Saturday, January 11, 2003 Italy Admits Police Framed Genoa G8 Protestors U.S. Media Silent
Police in Genoa, Italy have admitted to fabricating evidence against globalization activists in an attempt to justify police brutality during protests at the July 2001 G8 Summit. In searches of the Nexis database, FAIR has been unable to find a single mention of this development in any major U.S. newspapers or magazines, national television news shows or wire service stories.
According to reports from the BBC and the German wire service Deutsche Presse-Agentur (1/7/03, 1/8/03), a senior Genoa police officer, Pietro Troiani, has admitted that police planted two Molotov cocktails in a school that was serving as a dormitory for activists from the Genoa Social Forum. The bombs were apparently planted in order to justify the police force's brutal July 22 raid on the school. According to the BBC, the bombs had in fact been found elsewhere in the city, and Troijani now says planting them at the school was a "silly" thing to do.
The BBC and DPA also report that another senior officer has admitted to faking the stabbing of a police officer in order to frame protesters. These revelations have emerged over the course of a parliamentary inquiry into police conduct... Three police chiefs have been transferred and at least 77 officers have been investigated on brutality charges...
Here is the rest of the story from FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting) about the lack of U.S. coverage.
Posted by Karsten Barde,
10:24 PM
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Republican Does Something Right!
Illinois' Republican Governor George Ryan has commuted the death sentences of everyone sitting on Illinois' death row. [NYT] It warms my heart to know that some of them out there haven't compromised their principles to the uber-conservative kill-em-it's-the-Lord's-justice mentality.
Posted by Jonathan,
11:13 AM
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Friday, January 10, 2003 Some Fringe Website?
Alex Talcott on dartlog has this complaint about a NYT column:
I can't believe the Times ran this Even for the NYT, this is pretty bad. One gem: "'The only absolutely guaranteed, permanent contraception is castration,' one Catholic site suggests helpfully. Hmmmm. You first." This is so obviously fringe that it's irresponsible to include in a position piece, especially as early as paragraph four, as if it's a significant part of Kristof's argument (emphasis added).
Well, I thought the site was probably a fringe outfit, but as I looked at the site I'm not so sure. I think this says more about Mr. Talcott's ability to see bias in everything the New York Times prints (though I'm not a big fan of the columnist in question, Nicholas Kristof). The quotation in the NYT column comes from catholic.net. They claim to have been endorsed by the Vatican:
"This [CICI] is Very, Very Great !!" said Pope John Paul II at the demonstration of the Catholic Information Center on Internet on October 7, 1995 by James S. Mulholland, Jr., Founder and President of CICI.
The fact that the Pope endorsed the site is also confirmed by a nexis search. For more info on Catholic.net check out here. The website Kristof refers to is hardly the fringe group I thought it would be. It has some slickly designed webpages too!
Also, this website says that Catholic.net was founded by a group not originally prominent within Catholic press, but that: Catholic.net was launched with Vatican endorsement in 1995, and recently joined Catholic Twin Circle Publishing Group, initiating a Spanish site as well.
Posted by Timothy,
10:09 PM
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Should public schools be allowed to ban the wearing of confederate flag T-shirts?
Check out this Slate article. This raises a lot of interesting issues about law and free speech.
Plus: Andrew Kallman responds to my post yesterday attacking him for his criticism of Andrew Hanauer's article. Now you all be sure to all read it, because he complains that he does not have "equal opportunity to present [his] argument" as I posted my initial defense of Hanauer not on a blog to which he belonged, but on this blog. I replied again here which you masochists can take a look at. The only interesting part in is the middle where I outline how former Reagan Chief of Staff Don Regan said that President Reagan's scheduling was controlled by Nancy Reagan's astrology, contrary to Mr. Kallman's claims that this assertion of mine is 'blatantly false.'
Posted by Timothy,
9:37 PM
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Gun crimes? In Britain? B-b-b-but how?
But wait? How is this possible? Didn't Blair place a "total ban" on guns? Don't the customs offices search everyone upon arrival? Wasn't Britain supposed to be safe and civilized? What's going on?
I know correlation doesn't imply causation, but I could have sworn the purpose of gun control was to control guns...
Posted by Brad Plumer,
4:31 PM
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Re: Guilty especially if not proven guilty?
Mr. Sarma: Maybe I'm just brainwashed, but I interpreted Negroponte's statement a little differently. Plenty of Iraqi defectors have openly said that Mr. Hussein has continued his chemical weapons programs since 1998. And apparently none of this was mentioned in the big fat 12,000 page report (which, admittedly, I have not looked through). Well, where are these weapons? Were they dismantled? Were the defectors lying? (Which means that we should take Mr. Hussein's word over the defectors').
I can think of plenty of good reasons not to invade Iraq. But you seem to imply that Mr. Hussein has no weapons. That's just silly. He was always guilty until proven innocent. I don't see how it can be otherwise.
And as for Iran, yes, I think the US should support the moderate movement there. Maybe even try to engineer a little coup. (Though I'd love to hear arguments against doing this).
Posted by Brad Plumer,
4:00 PM
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In typical Orwellian fashion the writing on the White House barn that once read "Innocent until proven guilty" has just morphed unexpectedly into "guilty until proven guilty"... but wait, don't look now but I think it's just changed again... now it says "guilty especially if not proven guilty". Or maybe it said that all along and I was just to zoned out to realize it. Yawn, back to bed and my Fox News intravenous drip.
For those of you wondering, I'm referring to The Bush Administration's policy on weapons inspections in Iraq. It began to say "guilty until proven guilty" when Rumsfeld began reciting the mantra "The absence of evidence is not evidence of absence" to anyone who would listen. (What scares me most about this phrase is that if you look it up on Google, you actually get links to a bunch of quacks arguing for the existence of UFO's. And I'd thought Reagan's schedule being almost entirely controlled by Nancy Reagan's astrologer was the last we were going to hear of this type of thing. Personally, I think all the time these people have spent contemplating Star Wars missile defense has made them a bit cooky.)
Now, as weapons inspectors repeatedly turn up nothing in Iraq, the Bush administration has grown noticeably more restless, the "White House barn" has become the newspaper, and the writing on it says "guilty especially if not proven guilty". According to US ambassador to the UN, John Negroponte, if Iraqi doesn't come forward with evidence of its own guilt by January 27th, it will be "an extremely serious matter". So now Iraq must admit its own guilt in order to be found innocent, and is "extra guilty" if no evidence is found. Excuse me, but did someone accidentally screw the President's head on backwards again this morning?
The months of January and February have long been earmarked as the official "invade Iraq" season on the Bush family hunting calendar, and they are definitely getting fidgety with the lack of evidence coming out of UN weapons inspections. Far from "confirming" the existence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, the weapons inspectors are unearthing evidence that many US allegations were nothing more than a load of hot air: Most crucially, the central piece of evidence presented by the US -- Iraq's importation of aluminum tubes -- has been shown by weapons inspectors to have nothing to do with any alleged plan to build centrifuges for nuclear uranium. True, the aluminum importation broke Iraqi sanctions regulations, and it was, according to the inspectors, intended to built rockets, but all of this is a far cry from "evidence of weapons of mass destruction".
