
While we are getting the 24-7 treatment of the sniper story, news such as that above is getting pushed off of the front page and out of the headline summaries. Yet the news above is what will have a greater impact on far more Americans than the DC sniper ever will.
As far as I've been able to determine - and it is always possible that I've missed a few things along the way - not one of Bush's excuses for attacking Iraq, with the possible exception that this is the guy who tried to kill his Dad, has stood up to scruitny. In addition to the claims and refutations listed above, Bush claims he's concerned about their weapons of mass desctruction - which have yet to be proved to exist - yet has not indicated what, or even IF, he has any plans for dealing with North Korea's nukes.
The article also lists several items from Bush's October 7th speech in support of the idea of a war with Iraq and provides counter-arguments to each, and looks at some other statemens he's made during his presidency and the problems with them as well.
There's no doubt that the deaths of 10 individuals in the Washingtion DC area is horrific and tragic, or that the families of all those assaulted have bee changed forever. What concerns me, though, is that because of the wall-to-wall coverage of the sniper case, we're not hearing about these distortions. If we do get involved in a shooting war, there will be a lot more than 10 people killed.
New York Bill on Gay Rights Is Set for Vote. The Republican-led New York State Senate will vote for the first time on landmark gay-rights legislation in December after having blocked its passage for decades. By James C. Mckinley Jr.. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
New York Governor George Pataki, who is facing a serious challenge in his re-election bid from the Independence Party candidate, Thomas Galisano, has been promising for years that he would sign gay-rights legislation, but the Republican-led Senate has consistantly refused to bring it to a vote. Over the last 18 months, he's told gay-rights activists that he would coerce the Republican leadership to bring it to a vote, and now seems to have finally gotten his way. Expectations are high that once the Senate has a chance to vote on the bill, it will pass and be signed into law.
While this is obviously a political ploy on the part of Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno to help his party have a better chance at keeping the Governorship of New York, the important outcome will be if gays and lesbians have their rights legally secured throughout the state.
In an odd bit of irony, the Houston Chronical is reporting today about the efforts a Texas Republican is taking to derail the election hopes of a fellow Republican who is running for Justice of the Peace. The article notes:
[Republicans Urged Not to Vote Straight] GOP political activist Dave Wilson has a message for fellow Republicans -- If you vote straight, you vote gay.
Wilson is sending Republican voters an automated telephone message telling them not to vote a straight Republican ticket because it includes a gay candidate. [Houston Chronicle Home Page]
Yeah, you read that right. Wilson is calling Republicans in one of the Houston Judicial districts to urge Republician voters to vote against Alex Wathen because he's gay. And he's doing this even though the party leaders would rather that he not - because having Republicans vote a straight Republican ticket helps all of their candidates. Instructing them not to vote straight Republican, they fear, could weaken other candidates as well.
As Harris County GOP Chairman Jared Woodfill said:
"Why would Dave do this?" Woodfill said. "I mean, I agree with him on the homosexual issue, and the party position on that is clear."
"But it is wrong for Republicans to send the message not to vote straight ticket," he said. "The straight ticket helps all of our judicial races in Harris County."
Why would Dave do this? Perhaps it has something to do with the official Texas Republican Party platform for 2002, which goes beyong taking a political stance against gay rights and instead goes straight for a carefully worded moral stance that comes close to being against gays, themselves.
The platform says that:
homosexual "behavior is contrary to the fundamental, unchanging truths that have been ordained by God, recognized by our country's founders and shared by a majority of Texans."
Oh, is that all?
It's sad that in one state, gays are not only being politically maligned, but have apparently offended one of the major political parties to the point that they felt it was necessary to insert a plank condemning homosexual behaviour because it is contrary to the truth of God; and in another state gays are finally having a chance to have their rights enshrined in law, but only because the Governor's re-election bid looks like it might be in danger.
I can only hope that one day the Texas Republicans will figure out that it really doesn't matter what that think God has ordained or forbidden, God has no place in the making of political policy or the passage of laws; and that one day gays will no longer have to hope for a tight election race in order to finally have assurance of their rights.
[Ed.Note: Don't worry, I'll find a new topic soon - this is just one of those things that really frosts my cookies]
Media May Have Unwittingly Foreshadowed Sniper's Moves
By Dru Sefton
c.2002 Newhouse News
The Washington-area sniper may be taking cues from media coverage as to what his next move will be, experts say.
The evidence is mounting:
- Last Friday a former FBI profiler said on CNN, "I could see, he could keep going on down to Ashland, possibly all the way to Richmond ..." The next day, the sniper struck in Ashland, Va.
- On Oct. 15, The Washington Post ran a story headlined "Weekend Lulls in Shootings Could Offer Clue on Lifestyle," because each shooting had been on a weekday. The next victim was shot the following Saturday.
- On Oct. 4, 5 and 6, several criminal profilers were quoted on television and in print about how the sniper was "playing God" or "has a God complex." On Oct. 7 the sniper left a tarot card reading, in part, "I am God."
- On Oct. 3, a Montgomery County official appeared on several national networks, assuring nervous parents. "We feel children will be safe inside schools with us," he said on CNN. On Oct. 7, the sniper shot a student at a Bowie, Md., school.
Given the previous speculation about how much of an impact the media speculation is having on the sniper and his choices, I found this entire article quite interesting. In addition to the above examples, the article talks about how the on-air "profiling" by former FBI agents and former cops could actually lead the suspect to change how he acts in order to avoid conforming to the profile, and how it can also confuse the public. One concern is that if people hear too much about these armchair profiles (armchair because they don't have access to all the info), they might inadvertantly overlook a possible suspect if he doesn't fit what they think they're supposed to be looking for.
I know I've commented on this subject a few times already, but I find it quite disheartening that the media - print and TV - can comment on how the killer seems to be taking cues from the coverage, and yet they don't change how they're covering the case. If their ethics don't dictate that should exercise more care, common sense should.
This is one of those times I wish Jack McCoy and the other heroes of "Law & Order" were real. I have no doubt that if he were to see this kind of a pattern emerging - compete with the media recognizing that what they have to say may be helping this guy pick his targets and his timing - and go after the network editors for criminal charges based on their reckless disregard for human life. The sticking point, of course, would be proving that he wouldn't have killed someone else even if the media wasn't reporting on it, so the case might not go very far, but just getting the charges filed might be sufficient to get a better national debate on where the news media should impose limits on themselves.
I don't mind them reporting the facts - that's their job. Its the wild speculation that gives me concern. Under these circumstances, not only does it make no sense, it is, in my opinion, unethical. They're job is to report what has happened, not create news themselves - and I honestly think that in this case, even if they don't intend to, that is one of the side effects of what they are doing.
N. Korea Issue Irks Congress (washingtonpost.com). The White House withheld North Korea's admission about a nuclear weapons program from key Democrats until after Congress had passed its resolution authorizing war with Iraq, prompting complaints on Capitol Hill that the administration has let politics influence its conduct of foreign affairs. [Daypop Top News Stories]
[...] Democrats on Capitol Hill were critical yesterday of the 12-day gap between the admission by North Korea and the administration's disclosure. During that time, Congress passed the Iraq resolution, and President Bush signed it hours before the 7 p.m. disclosure about North Korea. Administration officials said they revealed the information because former Clinton administration officials had leaked the news after learning about it from State Department contacts. Democrats said the episode could further impair the administration's already fragile relations with Congress. [...]
I find it quite ironic that the Bush administration is so willing to try and invade the privacy of American citizens when they are so insistent on keeping as many secrets as possible themselves. Granted, those two philosophies - the government can keep secrets but the citizenry can't - that I shouldn't be surprised, but sometimes the depths to which this administration will go to hide information really does astound me.
I cannot imagie that the knowledge of North Korea's secret nuclear weapons program would not have had an impact on how members of Congress voted in regards to authorizing President Bush to be able to go to war with Iraq. Obviously, neither could the Bush administration, since they felt it was best to withhold this information from Congress and the public for 12 days after they first were made aware of it.
This, more than anything else I've seen, give lie to Bush's claims that he wants to go to war against Iraq because of concerns over weapons of mass destruction. There is no unquestionable evidence I am aware of that would prove Iraq has such weapons. North Korea, on the other hand, has admitted that they are working on it, and it's just possible they have working weapons already. Are we preparing to go to war with them? No. Even though they were a part of Bush's Axis of Evil, and even though we have their own admission that they are working on weapons of mass distruction, we are not threatening them with military repercussions if they do not stop. We aren't working to get a global coalition against them if they do not stop. We are not demanding any kind of UN inspections or anything else.
In fact, it appears that the only thing we've done with the information is prevent anyone from hearing about it for 12 days, so Bush could get his war authorization for Iraq. Even then, it was only revealed because they were afraid someone else would reveal it first.
Bush has shown this penchent for secrecy on many occasions. He has changed the rules on the release of Presidential papers to that the public - which has a right to this material - is kept from it for an even longer period of time. He has decided to store his own gubernatorial papers at his father's Presidential library, where it can be much harder to gain access to them, rather than give them to one of the state libraries as his predecessors have done. He has supported Dick Cheney in his quest to keep anyone from knowing who he met with to help determine what the energy policy of the country should be (and who was influcing that decision). He has tried to prevent investigations into the 9/11 tragedies. Time and time again, he has shown that given a choice, he believes the public doesn't have a right to know anything. And now he's hiding things from Congress as well, so that they won't interfere with is plans.
I hope that Congress will realize that this is not a man who can be trusted with disclosing the whole truth, and that they should be wary if he's pushing hard for something and they're not entirely clear on why. I also hope that America in general will recognize that someone this obsessed with secrecy is not the kind of leader a nation built on the idea of "by the people and for the people" needs.
US sniper widens range with first weekend shooting. World latest: Man on life support after being shot in the stomach in the 12th suspected attack by the sniper of the suburbs. [Guardian Unlimited]
[...] The attack comes at a time when the public is in near despair at the failure of police to hunt down the killer. By local crime standards the nine deaths attributed to the sniper do not constitute an epidemic. Since he set off on his deadly rampage there have been 18 other murders in Washington DC and surrounding areas - or "traditional homicides" as the police now call them.
