US, Other Nations Bake in Record Summer Heat
Paul Yeager
AOL News
Aug. 1, 2010
Summer 2010 is far from over, but extremely hot weather has been a major weather story to date, not only in the United States but also in other parts of the Northern Hemisphere. All-time record high temperatures have been tied or broken in more than a dozen nations.
Across the United States, the heat has been particularly persistent in the Southern and Eastern parts of the country. A July heat wave produced 100-plus-degree heat along the Eastern Seaboard from southern New England to the Virginias, including temperatures in excess of 105° F in parts of Maryland (including Baltimore) and Virginia. Hartford, Conn., tied its all-time record high temperature of 102° F on July 6.
Globally, at least 14 different countries have reported all-time record high temperatures this year (not all have been during the Northern Hemisphere summer), according meteorologist to Jeff Masters of Weather Underground...
Monday, August 02, 2010
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Documents indicate heavy use of dispersants in gulf oil spill
Documents indicate heavy use of dispersants in gulf oil spill
Chemical dispersants speed the natural process of breaking up oil that waves and water eventually do anyway.
By David A. Fahrenthold and Steven Mufson
Washington Post
August 1, 2010
While the BP well was still gushing, the Obama administration issued an order that limited the spreading of controversial dispersant chemicals on the Gulf of Mexico's surface. Their use, officials said, should be restricted to "rare cases."
But in reality, federal documents show, the use of dispersants wasn't rare at all.
Despite the order -- and concerns about the environmental effects of the dispersants -- the Coast Guard granted requests to use them 74 times over 54 days, and to use them on the surface and deep underwater at the well site. The Coast Guard approved every request submitted by BP or local Coast Guard commanders in Houma, La., although in some cases it reduced the amount of the chemicals they could use, according to an analysis of the documents prepared by the office of Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.).
The documents indicate that "these exemptions are in no way a 'rare' occurrence, and have allowed surface application of the dispersant to occur virtually every day since the directive was issued," Markey wrote in a letter dated Aug. 1 to retired Coast Guard Adm. Thad W. Allen, the government's point man on the spill. Markey chairs the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming...
Chemical dispersants speed the natural process of breaking up oil that waves and water eventually do anyway.
By David A. Fahrenthold and Steven Mufson
Washington Post
August 1, 2010
While the BP well was still gushing, the Obama administration issued an order that limited the spreading of controversial dispersant chemicals on the Gulf of Mexico's surface. Their use, officials said, should be restricted to "rare cases."
But in reality, federal documents show, the use of dispersants wasn't rare at all.
Despite the order -- and concerns about the environmental effects of the dispersants -- the Coast Guard granted requests to use them 74 times over 54 days, and to use them on the surface and deep underwater at the well site. The Coast Guard approved every request submitted by BP or local Coast Guard commanders in Houma, La., although in some cases it reduced the amount of the chemicals they could use, according to an analysis of the documents prepared by the office of Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.).
The documents indicate that "these exemptions are in no way a 'rare' occurrence, and have allowed surface application of the dispersant to occur virtually every day since the directive was issued," Markey wrote in a letter dated Aug. 1 to retired Coast Guard Adm. Thad W. Allen, the government's point man on the spill. Markey chairs the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming...
Arizona ruling may backfire for immigrants
THE OPPENHEIMER REPORT
Arizona ruling may backfire for immigrants
BY ANDRES OPPENHEIMER
MiamiHerald.com
Like most civil rights supporters, I celebrated last week's news that a judge suspended the harshest portions of Arizona's xenophobic immigration law. But the more I think about it, the more I fear it will backfire in the near future.
The ruling suspends the Arizona law's provision that ask local police officers enforcing other laws to demand immigration papers from people they suspect are in the country illegally. That could have led to racially-motivated interrogations of both legal and undocumented Hispanics.
But contrary to conventional wisdom that the judge's decision was a victory for pro-immigrant forces, it could have a negative political impact in November's legislative elections and may end up hurting immigrants in the long run.
First, the ruling was the first step of what's likely to be a long legal battle. Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, a vocal supporter of the state law, has already said she has appealed the ruling and that she may take it all the way to the Supreme Court.
JUST THE BEGINNING
The legal battle over the Arizona law is far from over.
Backers of the state law and similar bills that have been introduced in 17 states say that in light of federal government inaction, states have to take measures on their own to stem the flow of undocumented immigrants. The Obama Administration and pro-immigrant groups say the law violates fundamental rights, and call for a more comprehensive immigration reform.
Second, the ruling may energize Republicans in the November election. It will be used by anti-immigrant groups as a rallying cry to get voters to elect a new Congress that is more sympathetic to Arizona-style measures.
``I fear that the unintended consequence of this ruling is that it will redouble restrictionists' efforts at the national level, which will be to the detriment of immigrants,'' Temple University law professor Peter Spiro said. ``They are hitting a brick wall at the state level, so they will step up their efforts in Washington.''
Third, and most important, the news that the judge's ruling knocked out the most pervasive traits of the Arizona law may drive many Hispanics to stay at home in November...
Arizona ruling may backfire for immigrants
BY ANDRES OPPENHEIMER
MiamiHerald.com
Like most civil rights supporters, I celebrated last week's news that a judge suspended the harshest portions of Arizona's xenophobic immigration law. But the more I think about it, the more I fear it will backfire in the near future.
The ruling suspends the Arizona law's provision that ask local police officers enforcing other laws to demand immigration papers from people they suspect are in the country illegally. That could have led to racially-motivated interrogations of both legal and undocumented Hispanics.
But contrary to conventional wisdom that the judge's decision was a victory for pro-immigrant forces, it could have a negative political impact in November's legislative elections and may end up hurting immigrants in the long run.
First, the ruling was the first step of what's likely to be a long legal battle. Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, a vocal supporter of the state law, has already said she has appealed the ruling and that she may take it all the way to the Supreme Court.
JUST THE BEGINNING
The legal battle over the Arizona law is far from over.
Backers of the state law and similar bills that have been introduced in 17 states say that in light of federal government inaction, states have to take measures on their own to stem the flow of undocumented immigrants. The Obama Administration and pro-immigrant groups say the law violates fundamental rights, and call for a more comprehensive immigration reform.
Second, the ruling may energize Republicans in the November election. It will be used by anti-immigrant groups as a rallying cry to get voters to elect a new Congress that is more sympathetic to Arizona-style measures.
``I fear that the unintended consequence of this ruling is that it will redouble restrictionists' efforts at the national level, which will be to the detriment of immigrants,'' Temple University law professor Peter Spiro said. ``They are hitting a brick wall at the state level, so they will step up their efforts in Washington.''
Third, and most important, the news that the judge's ruling knocked out the most pervasive traits of the Arizona law may drive many Hispanics to stay at home in November...
Unitarians have come a long way since anti-Catholic and anti-immigrant actions of their Puritan antecedents
Unitarians have come a long way since anti-Catholic and anti-immigrant actions of their Puritan antecedents.
See all posts on Arizona anti-immigrant law.
SB 1070 Day One
07/29/2010
Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Phoenix
As I write, my minister and friends are blocking Sheriff Joe Arpaio's jail on this- the first day of SB 1070.
UU's are blocking traffic by staging a peaceful protest on the streets of Phoenix. The police and sheriff's deputies are out with riot gear.