Meanwhile, we're getting needle-in-the-haystack arguments out-the-wazoo from many commentators, who point out that Iraq is bigger than California, and very easy to hide weapons in, so how can we be expected to find the evidence before we go to war next month, and wahh! wahh! mommy! Saddam punched me while your back was turned! To the rest of the world, America must look like such a baby, because, they might explain patiently: "If you really wanted comprehensive weapons inspections, then you never should have ordered the weapons inspectors to leave Iraq in 1998, so you could bomb. What's more, it was particularly childish of you to then go around telling all your friends that it was Saddam who kicked out the weapons inspectors... You had a choice between bombing and inspections, and you chose to bomb, so live with it." After forcing the UN to withdraw all oversight in preparation for Operation Desert Fox, we're now trying to turn around and blame Iraq for lack of UN oversight.
I don't mean to imply that Saddam Hussein hasn't committed War Crimes, but the Bush administration's case for war completely lacks any sense of credibility or justice. Too many of Bush's policymakers were Saddam's biggest supporters during the 80's when he committed all the crimes he's accused of (except for the invasion of Iraq, which they obviously opposed). If we're going to have justice with Saddam Hussein, let the judge not be his co-conspirators who were egging him on to commit the crimes in the first place. If we allow this sort of "mafia-style justice" to prevail, we're certain to end up with mafia-style grudges to contend with, more of the kind we faced on September 11th.
...This is my first time posting on Free Dartmouth. Hope all of this is not too grossly irrelevant to the current trend of conversation. In any case, I wanted to get a feel for people's sentiments on this seemingly inevitable war we're approaching. If invading Iraq is ok, should North Korea be next? What about Iran? Are the gross financial expenses of all of this war really a price worth paying? If not, then how can we escape being cast as unpatriotic, for opposing war (I know I did a particularly bad job at this in what I just wrote). What I want to know is how can we point out the contradictions in our own nation's foreign policy without being pidgeonholed as unamerican?
Alright, I'm all blogged out for tonight.
-justin
Posted by Justin Sarma,
3:15 AM
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Thursday, January 09, 2003 Jared
I'm not sure about John Kerry, but look at this silly thing John Edwards said:
"The fact that I see issues through the eyes of regular people is an enormous strength... Look at the way I reacted when I saw those planes going into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The first thing I asked was, 'Where is Elizabeth? Where are my kids?' People wanted to know whether their kids were safe. Washington's answer to that is to rearrange a bunch of government bureaucracies."
Posted by Timothy,
7:47 PM
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Racist Races to elect Reagan
Earlier, I said I enjoyed reading Andrew Hanauer's column on Trent Lott, but Andrew Kallman on the Dartmouth Observer apparently is not unconvinced. I can think of other examples Hanauer left out (how could he not), but I'm distinctly unimpressed by Kallman's response. If Kallman can't understand why beginning a presidential campaign in a town known for the killing of three civil rights workers isn't a racial signal, I'd like him to tell us why Reagan (or his campaign) chose that oh-so-obvious place. If talk about state's rights, the language used to defend slavery and segregation, is not always racist, talking about it in that context rightly raise eyebrows to those paying attention.
The point of the racist signals is to be somewhat ambigious: you say something that anyone who knows the context (i.e. racists) will know what it is about, but you can deny you knew about the context later. Are we to expect that the political strategists deciding where to launch Reagan's campaign didn't research the town and didn't think about the message it would send? I for one don't think they were that ignorant, and I hope Kallman isn't dumb or naive enough to think they were. Actually Kallman concedes Reagan knew, but does not offer any conceivable explanation why Reagan would still choose that town. It is not like Reagan was born there, was he? The best reason I can see for making that statement in that town while launching your campaign is that Reagan wanted to send a signal to certain Southerners that he was on their side. If there is a better explanation why that town was chosen, I'd like to hear it and in absence of anything plausible, it is more than fair for Hanauer to cite that as an example. The Republicans won both houses of Congress in 1994 largely because of a shift in one region: the South. Also, I think John Derbyshire of The National Review is right when he says that Republicans would not win nationally without the support of that (however small) segments of racists. Why is this so? Interesting to ponder.... I'm open to other interpretations.
What would be proof for Kallman that Reagan's campaign knowingly appealled to racists? Kallman didn't think it was fair of Hanauer to cite one old example of Rush Limbaugh saying "Take that bone out of your nose and call me back" to a Black caller. What if Reagan had said in public something like what Rush Limbaugh said to that black caller (which I hope Kallman thinks is racist)?Apparently Kallman thinks that to rightly be called racist, you have to issue one racist statement after another after another. (Gee, I'm sure Limbaugh hasn't... but let's check his archived transcripts.... oh wait, those aren't easily available... I wonder why Hanauer supposedly relied on a liberal quote sheet. I'll give another example from a liberal source who has it on tape: "Black students do not have the genetic-heretary-backround to score an average or higher-than-average test score in college." Isolated incident, right?) Yes, there needs to be a pattern. In the case of the Republican party there is. It's inevitable that in the space of 800 words, a D column is not going to be at the level of a senior thesis (though many books have been written on this topic) but I thought it was pretty decent.
Before and during the Lott fiasco, I often heard things like 'you can't call someone racist because you can't see their heart.' Well if you want to maintain that, at least admit that it is not always illegitimate to judge someone based on their public statements and actions, especially ones that are not exceptions (Limbaugh) and/or were planned and well thought through (Reagan).
By the way, if anyone wants to cite examples of racism from White Southern Democrats and argue that the pattern extends to American politics in the South or the country as a whole, knock yourself out. The Republican's 'Southern Strategy' worked because they were best able to appeal to the racists in the South that the Democrats had previously locked up. It is no suprise you still have Democratic politicians elected around from the time when Democrats excelled at playing that game.
Oh, Kallman ends with lovely talk about how Reagan was a principled man so he can't be racist: I say that sounds like unsubstantiated b.s. (no, a biography by Dinesh D'Souza or another Reagan acolyte does not count as proof). I'm not sure how his public actions show him to be so principled. For all Reagan's talk of family values, he was divorced, and as governor of California signed one of the most liberal no-fault divorce laws in the country. Reagan's talk about 'federalism,' he tied states' highway funding to states' passing laws to lower the drinking age. I guess he was real committed to federalism, huh?
Or maybe Kallman's logic unwittingly helps illustrates the point about the signals Reagan (or least his campaign) meant to send. Even if Reagan was deeply committed to some of his rhetoric, that doesn't mean he was committed to all of it, and I guess Kallman's point could be used to show that the rhetoric he didn't follow through with was the rhetoric he didn't deeply believe. Reagan did not stand up for racial progress (yes, there are details!), so I suppose that wasn't one of the principles he deeply held, right? I'm not sure how Kallman gets from Reagan's deep beliefs (in say, Star Wars or supply-side economics) to saying that one of those deep beliefs was to racial equality. Of course, even if Reagan was a 'nice' guy, he often had aides prepare cards from him on exactly what to say. But I'm sure Reagan has the soundness to select great non-racist advisors. Absolutely no question about Reagan's judgment or policies, because the man knows where to look for advice right? As a funny side note, did you know that Reagan's schedule was almost entirely controlled by Nancy Reagan's astrologer? Hmm.....
All this talk about how Reagan's friends say he was, of course, deeply principled (and he seems like a nice guy on TV, gee!) so he couldn't possibly be racist, reminds me of how people defended George W. Bush when he visited Bob Jones university. Bush may not have a racist bone in his body, as the saying goes, but he still allowed his operatives to run a dirty, racist campaign in South Carolina. One Bob Jones University Professor admitted to spreading (false) rumors that McCain fathered a black baby (it was actually adopted). If Republicans don't have a race problem, they sure a problem with how they seem to accidently run a lot of racist campaigns.