None was given even a fraction of the attention paid to the sniper. None of the killers was hunted by thousands-strong taskforces. None of the victims received anything near the outpourings of sympathy for those killed and wounded by the serial killer. None of the killings provoked wider panic. [...]
You know, it's not just other countries' pain we in America are sometimes oblivious to, its also the pain felt by some of our own. It's just sad that the first time I read about it this time, its in a British newspaper.
The media has a very difficult job, there's no doubt about that, because they not only have a certain perceived obligation to help ensure that citizens are informed of the issues and happenings in this country and around the world, but they also have an obligation to make money - and usually servicing the public good and making a profit seem to be in conflict.
Unfortunately, making a profit often seems to lead to a very myopic view of the world or the country. One story, or a certain kind of story, takes precedence over all other, until something hotter or more sensational comes along. Eighteen months ago or so it was shark attacks. The fact that there were actually fewer shark attacks for that time of the year was irrelevent. Each network seemed to be under the presumption that every other network was covering it, so they needed to cover it, too.
Then, of course, was September 11. And yes, that was a huge story - a legitimately huge story - but one that was nearly the only story on American newscasts for several months. During that time, several other stories went under-reported - the beginnings of the Enron collapse and other buisiness scandals, the debate over whether or not the members of Dick Cheney's Energy Task Force should be named or not, and the passage of the USA Patriot Act.
The beginning of this summer was the Season of the Missing Children. That one, at least, provoked a bit of discussion about the fairness of coverage, as some missing children seemed to receive much greater coverage than others, and many of the ones who got the most coverage were from wealthy, white neighborhoods. The pain of having their child go missing couldn't have been any less for the poorer, non-white families, but the coverage certainly was.
Now, of course, its the sniper's turn. There are serious debates to be had about whether or not we should go to war against Iraq, what, if anything, we should do regarding the nukes in North Korea, the further erosion of our rights in the name of safety, and, I'm sure, many other things, but all the media can focus on is a mysterious sniper who is randomly killing people in and around Washington DC.
As the Guardian pointed out (in the quote above), these 9 murders/12 shootings, have gotten wall-to-wall coverage on every news network and all of the news magazines and shows. The fact that 18 other people have lost their lives in a less sensational manner has, until now, gone unreported. Are their deaths any less tragic? Were their lives any less worthy? No, but because of the way the news industry works, some deaths are deemed more important than others.
The only solution, of course, is for the consumer to begin demanding more - and to do that, we have to vote with our remotes. As a news junkie and unabashed MSNBC addict (though I do gather information from more sources than just them), I know how difficult that can be. When something "big" happens, my TV seems to automatically set itself to 56 (where MSNBC is located on my cable service) and I can be glued for hours.
This, of course, means that I am part of the problem. But as this whole sniper story has been going forward, and I've been seeing more of how the killer responds to the news broadcasts, I'm also finding myself much less interested in watching news about it, simply becuase I don't want to be one who is encouraging them to keep filling their hours with as much speculation as possible. The fact that I'm not one of the people who's viewing habits aren't being monitered tends to make my own small protest less effective, but maybe if I can let others know about it, some of those who ARE being measured will have made a similar decision for themselves.
In the meantime, I think America needs to get its cultural eyes tested. We do seem to be more than a bit nearsighted.
Early Irish Vote Is 'Yes' to EU. In a dramatic aboutface, Irish voters gave the go-ahead to a vast expansion of the European Union expansion, endorsing a plan to push the union to the borders of Russia, first returns from a crucial referendum indicated Sunday. [AP World News]
Irrelevent humorous comment first: When I first heard about the treaty being voted upon, it was phrased as "The Nice Treaty". I have to be honest, the city in France was not the first thing that came to mind, and I actually found myself wondering if they'd hired a PR firm to give it a name that would sound non-threatening. What could be better than a "Nice" Treaty?(pronounded with a long 'i')
That said, I'm glad to hear that it appears likely that the Irish will pass the treaty and that the EU will be able to expand. Some Americans may think this unpatriotic of me, but I think it will be good for America to have a stronger, larger and more closely bound Europe to deal with. The way that we're going these days, we need more friends who are willing to stand up to us and tell us when we're going that extra bit too far.
Living in a country that has had a reasonably stable government for over 200 years, its sometimes hard to comprehend the upheaval that the eastern European countries have undergone since the end of Communist rule there. For the citizens of those countries, however, being able to align themselves with the other European nations must offer a certain amount of comfort and, more importantly, hope.
My personal hope is that the US will be able to maintain a good relationship with the EU, even as it expands, and that it will become a true partner - someone we can stand with, grow with, and work with, and one that will have the willingness to help us when the cause is just and the strength to caution us, when it is not.
Man Arrested for Misleading Account in Sniper Case
By THE NEW YORK TIMES
A man who claimed to be a witness to the most recent killing in the series of sniping attacks in suburban areas around Washington was arrested today after doubts were raised about his account.
The man, Matthew Dowdy, 37, of Falls Church, Va., was taken into custody this afternoon by the police in Fairfax County, Va. He was charged with making "a materially and intentionally false statement or representation to a law enforcement officer who is in the course of conducting an investigation of a crime by another."
[ed note: this entry has been substantially edited from what I originally posted. On re-reading it, my thoughts seemed to be a bit more jumbled than I like. The basic concept and points, hwoever, are the same]
Too often, people fail to grasp the consequences of their actions. A couple days ago, I wrote about how the media was noticing some disturbing patterns in the snipers behaviour that make it appear that he is not only paying attention to what is being said about him, but is responding (see "Speculation -> Action").
Now we have a man who decided - for whatever reason - to give the police false information, claiming to have witnessed the latest shooting. Whether he was hoping to gain attention (from either the police or the media) by being a "witness" or to have a shot at the $500,000 reward (if any of his information proved to be a lucky guess, apparently), or for some other unfathomable reason, the very real effect of his actions could have been disasterous. As it is, the police have already wasted time trying to follow up his information through investigations, and inaccurate or misleading information has been released to the public. Even though the public has now been told that the information this man provided was a lie, with as much attention as this story (as a whole) gets, its going to be difficult for people to remember what was based on this alleged witnesses stories and what is legitimate.
Given the killers apparenty tendency to want to demonstrate to the police that they're on the wrong track, this man's lies could have led to another death. On previous occasions, when the police or media have commented on patterns that have been observed, or mentioned that the police may be speaking to a possible suspect, the sniper has taken lethal action to demonstrate that they're not talking to him, or to change the patterns that had been reported.
Fortunately, this hasn't been the case in this particular situation, and there have been no further killings since Monday night. I sincerely hope, however, that the quick identification of this man as being a false witness and his subsequent arrest (even if only on misdemeanor charges) will give others who might contemplate gaining their few minutes of fame or a shot at the witness lottery more than a few second thoughts. And I also hope that they will remember that this isn't some kind of a game.
US press ignores Australia's pain
October 15 2002
The British press has dubbed the Bali bombings Australia's own September 11.
But in the US, Australia is hardly rating a mention. [...]
[...] The online paper refers to two Americans killed and three injured in the blast.
As for the rest: "Most of the dead are foreigners," the article stated. [...]
Sadly, I can't say that I'm surprised about this, but it really seems part for the course for America. Far too often, we (and I include myself in this) fail to recognize that things we hear about in distant places actually affect real people.
The night of the bombings in Bali, a friend of mine from Australia had mentioned how concerned she was because Bali was such a popular place for Australians to go. Somehow, though, the comment pretty much went over my head. It wasn't until I read the article cited above that I even realized how many of the dead were from Australia.
Most of the news that I've read or heard in relation to the Bali bombings has done much as the newspaper cited in the article did - mentioned how many Americans were killed and injured, and referred to the rest only as "foreigners".
This is one of the things that sometimes makes me feel ashamed about being an American - how completly self-centered we can be. It's rare that world news gets covered without having to find some tangental connection to America or Americans, and the more tenuous that link is, the less time the story is given play and the less importance is place upon it. But, if America wants to be a true world leader, then we need to start caring about what happens around the world, even if there's no "American" angle to the story.
In one of the strangest murder cases in recent memory, Ira Einhorn has been found guilty of the first degree murder of Holly Maddux.
The course of this case has taken over 25 years, from Holly's disapperance, the discovery of her body in a steamer trunk in Einhorn's closet, Einhorn's flight to Ireland and, eventually, France, a trial in absentia in which Einhorn was found guilty, the French refusing to turn Einhorn over to authorities in Pennsylvania until they passed a specific law granting him a new trial, to, finally, his conviction today.
ACLU Acts Against Patriot Act. The American Civil Liberties Union has had enough of some aspects of the Bush administration's Patriot Act, and it's launching a visible, nationwide campaign against it. By Julia Scheeres. [Wired News]
Much has been made of the perceived loss of freedom since the September 11th attacks, but this Wired article provides information on three specific cases, which stand to illustrate that the loss of freedom is more than just perceived.
In response to incidents like the above, the ACLU has introduced a new campaign: Keep America Safe and Free . Sadly, it appears that such a program is needed, given the general paranoia that America, as a whole, has been feeling, and our government's attempts at encouraging it.
Safety and freedom do not have to be mutually exclusive. What we need is to find an appropriate balance between the two. Yes, this means we have to make some compromises, possibly allowing some restrictions to a few of our freedoms; but it also mean we have to be willing to take risks. For us to be able to minimize the restrictions on freedom, there has to be some trust in the system, and some people will violate that trust. But life has never been totally without risk, nor do I believe it is intended to be. There are many ways in which to reduce risks without destroying freedom - but before we can get the government to work on developing and adopting those kind of measures, we, as a people, have to make it clear that we're NOT willing to trade away our most precious freedoms.
By MAUREEN DOWD
WASHINGTON — This has always been a place where people say the opposite of what they mean. But last week, the capital soared to ominous new Orwellian heights. [...]