Many UU's have been arrested so far -
* Mar Cardenas of UU San Diego, South Bay
* Rev. Ian Maher of Queens, NY
* Rev. Annette Marquis, Thomas Jefferson District Executive
* Rev. Peter Morales
* Rev. Susan Frederick Gray
* Rev. Melissa Carvil-Ziemer, Kent Ohio
* Rev. Wendy Von Zirpilo, Marblehead, MA and ARE
* Rev. Greg Ward, Carmel CA
* Rev. Colin Bossen, Cleveland
* Kat Crabtree, member of the UUCP
* Margy Angle, member of the UUCP's Immigration Task Force
I am sure many others will be next.
They are putting their personal liberty at risk to stand on the side of love.
I am worried but I have never been prouder of our minister, Rev. Susan, who said,
"In the face of fear that is assaulting our community,
we must not be silent,
we must make it clear which side we stand on.
We stand on the side of love."
As our DRE says: "Very proud to call Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray my boss, my friend and my minister."
I would add - and my heroine.
I am also so grateful to the 100+ UU's who have come here to help and organize and protest and get arrested.
We are all immigrants, we are all Arizona, we are all UU's.
Jimmy Leung
See all posts on Arizona anti-immigrant law.
SB 1070 Day One
07/29/2010
Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Phoenix
As I write, my minister and friends are blocking Sheriff Joe Arpaio's jail on this- the first day of SB 1070.
UU's are blocking traffic by staging a peaceful protest on the streets of Phoenix. The police and sheriff's deputies are out with riot gear.
Many UU's have been arrested so far -
* Mar Cardenas of UU San Diego, South Bay
* Rev. Ian Maher of Queens, NY
* Rev. Annette Marquis, Thomas Jefferson District Executive
* Rev. Peter Morales
* Rev. Susan Frederick Gray
* Rev. Melissa Carvil-Ziemer, Kent Ohio
* Rev. Wendy Von Zirpilo, Marblehead, MA and ARE
* Rev. Greg Ward, Carmel CA
* Rev. Colin Bossen, Cleveland
* Kat Crabtree, member of the UUCP
* Margy Angle, member of the UUCP's Immigration Task Force
I am sure many others will be next.
They are putting their personal liberty at risk to stand on the side of love.
I am worried but I have never been prouder of our minister, Rev. Susan, who said,
"In the face of fear that is assaulting our community,
we must not be silent,
we must make it clear which side we stand on.
We stand on the side of love."
As our DRE says: "Very proud to call Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray my boss, my friend and my minister."
I would add - and my heroine.
I am also so grateful to the 100+ UU's who have come here to help and organize and protest and get arrested.
We are all immigrants, we are all Arizona, we are all UU's.
Jimmy Leung
Friday, July 30, 2010
Joe Arpaio's Goons Grab Salvador Reza Off the Street and Arrest Him, Again
Joe Arpaio's Goons Grab Salvador Reza Off the Street and Arrest Him, Again
By Stephen Lemons
Jul. 30 2010
...[C]ivil rights leader Salvador Reza of the group Puente was arrested this afternoon by a contingent of MCSO goons, apparently on Arpaio's direct orders.
Reza was in a parking lot across the street from where Arpaio was giving a press conference at an MCSO command post near the Lower Buckeye Jail, according to several witnesses.
Eleven protesters blocked the entrance and exit to the driveway as one of Arpaio's anti-immigrant sweeps was resuming.
The demonstrators were arrested by deputies and Arpaio came out to the street to talk to the media. According to Puente's Carlos Garcia, Arpaio gestured in Reza's direction and eight MCSO thugs rushed across the street to nab Reza, who was getting into his car. They cuffed him and hustled him away.
"Sal was out here by his car, he wasn't one of the protesters," Garcia told me at the scene. "As far as we know, he's a political prisoner."
Chris Newman, a lawyer for the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, said he was briefly detained by Captain David Letourneau, the head of Arpaio's SWAT detail, but he also witnessed the arrest of Reza.
"I heard someone yell, `Salvador Reza's getting in his car, we get him,'" said Newman, who had been across the street observing the protesters' arrests. "They left across the street, this is while I was being detained. The next thing you know, he was in cuffs being walked across the jail."...
By Stephen Lemons
Jul. 30 2010
...[C]ivil rights leader Salvador Reza of the group Puente was arrested this afternoon by a contingent of MCSO goons, apparently on Arpaio's direct orders.
Reza was in a parking lot across the street from where Arpaio was giving a press conference at an MCSO command post near the Lower Buckeye Jail, according to several witnesses.
Eleven protesters blocked the entrance and exit to the driveway as one of Arpaio's anti-immigrant sweeps was resuming.
The demonstrators were arrested by deputies and Arpaio came out to the street to talk to the media. According to Puente's Carlos Garcia, Arpaio gestured in Reza's direction and eight MCSO thugs rushed across the street to nab Reza, who was getting into his car. They cuffed him and hustled him away.
"Sal was out here by his car, he wasn't one of the protesters," Garcia told me at the scene. "As far as we know, he's a political prisoner."
Chris Newman, a lawyer for the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, said he was briefly detained by Captain David Letourneau, the head of Arpaio's SWAT detail, but he also witnessed the arrest of Reza.
"I heard someone yell, `Salvador Reza's getting in his car, we get him,'" said Newman, who had been across the street observing the protesters' arrests. "They left across the street, this is while I was being detained. The next thing you know, he was in cuffs being walked across the jail."...
Arizona: Shawna Forde, Brisenia Flores, and the problem of taking the law into one's own hands
http://azstarnet.com/news/local/crime/article_bfe15833-f7a0-5aa7-9432-6dad29a10db5.html
Kim Smith Arizona Daily Star
July 26, 2010
The FBI was told that Shawna Forde was planning a home invasion in the Arivaca area weeks before a man and his 9-year-old daughter were shot to death there.
According to documents filed this week in Pima County Superior Court, two confidential informants for the FBI say they told agents in April 2009 that Forde was recruiting people to raid a house she believed was filled with illicit drugs, money and guns.
Raul Flores, 29; his wife, Gina Gonzalez; and their daughter, Brisenia Flores, 9, were shot by one member of a group of people who claimed to be law enforcement officers and demanded to be let inside their house on May 30, 2009. Gonzalez was the only survivor.
The documents say Forde, 42, and others were on the verge of hitting additional targets when she, Jason Bush, 35, and Albert Gaxiola, 43, were arrested on June 12, 2009.
All three have been charged with first-degree murder. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.
Sheriff's officials said at the time that Raul Flores was suspected of being a drug dealer, and the three suspects targeted the house with the intention of stealing money and drugs.
In a phone conversation taped by the FBI, Forde tells one of the informants that future jobs would be something of a test for a new recruit, saying: "Our hands are already dirty. We've got to know he can pull the trigger."
Earlier this week, Forde's defense attorney, Eric Larsen, filed a motion asking Judge John Leonardo to force prosecutors to hand over all FBI documents pertaining to the two confidential informants. The documents indicate neither was paid for his information, nor were they cooperating to avoid prosecution in any unrelated cases...
Who Killed Brisenia Flores?