With Zell Miller not seeking re-election in Georgia, Ralph Reed might run to become a U.S. Senator. That's right, Ralph Reed, formerly of the Christian Coalition. Here's what Roll Call says: "Top ranking Republican sources said Georgia Republican Party Chairman Ralph Reed might receive the backing of the White House should he decide to enter the race." I have to say that Reed is one smart mofo as manuevering himself, though. He's got higher ambitions than I thought: with a Senate platform, I wouldn't be shocked to eventually see him run for President. God help us.
Posted by Timothy,
6:11 PM
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Bring back my baby to me!
Dartlog provides links to article in the Weekly Standard called "Eating Babies II: Coming Back for Seconds." Check it out and see the original course. Strangly, the article say that there are some things we should not even report on, like baby eating, but then these articles are printed! This brings us back to the original question I asked of whether Channel 4 in Britain should have even broadcast a picture of a Chinese artists eating a still-born baby. (I believe it was a still, rather than a video, so this doesn't seem like REAL TV or any other reality TV crap; though I think that worry and the context of TV producers being ever more reckless is part of what leads us to condemn the channel's airing of the photo, apart from the disgust at the actual act itself and how it is done in the name of art.)
Posted by Timothy,
5:54 PM
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More Trent Lott, bwawawa!!!
Read this well written article by Andrew Hanauer in The Dartmouth today. By the way, for those of you who don't know, Trent Lott might get to keep the tax-provided driver he had as Senate Majority Leader (whom Andrew Sullivan hopes is not black), gets the chairmenship of the Senate rules committee, and gets the President to renominate his favorite pick(ering) for the federal bench. I guess the Republicans truly are principled on race. I wonder what all the conservative commenters say about this now? (By the way, the New York Times has an editorial today referring to all the "moderate" Senate Republicans who spoke out against Lott. Um... didn't they initially stay silent or praise Lott because they preferred areplacement to Lott would be more conservative? And wasn't it staunch conservative Senator Nickles who first publically raised the prospect of dumping Lott? Newspapers have a stupid way of labelling 'moderates') Oh, check out TNR for a great comment about how some Republicans are thinking they can nominate Judge Pickering (who was not confirmed because of accusations of racial issues in the past) because George W. Bush has gained enough racial capital to push it through without seeming bad. They posit nominating Pickering is way for Bush to show. By the way, I haven't looked deeply at what was said about Pickering, more on that later. For now, check out here. Senator Schumer is quoted in the Post as saying Pickering's renomination "shows that Nixon's 'southern strategy' is alive and well in this White House." The conservatives claim that Pickering has really worked for racial progress in Missisippi, which could be true (in which case he's a victim) or smoke or mirrors. More likely it's a mixed past which we can debate about, particularly on how much of the past should be forgotten and forgiven. Pickering does not seem unreconstructed, but neither is he unproblematic, and I'm not certain he's getting a fair shake (of course I could be falling for Republican propaganda) under judgments many would apply to confirmations (though many of these judgments involve standards I think are probably too low). Check out the beginning of the conservative counterstrike in National Review here and here. (These articles are written by Bryan York, who wrote the bogus sensationalist National Review stories about widespread voter fraud on Indian reservations and the like. I didn't help York's case that a Republican attourney general of the state denied this was so. But it couldn't possibly be that some Republicans are attempting to suppress minority registration and turnout, noooo.... )
So rather than York, check out the NR editorial and this article by Deroy Murdock (via dartlog's campanion blog, The Inner Office, which is reserved for national issues, unless Grossman and company feel like bashing FreeDartmouth posts)). The Murdock brings up some interesting examples of 'democratic racism.' Some of examples previously unknown to me seem egregious, some rightly take to task Al Sharpton in well known incidents, but a lot of Murdock's examples involve people making accusations of racism. But I'm sorry, it's not always racist to say others are racist. When Al Gore says we shouldn't we shouldn't look at the strict construction of a constitution in which the founders included the 3/5 clause, that's not racist like Trent Lott's comments were. It may be an exaggeration, but its a perfectly legitimate piece of rhetoric to show that notions of 'strict construction' can hide something else. Nor is being for affirmative action the equivilent of wishing the Dixiecrats had triumped. One questionable example given by Murdock is to equate Helm's infamous 'white hands' ad with Dem. Rep. Charlie Rangel saying when Blacks know they will be discriminated against other white candidates are in the pool.
Playing the 'race card' can be legitimate if others are already discriminating. Of course, playing the race card can be illegitimate if that is not the case. But with conservatives proliferating examples of white racists on both sides of the aisle (like Senator Byrd and even Clinton's actions) you'd think they should draw the conclusion that racism is epidemic in our politics if so many people in government actually believe it: if you believe in their premises and follow their logic, you have to wonder why they still say it is racist to cry 'racist'.
Posted by Timothy,
5:01 PM
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RE: "How do we cry out against dividends to a population who doesn't know what they are? How do we explain the intangible threat of infrastructure instability inherent to many of the proposed social service cuts? I'm asking literally."
We can talk about effects: those would impact low-income voters in a very tangible way. Those who are unemployed or have been unemployed or in danger of unemployment, and those who need these social services, can see the immediate injustice of it. Help for those living in poverty or at the brink of poverty is either cut or, in the case of umemployment benefits, increased by a comparatively miniscule amt., while help for the rich, who are able to feed themselves and pay their heating bills in winter without extra tax breaks from the government, increases by far more in real $$s. I do not think it is difficult to see that this is unfair.
Don't sweat it, Jared. I did say "WE ivory tower liberals and progressives:" I recognize that I am certainly guilty of this, too. (I do love my ivory tower education and a tasty glass of sancerre.) As Karsten said, this is a problem a lot of us have to get over -- me included. For me, I guess that means I need to get over my delusions of entitlement and the sense of superiority I have from having been able to purchase a better education.
Brad's not an apologist for cannibalism? By that I mean, sorry Michelle - I just didn't like the ivory-tower accusation. And, you're right, Tim, we should be nice to each other.
Posted by Jared,
10:42 AM
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Can't we all just get along?
It's getting a little mean here. Can we all be a little more respectful to each other? I mean, I think name calling in jest is fine, like when I called Brad Plumer an Apologist for Cannibalism (I hope he saw it the same way, heh. Brad, it is just jealously that I can't match your great sense of humor, which sincerely is probably my greatest pleasure in reading this site).
But in the past people have accused people of not even reading their posts and insulted them personally for that. I'll single Jared out as the latest incarnation of this disrespect, with his title below attacking Michelle's discernment and saying to her: "That you took that to mean that I was displacing our political onus is somewhat unfounded if not irrational. Perhaps you should take some time whilst peering out of said tower to read." I don't think that misreading or possibly misinterpreting someone's post is 'irrational' even if it is unfounded. It is frustrating if someone does that and you feel that way, but it is bound to happen and if we personally attack each other in a sincerely mean manner every time we feel someone didn't understand us, then this is not going to be a fun site. We can attack each others' logic without always attacking each other ability to logically reason. We can easily note with greater levity if we think others have made mistakes. This is not to say that everyone actually always DOES closely read everyone's post before responding. I know I was untypically light on logic on one exchange ( I think with Jon?) a week ago, but there wasn't personal attacks then. And hopefully in the future people might excuse my too frequently hastily posted responses, written under conditions that too often involve sleep deprivation and the like (note the time of this post!). People should feel they can express their opinions freely, however tenative they are, and expect good vigorous debate and lively comebacks. This is a mixture of conversation and writing, so let's let it be a back and forth dialogue, with mistatements and all.