There are many things about the current direction of the country that have made reality feel like it's be thrown a bit topsy-turvey lately, and Dowd does a wonderful job of pointing out some of the obvious contradictions, conflits, ironies and paradoxes that currently plague the statements, thoughts and actions of the national leadership.
Its yet another thing that makes me so uncomfortable about this whole war on Iraq. The reasons we are given frequently don't make sense, or are contradicted by information available elsewhere. One of the best examples of this is that Bush has consistantly claimed that the war is justified because Saddam is a threat to launch an attack against the US at "anytime", yet a report memo from CIA director George Tenet says that Saddam is unlikely to launch an attack, unless he feels that we are going to attack him. If that's the case, then, the worst thing we could do would be to make Saddam think that we were any kind of a threat to attack him - which is exactly what Bush has spent most of the last few months doing. After a while, it all begs the question, is there any length that he would consider to far? Or will he say or do whatever he thinks he has to in order to justify a war with Iraq?
On MSNBC's Nachman show today, they were discussing responsiblity and the media, especially in regards to the sniper case.
They've been observing an interesting, and frightening, phenomenom with this killer - he makes it clear that he's watching the news being broadcast about him. When the news media announced that they were looking into geographical profiing of the killings, the next murder happened quite a distance away. When they mentioned that most of the killings had happened during the day, the next murder was at night. Both times that they have mentioned that the police were possibly looking at or talking to a specific suspect, a killing happened that day - as if to say "you're looking in the wrong place guys".
Now that this pattern has been identified, the news media has before it a challenge - one they need to think about carefully. If the killer is - as he appears to be - responding to the stories being broadcast, what kind of responsiblity do the news media have when it comes to releasing information he might react to? The next time the police are focusing on a possible suspect, does the media give that information to the public and run the risk that the killer will decide to strike again to prove that the police are still on the wrong trail, or will they hold back and possibly spare someone's life in the process? And if someone IS killed under those circumstances, how much - if any - responsiblity should the news media bear for releasing a statement they could reasonably foresee that he would react to the same way he has before?
These are not only difficult moral questions, but given the litigious nature of our society, they could also be important legal questions. It is my hope that the media will err on the side of caution. I would much rather have less news about this case, if it means that he might go for another day without a killing.
Right now, the media is filling up much of its airtime and many of its column inches with news about the Sniper. There are, however, other important stories that need as much, if not more, attention. With the elections coming up, covering the state of the US economy and other domestic issues would be a valuable service to help voters with deciding who they want to vote for. The upcoming war with Iraq, the possiblity of new terrorists acts (such as the ship that blew up in Yemen, or the bombing of the nightclub in Bali), the situation in Northern Ireland and other such stories are things that could be of interest to many people.
I know that, for the 24-hour news channels, one concern they have is what to do about the fact that people tune in at different times during the hour and want the latest news as soon as possible. I would suggest that they do an update with the latest on the "hot story" every 15 minutes. Usually it can be reported on in under 2 minutes, then move on to the other news of the day. Cut out the talking heads and various specialists who's only purpose at this point is to speculate. They aren't going to have access to any more information than the general public (at least not in most cases), so the speculations they make may not be taking some crucial, but unreleased, information into account.
The media needs to realize that, yes, we want as much news as we can get - but that in addition to their responsibility to provide us with solid, complete and accurate coverage, they also DO have a responsibility to the community at large to avoid providing information that could endanger the investigation or the lives of innocent people.
DC Sniper May Halt Colin & Kiefer Flick
Upcoming Hollywood thriller Phone Booth is set to be delayed because of the plot's similarity with the current sniper attacks in and around Washington D.C. Eight people have been killed by a sniper this month, leading local citizens of the nation's capital and the neighboring Maryland and Virginia states living in fear while police try to track down the assailant. And now executives at 20Th Century Fox are deciding the fate of Phone Booth, which stars Minority Report star Colin Farrell as a man stuck in a phone booth at the mercy of crazed sniper, 24 actor Kiefer Sutherland. Director Joel Schumacher is keen to avoid a delay and he says comparisons between the flick and the real-life events are "different cases" and he hadn't even thought about negative parallels. Joel says, "I mean, there are many serial killers that haven't been caught. Should they not release Red Dragon?" Phone Booth has already taken a long time to finally be made. The movie has been in development for some time and at various points Jim Carrey and Will Smith were set to star, but dropped out.
posted by XQUZYPHYR at October 14 7:38 AM. Politics are allowed in politics, but there are limits, and there is a pale, and Metafilter has managed to deceive those limits, and sensationalize beyond that pale. What makes this quote funny? It's automatically generated by this site, which can add your name or website to any accusation of liberal bias you'd ever want. This will save so many people so much time. [MetaFilter]
I had to give the site a try -- it just sounded like too much fun. Here is the article it generated about me:
Kriselda Jarnsaxa: hollow, absurd and execrable
by R. Robot
Instead of constructing arguments based on logic, the naysayers assume that whatever they want to be true must be. "If Saddam could attack us at any minute, what was Bush doing on vacation for a month?" says Kriselda Jarnsaxa.
One day, the Iraqi tyrant's rule will be at an end. On that day, we want to be able to look these people in the eye and tell them that we cared about them, too. Isn't it clear by now that the world is menaced by a execrable villain who has already bullied his neighbors?
When will Kriselda Jarnsaxa come clean about the way she criticizes George Bush?
"What kind of a skeeza is Condoleeza?" says Kriselda Jarnsaxa. I suppose she'd rather invite Bin Laden over and make love. One day, Mullah Omar's rule will be at an end. On that day, we want to be able to look these people in the eye and tell them that we cared about them, too.
Last week Kriselda Jarnsaxa went so far as to leave the mainstream completely and enter a kind of hysterical alternate universe of hollow viciousness.
What's scary is that some of this sounds not too far off from the kind of insults a particular list-mate slings on a regular basis, but that's a different matter. The thing that caught my eye the most was the quote in the first paragraph that was "attributed" to me: "If Saddam could attack us at any minute, what was Bush doing on vacation for a month?"
It's actually almost not a bad question. Sure, a bit of a hyperbole, but at the same time, if Iraq truly is such a threat, then why did Bush and the Congress have time to go away for a month? Shouldn't they have been spending that time looking, perhaps, for evidence, or trying to work out a diplomatic solution? Or did they need to have that month-long break to help ensure that the war-mongering was best timed to help the Republicans out in the November elections?
-=<*>=-
Just as a side note, the "Liberal Bias Detector" is available to be installed on other websites, so, in the interest of a good laugh now and again, I've added it to different strings. Be sure to take a moment to find out just how much of a liberal YOU are. :)
Time to Take On America’s Haters
Will anyone stand up to America’s fundamentalists?
NEWSWEEK
One of the most troubling realities of the Muslim world today is the cowardice of moderates. Mainstream Muslim leaders—political and religious—do not condemn religious extremism often enough and vigorously enough. As a result, fundamentalists gain courage and their poisonous views go unchallenged.
Unfortunately, the same phenomenon appears to be at work now with America’s own homegrown fundamentalists. Last week Jerry Falwell announced on CBS’s “60 Minutes” that Muhammad was “a terrorist.” His comments are part of a trend. At various points Pat Roberston has called Muhammad “a robber and a brigand” and described Islam as “a monumental scam.” Billy Graham’s son Franklin has chimed in as well, frequently calling Islam “a very evil and wicked religion.”
It's been all over the news for the last few days that the protests in India sparked by Falwell's comments have lead to at least 9 deaths so far. Muslims, outraged over Falwell's comments, which have been taken by many Muslims as being representative of how the US as a whole feels, staged a strike in protest. Hindus in the area confronted the protesters, and the protest became violent. Of the nine who have died thus far, some have been killed by police gunfire as they try to bring the riots to an end, and others were stabbed or beaten with stones. The latest reports I am aware of indicate that the rioting is still underway, and officials have reimposed a curfew in hopes of bringing the unrest to an end.
And what is Falwell's response to this? In a statement released through the PR Newswire, he said:
LYNCHBURG, Va., Oct. 12 /PRNewswire/ -- I sincerely apologize that certain statements of mine made during an interview for the September 30 edition of CBS's "60 Minutes" were hurtful to the feelings of many Muslims. I intended no disrespect to any sincere, law abiding Muslim.
In my more than 50 years of Christian ministry, I have never preached a sermon on Islam. I have never written a book or booklet on the subject. I have always shown respect for other religions, faiths and denominations. Unfortunately, I answered one controversial and loaded question at the conclusion of an hour-long CBS interview which I should not have answered. That was a mistake and I apologize.
He's sorry that his statements were "hurtful to the feelings" of Muslims. Note that he does not say that his statement was wrong, only that he's sorry if it was hurtful. Apparently, he still considers Mohammad to be a terrorist, but regrets this his having said so is upsetting to some.
As for the rest of his his "statement of reconciliation" (the headline it was published under), he notes that he was asked a "controversial and loaded" question at the end of an "hour-long" interview, and that he shouldn't have answered it. If the problem is that he shouldn't have answered it, but lacked the judgement to do so, why is it necessary to point out that the question was controversial and loaded or that it came at the end of a long interview? If he was truly accepting responsilbity for his comments, he could simply have said it was a question he shouldn't have answered. By making a point of describing it in such negative terms and pointing out that it was asked at a time when he might be expected to be tired, he appears to be trying to shift the focus for the fall out away from himself.
Here's the problem I have with that. How many time has Jerry Falwell said something, and then later had to retract, apologize, restate, explain or otherwise backpedal from what he was saying? Its probably one of the things he's most famous for, because it's usually how he gets his name in the papers. Given how long his career has been and how many time he's been in hot water for statements that have been upsetting, hurtful or, in this case, lethal, there is absolutely no excuse for him to keep making the same mistakes over and over.