America's Voice
A month ago, anti-immigrant activists brutally shot and killed nine-year-old Brisenia Flores and her father...
What does this have to do with the Minutemen and FAIR?
Shawna Forde, the alleged ringleader and one of three suspects arrested in the deadly home invasion, heads up a border "watchdog" group known as the Minuteman American Defense (MAD).
Forde is suspected of having plotted and executed the killing of nine-year-old Brisenia Flores in order to raise money for her vigilante group. According to the Associated Press:
Two of three people arrested in a southern Arizona home invasion that left a little girl and her father dead had connections to a Washington state anti-illegal immigration group that conducts border watch activities in Arizona.
Jason Eugene Bush, 34, Shawna Forde, 41, and Albert Robert Gaxiola, 42, have been charged with two counts each of first-degree murder and other charges, said Sheriff Clarence Dupnik of Pima County, Ariz.
ShawnaIt turns out that Shawna has also been a representative of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), an organization that regularly lobbies Washington and appears as an expert voice on mainstream news, despite its classification as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center...
Kim Smith Arizona Daily Star
July 26, 2010
The FBI was told that Shawna Forde was planning a home invasion in the Arivaca area weeks before a man and his 9-year-old daughter were shot to death there.
According to documents filed this week in Pima County Superior Court, two confidential informants for the FBI say they told agents in April 2009 that Forde was recruiting people to raid a house she believed was filled with illicit drugs, money and guns.
Raul Flores, 29; his wife, Gina Gonzalez; and their daughter, Brisenia Flores, 9, were shot by one member of a group of people who claimed to be law enforcement officers and demanded to be let inside their house on May 30, 2009. Gonzalez was the only survivor.
The documents say Forde, 42, and others were on the verge of hitting additional targets when she, Jason Bush, 35, and Albert Gaxiola, 43, were arrested on June 12, 2009.
All three have been charged with first-degree murder. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.
Sheriff's officials said at the time that Raul Flores was suspected of being a drug dealer, and the three suspects targeted the house with the intention of stealing money and drugs.
In a phone conversation taped by the FBI, Forde tells one of the informants that future jobs would be something of a test for a new recruit, saying: "Our hands are already dirty. We've got to know he can pull the trigger."
Earlier this week, Forde's defense attorney, Eric Larsen, filed a motion asking Judge John Leonardo to force prosecutors to hand over all FBI documents pertaining to the two confidential informants. The documents indicate neither was paid for his information, nor were they cooperating to avoid prosecution in any unrelated cases...
Who Killed Brisenia Flores?
America's Voice
A month ago, anti-immigrant activists brutally shot and killed nine-year-old Brisenia Flores and her father...
What does this have to do with the Minutemen and FAIR?
Shawna Forde, the alleged ringleader and one of three suspects arrested in the deadly home invasion, heads up a border "watchdog" group known as the Minuteman American Defense (MAD).
Forde is suspected of having plotted and executed the killing of nine-year-old Brisenia Flores in order to raise money for her vigilante group. According to the Associated Press:
Two of three people arrested in a southern Arizona home invasion that left a little girl and her father dead had connections to a Washington state anti-illegal immigration group that conducts border watch activities in Arizona.
Jason Eugene Bush, 34, Shawna Forde, 41, and Albert Robert Gaxiola, 42, have been charged with two counts each of first-degree murder and other charges, said Sheriff Clarence Dupnik of Pima County, Ariz.
ShawnaIt turns out that Shawna has also been a representative of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), an organization that regularly lobbies Washington and appears as an expert voice on mainstream news, despite its classification as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center...
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Scientists: New Study Affirms Climate Change Is 'Undeniable'
JULY 28, 2010
Scientists: New Study Affirms Climate Change Is 'Undeniable'
AP
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
Scientists from around the world provided more evidence of global warming in the annual State of the Climate report Wednesday, the Associated Press reports.
Compiled by more than 300 scientists from 48 countries, the report said analysis of 10 indicators that are "clearly and directly related to surface temperatures, all tell the same story: Global warming is undeniable."
The research was led by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and is based on new data that wasn't available to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change for its report for 2007, which has been attacked by skeptics.
Concern about rising temperatures has been growing in recent years as atmospheric scientists report rising temperatures associated with greenhouse gases released into the air by industrial and other human processes. At the same time, some skeptics have questioned the conclusions.
The report issued Wednesday focuses only on global warming and doesn't specify a cause.
Full story at http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_SCI_STATE_OF_THE_CLIMATE?SITE=TXKER&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
Scientists: New Study Affirms Climate Change Is 'Undeniable'
AP
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
Scientists from around the world provided more evidence of global warming in the annual State of the Climate report Wednesday, the Associated Press reports.
Compiled by more than 300 scientists from 48 countries, the report said analysis of 10 indicators that are "clearly and directly related to surface temperatures, all tell the same story: Global warming is undeniable."
The research was led by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and is based on new data that wasn't available to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change for its report for 2007, which has been attacked by skeptics.
Concern about rising temperatures has been growing in recent years as atmospheric scientists report rising temperatures associated with greenhouse gases released into the air by industrial and other human processes. At the same time, some skeptics have questioned the conclusions.
The report issued Wednesday focuses only on global warming and doesn't specify a cause.
Full story at http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_SCI_STATE_OF_THE_CLIMATE?SITE=TXKER&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
Friday, July 23, 2010
Texans: Did we execute an innocent man?
Texans: Did we execute an innocent man?
By the CNN Wire Staff
July 23, 2010
Todd Willingham said he was innocent but was executed in February 2004 for the arson murders of his three kids.
(CNN)
A Texas state board revisited questions surrounding a 2004 execution on Friday amid warnings from critics of the controversial execution that the panel is trying to bury its own critical review of the case.
Cameron Todd Willingham was executed in 2004, 13 years after a fire killed his three daughters. Prosecutors argued that Willingham deliberately set the 1991 blaze -- but three reviews of the evidence by outside experts have found the fire should not have been ruled arson.
The last of those reports was ordered by the Texas Forensic Sciences Commission, which has been looking into Willingham's execution since 2008. But a September 2009 shake-up by Texas Gov. Rick Perry has kept that panel from
reviewing the report, and the commission's new chairman has ordered a review of its operating rules. Critics say that may kill the probe.
"They are attempting permanently to keep the investigation from continuing and moving on, and I do believe it's because they don't like the direction the evidence is leading," Willingham's cousin, Pat Cox, said Thursday.
The Forensic Science Commission's chairman is now John Bradley, an Austin-area district attorney with a reputation as a staunch supporter of the death penalty...
Poll: Support for Arizona Immigration Law Hits 57 Percent
CBS video report on Arizona violence
Poll: Support for Arizona Immigration Law Hits 57 Percent
Posted by Stephanie Condon
CBS News
July 13, 2010
CBS News Poll analysis by the CBS News Polling Unit: Sarah Dutton, Jennifer De Pinto, Fred Backus and Anthony Salvanto.
Public support for Arizona's controversial new immigration law has increased slightly, a new CBS News poll shows, with 57 percent of Americans characterizing the law as "about right" in the way it addresses the issue of illegal immigration.
Support for the measure increased five points since May. Since then, the Justice Department has filed suit against the law, claiming that it usurps federal authority to enforce immigration laws.