I can't say that we all should never attack someone for pretentiousness or other perceived sins (if I said that, those of you who know my history of attacking John Stevenson on the Dartmouth Observer would rightly call me a hypocrite). To be sure, I'm not saying to Jared, for example, that it's necessarily always unfair to accuse those who say people are being elistist and stuck in an ivory tower with doing a similar thing. But let's start with the presumption of being polite and not call each other irrational or stupid at least. Generally, rudeness is best done in a friendly manner with biting insults delivered with levity (think of how fun it is to watch Prime Minister's questions in the House of Commons). I'm not saying this should be a mandate and we should have politeness police, or that we should all be Gandhi-like. I'm saying that the discussion on the site would be better if there would be no need for those (especially personal) attacks. We should aim for a site like that. I am confident we can have sharp, pointed, funny, and respectful debate. Now I will get off my soap box, and get back to that paper on rhetoric I've been avoiding.
Posted by Timothy,
4:36 AM
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Hate to question your discernment skills, Michelle
But, you wrote
Jared wrote: "The fact that poor people don't vote is not nearly as sad as the fact that even some of them would vote for Bush." Hmm... this strikes me as a bit paternalistic. I think we have the burden of proof of convincing and educating voters rather than just blaming them for making decisions we don't agree with. What's sad is that we rich, elitist, ivory tower liberals -- and even progressives ;) -- don't think we have to bother to convince low income voters, either. We think they're too dumb to vote "right."
I wrote "even some" as in wow, that sucks. That you took that to mean that I was displacing our political onus is somewhat unfounded if not irrational. Perhaps you should take some time whilst peering out of said tower to read. While even the concept of inherent blame is a stretch unless you are reactionary or just itching for a debate, you did at least glean, if haphazardly, the point from what I wrote. We do, as you noted through the use, I assume, of mature sarcasm, that we do in fact have every responsibility to educate voters. You are right, and there is no limit to the urgency of this call.
When I was plastering Lewiston Maine at four AM on election day with flyers and doorknob hangers, I began to wonder wherein lies this burden which anyone who posts to this blog must admit to. In a Fox News culture, how do we express these sometimes abstract ideas? How do we cry out against dividends to a population who doesn't know what they are? How do we explain the intangible threat of infrastructure instability inherent to many of the proposed social service cuts? I'm asking literally. I don't know, but I know that the last election taught us that one way not to do it is to have candidates who don't know what they stand for. Anyone?
Per Karsten's post, two things. First, I consider The Guardian a rag. They were so zealous to show that the US was making a mess of the campaign in Afghanistan (which, in fact, ended up being the case, but at the time, it was not) that they printed things that seemed completely insubstantiated; no other newspaper or media outlet, in Britain or otherwise made mention of them. In particular, they printed that we sustained casualties in the token raid we performed one night on several Taliban-held areas just to show that we could. However, casualties are the type of thing that the media can pretty easily substantiate - if The Guardian prints that Johnny got his foot blown off, to double-check, someone could just contact Johnny's parents. The point is, unless we're speaking of clandestine missions, the type of story The Guardian ran, if it is as false as it seems, is a farce. While I consider the charges that the mainstream media in the US has a liberal bias to be ridiculous, I would not say the same of The Guardian.
Secondly, while I disagree with the application of the death penalty at all, I think that if one is going to apply it, juries should have it at their disposal for dispensation upon juveniles. It is implausible to think that 12 people would give the death penalty (in a fashion more unfair or unreliable than that in which it is carried out against adults, at least, which is the only standard we can compare it to) to someone too young to deserve to be accountable for their crime. Were I to believe the death penalty to be an acceptable means of punishment, and even understanding myself and virtually all of my non-retarded (pardon the political incorrectness) peers to have been 17 at the time of commiting an egregious murder, I would advocate responsibility for the crime. As for my retarded peers, even if I considered the death penalty generally useful, I would find fault in its application to such individuals.
Posted by Jonathan,
1:54 AM
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Wednesday, January 08, 2003 Swim team press release
Look here for the background info on the funding, comments from students and administrators and more on the reinstatement of the swim team. Judging by comments on dartlog.net, it looks like SA president Janos Martin is going to be praised for his efforts [update: I shouldn't have implied that all, or even most, of the statements on dartlog praise Janos, the SA, and other's efforts to reinstate the swim team. Andrew Grossman, for example, is one of the people who questioned ealier on the willingness of some students to protest the swim team cuts but not the earlier library cuts]. But I'm going to repeat some of the queries I've heard, read and thought of: Why was the focus on the swim team? What next Why didn't the large protests start earlier with the libraries? Do we (and how so can we) institutionalize the student voice? What do sports such as swimming have to do with the education mission of the College? Sure, this affects some people rather hard, but so does the reshaping of the certain libraries like Sherman, am I right about this? Was this merely the final straw? If the swim team had been cut first, and then the libraries would something different have happened (why)?
The point I'm trying to make in asking these questions is that was it the swim team itself that so many people were angry about or the lack of voice that made the elimination of the swim team possible? Does merely reinstating the swim team restore student voice? If we and can we declare victory and let the other cuts stand, does that mean we didn't care about the libraries or how the cuts happened? And one tougher question from my perspective: what if students' voices are misplaced in their priorities? If students do value the swim team more than the libraries (do they?) is that justifiable? I say that not from some paternalistic perspective that mandates interference, but merely to note that all preferences are not justifiable or rational. Students should reflect not only on how to get an institutionalized voice, but on what that institutionalized voice should be. The administration has a lot of reasons for not giving students (and alums I suppose) a voice and I don't think it is just that they don't view students as 'responsible'. But I mean to say that it is not enough to say that this is the student preference, we have to argue this preference is justified, because one excuse the administration could use to deny student voice is that students don't even offer reasons for what they think, so be sure to when you advance your case, as many (I assume) are already eloquently doing so. To conclude this convoluted post: even if the administration disagrees with what the student voice says, and the reasons students have for justifying their position, it is not wise for students to portray themselves as not even thinking about their justification.
Posted by Timothy,
10:25 PM
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For Karsten, Wherever This May Find Him
Per your last post, and the flippant mention of Tim LaHaye, I thought I would point out this bit of information, aired by Paul Krugman on 17 December of last year:
And the influence of the religious right spreads much further. The Internet commentator Atrios, who played a key role in bringing Mr. Lott's past to light, now urges us to look into the secretive Council for National Policy. This blandly named organization was founded by Tim LaHaye, co-author of the apocalyptic "Left Behind" novels, and is in effect a fundamentalist pressure group. As of 1998 the organization's membership contained many leading Congressional figures in the Republican Party, though none of the party's neoconservative intellectuals.
As I noted earlier today in a post about the Religious Right and the Republican Party, Christianizing America's schools is a de facto denial of modernity, akin to fundamentalist Islamic schools in areas we love to hate, and begins with the introduction of "creation science" into the classroom. Mr. LaHaye, popular author, and apparently, influential figure vis-a-vis the Republican Party, funded a group called the Institute for Creation Research, whose original mandate was to get flood geology (based on a Noachian deluge) and creationism back into American public schools (See Ronald Numbers' excellent account, The Creationists). Harmless fiction author, he ain't (in fact, I suspect his fiction is not quite harmless, anyway)...