Either Falwell is too much of an idiot to learn from his mistakes, or he knows exactly what he's doing, and most likely does it intentionally. Obviously, I tend to think its the second of the two. He says things that he know will be offensive, that he knows will be hurtful, and that he knows will be controversial with the expectation that there will be a flap over the comments and that he'll not only get another shot of publicity, but his views will be more widely circulated that they otherwise might have been. Then, after a day or two, he comes up with a non-apology apology - a statement intended to sound like he's being contrite without saying he's wrong or accepting any blame.
The thing that sickens me the most, however, is that he can release a statement like this, well after reports of the nine who died in the protests have been published, and not so much as even mention that his words did more than hurt anyone's feelings. I'm sorry, but being stabbed, shot or bludgeoned to death is more than "hurt feelings", yet he won't even acknowledge that, were it not for his statement, the riots that killed those people would not have occured.
Another area of concern was also addressed by the Newsweek article:
While there have been scattered condemnations from editorials here and there, there has been silence from the White House and most mainstream political and religious leaders. Commentators who froth at the mouth when they read of one crackpot mullah in Egypt saying noxious things about Christians or Jews are now silent. Forget about Islamic moderates for a moment; where are America’s moderates?
It's a good question.
Reports have indicated that Muslims in the Arab world are pointing to Falwell's statement, saying it shows that America really does hate Islam and the Islamic world. Right now, especially with the war in Iraq looming on the horizon, we need to maintain the best relations we can with the Islamic countries in the Middle East. The more that the US is perceived as hostile to Islam as a faith, the more likely Islamic countries are to band together against us. And with President Bush so far silent on these comments - as he has been silent on most other occasions when one of our vaunted religious leaders has spoken against Islam or characterised it as a religion of violence - or outright evil - he appears to be tacitly agreeing with them. This is not a good diplomatic strategy to be persuing.
In the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, Bush went out of his way to reach out to Muslims in America and offer them reassurance that we know what the terrorists did is not a true reflection of the Islamic faith. Since then, however, as the rhetoric from the Religious Right has become hotter and more anti-Islamic, Bush has become quieter. One might even think that he was afraid of offending religoius conservatives with an election just over the horizon. I suppose eventually he'll have to decide which would be the worst result: The Islamic world unified against us, believing that we hate them, or running the risk of losing Republican control of Congress and/or possibly losing his re-election bid in 2004? That may well tell us whether he's more committed to his own career or the well-being of the United States.
The Institute for Public Accuracy has Fisked Bush's speech the other night about why we need to attack Iraq. The comments are from a varitey of sources and include links to the original source material. Interesting reading...
'White community should help pay off debt’
Web Posted - Thu Oct 10 2002
THE sponsoring organisation for the recently concluded racism conference will be turning to the local white community to pay off its $200 000 debt. [...]
[...] “We have employed staff of CARB, but have not been able to pay them. We have contracted some people to do work for us, but we have not been able to pay them and we have to find that money to honour our contract and to make sure that no one is left wanting based on their giving up their time...for some of them, their jobs have been at risk to support us,” he said yesterday. [...]
[...] “The white-owned businesses in Barbados need the support of black people. They depend on us for their businesses and I’m saying this conference (was) to help the black people of Barbados out of their ignorance and poverty and if white people don’t see it fit to contribute towards that, then I will be asking black people to look very carefully at how they spend their money with white people... [...]
Last week, over at Bitchqueen (where I write about human stupidities in all their wonder), I wrote an article about an anti-racism conference were all non-black attendees were kicked out, because the organizers felt that it was too traumatic to discuss issues of slavery in front of them. I found the idea of a racist anti-racism conference to be absurd. This latest news, however, pushes it beyond even those bounds.
One theme you will probably see me visit more than a few times is that racism is racism, no matter what the colour of the person commiting it is. Society seems to have a great deal more tolerance for all-black or all-hispanic groups (or any other minority, for that matter, including women, minority religionists and more), but it's considered racist if whites or, worse, white men, want to have a group of their own. As far as I'm concerned, if they're not being supported by or benefiting from public tax dollars - if they're a truly privately organized and funded group - then go for it! Have your exclusive group! If you want someone else (who isn't a memeber or a customer) to pay for it, though - and especially if you want the goverment to pay for part of it - then you'd better be willling to welcome everyone.
This conference that was held in Barbados was organize and run by a group and focused solely on the concerns of blacks in regards to what kind of reparations should be made to compensate for their ancestors having been enslaved. The organizers admit that they hired or contracted with people, and that some of them apparently took time away from their jobs to work on the conference; but now they're not getting paid because the conference doesn't have enough money to honour it's obligations. Rather than calling upon their members, however, or attendees to help raise funds to help cover these costs (which, maybe, they should have budgeted for before they hired people, but that's a somewhat different matter), they're now saying that they believe the white community should help pay for it.
Remember, these are the same people who felt it was too traumatic to have non-blacks participate in their conference. It's not traumatic, however, to expect them to pay for it. There's just something fundamentally wrong with that mentality. Yes, it's true, whites have not always treated blacks well, but at some point, if minorities truly want to be equal with the majority, then they need to start accepting some responsiblity for themselves.
I'm not saying that they're the only ones to blame for the problems that exist - by far, they are not. But in this situation, I have a hard time seeing where their inability to pay is, in any way, caused by their being victims of racism. They knew what they had to work with and they knew what they were going to need to spend. No one came in and made them spend more money than they had available, and I'm not aware of any accusations that they were overcharged or otherwise pushed or tricked into paying more for things because it was a black conference. They simply spent more than they had to work with. By saying that they expect the white community to help cover their costs because the whites "owe" it to them, they are effectively shirking their own responsiblity and attempting to coast by on the coattails of victimhood in a situation where is simply not warranted (unless there are other factors I'm unaware of).
This is where the issue of taking responsiblity comes in. In situations where a problem exists and it is clearly related to issues of subtle or blatant racism, I don't have a problem with expecting those who are practicing the racism to help resolve the issue. That is basic fairness. Expecting non-minorities to step in and take care of situations where racism was not a factor in creating the problem, however, is wrong-headed and does little but impede progress. Whites see that kind of behaviour and begin to wonder when it stops being "their" fault, or if the minorities are simply planning to maintain an air of perpetual victimhood in order to obtain ongoing benefits from the sympathy that generates. After a while it stops sounding like a legitimate grievance and more like an opportunity to take advantage of.
And just to be clear, let me reiterate - there are legitimate issues in regards to racism and there are situations currently that do have their roots in slavery and for which it may be reasonble to expect some assistance from the majority - but those situations have to be clearly identified and handled on a situation-by-situation basis. All minorities deserve - and have the right to expect - equal opportunities. No one, however, has the right to expect that they can just whip out their victim card and have everything handed to them, whether its related to the wrong that has been done to them or not.
Sopranos march into New York row. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg says he will not march in the Columbus Day parade because organisers have refused to let him bring actors from the hit television show "The Sopranos".
[Yahoo! News: Oddly Enough Reuters UK]
The first thing to understand is that Mayor Bloomberg did not ask the performers to march with him because they are on "The Sopranos". Dominic Chianese was invited because of his participation in the post-9/11 public service announcements that were produced to help encourage people to keep coming to New York City as tourists (since tourism is an important part of New York City's economy). Lorraine Bracco was invited in recognition of her work as a spokeswoman for environmental issues.
Unfortunately, the Columbus Citizens Foundation, and Italian-American group which has run the Columbus Day Parade for over half-a-century, is offended by the portrayal of Italian-Americans on the show, and refuses to allow Bracco and Chianese to participate. Personally, I think that's a bit on the silly side, but apparently it's their parade, so they can be silly if they want to.
Mayor Bloomberg responded to the CCF's decision by saying:
"I'm sorry if anybody is annoyed but if my friends can't march, or people that I think have done things for the city, then I'll find some other way to celebrate the Italian heritage."
Personally, I think that's a bit on the silly side, too. As Mayor, he has many ways of honouring whomever he so chooses. If he wants to thank Bracco and Chianese for their work on behalf of the city, I'm sure he can find another way. He doesn't need to push the CCF to accept his guests in their parade. They may be being a bit silly in choosing to be offended by the roles they play as opposed to wanting to recognize the contributions they have made, but the Mayor is being just as silly in basically saying he's going to take his ball and go home.
Congress backs Bush war powers. Both houses of the US Congress give President Bush authority to use force against Iraq - if he believes diplomatic efforts have failed. [BBC News | Front Page]
IF he believed diplomatic efforts have failed? I don't suppose there's any chance he won't come to that conclusion, is there?
I'm not the least bit surprised by this turn of events, but I am disturbed by it - coming as it does the day after the director of the CIA released a letter stating that they do not believe it is likely that Iraq would initiate an attack against us, unless they believe that it is inevitable that we will be attacking them.
I remember the night the first Gulf War began. I was driving home from work when the DJ came on with the news that we had launched air strikes at Baghdad. Nothing had felt more terrifying in my life. I was too young to have any real recollection of the Vietnam War, and the few scuffles we'd had during my life time - Panama and Granada - seemed to be more of a non-event than anything that made me feel at all at risk.
Shooting at Iraq, however, was a different story - and when he began firing back at at Israel, not only was I scared, but I was confused. I didn't understand the whole Middle East situation at all back then (not to say that I'm any kind of an expert now), so why he'd shoot at someone who wasn't shooting at him just made it that much more frightening. By the time I got home from work, I was in tears. I turned on the TV - I'd left it on MTV which is what I'd been watching before I left - and the first thing I saw was the "star-studded" version of John Lennon's "Give Peace a Chance". I wasn't able to sleep at all that night
This time around, I doubt I'll be as freaked out. I'm a decade older, I've been through one "war" (if you can call it that when you, yourself, are never in any danger.... for the soldiers in the Gulf area, it was a War, for me it was a patriotic TV show), an I'm less paranoid than I had been. But I AM still uneasy. I don't really understand why it's so important to attack Saddam now - the report that was cited as proof he was near to being able to make nuclear weapons has been declared non-existant by the entity cited as having published it; the CIA doesn't think he's a first-strike threat; there are a large number of governments who commit abuses against their populations, but we're not planning to attack all of them; and he's not currently being aggressive towards any of his neighbors. That pretty much leaves oil and that "this is the man who tried to kill my Dad".