The measure in question, signed into law in April and slated to go into effect later this month, makes it a state crime for a person to be in the country illegally. It also requires local law enforcement to question a person about his or her immigration status during all "lawful stops" if there is "reasonable suspicion" that person may be in the country illegally.
Twenty-three percent of Americans think the law goes too far, according to the poll, conducted July 9 - 12. That's down five points from the 28 percent who said in May that the measure goes too far. Another 17 percent said it doesn't go far enough...
Poll: Support for Arizona Immigration Law Hits 57 Percent
Posted by Stephanie Condon
CBS News
July 13, 2010
CBS News Poll analysis by the CBS News Polling Unit: Sarah Dutton, Jennifer De Pinto, Fred Backus and Anthony Salvanto.
Public support for Arizona's controversial new immigration law has increased slightly, a new CBS News poll shows, with 57 percent of Americans characterizing the law as "about right" in the way it addresses the issue of illegal immigration.
Support for the measure increased five points since May. Since then, the Justice Department has filed suit against the law, claiming that it usurps federal authority to enforce immigration laws.
The measure in question, signed into law in April and slated to go into effect later this month, makes it a state crime for a person to be in the country illegally. It also requires local law enforcement to question a person about his or her immigration status during all "lawful stops" if there is "reasonable suspicion" that person may be in the country illegally.
Twenty-three percent of Americans think the law goes too far, according to the poll, conducted July 9 - 12. That's down five points from the 28 percent who said in May that the measure goes too far. Another 17 percent said it doesn't go far enough...
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Win Straube's Generic Education; Free speech; Suzette Peterz writings about race; South Fork Island counternarratives on racism; Arvid Fredborg
What is Generic Education
The concept of generic education was proposed by Win Straube in his book, "QGE=A, Quality Generic Education is the Answer". Generic Education means the identification and practice of objective, unarguable values. Generic Education can be taught and learned anywhere because it is free from cultural or political baggage, yet it is understood on all sides as a shared, generally accepted version. Generic Education is universally measurable, which means that learners’ proficiency in the studied subjects can be tested. It also means that the tests used are either identical or at least comparable in different locations and as administered at different times. In other words: The level of proficiency to pass a specific test needs to be as close to identical to every other such test as possible.
Generic Education means "proficiency in" a certain science, art, or other subject which is agreed on by all or almost all...
Those who have been prosecuted for ideas that challenged the social order have included some of the greatest minds in human history. Socrates was forced to drink poison for his words, Galileo was put under arrest for his words, James Joyce and Lenny Bruce were convicted of obscenity. And its not just artists and scientists; Jesus was brutally murdered for his words and ideas.
Freedom of speech is not just part of the right to enjoy yourself. It is the freedom to move society forward...
--Arvin Vohra
Our Most Highly Recommended Private Educational Service
Educational Consulting & Curriculum Design for Local and National School Systems ... Training Programs for Parents · Book Arvin Vohra as a Speaker ...
The Overrepresentation of Black Students in Special Education ...
in Special Education Classrooms Kimberly Suzette Peterz
Chicago, Illinois.
American Indian education: counternarratives in racism, struggle Matthew L. M. Fletcher - 2008 - Education - 223 pages... Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians and the Michigan Land Use Institute to, inter alia, improve access to the cemetery on South Fox Island). ...
Who were the evangelicals? conservative and liberal identity in the Unitarian Controversy in Boston ...Universalists...UU... University of Minnesota
Arvid Fredborg, 80, a journalist and one of the first to...
Baltimore Sun
January 11, 1996
Arvid Fredborg, 80, a journalist and one of the first to report the scope and goals of the Nazi Holocaust, died of an apparent heart attack Thursday at his home outside Stockholm, Sweden.
His 1943 book "Behind the Steel Wall" detailed the systematic genocide at Nazi death camps and estimated that 2 million Jews had been killed. The book came out two years after the death camps were started, but before the killing reached its peak. The book caused a stir in Sweden and was published in English in 1944.
His biggest contribution was to publicize the extent of Nazi genocide and the goals of the Holocaust, rather than to expose it for the first time, Swedish historian Henrik Brackner said. Many governments, including Sweden's, knew about the death camps but kept silent.
The concept of generic education was proposed by Win Straube in his book, "QGE=A, Quality Generic Education is the Answer". Generic Education means the identification and practice of objective, unarguable values. Generic Education can be taught and learned anywhere because it is free from cultural or political baggage, yet it is understood on all sides as a shared, generally accepted version. Generic Education is universally measurable, which means that learners’ proficiency in the studied subjects can be tested. It also means that the tests used are either identical or at least comparable in different locations and as administered at different times. In other words: The level of proficiency to pass a specific test needs to be as close to identical to every other such test as possible.
Generic Education means "proficiency in" a certain science, art, or other subject which is agreed on by all or almost all...
Those who have been prosecuted for ideas that challenged the social order have included some of the greatest minds in human history. Socrates was forced to drink poison for his words, Galileo was put under arrest for his words, James Joyce and Lenny Bruce were convicted of obscenity. And its not just artists and scientists; Jesus was brutally murdered for his words and ideas.
Freedom of speech is not just part of the right to enjoy yourself. It is the freedom to move society forward...
--Arvin Vohra
Our Most Highly Recommended Private Educational Service
Educational Consulting & Curriculum Design for Local and National School Systems ... Training Programs for Parents · Book Arvin Vohra as a Speaker ...
The Overrepresentation of Black Students in Special Education ...
in Special Education Classrooms Kimberly Suzette Peterz
Chicago, Illinois.
American Indian education: counternarratives in racism, struggle Matthew L. M. Fletcher - 2008 - Education - 223 pages... Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians and the Michigan Land Use Institute to, inter alia, improve access to the cemetery on South Fox Island). ...
Who were the evangelicals? conservative and liberal identity in the Unitarian Controversy in Boston ...Universalists...UU... University of Minnesota
Arvid Fredborg, 80, a journalist and one of the first to...
Baltimore Sun
January 11, 1996
Arvid Fredborg, 80, a journalist and one of the first to report the scope and goals of the Nazi Holocaust, died of an apparent heart attack Thursday at his home outside Stockholm, Sweden.
His 1943 book "Behind the Steel Wall" detailed the systematic genocide at Nazi death camps and estimated that 2 million Jews had been killed. The book came out two years after the death camps were started, but before the killing reached its peak. The book caused a stir in Sweden and was published in English in 1944.
His biggest contribution was to publicize the extent of Nazi genocide and the goals of the Holocaust, rather than to expose it for the first time, Swedish historian Henrik Brackner said. Many governments, including Sweden's, knew about the death camps but kept silent.
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Freedom of speech in Northern Ireland: Ireland's version of a KKK march is met with violence
I woke up yesterday morning and thought, "This is the twelfth of July, the day the Orangemen march in Northern Ireland to celebrate their conquest of the native Irish centuries ago. This won't be good."
Northern Ireland's Chief Constable has called for a major debate on the controversial parades.
Northern Ireland Riots: New Video Released
July 13, 2010
Sky News HD
Carole Erskine, Sky News Online
Dramatic footage of fresh violence in Northern Ireland has been released by police after a second night of riots in north Belfast.
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The video shows masked protestors throwing petrol bombs, bricks and bottles at police officers.