M.Chui wrote: What's sad is that we rich, elitist, ivory tower liberals -- and even progressives ;) -- don't think we have to bother to convince low income voters, either...
What needs to change is that we need to learn how to talk the talk and walk the walk -- and rather than just working on some snobbish level for policies that we in our removed worlds think is good for to common proletariat, actually teach folks how to educate themselves about issues and organize their vote. They're not going to try unless they believe it is possible.
Kudos to Michelle for pointing out a pervasive--but not unresolvable--problem. Even the cynical jokes we make are representative of more fundamentally dangerous assumptions. When Republicans win, our first inclination must not be to despise the Americans who vote for them but to seek to understand them. With repugnance at "bicoastal elitism" gaining increasing prominence among voters in the heartland, we must put down our bullhorns and start listening to each other. Our heady ideals and rhetoric about "democratic pluralism" are meaningless if we don't apply them to the might-as-well-be-a-foreign-country cultures found "down home." One reason Minnesota politics are so fascinating to watch, for example, is the mixture of liberalism-labor-farm traditions.
So put on your Wranglers, pop open a Bud Light and turn up the Tim McGraw. I wouldn't suggest reading any Tim LaHaye, though. We have to draw the line somewhere. :)
Posted by Karsten Barde,
8:16 PM
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The Student Assembly has posted the full press release on their site. It seems it may not be posted on the official Office of Public Affairs site until sometime tomorrow.
The Dartmouth Observer has posted this email from the Student Body President and Vice President saying the Swim Team is back:
Dear Fellow Students-
This is a great day for Dartmouth! Today, for the first time in recent memory, we have seen the powerful impact of unified student voice. This is a victory for every student who marched to the President's lawn, who rallied on the steps of Parkhurst, and who participated in the sit-in that filled Parkhurst to its walls, forcing the administration to confront this issue. This is a victory for everyone who blitzed in their support, who wrote to the D, who drafted letters to President Wright and administrators, and for organizations that gave their unrelenting support. And of course, this is a victory for the Swimming and Diving Teams; their passionate persistence made this new decision possible, and every member of the Dartmouth community can celebrate the return of these Varsity programs together.
When we first began working on this issue, conversations with administrators were at times disheartening. However, there were significant breakthroughs on December 9th when administrators became receptive to the ideas put forth by the swim team captains and members of the Student Assembly. Over the winter break, significant leg work was done by parents of the swim team and faithful alumni. All these efforts were validated by today's announcement.
While this process was extremely arduous for all involved, we commend the administrations ultimate decision to agree upon the preservation of the Dartmouth Swimming and Diving Programs. Handling budget cuts is never easy, and we appreciate that the administration recognized the overwhelming student consensus on this issue and responded appropriately. Hopefully this experience will set a precedent for truly open communication between students and administrators on issues of great importance, and will forever strengthen student voice within our community. We look forward to the formation of the Budget Advisory Committee, which will ensure student input in upcoming budget decisions.
There are many other issues that unite us today, and the administration's willingness to compromise in the face of a mobilized student body illustrates our ability to fight for what we know is right. Thanks again to everyone for all their help!
Sincerely,
Janos Marton '04 Student Body President
Julia Hildreth '05 Student Body Vice President
UPDATE:
I checked out the official Dartmouth news site, but the press release on which the letter above is presumably based on is not up yet. But the SA has a version posted by Amit Anand (who was formerly a summer campus news editor of The Dartmouth Free Press, I might add). Kudos to quick rapid posting all around. One more update: I guess Sam Reisner above was quicker than me, posting links here on FreeDartmouth.com as I wrote this update.... heh. But here's the full text of the release:
CONTACT: OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE (603) 646-3661 January 8, 2003
DARTMOUTH TO CONTINUE SWIMMING AND DIVING PROGRAM; FUNDING SECURED THROUGH VOLUNTEER EFFORTS
HANOVER, NH – The Dartmouth men’s and women’s varsity swimming and diving programs will be continued through a funding agreement between a group of students, alumni, and parents and the Dartmouth administration. The agreement calls for the program to be fully reinstated based on a $2 million fund-raising effort. "I am very pleased that we have reached a positive outcome that enables us to continue the program," Athletic Director JoAnn Harper said. "Through the efforts of a group of generous alumni, parents and friends, and the support of President Wright, Dean Larimore, and the senior administration, we have overcome the budget pressure that forced the original decision." Dartmouth announced in late November that the swimming/diving program would be eliminated at the end of the current competitive season in March as part of planned College-wide budget reductions. A recent series of discussions between Dartmouth officials and supporters of swimming and diving (including current students, their families and alumni) produced the agreement. Under its terms the teams will be restored through $2 million in pledges to finance operating expenses for 10 years while other funding options are identified. The continuation of the program next year will be supported with funding arranged through reallocations in the Dean of the College area. "We are delighted to reach an agreement that allows the swimming and diving program at Dartmouth to continue, while recognizing the budget goals that Dartmouth must meet," said Dean of the College James Larimore. "The College does face significant budget challenges and will take the measures it must to be fiscally responsible. The agreement supports Dartmouth in meeting our fiscal responsibilities and also maintaining the swimming and diving program. We are eager to do that." President James Wright said that the plan "is a wonderful example of how the Dartmouth community can work together in a constructive effort. I commend the different groups involved – the athletes, Student Assembly, parents, and alumni/ae as well as James Larimore and JoAnn Harper and her staff, and I am pleased that we will continue to have swimming and diving at Dartmouth." The volunteer effort has been led by former Dartmouth varsity swimmers John Ballard ’55, Tom Kelsey ’54 and Steve Mullins ’54, and by several parents of swim team members, including Dean Allen, Paul and Marilyn Bochicchio, Sheila Brown Klinger, Bart Cameron, and Chuck Zarba. Ballard, chair of the Board of Overseers of Dartmouth’s Thayer School of Engineering, said the $2 million in pledges will be provided to Dartmouth through the newly formed John C. Glover Fund for the Support of Swimming and Diving. Glover, a member of the class of 1955, was widely regarded as a top sprinter when he died in early 1956 while in training as an Olympic swimmer. The athletic department presents annually the Glover Award to the swimming team member "who demonstrates the athletic and scholastic qualities associated with the late John Glover." "We are grateful to the leaders of Dartmouth for their willingness to listen to the needs of Dartmouth students, the desires of alumni, and the concerns of swimmers and divers everywhere," Ballard said. "They have earned the trust we place in them." The decision to eliminate the swimming and diving program stemmed from the impact that the current general economic downturn has had on Dartmouth, as it has on many other colleges and universities, and the resulting allocation of necessary budget reductions throughout the institution. The Dartmouth athletic department faces a $260,000 reduction of its $10.8 million annual operating budget. The department had already pared down administrative budgets, increased revenue expectations, and required reductions to intercollegiate, recreation and maintenance budgets the previous year. Dartmouth faces challenges similar to other Division I institutions in attempting to balance a broad array of intercollegiate and recreational programs and the resources available for them. Dartmouth offers one of the nation’s most extensive Division I athletic programs with 34 varsity sports — 16 men’s, 16 women’s and two coed — involving opportunities for more than 900 student-athletes, while having one of the smallest enrollments in Division I with 4,300 undergraduates. For additional background information, see the Dartmouth Public Affairs Web site, http://www.dartmouth.edu/~news/releases/2003/jan/010803a.html
Posted by Timothy,
6:26 PM
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Point of information: Jane Swift never ran for Governor .. b/c her party wouldn't nominate her to run.