A friend of mine is in the Air Force reserve. He mainly flies fuel tankers, but he could, conceivably, be sent to Iraq at some point. I don't know that I think money and a personal vendetta is sufficient cause to risk his life - much less the lives of all of the thousands of other soldiers who will have to go "over there" to protect the oil company interests and help satisfy Bush's blood lust.
For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
October 5, 2002
Remarks by the President at John Sununu for Senate Reception
Expo Center of New Hampshire
Manchester, New Hampshire
12:15 P.M. EDT
[...] I was proud the other day when both Republicans and Democrats stood with me in the Rose Garden to announce their support for a clear statement of purpose: you disarm, or we will. We owe it to our children to think about this issue, we owe it to the future. My belief is, is that the enemy hit us, and out of the evil can come some incredible good. And one of the good that can come is peace. [...]
Yes, I know... he's an easy target, our President, but this is one promise I bet Saddam wishes Bush would keep.
My husband participates in a message board for men with long hair. From time to time, one certain topic comes up that just about drives him nuts: Civil Rights protections for men with long hair and/or beards.
I can understand why it irritates him. As you may have noticed, I tend to be in favour of Civil Rights in general, and with protections to prevent discrimination against things like sexual orientation or religion. There are limits, however, as to what I think should be protected.
There are any number of reasons a person can be subjected to discrimination. Some of these are factors totally out of their control, such as what country they were born or raised in, what race they are, what gender they are and physical or mental deficincies (in the vast majority of cases). Others may have an aspect of control, but are still an intrinsic part of who the person is and are things that cannot be readily changed, such as religion, size or sexual orientation. A large number, however, are things that are entirely voluntary and can be changed at will. This last group includes things like length of hair, decision to wear facial hair, piercings, tatoos, modes of dress/style/fashion sense, whether or not to smoke, drug and alcohol use and other such choices. The first two groups I can see extending certain protections to, to help ensure that they have equal opportunities, though I do believe that trying to ensure equal outcomes is both nearly impossible and rather foolish.
Part of the problem I have with groups like the one proposed on the Men's Long-Haired board is that they tend to dilute the effectiveness of those groups fighing for civil rights based on factors that actually have some substance to them. Sure, how long you wear your hair is an expression of who you are, and it may even make you look better, but if you have to cut your hair for a job, it's not going to change who you fundamentally are the way having to change your religion might.
One argument I've heard that I find especially specious is that because how you wear your hair can be considered a form of expression, then under the First Amendment, no one can take away your right to wear it that way. This, as far as I'm concerned, is bull. First off (and this is a point far too many people seem to be oblivious of), the guarantee of Free Speech doesn't literaly mean you can say whatever you want, whenever you want, however you want or wherever you want. It means that the <b>government</b> cannot place restrictions on your abiity to express yourself. It does not, however, mean that property owners, employers and other non-governmental entities do not have the right to estabish what they consider appropriate in terms of self-expression in areas or situations under their control.
It's what I sometimes call "the living room theory". When you're in my living room, I have the right to set the rules for my house. If I don't want you to smoke, I can tell you not to smoke; if I don't want you swearing while in my home, and I can ask you to stop and tell you to leave if you don't. When I'm in your home, you have the same right to place restrictions on me.
This same theory applies to businesses. They have fair amount of leeway in determining what kind of behaviour or (controllable) appearance they want in their employees. Whenever you interact with someone, you are representing the company, and how the company is represented affects the ability of the business to succeed or can bring about its failure. Even in areas where employees have no contact with customers, though, they company still has the right to establish rules for what they consider appropriate. Its just like the rights they have as to what you can use their equipment for (by forbidding personal phone calls or using company computers for non-company-related work, etc.), and to monitor your activity.
I know that many men are frustrated becuase they can't find jobs that will let them keep their long hair or beards. People who must wear their hair or beards a certain way for religious reasons are generally exempt from rules forbidding them, but for people who wear their hair long as a choice or a fashion statement, such exemptions aren't necessary. Imagine for a moment that the issue, instead of being men wearing long hair, was a group of people who, as a means of expressing themselves (or to make a fashion statement) decided to do away with bathing all together. How many people would feel it appropriate to give them special consideration, to reqiure companies to hire them, even though they smell horrible, and could easily change the situation if they wanted? While long hair may not be offensive in the same way, the issue is still quite similar. Both involve people making a personal choice for the purpose of self-expression, and both involve behaviour that some may consider inappropriate for their company (or other entity).
It just really bothers me when people with this kind of a frivolous issue try to focus the Civil Rights spotlight on themseles, eating away at the credibility of groups who genuinely need the Civil Rights protections.
Wiccan takes on board's prayer policy
BY MEREDITH FISCHER
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER
Oct 09, 2002
Fellow witches are rallying around Bon Air Wiccan Priestess Cyndi Simpson and her quest to lead an invocation at Chesterfield County's Board of Supervisors meeting.
Simpson, a member of the Reclaiming Tradition of Wicca, was recently rejected by the county when she asked to be added to its list of religious leaders who perform such prayers.
This has prompted witches, other religious leaders and civil-rights activists to speak out, saying Chesterfield is violating their right to religious freedom. [...]
In the letter, Micas said the county's invocations are "traditionally made to a divinity that is consistent with the Judeo-Christian tradition." [...]
As a Pagan, stories like this tend to catch my attention. Personally, I think that offering any kind of prayer at the start of a council meeting or other governmental session is inappropriate, because the government is supposed to maintain a neutral position towards religion in general, which goes beyond not picking or establishing an "official" religion, but also includes the idea that the government are not supposed to sho a preference for being religious over being non-religious.
If, however, councils and other governmental bodies are going to insist on having a prayer to open their sessions, then they need to be open to representatives of any religion represented in their community, including ones they don't follow, understand or necessarily approve of. As the quote above shows, however, they fail to understand even the basic concept that, as a governmental body, they cannot endorse one faith or family of faiths over another. To only allow prayers to a divinity that is consistent with the Judeo-Christian traditions is very much establishing an officially approved-of religion.
Another very interesting article by St. Parker at .u.n.f.o.l.d.e.d. .r.e.q.u.i.e.m., this one looking at issues related to George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush, Iraq, Oil and weapons. Very well documented.
CIA Boss Downplays Notion Iraq Poses Imminent Threat
Wednesday, October 9, 2002
WASHINGTON -- Contradicting assertions by the Bush administration that Saddam Hussein poses an imminent threat, the director of the CIA told lawmakers Tuesday that Iraq "for now appears to be drawing a line short of conducting terrorist attacks with conventional or chemical or biological weapons against the United States."
But CIA Director George Tenet said that if Saddam comes to believe that he cannot prevent a U.S.-led attack on Iraq, "he probably would become much less constrained in adopting terrorist actions. Such terrorism might involve conventional means, as with Iraq's unsuccessful attempt at a terrorist offensive in 1991, or chemical and biological weapons."
I have to wonder if this isn't the point. Bush has been rattling his saber for quite a long time, now, moving closer and closer to an invasion. He's even said that he things war "may" be inevitable. It makes perfect sense to think that if Saddam Hussein became convinced that we're going to attack him no matter what, he might try to make a pre-emptive strike against our own pre-emptive strike.
If he did, of course, that would simply prove Bush's dire predictions right, wouldn't it? At that point, there'd be no question about our going in and attacking Saddam - of trying to take him out and replace him with someone we like better. The justificaion for war would be handed to Bush in a nice little gift-wrapped package.
I hope this isn't the game he's playing, but with the rhetoric getting hotter and hotter, it sometimes feels like his whole point at this time is to provoke Saddam into making some kind move so that he can give the whole world a bit "I told you so" and march in with the full backing of the international community. If that's the case, then our only hope is that Saddam is smarter and more patient than Bush, and will hold off on taking any action against us, regardless of Bush's rhetoric. I'm not sure I feel confident relying on that...
Signs of Intelligence: Web Broadcasting Royalty Deal Reached. Web broadcasters are no longer doomed... [Morons Dot Org]
-=<*>=-
Sun Oct 6, 7:10 PM ET
By Brooks Boliek
WASHINGTON (The Hollywood Reporter) --- Negotiators for the record companies and webcasters reached a deal Sunday on a royalty payment scheme for music streamed over the Internet that carves out a lower rate for small webcasters, sources close to the negotiations said. [...]
While details of the deal were sketchy Sunday, it appears that the record companies made several concessions that would allow webcasters that aren't part of the big broadcast and Internet conglomerates to pay a significantly lower rate, the sources said.
Back on September 23rd, I had posted about the Internet Radio Fairness Act, legislation that was proposed to help ensure that the smaller Internet Radio stations would be able to continue broadcasting by establishing royalty rates that would be more inline with what traditional radio stations pay, as opposed to the rates proposed by the Copyright Royalty Arbitration Panel which were several times higher, and would have driven most of the Internet stations out of business.
Today a settlement has been reached that will allow smaller stations to pay lower rates, based on a percentage of their income, as opposed to a rate based on a per-song per-listener basis. It's good to see that common sense won out for a change. While this agreement is only slated to last for 2 years, hopefully it will set a standard that is workable and can be extended or built upon for the future.
Decatur OKs sexual orientation protection
Advocate: Issue could surface in Peoria
October 8, 2002
By JAN DENNIS
of the Associated Press
DECATUR - After more than two hours of emotional debate, the City Council approved an ordinance Monday night that prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation.
With the vote, Decatur joined a growing list of Illinois cities that have adopted a gay rights ordinance. [...]
I'm glad to see more and more cities adopting ordinances to protect people from being discriminated against because of their sexual orientation, but I've always had a hard time understanding why it should even be an issue.
This country has, as part of it's foundational concept, the idea that the government cannot establish any kind of "official" religion. What does that have to do with not discriminating against gays? Well, in the vast majority of cases, the reason a person or group of people are opposed to homosexuality is because their religion teaches that it is wrong. There are very few non-religious reasons - as least very few that I'm aware of - for opposing homosexuality.