It also shows a police van being attacked by a large group carrying metal poles and weapons - at one point they try to turn the vehicle onto its side.
Officers fired 70 baton rounds and used water cannons to disperse the protestors.
The violent scenes at the flashpoint in the Ardoyne area are all too familiar as crowds targeted officers who had been trying to escort a planned Orange march past streets dividing loyalist and republican neighbourhoods.
Belfast violence
This was the second night of violence in the Ardoyne Road area of north Belfast
Police have also been attacked by rioters in violent clashes elsewhere in Belfast and in other areas across Northern Ireland, including Lurgan, Co Armagh and Armagh City.
Over two nights of trouble 82 police officers have been injured.
Northern Ireland's Chief Constable has called for a major debate on the controversial parades.
http://hubpages.com/hub/The-Twelfth-of-July-A-Festival-of-Bigotry
Northern Ireland's Chief Constable has called for a major debate on the controversial parades.
Northern Ireland Riots: New Video Released
July 13, 2010
Sky News HD
Carole Erskine, Sky News Online
Dramatic footage of fresh violence in Northern Ireland has been released by police after a second night of riots in north Belfast.
To view this content you need Flash and Javascript enabled in your browser.
Please download Flash from the Adobe download website.
The video shows masked protestors throwing petrol bombs, bricks and bottles at police officers.
It also shows a police van being attacked by a large group carrying metal poles and weapons - at one point they try to turn the vehicle onto its side.
Officers fired 70 baton rounds and used water cannons to disperse the protestors.
The violent scenes at the flashpoint in the Ardoyne area are all too familiar as crowds targeted officers who had been trying to escort a planned Orange march past streets dividing loyalist and republican neighbourhoods.
Belfast violence
This was the second night of violence in the Ardoyne Road area of north Belfast
Police have also been attacked by rioters in violent clashes elsewhere in Belfast and in other areas across Northern Ireland, including Lurgan, Co Armagh and Armagh City.
Over two nights of trouble 82 police officers have been injured.
Northern Ireland's Chief Constable has called for a major debate on the controversial parades.
http://hubpages.com/hub/The-Twelfth-of-July-A-Festival-of-Bigotry
Climategate: no fudging, but a fear of openness
Climategate scientists cleared of manipulating data on global warming
Muir Russell report says scientists did not fudge data, but they should have been more open about their work
The Guardian
8 July 2010
Climate emails and climagate : Sir Muir Russell Muir Russell during the release of his report into the scandal of the hacked emails sent by climate scientists from University of East Anglia. Photograph: Sang Tan/AP
The climate scientists at the centre of a media storm over leaked emails were yesterday cleared of accusations that they fudged their results and silenced critics, but a review found they had failed to be open enough about their work.
Sir Muir Russell, the senior civil servant who led a six-month inquiry into the affair, said the "rigour and honesty" of the scientists at the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia (UEA) were not in doubt. His investigation concluded they did not subvert the peer review process to censor criticism and that key data was freely available and could be used by any "competent" researcher.
But the panel said the scientists' responses to "reasonable requests for information" had been "unhelpful and defensive". The inquiry found "emails might have been deleted in order to make them unavailable should a subsequent request be made for them" and that there had been "a consistent pattern of failing to display the proper degree of openness". Scientists also failed to appreciate the risk their lack of transparency posed to the university and "indeed to the credibility of UK climate science".
The controversy began when 13 years of emails from CRU scientists were released online last year...
Muir Russell report says scientists did not fudge data, but they should have been more open about their work
The Guardian
8 July 2010
Climate emails and climagate : Sir Muir Russell Muir Russell during the release of his report into the scandal of the hacked emails sent by climate scientists from University of East Anglia. Photograph: Sang Tan/AP
The climate scientists at the centre of a media storm over leaked emails were yesterday cleared of accusations that they fudged their results and silenced critics, but a review found they had failed to be open enough about their work.
Sir Muir Russell, the senior civil servant who led a six-month inquiry into the affair, said the "rigour and honesty" of the scientists at the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia (UEA) were not in doubt. His investigation concluded they did not subvert the peer review process to censor criticism and that key data was freely available and could be used by any "competent" researcher.
But the panel said the scientists' responses to "reasonable requests for information" had been "unhelpful and defensive". The inquiry found "emails might have been deleted in order to make them unavailable should a subsequent request be made for them" and that there had been "a consistent pattern of failing to display the proper degree of openness". Scientists also failed to appreciate the risk their lack of transparency posed to the university and "indeed to the credibility of UK climate science".
The controversy began when 13 years of emails from CRU scientists were released online last year...
Monday, June 28, 2010
Staples to Pay $38 Million to Settle Asst. Manager OT Case
Staples to Pay $38 Million to Settle Asst. Manager OT Case
Wage Law
November 20, 2007
A wage & hour class action lawsuit brought against Staples Inc. on behalf of approximately 1,700 current and former assistant store managers in California has been settled for $38 million. The settlement is still subject to court approval. A trial had been scheduled to start earlier this month. The suit alleged that the stores misclassified assistant managers as exempt under overtime pay regulations. According to a 2003 SEC filing, the lawsuit alleged damages of up to $150 million. The company denied the claims and admitted no wrongdoing in the settlement. A spokesperson for the office products firm said that "Staples believes that its store labor model, which is based on a commitment to fair and respectful treatment of its associates, is fully compliant with applicable California law.''
136
Sales Manager salaries
at Staples
$46,152
8
District Sales Manager salaries
at Staples
$120,375
4
Regional sales manager salaries
at Staples
$116,000
3
Sales/Operations Manager salaries
at Staples
$43,666
2
Operations and Sales Manager salaries
at Staples
$47k - $59k
2
Assistant Store Manager/Sales Manager salaries
at Staples
$35k - $49k
2
Senior Manager, Inside Sales salaries
at Staples
$75k - $86k
2
SBA Inside Sales Account Manager salaries
at Staples
$57k - $65k
2
OPERATION MANAGER/SALES MANAGER salaries
at Staples
$42k - $48k
2
Sales Manager/Assistant Store Manager salaries
at Staples
$34k - $55k
Wage Law
November 20, 2007
A wage & hour class action lawsuit brought against Staples Inc. on behalf of approximately 1,700 current and former assistant store managers in California has been settled for $38 million. The settlement is still subject to court approval. A trial had been scheduled to start earlier this month. The suit alleged that the stores misclassified assistant managers as exempt under overtime pay regulations. According to a 2003 SEC filing, the lawsuit alleged damages of up to $150 million. The company denied the claims and admitted no wrongdoing in the settlement. A spokesperson for the office products firm said that "Staples believes that its store labor model, which is based on a commitment to fair and respectful treatment of its associates, is fully compliant with applicable California law.''