*insert picture of Michelle's head with one hand on wig, the other pointing at Jared
Jared wrote: "The fact that poor people don't vote is not nearly as sad as the fact that even some of them would vote for Bush."
Hmm... this strikes me as a bit paternalistic. I think we have the burden of proof of convincing and educating voters rather than just blaming them for making decisions we don't agree with. What's sad is that we rich, elitist, ivory tower liberals -- and even progressives ;) -- don't think we have to bother to convince low income voters, either. We think they're too dumb to vote "right." Quite likely, many are just smart enough to see that really, the Democratic party isn't so big on representing their interests a lot of the time, either. Elitist academics tell poor voters they're uneducated and can't understand anything so complicated as policy and economics, etc..., so don't bother trying. Voters can then only go on social issues or personality, making them vulnerable to slick, nasty conservatives who sell out these voters to big corporations.
What needs to change is that we need to learn how to talk the talk and walk the walk -- and rather than just working on some snobbish level for policies that we in our removed worlds think is good for to common proletariat, actually teach folks how to educate themselves about issues and organize their vote. They're not going to try unless they believe it is possible.
Michelle, the reason the day to day matters is that while the economy is not determined by the trading of a given day, people very much are. While anyone with a decent investment strategy knows that they're looking long-term, any senior citizen or major group who is invested in and dependent on their stocks for income (note lesson below on dividends, frickin' non-econ people trying to talk politics) have a lot to lose day to day with the market. In a more tangible sense, the people who are buying, selling, or trading today care a great deal. Unfortunately, it also provides false-feedback for the 95% of American's who do really believe it's an indicator.
And, you're half-right on the taxes stuff. As a rich MA liberal, I can tell you Jane Swift did a lot more than raise taxes. She's not a very bright person and she had dull advisors, but she lost the election because the media, on its conservative swing, crucified her for having a child while in office, questioned every decision she made, and jumped on her flaws. She's decent but not great, but her PR lost her election, not taxes. In the end, with taxes, what Brad might consider is that when you lower Federal taxes, you reduce Federal programs. States lose funding, but only on Federal things. So, it's much harder, especially in a recession, to convince anyone to raise state taxes to compensate for things like the National Parks, Head Start, etc. This is one of the worst things to happen to our country since Regan slashed more social services than any recent president. You ever been to Templeton? Ask their director why the place didn't get its scheduled updgrades or even maintenance for several years until the fortunately wealthy neighbors in VT started funding it themselves. The fact that poor people don't vote is not nearly as sad as the fact that even some of them would vote for Bush.
Posted by Jared,
1:38 PM
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Jon, you can't keep posting your head. A little head is fine, we made this clear before. It really messes with the focus of the Blog. Stop stop stop. Michelle, really, you're encouraging the child. If you have such a need, please just Blitz me your pictures and I'll create an about the posters page, or put all your pics on the right or something.
"House Republicans weakened their own ethics rules yesterday, pushing through language that would allow lobbyists to cater meals to members' offices and let charities pay for lawmakers to travel and stay at golf resorts and other locales."
The Republican Party's commitment to equality of opportunity has come under question in recent weeks, particularly its determination to deal effectively with racial segregation. That's lamentable, for there is a laudable story to tell about the modern Republican Party and the efforts of a Republican president to ensure equal opportunity for all Americans.
Perhaps now is the time for me to become a reluctant post-modernist, because if the modern Republican Party is embodied by an egalitarian gesture on the part of Richard M. Nixon, we are clearly no longer in the modern age. Modernity vis-a-vis equality of all people before the law (I think this can be fairly characterized as a tenet of modernity) is embodied in the founding ideals of the United States. The fact that it was not the government's practice to live up to its own standards until the 1960s-1970s (and, concerning homosexuals, it is still not government practice) is not a criticism of that tenet, but a criticism of the government. Nixon should be lauded for anything he did to push the nation closer to its founding ideal, but Nixon's good deeds are no more a reflection of the Republican Party's attitude towards race today than Strom Thurmond's pre-Dixiecrat racial notions are of the Democratic Party today. Since the Nixon era, the Religious Right in America has caused the Republican Party to be corrupt vis-a-vis a thorough understanding of its own philosophy. Devolution should favor the individual, and yet the draconian ideals of freedom and morality that the Republicans are forced to issue because of the Religious Right compromise the notions of local control and freedom of choice that the GOP seemingly should be about. Per the race issue, there are statements by people who are currently pulling the strings of the Republican Party in their positions as members of the Religious Right that denounce evolution on the basis that it would 'make whites the equal of blacks' (I am unsure of how this logic works on the individual level for these fundamentalists, but I have often heard it said by those who wish to beat the Bible without looking scientifically ridiculous that whites descend from Adam and Eve, while blacks descend from apes...nevermind from whence Asians descend, nor the fact that these fundamentalists are supposedly looking erudite in making this "concession" to science). If the Republican Party wants to remain a viable option in the tradition of America - what America really stands for - it needs to return to its roots. Otherwise, its ascendancy will signal things like like a Christian Wahabbization, if you will, of American schools. Because, you see, for major Republican voting blocks like Falwellites, it's bad when Saudi Arabians and Pakistanis deny modernity with strict Islamic schools, but America needs a Christian denial of modernity in its schools. And, if we're denying modernity, we return to my initial claim of equality as a modern notion - out the window.
OK on the federal vs. state taxation devolution thing, precedence has it that there does seem to be backlash in some quarters for increases in state taxation to make up for decreases in federal taxation. Think of the estate tax reinstatement in MA, for instance. After activist groups forced former acting Governor Jane Swift to reinstate the tax rather than kill programs for low-income families, the Republican party ostracized her ... and then Mitt Romney was elected--ANOTHER Republican Governor of what has traditionally been a non-politically conservative state. Backlash? Possibly... These rich Cambridge liberals still do love their grey, wooly Brooks Brothers suits and SUVs.
Other bad effects include Texas, where after federal cuts in funding to education programs, rather than increase state spending -- a state-levied income tax is prohibited in the state constitution! -- local school districts were forced to take up the burden ... which meant that property poor districts got the shaft, of course. States are faced with unfunded mandates to enforce environmental laws... that oftentimes the government doesn't want enforced so very badly anyway... so programs that benefit the public good but not rich voters get scrapped.
I think many state governments would prefer to (and get away with) cutting programs for low-income communities rather than raise taxes. Poor people don't vote anyway, so who the hell cares?
Posted by Ms. Anthrope,
8:28 AM
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Thanks Jared and Brad. I was wondering more what the heck the stock market actually has to do with economic health. Is it an determinant, an indicator, just a fun Las Vegas casino game -- what?
Clearly I understand how the Bush plan is so very carefully fine-tuned for the rich. I'm trying to play out scenarios in my head of how it could possibly help the Americans who rather need more help. I want to know what conservative counterarguments could be so I can better tell the ones I consort with on occasion why they're wrong.