Laws like the "Defense of Marriage Act" are passed because marriage is "intended" to be the union of a male and a female. Intended by whom? Most will tell you by God. If that's the case, then the DoMA is a law intended to enforce a religious view of marriage - legislating a religious belief and imposing it on the entire nation. They're not supposed to be able to do that. Most objections to homosexuality in general are along the lines of it being "offensive", "immoral", "in defiance of nature" or other such concept - all of which go back, again, to the religious view of how love and sexuality should work.
Protecting the rights of gays and lesbians do not provide them with special rights. It just ensures that they will be treated like every other person, which is appropriate since that's exactly what they are -- another person. As such, they should be entitle to hold any job for which they are the most qualified person and rent or purchase any home or apartment that they can afford.
One thing we seem to overlook at times is that religious discrimination works in two directions. You can be discriminated against because of what you believe, or you can be discriminated against because of what the person you are dealing with believes. Neither is right and neither should be condoned in the public arena or in publicly-accessible places.
No one has to like or be friends with someone that they have a problem with because they don't fit in with that person's religious beliefs, but they shouldn't be allowed to deny them things that they would otherwise be able to obtain, either. Jobs, housing, access, benefits... all of those things should be determined solely on relevent merits -- qualities and abilities that directly relate to the ability to do the job, afford or maintain the housing, obtaining the access or earn the benefits in question.
The Raven posts about a call he got recently that appears to have been part of a potential scam.
Another excellent reminder of why it is important never to give out personal or financial information unless you're positively sure of whom you are speaking with....
What are they thinking in Washington DC these days?
Or is putting "thinking" and "Washington" in the same sentence an oxymoron?
Granted, I try not to watch the propaganda they laughingly call news these days; but from what I gather, emperor G.W. Bush is planing to have the U.S. jump feet first into a no-way-we-can-win war in Iraq. It even sounds like he is willing to go to war with, or without the approval of Congress. [...]
While it has become common to see comparisons between President Bush's current actions and attitudes, St. Parker at .u.n.f.o.l.d.e.d. .r.e.q.u.i.e.m. has written a very interesting editorial looking at some of the commonaities between our current approach to Iraq and the course of the Vietnam war. I strongly recomment taking a few moments to check it out...
Footing The Bill For Gifted Kids
Oct. 7, 2002
[...] Of course, sending a kid to college costs money, even if the kid is only 11 years old. But since the state requires children to attend school, parents of gifted children say the state should pick up the college bill.
Levi and his mother took their case to California State legislators. Many lawmakers were convinced that kids who outgrow grade school deserve help. [...]
I can easily sympathize with the plight of families who have young, highly-intelligent children. These children do not fit into the normal school system socially or intellectually, and have genuine special educational needs. And there's no denying that college tuition is expensive - and for many of these extra-gifted children, college is the only place they can find the challenges their minds need.
I'm not sure, however, that it's appropriate for the state to pick up all of the tuition costs that are involved in sending them, especially since the cost of a college education varies greatly on which college you decide to attend. I have no problem with the idea of the state contributing to the cost of educating these children, and agree that there probably is some liability given that children of those ages are required to attend school, and since the state would be footing the cost of the child's education in the public school system.
There are, however, a couple options that I think might be good compromises - providing parents assistance with the costs associated with a student in college (especially since, in most cases, parents have 18 or so years to save up for college tuition, while parents who have a child prodigy don't have nearly as long - through no fault of their own, unless you could the way their genes combined), without putting the state on the hook for full tuition for some of the more prestigious, more expensive and privately run schools. One option would be to grant parents an allowance equal to the amount the school would pay for a student's public school education that can be used at any college they choose. Another option might be to allow gifted students to attend state colleges at no cost, and give an allotment equal to 4-years in-state tuition for parents who want to send their students to private universities.
One thing to keep in mind is that in most cases, the student is leaving the public school system entirely, and, frequently, for more than four years. That could lead to another option - the state could calculate how much they would spend on the child for however much time there is between their current age and when they would be legally able to leave school if they chose. For example, in a state where a school is required to go to school until they are 16, if a child enters college at age 11, there would be 5 years during which the state would be paying for the child's public school education. Assuming that it costs $4,000 a year for a public school education (and that's a figure I just pulled out of the air, in all honesty, I have no idea what that figure would be), there would be $20,000 for those 5 years. That money could then be alloted over the 4 years of college the student would be attending, and the parents could us it as they see fit. Since the money would be parsed out over the 4 years of college, if the amount the state pays for public school students changes, then the allotment could be modified accordingly.
I'm sure there would be other options that could also help the parents, without costing the state significantly more than they'd be paying for any other child, and still allow the student the opportunity to choose an appropriate school for their education.
Wichita to revisit brutal slayings as testimony begins
By Valerie Richardson
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
[...] The case also has added its chapter to the culture wars by fueling a backlash against hate-crimes laws and feeding resentment against the national media for avoiding coverage of the case because, many in Wichita say, of political correctness.
The Carr brothers are black, and each of the five victims was white. At the time of their arrest, Sedgwick County District Attorney Nola Foulston refused to charge them with hate crimes, explaining that the main motive was robbery, and that Kansas did not have a hate-crimes law.
This case illustrates one of the problems I have with hate crimes legislation - the fact that its application sometimes appears to be somewhat arbitrary. It's fairly easy to claim that a white-on-minority or straight-on-gay crime is a hate crime, but it seems to be tricker to claim that minority-on-white or gay-on-straight, since it is often consider inappropriate to suggest that minorities might feel hatred towards the majority they view as their oppressors - or, at the very least, to imply that they are not justified in doing so if they do.
The bigger problem I have, though, is that the primary concept of a hate-crime is that a person should be punished because of what they thought or felt about whatever group they felt their victim represented.
Hate crimes are not inherently more vicious or brutal than other crimes (though this particular case is an exceptionally brutal crime), nor are they even necessarily distinguishable from other crimes. In some cases, the perpetrator may leave some kind of sign that the crime was committed out of hatred for some group or minority, or may make comments that give away their state of mind, but whatever the case, it is what's in their mind that the hate crimes laws addresses.
It's not uncommon to hear civil libritarians to caution that someday we may be prosecuted for what are called "thought crimes", yet these are often the same people who demand prosecution for hateful thoughts under hate crimes legislations. Granted, you cannot yet be prosecuted for simply thinking hateful things, but you can have your sentence increased based on your thoughts, and I'm not so sure that's a road we want to start walking down.
One other issue I have is this:
Her decision touched off an outcry in Wichita and on the Internet among hate-crimes law opponents, conservatives and others. The online publication FrontPage, founded by author David Horowitz, said the Wichita case illustrated a national double standard.
"The indifference of government, media and civil-rights leaders to crimes such as those alleged to have been committed by the Carr brothers send a clear message across America that some lives matter and some lives don't," the magazine said shortly after the murders. [...]
In a sense, this is the message hate crimes legislation itself sends. By saying that someone should be more harshly punished because they killed a minority out of hatred sends a message that the life of that minority is more important than the life of a non-minority person, even if that person had been killed in the same manner. I think its fair to say that every crime against a person has more than a bit of hate to it to begin with - is it really necessary to create special punishments based on what kind of hate that is?
A couple months ago, a friend of mine, Lisa Keele, moved to Egypt as her husband was beginning a new job there. Since she's been there, she's had an opportunity to see how the United States - and our government - look to people in a Middle Eastern country. Recently, inspired by the Armed Forces Day celebrations, she wrote about her observations of how America is viewed in Egypt. I found it very interesting and asked if I could republish her comments here:
Yesterday, the 6th of October, was a holiday here, Armed Forces Day. Which means, practically speaking, there was a three day weekend, which most folks took advantage of by getting the heck out of dodge, or at least out of Cairo (this despite the fact that the weather absolutely lovely).
Politically speaking, however, it meant the celebration of the anniversary of kicking Israel's butt. (Except the 1973 victory wasn't *that* decisive. However, Egypt did win back the Sinai peninsula, which it had lost in the 1968 war with Israel).
Which, of course, leads me to all manner of political thoughts. Don't know if you've noticed, but I've more or less been staying away from political topics in my LJ, even though they've been primary in my thoughts most days. Though god knows, I do my best to try to avoid politics when and where possible.
So, politics.
First, the obvious, the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.
It is horrific. As I always thought reading about it from the other side of the ocean. And of course, many of the papers are slanted towards Palestine, folks here have great sympathies for the suffering of the Palestinians under Sharon's brutal rule.
Yes, brutal. I have mixed feelings for the history of the area, it's so damned complicated. But it is hard to have mixed feelings about the last two years, about how the west bank & gaza strip have been treated since 2000. It's horrific.
And the worst part is, the country I come from, the United States, appears to all to be supporting this terrifying regime. Sharon uses the US war on terror as an excuse to continue his brutal tactics (despite the fact that he began *his* war on palestinians a full year before 9/11...), US still supplies funds to Israel, the US hasn't come out openly condemning Sharon, despite the many UN resolutions Israel is currently in violation of...
And I want to know why. Why we don't declare our condemnation of these practices, why we don't stop funding Israel until they stop the occupation. There are probably many reasons, many answers to my questions, that make sense, but we should be hearing more about them. US silence on the issue of Palestine, given our previous support of Israel, looks like we're fully behind these practices, whether we are or not. And it seems pretty clear that Arab disgust with this appearance of approval was at least one factor behind 9/11. Do we really support Israeli tactics?? If not, we should say so. If we do, we should explain ourselves to the world.
OK, there's one. Second. Iraq.
My first reaction to hearing the full story behind our current tensions with Iraq was "Why didn't we do something about the weapons inspectors earlier?" And, I fully see the need to check Iraqi weapons especially now of all times. But I have to say, Iraqi is playing the political game here beautifully, and Bush is playing it badly. He comes off to the world as a war-monger, as someone who doesn't care about the UN, about consensus, about weapons inspectors, about anything but war, pushing war, encouraging war, a blind determination to depose Hussein no matter what the cost. Yes, I know from reading US papers that it's more complicated than that -- but he's fumbling the political ball on this one, and it looks bad.