136
Sales Manager salaries
at Staples
$46,152
8
District Sales Manager salaries
at Staples
$120,375
4
Regional sales manager salaries
at Staples
$116,000
3
Sales/Operations Manager salaries
at Staples
$43,666
2
Operations and Sales Manager salaries
at Staples
$47k - $59k
2
Assistant Store Manager/Sales Manager salaries
at Staples
$35k - $49k
2
Senior Manager, Inside Sales salaries
at Staples
$75k - $86k
2
SBA Inside Sales Account Manager salaries
at Staples
$57k - $65k
2
OPERATION MANAGER/SALES MANAGER salaries
at Staples
$42k - $48k
2
Sales Manager/Assistant Store Manager salaries
at Staples
$34k - $55k
Saturday, June 26, 2010
The Boycott Divestment Sanctions Movement
The Boycott Divestment Sanctions Movement
Adam Horowitz and Philip Weiss
June 9, 2010
In April the student senate at the University of California, Berkeley, twice held all-night sessions to debate a proposal urging the school to divest from two US military companies "materially and militarily profiting" from the occupation of the Palestinian territories. Hundreds of people packed the hall, and statements in support of the measure were read aloud from leaders, including Noam Chomsky, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Naomi Klein and Alice Walker. In the end the divestment measure failed (the senate majority of 13 to 5 was not enough to overturn the student government president's veto), but the outcome was surely less significant than the furor over the issue. Following related battles last year at Hampshire College and the Toronto International Film Festival, the Berkeley measure was yet another signal that the divestment initiative, part of a broader movement popularly known as BDS, for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, has become a key battleground in the grassroots struggle over the future of Israel/Palestine.
"We're at a super-exciting moment, truly a turning point," says Rebecca Vilkomerson of Jewish Voice for Peace, an activist organization that supports selective divestment from companies profiting from the occupation. "For the first time we're seeing a serious debate of divestment at a major public university." BDS supporters say the movement has the potential to transform international opinion in much the way that the divestment movement in the 1980s isolated the South African apartheid regime. Or as Tutu wrote to the Berkeley students:
The same issue of equality is what motivates the divestment movement of today, which tries to end Israel's 43 year long occupation and the unequal treatment of the Palestinian people by the Israeli government ruling over them. The abuses they face are real, and no person should be offended by principled, morally consistent, nonviolent acts to oppose them. It is no more wrong to call out Israel in particular for its abuses than it was to call out the Apartheid regime in particular for its abuses.
Opponents of BDS see just that threat—that Israel will be isolated. They say that BDS unfairly singles out Israel for conduct that other states are also guilty of and that it seeks to delegitimize the Jewish state in the eyes of the world, thereby threatening Israel's existence. Some argue that grassroots actions put the emphasis on the wrong target. As Rabbi Arthur Waskow of the Shalom Center said on Democracy Now! in March, "It's the United States government you've got to look to, not private industry or private commerce. So that's one really big difference simply at strategic and tactical levels."
When did the BDS movement begin, why is it growing and what does it want?
The campaign traces its origins to a July 2004 advisory opinion by the International Court of Justice (the World Court), which found Israel's separation wall in the West Bank to be "contrary to international law." The ICJ also recommended that the parts of the wall built inside the occupied territories be dismantled and that Palestinians affected by the wall be compensated. When a year passed with no sign that the opinion would be enforced, a wide-ranging coalition of more than 170 organizations representing Palestinian civil society issued a call for boycott, divestment and sanction of Israel "until it complies with international law and universal principles of human rights." Compliance meant three things: ending the occupation, recognizing equal rights for Palestinian citizens of Israel and respecting the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN Resolution 194 of 1948...
The Jewish push for peace is surging through the grassroots, but leaders and policy-makers are still turning a deaf ear.
Adam Horowitz and Philip Weiss
Israel vs. Human Rights (Regions and Countries)
American Jews Rethink Israel
The Jewish push for peace is surging through the grassroots, but leaders and policy-makers are still turning a deaf ear.
Adam Horowitz and Philip Weiss
Adam Horowitz and Philip Weiss
June 9, 2010
In April the student senate at the University of California, Berkeley, twice held all-night sessions to debate a proposal urging the school to divest from two US military companies "materially and militarily profiting" from the occupation of the Palestinian territories. Hundreds of people packed the hall, and statements in support of the measure were read aloud from leaders, including Noam Chomsky, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Naomi Klein and Alice Walker. In the end the divestment measure failed (the senate majority of 13 to 5 was not enough to overturn the student government president's veto), but the outcome was surely less significant than the furor over the issue. Following related battles last year at Hampshire College and the Toronto International Film Festival, the Berkeley measure was yet another signal that the divestment initiative, part of a broader movement popularly known as BDS, for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, has become a key battleground in the grassroots struggle over the future of Israel/Palestine.
"We're at a super-exciting moment, truly a turning point," says Rebecca Vilkomerson of Jewish Voice for Peace, an activist organization that supports selective divestment from companies profiting from the occupation. "For the first time we're seeing a serious debate of divestment at a major public university." BDS supporters say the movement has the potential to transform international opinion in much the way that the divestment movement in the 1980s isolated the South African apartheid regime. Or as Tutu wrote to the Berkeley students:
The same issue of equality is what motivates the divestment movement of today, which tries to end Israel's 43 year long occupation and the unequal treatment of the Palestinian people by the Israeli government ruling over them. The abuses they face are real, and no person should be offended by principled, morally consistent, nonviolent acts to oppose them. It is no more wrong to call out Israel in particular for its abuses than it was to call out the Apartheid regime in particular for its abuses.
Opponents of BDS see just that threat—that Israel will be isolated. They say that BDS unfairly singles out Israel for conduct that other states are also guilty of and that it seeks to delegitimize the Jewish state in the eyes of the world, thereby threatening Israel's existence. Some argue that grassroots actions put the emphasis on the wrong target. As Rabbi Arthur Waskow of the Shalom Center said on Democracy Now! in March, "It's the United States government you've got to look to, not private industry or private commerce. So that's one really big difference simply at strategic and tactical levels."
When did the BDS movement begin, why is it growing and what does it want?
The campaign traces its origins to a July 2004 advisory opinion by the International Court of Justice (the World Court), which found Israel's separation wall in the West Bank to be "contrary to international law." The ICJ also recommended that the parts of the wall built inside the occupied territories be dismantled and that Palestinians affected by the wall be compensated. When a year passed with no sign that the opinion would be enforced, a wide-ranging coalition of more than 170 organizations representing Palestinian civil society issued a call for boycott, divestment and sanction of Israel "until it complies with international law and universal principles of human rights." Compliance meant three things: ending the occupation, recognizing equal rights for Palestinian citizens of Israel and respecting the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN Resolution 194 of 1948...
The Jewish push for peace is surging through the grassroots, but leaders and policy-makers are still turning a deaf ear.
Adam Horowitz and Philip Weiss
Israel vs. Human Rights (Regions and Countries)
American Jews Rethink Israel
The Jewish push for peace is surging through the grassroots, but leaders and policy-makers are still turning a deaf ear.
Adam Horowitz and Philip Weiss
Yes, It Was Murder: 'Bloody Sunday' Report Released at Last
Bloody Sunday's Architects
Peter Pringle
June 24, 2010
The British excel at political theater, but the carefully staged publication of the long-awaited Saville report on Bloody Sunday produced an effect no government choreographer could possibly have predicted. A large crowd, several hundred strong, of Northern Ireland's nationalists had gathered by a TV screen in front of Derry's Victorian Guildhall awaiting—anxiously, fearfully—an announcement to accompany the publication by the new Tory prime minister, David Cameron. Four words caused the crowd to raise a prolonged cheer: "I am deeply sorry," Cameron told the House of Commons.