Anyway, those stock market gains didn't stick, apparently. The Dow closed down about 33 pts. I imagine that like Brad said, any effects / indicators aren't going to show for a while. On a day to day basis, it doesn't seem as though the stock market has too much to do with anything; it's more the general trend that counts. So big headlines about great performance one day seems more like a rah rah, go team go kind of thing than a very accurate indication of change in economic environment. It all makes me wonder why NPR devotes time every hour to reporting on stock market ups and downs and downs and ups and ups and ups and downs and downs. Makes me crosseyed.
(That, believe it or not, was a question. Do these day-to-day variations matter?)
Now the second interesting thought I had yesterday was given that the economy is faring poorly not because of poor consumer confidence, but because of decreased corporate spending, maybe it doesn't matter if the plan boosts the stock market, a measure of consumer confidence, even in the long run. The root of our economic malaise does not lie in consumer confidence. Big corporations are ABLE to spend, they just don't want to -- at least not when it comes to spending to keep their employees employed. Tax breaks on dividends aren't going to encourage corporate spending in key areas like building infrastructure or ... er... "human capital" -- partly b/c there's already a backlog of goods in warehouses all over the country.
It all sounds suspiciously like Reagan-esque trickle-into-the-pocketbooks-of-CEOs voodoo economics, as the BBC perceptively notes: Is George Bush following the Reagan path?
In other interesting news, here's another factor that will help stimulate the economy: putting more people in the street. HUD plans to cut funding for public housing by as much as 30-percent, nationwide. (See the Boston Globe article on more local effects of the cuts at: Word of slash in US housing funds stuns city)
Good morning!
p.s. say, hypothetically speaking, i wanted to post my head, too. how would i -- hypothetically -- do this?
Note that you pay dividends as income when you receive them. But if you defer them, like most people who can't afford to live off their investments, 92% of retired people who have investments for instance, you pay a tax when you collect. That is, rather than paying a tax every year [to encourage savings], you pay a tax when you take it out. Rolled into that is the dividend tax (what they would have paid every time they got their dividend checks if they were valuable enough to be worth it for however many years). The shit is that Bush's plan doesn't cut or even reduce these taxes on deferred plans. So, only the very wealthy benefit from the change.
This New York Times Article sums up relatively the effects of the plan. Most of the money that isn't going to the richest 10% of Americans (50%) goes to married couples with children. Now, a thought: If gay people can't marry, and legally can't adopt in most states...
Jon - really, I don't normally complain about getting too much head, but in this case...
Dividends
Econ 1 sans Power Point: Dividends are payment on stocks. Essentially, a company gets money from investors to do stuff. When they've done the stuff, they don't just give the money back to the investors [that would be a loan]. They need working capital, right? Of course right. So, they pay dividends. We knew that. Right. Anyway, the tax on these is similar to the tax on income. It's as if your work was to invest, and this was your payment, thus, it's income on top of the value of your stock. Like interest on a money tree.
Companies are quite motivated to pay dividends. The stability of their company depends on the happiness of their stockholders. Their complaint is that even though their stockholders already pay taxes on the profit of their company [essentially, the value of their stocks], they are then forced to pay again for the income of the dividends. If they no longer had to pay this, it is argued, investors would be more likely to invest, companies would be more stable, and the economy would grow.
What is most at issue here is the validity of that assumption. Fairness in an ideological sense is irrelevant in many ways because - many people on both sides would argue - what matters is that the economy improves and that we end up better off than we started. Herein lies the problem. How do we define we? In a very real and literal sense, this causal relation is true. If we lower or take away the dividend tax, more people will invest. Trickle-down economics, as Regan could tell you if he could remember, follows with the idea that with more people investing, the economy becomes more vibrant, and the little guy [eventually] wins. This of course depends on what people invest in, and, and this is the clincher other market factors. As Papa Bush realized, the war, a stagnant auto industry, and competition from Asia made shortwork of his predecessor's well-laid plans. No matter how much you encourage the rich to invest and business to expand, history shows us, other factors tend to be much more potent. Clinton, with some business-friendly policy and a lot of people-friendly policy, presided over a great amount of prosperity that had more to do with emerging technologies, peace, and international market factors than any policy decision Adam Smith could have wanked to. If we define the other we, on the other hand, if we say that the average Joe, the welfare mom, and the spotted owl matter, then cutting taxes for the rich looks ludicrous. Any economist will tell you that the trickiest trick in the book is to give a poor person ten dollars. You give a rich person 100, and they'll spend 80, save 20. Why? They can, and saving means solidarity. Most people would save if they could. But, you want to seed the economy, and feed fucking starving people you put the money in the hands of the people who need it. Only a functionally illiterate cowboy would think that it's better to get back $80 per $100, when you could get $10 for $10. Only a pathetic imbecile with a daddy-complex would say the value of capital investment is somehow higher than the value of pure consumption. As for the morals, well, that's a different lesson, kiddies.
Posted by Jared,
2:05 AM
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Tuesday, January 07, 2003 Well ain't that nice
As nice as Brad's Point 1 below may be, it's implausible. Why? Because even if the federal government cut taxes on the assumption that the leeway would allow states to raise theirs, most of the states (especially those run by Bush's ideological compatriots) would not raise taxes anyway. In fact, if you look at an electoral map, the two biggest Democrat Blue states, New York and California, are the only two states that currently give the federal government more money than they take back from it. Somehow, though, all the states that like to leech money from the federal government also all vote in such ways to make such freeloading hypocritical. What I predict is that if the federal government cuts taxes, the state governments will not raise taxes proportionately (if at all), but will continue trying to suck money from a now dessicated federal teat.
P.S.: Thanks Michelle : ) P.P.S.: I really, really don't like when people screw with my posts.
Posted by Jonathan,
11:40 PM
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Taxes, taxes, taxes...
1. Karsten, I would think that in theory reducing federal taxes would allow states to hike up their taxes a bit without too much backlash, no? But I don't know if this really works...
2. Miss Chui, as far as I can tell, the stock market popped a wheelie because everyone's trading. Significant growth won't come until people start investing their newfound wealth. IF they invest... Although I imagine that corporations will soon have incentive to pay out dividends, and the ones that do are the hot stocks right now.
Oh, and someone smack me for pretending to know anything about economics. :)
Posted by Brad Plumer,
8:38 PM
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And for general entertainment....
A quote from page 12 of today's Boston Globe:
"If anyone attempts to intimidate you, the people of Iraq, repel him, and tell him that he is a small midget." --unnamed Iraqi leader
Posted by Ms. Anthrope,
3:48 PM
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Awww, I like Jon's head.
Hey, can we go back to Karsten's posting numero dos for a moment? What's up with the tax cuts on dividends? According to that NYT article, the stock market went nuts:
"In making the centerpiece of his plan a proposal to eliminate taxes on corporate dividends paid to shareholders, Mr. Bush electrified investors on Wall Street who sent the Dow Jones Industrial Average up by 171.88 points today."
To ... not really argue, but ponder from the devil's position, for a moment, is it possible for a jump in the stock market to lead to economic growth, or is the stock market (I guess in the long term) just an indicator of economic growth? Would someone far more knowledgable than me about stock market / econ issues please take this up?
You up for writing a point/counterpoint in the DFP this coming - in regards to privatizing Education? I hereby throw down the gauntlet in a chivalrous no blood kind of way.
Yeah, why is it that girls can just stop. It's like a genetic screw for guys, if you want my opinion. Yeah, I know that's sort of not the point, I'm just sayin'.