And, personally, I hope I hope I hope we don't go to war with Iraq right now. As a pacifist, I do not support war in general, but the tensions between America and the mid-east are bad enough right now. At the very least, we need to get more world support before we go stomping around the world with our very heavy boots. And for goodness sakes, we need to try to make friends with the Arab world, instead of pissing them off at every turn!
OK, that's enough politics for today. You may all return to your regularly scheduled programs. See you on the next political holiday.
Law Bars a National System for Tracing Bullets and Shells
By FOX BUTTERFIELD
The technology exists to create a national ballistic fingerprint system that would enable law enforcement officials to trace bullets recovered from shootings, like those fired by the Washington-area sniper, to a suspect.
Such a system would have been of great use in the Washington case, in which six people were shot to death, because so far bullet fragments are virtually the only evidence. [...]
Gun control advocates and some law enforcement authorities like Mr. Vince have long advocated taking the next step, requiring gun manufacturers to keep an electronic record of the markings from bullets and shell casings when new guns are test fired. This data would be kept with the serial numbers of the guns.
With this information, the agency would be able to trace bullets and shell casings found at a shooting site to the gun maker and eventually to the buyer, said Mr. Vince and another former high ranking firearms bureau official.
But the National Rifle Association has opposed this, calling it tantamount to a national gun registry. The group succeeded in getting a provision in the 1968 federal Gun Control Act outlawing any national gun registry. [...]
I understan that the Second Amendment gives people the right to have guns, but I have a much harder time understanding where, exactly, is says that people have the right to have guns and that the government can't know that they do. Even if you accept the belief that the "well-regulated militia" - which provides the basis and justification for the right to bear arms - refers simply to the individuals who possess guns, and does not require that there actualy be any kind of structure or organization to the militia, I would think that part of being 'well-regulated" could reasonably include the concept of the government knowing who has guns, and therefore is a member of this militia.
The NRA, however, doesn't like the idea of the government knowing who has guns and who doesn't, and have managed to get laws established that prevent a national gun registry from being constructed. Sadly, the only people this really benefits are criminals, since it makes it harder for the police to connect the criminal to the a gun used in a crime - often a vital bit of information in getting a conviction. Personally, I think the idea of a ballistics registry is a great idea - test firing bullets from each gun and keeping a record of which ballistics markings go to which gun would be an excellent tool for law enforcement officers and agencies to have available to them, an would be of great use in helping solve a crime.
One of the more interesting ironies I've seen in the intense interest in "security" since 9/11 has been that virtually all of the focus has been on securing us from terrorism, with litte to no attention paid to the normal, everyday crime we've suffered with for years. The FBI wants to be able to infiltrate mosques and other religious organizations so that they can keep their ears open for any possible plots, librarians are being told that the government may need them to give information on who checks out which books, Ashcroft wants to get utility workers and postal workers to spy on peope who's homes they provide service to, there's been talk of a national ID card, registering anyone who wants to fly on an airplane and so on... more and more restrictions on our rights and freedoms, more invasions of our privacy, all in the name of preventing terrorism.
And yes, the 9/11 attacks were horrific, and yes, we do need to take reasonable steps to prevent such attacks from happening again. But when you get right down to it, more Americans are killed every year with handguns, rifles and other firearms than are killed by terrorism - even taking the approximately 3,000 dead from the WTC/Pentagon attacks. Where is the urgency to protect us from the common criminals that strike every hour of every day across the USA? In light of the steps being taken to prevent another WTC/Pentagon-type attack, it doesn't seem unreasonable at all to require that all guns be test fired before leaving the store, and the ballistic evidence provided by those test firings kept on record with the serial number of the gun, so that if the gun is ever used in a crime, it can more readily be traced to its owner.
[Edited 12:06pm - please be sure to take a look at the comments for this entry - The Raven brings up an excellent point regarding illegal weapons, which I've attempted to answer, giving more details of how something of this nature might be able to work. Thanks - kj]
In 1989, a jogger was attacked and raped in New York's Central Park. At the time, 5 young black men were arrested for the crime, and they gave confessions after long (up to 28 hours) interrogations by the police. This was the attack that taught us all about "Wilding" - young boys our running around causing havoc - and which captured the attention of the nation for a while.
The boys were convicted, even though by then they had renounced their confessions, and for the most part, people assumed we'd heard the end of that case.
Apparnetly that's not even close. A new investigation into the case has been underway for a while now, ever since an inmate confessed to having committed the crime by himself. DNA testing has shown that he did, in fact, have sexual contact with the jogger, lending much credibility to his story. The testing also showed that none of the physical evidence in the case matched that of the boys convicted for the crime, though it is technically possible for someone to commit a rape and leave no obvious DNA behind - especially with as much time as has passed in this case and the belief that the case itself was closed
One odd note in the whole story is that the man who has confessed to having raped the jogger has also confessed to having raped another woman 2 nights before. Whether it's because she was not as badly injured, or because her story lacked the "shocking" element of the Wilding teens, her story never made the news - at least not in the same manner the jogger's story did. The first rape had been handled by the Sex Crimes unit, but because it was believed that the jogger might not survive, her case was handled by the Homicide division. As noted in the New York Times article on this case:
For reasons that are not clear, investigators say, there is no sign that the information about the April 17 rape was turned over to the detectives handling the attack on the jogger.
And this is where I get a bit lost. How is it that with a case being as widely publicized as the jogger's case was, no one in the Sex Crimes unit thought to call up the Homicide division and say "hey, we've gone one a lot like your's". Had that happened, odds are good that the police would have discovered that the teens they'd arrested probably were not involved, since apparently the first victim did not suffer the memory loss that the jogger has. Knowing her case had only a single attacker might have helped refocus the investigation into the jogger's case. Unfortuantely, we'll never know for sure.
This goes right along with my earlier comments (in my "Shadowed Souls" blog, which deals with both true crime and crime fiction) about both the Columbine shooting and the WTC/Pentagon attacks: In both cases, there were warning signs, and had the various bits and pieces held by different agencies been somehow coordinated, is possible that the tragedies could have been prevented.
I suspect this "compartmentalization" of information is one of the greatest problems facing our country today. We are almost more at risk because of our inability to get all of our pieces talking to each other, than we are from outside threats.
Bush declares war may be 'unavoidable'. The US president says he may have no choice but to go to war with Iraq¸ as EU and Arab leaders stress their continuing differences with the US. [BBC News | Front Page]
Does President Bush actually expect us to find this at all surprising? Does he expect us to believe him? If war with Iraq is "unavoidable" it is because of all that Bush has done to ensure that we push the situation to that point. I'm not denying that Saddam Hussain has done some pretty awful things, but I don't see him as the most immediate threat to our security right now.
On September 7th, during a press conference, Bush stated that a report from the the International Atomic Energy Agency, stated that Saddam was within 6 months of being able to make nuclear weapons, and asked how much more proof was needed. Since then, the IAEA has denied that they published any such report. When it was reported that no such report had been published by the IAEA in 1998, Bush's press office said that it must have been their 1991 report that it came from, which IAEA also denies. Of course, my question is, even if the reports were true, even if we had known in 1991 or 1998 that Saddam was 6 months away from obtaining nuclear weapons, wouldn't that mean that he should already have them by now? And if he did, then why didn't Bush go after him immediately upon coming into office, why wait until just before the mid-term election to push so hard for this?
I have no doubt that Bush will ensure that we end up having no choice but to go to war with Iraq. He wants this war and is determined to have it any way he can get it. My only wish is that he'd be honest about why. It truly makes no sense to claim that we must go to war against a man because a report that was never written supposedly said that between 4 and 11 years ago, Saddam Hussain might have nuclear capabilities in 6 months. It also makes no sense to be heading into this kind of a war with other countries, who have previously backed us when we have had a legitimate reason for invading a nation, are refusing to do so now because they don't feel it is necessary. It makes you wonder what the real reasons are, you know?
4 new articles at The Bitch Queen
1 new article at Shadowed Souls
By Iain Thomson [01-10-2002]
Worm can steal passwords and credit card details
A worm which disables security software and can steal passwords and credit card details is spreading rapidly through Windows-based PCs, according to antivirus companies.
Codenamed Bugbear, the worm was first detected in Malaysia and is spreading fast. [...]
In addition it takes advantage of a longstanding Microsoft exploit, MS-01/020, as did Klez. A patch for this has been available since March 2001. [...]
The worm only affects Windows PCs and a patch is available from antivirus vendors. A patch for the Microsoft exploit can be found here. [...]
Just wanted to make sure this info was available. If you have not yet patched your system, be sure to do so.
Article Last Updated:
Wednesday, October 02, 2002 - 2:56:41 AM MST
Protest of school Satanic club a flop
By T.S. Mills-Faraudo
STAFF WRITER
SAN MATEO -- Police came to San Mateo High School Tuesday prepared to deal with a rally of parents protesting the school's backing of a club based on Satanism.
But the officers milling around the school's performing arts center were left with nothing to do. [...]
Parent Pam Cachay organized the lunch-hour rally, expecting 50 people to show up in an effort to dismantle the club, devoted to the study of the teachings of Anton LaVey, founder of the Church of Satan.
Cachay was stunned to find no one picketing. [...]
I just have to give the parents of San Mateo High School a hand for not panicking, overreacting and giving in to the usual hysteria that surrounds any mention of Satanism.
Robertson Charity Wins 'Faith-Based' Grant
By a Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, October 3, 2002; Page A02
Early this year, Pat Robertson denounced the Bush administration's "faith-based" initiative, warning that the program is a "Pandora's Box" that could make legitimate religious charities dependent on government and finance cults that "brainwash" prospective adherents.
Today, Operation Blessing International, a Virginia Beach charity created by Robertson, is to get $500,000 in the first wave of grants to be distributed under the faith-based initiative, which gives federal money to religious organizations that provide social services.