Yes, It Was Murder: 'Bloody Sunday' Report Released at Last
'Bloody Sunday' Apologies, What About Monday?
After thirty-eight years, the British government had finally, officially, apologized for the shooting by paratroopers of twenty-seven unarmed Catholics, thirteen of whom died, as they marched protesting internment-without-trial through Derry's Bogside on January 30, 1972...
Peter Pringle
June 24, 2010
The British excel at political theater, but the carefully staged publication of the long-awaited Saville report on Bloody Sunday produced an effect no government choreographer could possibly have predicted. A large crowd, several hundred strong, of Northern Ireland's nationalists had gathered by a TV screen in front of Derry's Victorian Guildhall awaiting—anxiously, fearfully—an announcement to accompany the publication by the new Tory prime minister, David Cameron. Four words caused the crowd to raise a prolonged cheer: "I am deeply sorry," Cameron told the House of Commons.
Yes, It Was Murder: 'Bloody Sunday' Report Released at Last
'Bloody Sunday' Apologies, What About Monday?
After thirty-eight years, the British government had finally, officially, apologized for the shooting by paratroopers of twenty-seven unarmed Catholics, thirteen of whom died, as they marched protesting internment-without-trial through Derry's Bogside on January 30, 1972...
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Kyrgyz claim that Uzbeks destroyed their own homes
How do you tell when someone is lying? It's not always this easy.
After 4 days, violence subsides in Kyrgyzstan, but ethnic resentments linger
Washington Post
By Philip P. Pan
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
JALAL-ABAD, KYRGYZSTAN -- The main road through this rustic town on the edge of the rich fields of the Fergana Valley offers a telling view of the destruction that has unfolded in southern Kyrgyzstan in recent days.
On one side of the street, the University of People's Friendship is a charred ruin, a symbol of ethnic harmony no more. Across the road, a community TV station has been left a blackened shell. Then come the torched cafes and shops, followed by seven blocks of burned-out Uzbek homes, a miserable procession interrupted only by the trees that residents cut down in a desperate bid to slow rampaging Kyrgyz mobs.
After more than four days of ethnic clashes that have left hundreds dead, the violence appeared to subside Tuesday in Jalal-Abad. In an interview, Kyrgyzstan's defense minister said the government had largely restored order here and in the nearby city of Osh...
"Batyrov said that Osh and Jalal-Abad would be theirs and that his policy was to make them Uzbek towns," Aibek said. Asked to explain the attacks on Uzbek neighborhoods, he replied, "People did this only after what the Uzbeks did to us in Osh." He then repeated widely circulating rumors that Uzbek gangs had raped Kyrgyz women there.
A soft-spoken man in the crowd volunteered that he agreed, arguing that the Uzbeks had destroyed their own homes. But as he spoke, a young Uzbek woman standing behind him grimaced and shook her head. Finally, she interrupted. "That's not the truth!" she objected. "That's not what happened!" ...
After 4 days, violence subsides in Kyrgyzstan, but ethnic resentments linger
Washington Post
By Philip P. Pan
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
JALAL-ABAD, KYRGYZSTAN -- The main road through this rustic town on the edge of the rich fields of the Fergana Valley offers a telling view of the destruction that has unfolded in southern Kyrgyzstan in recent days.
On one side of the street, the University of People's Friendship is a charred ruin, a symbol of ethnic harmony no more. Across the road, a community TV station has been left a blackened shell. Then come the torched cafes and shops, followed by seven blocks of burned-out Uzbek homes, a miserable procession interrupted only by the trees that residents cut down in a desperate bid to slow rampaging Kyrgyz mobs.
After more than four days of ethnic clashes that have left hundreds dead, the violence appeared to subside Tuesday in Jalal-Abad. In an interview, Kyrgyzstan's defense minister said the government had largely restored order here and in the nearby city of Osh...
"Batyrov said that Osh and Jalal-Abad would be theirs and that his policy was to make them Uzbek towns," Aibek said. Asked to explain the attacks on Uzbek neighborhoods, he replied, "People did this only after what the Uzbeks did to us in Osh." He then repeated widely circulating rumors that Uzbek gangs had raped Kyrgyz women there.
A soft-spoken man in the crowd volunteered that he agreed, arguing that the Uzbeks had destroyed their own homes. But as he spoke, a young Uzbek woman standing behind him grimaced and shook her head. Finally, she interrupted. "That's not the truth!" she objected. "That's not what happened!" ...
Monday, June 07, 2010
Father of New Jersey terror suspect Carlos Almonte says he's not supporting his son
My guess is that this father, who says he doesn't want to talk to his jailed son, also wasn't much interested in talking to his son when the boy was growing up.
Father of New Jersey terror suspect Carlos Almonte says he's not supporting his son
BY Barry Paddock, Robert Gearty, Henrick Karoliszyn and Helen Kennedy
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS
June 7th 2010
The father of one of the two accused Jersey jihadists says he is so disgusted with his son that he didn't attend his court appearance Monday.
"I'm not supporting anybody that does something wrong," Pedro Almonte said of his 24-year-old son, Carlos, in an interview with the Daily News.
The Dominican immigrant from Elmwood Park, N.J., said he doesn't know what to make of Carlos, who converted to militant Islam and changed his name to Omar after high school when he fell in with Mohamed Alessa, 20.
"I don't want to talk to anybody - even him," the father said...
Father of New Jersey terror suspect Carlos Almonte says he's not supporting his son
BY Barry Paddock, Robert Gearty, Henrick Karoliszyn and Helen Kennedy
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS
June 7th 2010
The father of one of the two accused Jersey jihadists says he is so disgusted with his son that he didn't attend his court appearance Monday.
"I'm not supporting anybody that does something wrong," Pedro Almonte said of his 24-year-old son, Carlos, in an interview with the Daily News.
The Dominican immigrant from Elmwood Park, N.J., said he doesn't know what to make of Carlos, who converted to militant Islam and changed his name to Omar after high school when he fell in with Mohamed Alessa, 20.
"I don't want to talk to anybody - even him," the father said...
Elections for judges: Judges must hold themselves apart from "the people" if they are to have any credibility and impartiality when ruling on cas
It's bad enough that most politicians owe their elections to contributions from corporations and wealthy individuals and organizations. Judges shouldn't be in the same boat. They should be a separate branch of government that upholds the law without political influence. Democracy in the courtroom exists in the jury system; the judge should be beholden only to the law, not to popular opinion at the time.
The Case Against Judicial Elections: Keep Politics Out of the Law
Andrew Cohen
AOL News
June 6, 2010
The single greatest threat to the "rule of law" in America is not President Barack Obama's health care reform or President George W. Bush's terror law tactics. It isn't a bunch of al-Qaeda thugs posing as terrorists. It isn't punitive damage verdicts in civil cases or, far less seriously, "judicial activism" of the sort loosely talked about all the time by the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The biggest single threat to fair and neutral justice is the trend toward partisan judicial elections at the state and local level. Through this practice, tiny pockets of zealous partisans mobilize to vote into office judges who, in the manner of an elected politician, are then presumed to owe something to their constituents. Or, in the alternative, special-interest groups rise up to vote off the bench judges who have not ruled the way those constituents wanted them to. These elections mark a terribly destructive seepage of politics into law.