Back in March, Robertson, founder of the Christian Coalition, told his 700 Club television audience that the groups getting funds "will begin to be nurtured, if I can use that term, on federal money, and then they can't get off of it." He added, "It'll be like a narcotic; they can't then free themselves later on." [...]
Not really a whole lot to add to this one. I've never been fond of the idea of funding "faith-based" programs, because I do believe that it ends up in an illegal govenment funding of religious activity. I just am completely taken aback at Pat Robertson's gumption to first complain about the whole "faith-based" concept and then turn around and ask for half-a-million dollars from that very program. The man truly has no shame.
Exclusive: As Andrea Yates begins her appeal with help from an anonymous $50,000 donation, her husband says, ‘I’ve given all that I want to give’
By Anne Belli Gesalman
NEWSWEEK
When a family has been destroyed and a couple split up because one is imprisoned, it's generally not that shocking when the marriage itself disintegrates. In some situations, though, its a bit more surprising than others, especially if an issue has previously been made of the family adhering to a strict or fundamentalist faith.
In the case of the Yates family, there was a fair amount of speculation that Rusty's fundamentalist-like beliefs may have contributed to the worseining of the post-partum psychosis that his wife Andrea suffered from and which, ultimately, resulted in her murdering all 5 of their children by drowning them in a bathtub.
It's been noted that he believed they were obligated to have 'as many children as God gave them', an even impregnated her while she may still have been dealing with the effects of severe post-partum depression after the birth of her fourth child. The fact that she had suffered such severe depression, and had even tried to kill herself, should have been a signal that having more children might not be a good idea, but reports have indicated that Rusty was not concerned about that, and simply wanted to keep having children, regardless. During Andrea's trial, Rusty testified that their house had the "traditional division of labor" - the man earned the money and the woman did all of the work around the home; they also lived by the traditional division of power - the man makes all of the decisions and the wife obeys.
One of the more controversial stances Rusty had taken was that, for spiritual reasons, the family needed to live simply, which he interpreted as living in a bus and home-schooling the children. In explaining why he felt this way, he once stated: "The social integration that the world claims is so essential is exactly what we need to protect our children from."
Now, it seems, simple living isn't so important to Rusty Yates, nor, from the sound of it, is loyalty or the idea that marriage is forever - both views usually associated with fundamentalist beliefs. According to Newsweek, Rusty is now contemplating divorcing Andrea, and has moved into a new home, which is described as:
[...] a nearby luxury-apartment complex that boasts a stocked fishing pond, white-sand beach, resort-style pool with cabana and gym. One-bedroom units in the pink Mediterranean-style complex rent for nearly $1,000 a month.
Currently, Andrea is attempting to get an appeal of her conviction started, and an anonymous doner has donated $50,000 to help her in her endevour. Rusty, however, says that he's now "given all that I want to give" and does not plan on contributing any more to Andrea's legal costs. He also notes that he has "lost money on this, not made it". He is, however, still considering suing Andrea's doctor as well as the hospital that had released her from their mental health facility shortly before she killed her children.
I have to admit, I never had much respect for Randy Yates. In the interviews I saw with him and the statements he made that I read, there was very much a feeling of him being quite self-involved and more concerned with having things go as he felt they should, rather than acknowledging anyone else's needs. This latest development does nothing to improve my opinion of him. If anything, it makes it worse.
I am constantly astounded at the number of people who will make a big deal about how important living by their faith is, until it become more convenient to live otherwise. And this isn't a fault that is unique to fundamentalist Christianity. I've seen it in people of most all religions. One might think that if a man's commitment to his faith is so strong that he will force his five children and his wife to live with him in a bus that it would also be strong enough for him to stand by his wife even in the face of a tragedy - especially a tragedy he himself may well have contributed to by ignoring her need for help and the rigid strictures he put about their lives.
I can only hope that if he does divorce Andrea, any woman who is tempted to consider being the mother of his next children will give serious consideration to his history and how he's handled this situation.
Article Last Updated:
Friday, September 27, 2002 - 10:04:13 AM MST
High school Satanism club prompts parental outrage
Students say lunchtime meetings do not worship Lord of Underworld
By T.S. Mills-Faraudo
STAFF WRITER
SAN MATEO -- A group of San Mateo High School students trying to stir up controversy formed a club based on Satanism, a religion typically associated with hedonistic philosophy and with the rituals of black magic.
[...]
While McEvoy said she has received calls from members of the religious community angry about the club's formation, Father Harold Snider of Our Lady of Angels Catholic Church in Burlingame said the First Amendment is behind these students. [...]
This is something that the people who are trying to get prayer and other religious activities put back into the school really need to contemplate. Every bit of ground they gain for their own faith they also gain for every other faith - and the more they try to push their beliefs into the schools, the more they'll find smaller, less well-known and less popular religions expecting equal treatment (which, under the First Amendment, they have a right to expect).
The difficult part, of course, is often in getting those who practice the more mainstream faiths to understand this concept. When a religion teaches that it is the only acceptable religion, its followers often believe that their religion should then be the only one entitled to Constitutional protection.
Washington, DC – Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) today introduced legislation designed to protect consumer’s ability to enjoy digital copyrighted material. Lofgren’s bill, the “Digital Choice and Freedom Act of 2002,” gives lawful consumers the ability to make personal uses of digital entertainment such as music, movies, and books. In addition, the bill recognizes that digital piracy will never be truly solved until consumers are given an affordable, reliable, legitimate and secure alternative.
Specifically, the proposed legislation will:
A lot of complaints have been made about the CBDTPA, in particular that the Act may be too broad and place too much restriction on the rights of consumers. A new bill has been proposed to Congress as an alternative. While I have not seen the text of the entire bill (nor, I suspect, could I read the legalese all that well), if it truly offers the kind of protections listed above, it may well be worth looking into
Practical Ministry Innovations
In an article announcing the upcoming unveiling of the White House's Faith-Based Community Initiatives, the following bit of advice was included:
Preliminary recommendations from the new office of Faith-Based Community Initiatives have focused on presenting your ministry with a secular look and feel. For example, the White House recommendations suggest that if your program is called the St. Luke School; change the name to the Luke School.
Which of course begs the question: Why try to hide what your program really is if the White House is going to be supporting Faith-Based Community programs? I simply don't understand the point. Since Faith-Based programs are going to be able to compete with secular programs for funds, is the goal to try and confuse those who distribute the money? Or is it to try and confuse those who receive the services?
Whatever the reason, the White House's office of Faith-Based Community Initiatives is encouraging Faith-Based orgaizations to try and hide who they are - essentially, to present a front that is a best a misdirection and at worst a lie. An interesting position for a White House office to take, given President Bush's pledge to return honour and integrity to the White House.
Monday, 30 September, 2002, 13:39 GMT 14:39 UK
Reagan lobbies for stem cell research
Former First Lady Nancy Reagan has been privately lobbying in favour of federal financing for embryonic stem cell research, according to US news reports.
Mrs Reagan is said to believe that the research could lead to a cure for Alzheimer's disease, which has afflicted her husband, former US President Ronald Reagan.
But the New York Times newspaper quoted a friend of Mrs Reagan as saying that she felt President George W Bush's controversial decision to restrict funding for the research was hampering efforts to cure Alzheimer's and other conditions.
Last year, President Bush restricted funding of research into embryonic stem cells so that only those cell lines in existence at the time of his decision could be used if the scientists wanted any governmental financing of their work. Anti-abortion activists, who saw it as a move that could help restrict abortion rights in the future, were pleased. Activists for the ill and disabled, who see a great deal of promise for therapies and cures in these stem cells, were rather angry. Not much, however, has been said since shortly after the announcement was made.
Personally, I've always had an issue with the decision. No one was suggesting that women should abort fetuses so that their embryos could be used for research. No one was even talking about embryos from abortions at all. In fact, the only embryos anyone wanted to use were one that had been created for use in in-vitro fertilization procedures and, for all intents and purposes, had been abandoned at the infertility clinics for so long that they were scheduled to be disposed of. These were not embryos that had any realistic chance of ever being implanted, growing and being born. These embryos are considered really nothing more than trash. Why then, is it so wrong to use them for research to help others live longer, fuller, more useful lives?
It would not have been difficult at all for the guidelines to have been written in such a way that it clearly restricted use of embryonic stem cells to only those embryos that have been in storage at a fertility clinic for a specified length of time, where the owners of the embryos either are no longer reachable or have given consent to have their embryo used as part of a research project and which are scheduled to be destroyed. That would prevent anyone from deciding to have an abortion in order to donate the stem cels to research (a prospect I find lacking in credibility, but which has been floated on a few occasions), and ensures that only those embryos that have no viable future are used for research.
For people who believe that life begins at conception, I would think they'd rather have those small lives used to help save and/or improve life for people who are already here than have them thrown out as so much trash. Would it not be better to have those tiny, embryonic lives have a meaning to them, even if they're never born as human? If the choice was between using an embryo or research or having it implanted and develop into a person, I could understand the position that they should not be used for research, but that's not the case in these situation. The choice is between being used for research and being used for nothing at all.
Freedom To Tinker: Fritz's Hit List Archives
Senator Fritz Hollings has proposed a new bill to help combat piracy and copyright infringement. The bill, called the Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act, has been criticized as being a bit too far-reaching and there are concerns that it could end up potentially regulating items that have nothing to do with copyrights at all. To help point out this font of potential stupidity, Prof. Edward W. Felten has started a new feature at his Freedom-to-Tinker blog called Fritz's Hit List. He will be listing different devices that would qualify as being "digital media devices" under the CBDTPA.
It's hard to know what to make of some of the new laws that are proprosed. Copyright in the age of the Internet and digital publications is going to be a tricky proposition, no matter how we go about it. What is needed, however, is to approach it with common sense, and a goal of balancing the interests of the copyright holders with the need for people to occasionally parts of copyrighted materials, such as has been allowed under the "Fair Use" provisions.
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