In California, for example, a coalition of religious conservatives called Better Courts Now is trying to remove four San Diego-based state court judges. The group's philosophy on judging is as simple as it is misguided. "As a branch of government, judges don't get to hold themselves apart from the people -- they are servants of the people." I am quite certain that every single member of the United States Supreme Court today would disagree entirely with that sentence. Judges must, in many significant ways, hold themselves apart from "the people" if they are to have any credibility and impartiality when ruling on cases...
Of course, judges, like all of us, must balance competing principles when making a decision.
Justice Souter’s Class
By LINDA GREENHOUSE
New York Times
June 3, 2010
..But for those who care about the Supreme Court, Justice Souter served up some rich fare: his own vision of the craft of constitutional interpretation and a defense of the need for judges to go beyond the plain text — what he called the “fair-reading model” — and make choices among the competing values embedded in the Constitution. Doing this was neither judicial activism nor “making up the law,” he said; rather, it was the unavoidable “stuff of judging,” and to suppose otherwise was to “egregiously” miss the point of what constitutional law is about...
The Case Against Judicial Elections: Keep Politics Out of the Law
Andrew Cohen
AOL News
June 6, 2010
The single greatest threat to the "rule of law" in America is not President Barack Obama's health care reform or President George W. Bush's terror law tactics. It isn't a bunch of al-Qaeda thugs posing as terrorists. It isn't punitive damage verdicts in civil cases or, far less seriously, "judicial activism" of the sort loosely talked about all the time by the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The biggest single threat to fair and neutral justice is the trend toward partisan judicial elections at the state and local level. Through this practice, tiny pockets of zealous partisans mobilize to vote into office judges who, in the manner of an elected politician, are then presumed to owe something to their constituents. Or, in the alternative, special-interest groups rise up to vote off the bench judges who have not ruled the way those constituents wanted them to. These elections mark a terribly destructive seepage of politics into law.
In California, for example, a coalition of religious conservatives called Better Courts Now is trying to remove four San Diego-based state court judges. The group's philosophy on judging is as simple as it is misguided. "As a branch of government, judges don't get to hold themselves apart from the people -- they are servants of the people." I am quite certain that every single member of the United States Supreme Court today would disagree entirely with that sentence. Judges must, in many significant ways, hold themselves apart from "the people" if they are to have any credibility and impartiality when ruling on cases...
Of course, judges, like all of us, must balance competing principles when making a decision.
Justice Souter’s Class
By LINDA GREENHOUSE
New York Times
June 3, 2010
..But for those who care about the Supreme Court, Justice Souter served up some rich fare: his own vision of the craft of constitutional interpretation and a defense of the need for judges to go beyond the plain text — what he called the “fair-reading model” — and make choices among the competing values embedded in the Constitution. Doing this was neither judicial activism nor “making up the law,” he said; rather, it was the unavoidable “stuff of judging,” and to suppose otherwise was to “egregiously” miss the point of what constitutional law is about...
Friday, June 04, 2010
BP investors want dividends rather than paying to clean up oil spill
BP puts containment cap on gushing Gulf well pipe
Anna Driver
Jun 4, 2010
Reuters
BP began capturing some oil spewing from a 46-day gusher on Friday after installing a containment cap atop a ruptured Gulf of Mexico well as President Barack Obama was set to make his third trip to the area since the disaster.
BP Plc executives sought to reassure jittery investors with a conference call but put off a decision on whether to suspend paying its next quarterly dividend as some U.S. politicians had demanded.
BP shares had been up 4 percent but the gains were pared back in Friday's session after company CEO Tony Hayward issued the statement.
The U.S. Coast Guard said the containment cap placed atop the gusher a mile deep beneath the Gulf's surface was now collecting about 1,000 barrels a day.
The collection rate is a small portion of 19,000 barrels per day that the U.S. government has estimated could be gushing from the well.
The captured amount should increase as BP closes vents to trap more oil, Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen told reporters in a conference call.
Anna Driver
Jun 4, 2010
Reuters
BP began capturing some oil spewing from a 46-day gusher on Friday after installing a containment cap atop a ruptured Gulf of Mexico well as President Barack Obama was set to make his third trip to the area since the disaster.
BP Plc executives sought to reassure jittery investors with a conference call but put off a decision on whether to suspend paying its next quarterly dividend as some U.S. politicians had demanded.
BP shares had been up 4 percent but the gains were pared back in Friday's session after company CEO Tony Hayward issued the statement.
The U.S. Coast Guard said the containment cap placed atop the gusher a mile deep beneath the Gulf's surface was now collecting about 1,000 barrels a day.
The collection rate is a small portion of 19,000 barrels per day that the U.S. government has estimated could be gushing from the well.
The captured amount should increase as BP closes vents to trap more oil, Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen told reporters in a conference call.
Tuesday, June 01, 2010
A Battle Over Who Speaks for Latinos in Vista Schools
A Battle Over Who Speaks for Latinos in Vista Schools
May 31, 2010
Voice of San Diego
By EMILY ALPERT
Before Eduardo Preciado took over, it was a placid committee where parents gave their input on programs for English learners in Vista schools.
Now the group is embroiled in Vista's struggle to find a voice for a Latino community that has grown in numbers but not in political posts over the last decade.
Preciado has changed the committee on English learners into a platform for a small but passionate group of Latino parents who say it's their only place to speak out on all kinds of issues. Though Latino children are now much more common than white students in Vista schools, the school board is largely white and other Latino groups are scarce. One fan calls his group "the voice of the Latino people."
But not everyone wants him to be that voice. His group has split Latino parents -- and some want the outspoken and impassioned Preciado out. Some take issue with his injection of politics into the committee. Others call him too aggressive and confrontational.
There is fierce disagreement over whether the English learners committee should even play the role Preciado has pushed it to. Such committees are supposed to advise their districts on programs for English learners. Preciado has pushed the group to voice its opinions and seek change on much broader, more controversial debates.
He rails against the teachers union and the school board. He argues that the school district has failed Latino kids, pointing to the sobering dropout rates for Latino teens and decrying cuts to busing and programs...
May 31, 2010
Voice of San Diego
By EMILY ALPERT
Before Eduardo Preciado took over, it was a placid committee where parents gave their input on programs for English learners in Vista schools.
Now the group is embroiled in Vista's struggle to find a voice for a Latino community that has grown in numbers but not in political posts over the last decade.
Preciado has changed the committee on English learners into a platform for a small but passionate group of Latino parents who say it's their only place to speak out on all kinds of issues. Though Latino children are now much more common than white students in Vista schools, the school board is largely white and other Latino groups are scarce. One fan calls his group "the voice of the Latino people."
But not everyone wants him to be that voice. His group has split Latino parents -- and some want the outspoken and impassioned Preciado out. Some take issue with his injection of politics into the committee. Others call him too aggressive and confrontational.
There is fierce disagreement over whether the English learners committee should even play the role Preciado has pushed it to. Such committees are supposed to advise their districts on programs for English learners. Preciado has pushed the group to voice its opinions and seek change on much broader, more controversial debates.
He rails against the teachers union and the school board. He argues that the school district has failed Latino kids, pointing to the sobering dropout rates for Latino teens and decrying cuts to busing and programs...
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