1. With the upcoming execution in Mississippi of a man who shot a store clerk at the age of 17, this article in the magnificent British newspaper, the Guardian, reminds us that the United States and Iran are the only nations which still conduct executions of individuals under the age of 18. The Supreme Court voted last year 5-4 not to consider the case of the death penalty for juveniles (legal in 22 states). They might face the question again this year.
2. The New York Times reports Bush's intention to eliminate the federal tax on dividends, a move which Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev) called "class warfare." Can someone more qualified than I assess the merits of this proposal considering its estimated impact of -$300 billion from the federal treasury? All I know is that state budgets everywhere are hurting right now (especially California with a projected $35B deficit for 2003-2004--that's about $1,000 for every CA resident for those of you who are interested in these things).
2a. Perhaps Bush will earmark some of the anticipated gains by the corporate top-dogs as a result of the aforementioned tax-cut in order to restore funds to LIHEAP, the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program, which he had previously promised to fully fund but now (according to the NPR morning news) has decided to severely cut. Food for thought the next time you call F0&M to complain about your room being cold in the midst of a New Hampshire blizzard. Hundreds of thousands of poor folk throughout New England don't have that luxury.
3. On my favorite radio station in the world (KPFA) the evening newscasters announced today that Amherst, Mass is in an uproar over the questioning of an East Asian labor organizer student and a professor by FBI agents (with complete compliance by the campus kops). Can anyone find a link to that info? The U.Mass. Amherst newspaper online didn't have anything about it. The broadcast said that the ACLU has filed a FOIA request on behalf of the two individuals.
4. What's going on with our goddamn swim team? Are they going to be cut, or aren't they? All I care about is that the D op/ed page get back to talking about important stuff (ha!).
5. Finally, life is good here in Fresno, where I'm discovering the challenges of making suggestions to a public television station manager who won't listen to anything that doesn't have money attached. Also, I'm realizing how amazing the MLK week is going to be... there at Dartmouth. The Kwanzaa celebration at the local African-American museum was a joke, unfortunately, and I hope the MLK ceremony will be a little better. You wouldn't believe what Dartmouth can accomplish just because it has the big bucks, compared to a poor city of 500,000 people like Fresno. But anyone with a spare moment might check out what a little enterprising Labor/Community Alliance has done with a 16-pg monthly magazine. It helps that the publisher also owns the printing press :)
Oh, I have to add: I hope you're up bright and early Tuesday morning to catch the GOP as they start lying, cheating and stealing their way into the 108th Congress.
I'll give you 30 seconds to take that head icon off your blog posts!
Posted by Timothy,
1:42 AM
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When in California...
From the AP, via CNN:
SAN FRANCISCO, California (AP) -- The California Supreme Court defined rape Monday as continued sexual intercourse by a man after his female partner demands that it stop.
The 7-0 decision reverses a 1985 ruling by a lower court.
"This opinion is significant. It appears the California Supreme Court has clearly rejected an opportunity to revisit past barriers to rape convictions," said Douglas Beloof, an attorney with the National Crime Victim Law Institute.
The 2000 case involved two 17-year-olds who had sex in a bedroom during a party. The boy testified that the sex was consensual and that he stopped when the girl demanded. She testified the boy kept having sex with her for about a "minute and a half" after she called it off.
The boy was convicted of rape and served about six months in a juvenile facility. The high court affirmed that conviction Monday.
Justice Janice Rogers Brown, while agreeing with the majority on what constitutes rape, dissented on whether the boy was guilty. She wrote that the girl never clearly said stop, instead saying "I should be going now" and "I need to go home."
Brown also wondered how much time a man has to stop once a woman says stop.
"Ten seconds? Thirty?" she wrote.
Setting aside this definition of rape, which if meant to be comprehensive seems to be one of the more narrow interpretations I've ever heard bandied about, what about the case specifics? If we accept that the boy told the truth in his testimony, that is that the sex was initiated consentually and he stopped when asked, how could one get at what seems to be the heart of the matter if not in the bedroom at the time? As the dissenting justice noted, there seems to be enough ambivalence to allow for the brief time for the boy to process that the girl meant she wanted him to stop (we're dim, us males), and I would guess that it was his intention, upon realizing what she meant, to stop and not take advantage of her (lest, it seems, he would've continued). Nevertheless, if one assumes he's guilty, six months might be seen as an unsatisfactorily short prison sentence. What a weird case.
...you forget that as far as California is concerned, vis-a-vis this administration, everything is a "state matter." (Except medicinal marijuana use or automobile emissions policy, of course, the latter of which California is allowed by Federal law to set at higher levels than the Clean Air Act requires...but let's not split hairs...let's have our Justice Department file amicus briefs for the automotive industry against the State of California...it's easier than actually catching real terrorists and it stops the Satanic California liberals who are against GM, and dammit, that's the same as being against America (excuse long parenthetical aside). )
Posted by Jonathan,
12:15 AM
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The California GOP's views on race
In 1999, an essay published in the official California State Republican Party newsletter claimed that we would have been better off had the South won the Civil War. The San Francisco Chronicle is reporting that Bill Black, the Vice Chairman of the California State Repulican party, allowed the article to be published and is running into trouble as he seeks the top spot in the California party. Black has now apologized and claimed that he does not share the article's sentiments. Despite claims by Republicans that Trent Lott views on segregation are unique, there really has not been an outcry against this common sentiment about the Civil War (oh, sorry, the war of northern aggression). And we should not think this view is confined to the South or California: when I moved to Wisconsin, I was a little taken a back to see confederate flags saying "If the south had won, we would have had it made" and students who shared these views arguing them in U.S. history class. Lott has been roundly condemned by many for claiming that America would be better off had segretation prevailed. Maybe the California GOP has no problem with having someone who merely let this be published in an official GOP newsletter lead their party. But maybe that type of toleration of bigotry and backwards views is the problem. Those who hold these views make up an important part of the Republican party, and their presence is tolerated to the extent their views can be published in official state party literature If we rightly condemn those who (still!) claim it was justified for states to claim the right to protect segregation, shouldn't we condemn those who used states' right to protect slavery? And what does the White House say? It's a state matter.
A 1999 newsletter published by a man looking to lead California's Republican Party included an essay suggesting the United States would be a better place if the South had won the Civil War. The piece, by William Lind of the Free Congress Foundation, was included in a GOP e-mail newsletter published by Bill Back of Yuba County, who's currently vice chairman of the state Republican Party. Back, who has fought efforts to wrest the state party from its strongly conservative leadership, denied that Lind's piece represents his views. "Upon reflection, I should have been more sensitive regarding issues raised in this piece and not included it in the e-mail," Back said in a statement Saturday. "I regret any pain and offense taken by readers." The report is another embarrassment both for California Republicans and for a national party still reeling from the outcry over Mississippi Sen. Trent Lott's widely quoted nostalgia for a time before civil rights moved to the political forefront. The blowup over the newsletter is especially disheartening for Republicans looking to make inroads among California's growing number of minority voters, a group that now heavily backs Democrats. The article was one of many published in the twice-monthly newsletter, Back said, which included a variety of political viewpoints. Lind's piece suggested that it was Reconstruction, not slavery, that really damaged race relations in the country and that economics eventually would have eliminated slavery, even without a war. "It's not hard to believe that history might have taken a better turn," if the South had won the Civil War, the piece said.. If the South were a separate country, it continued, "at least part of North America would still stand for Western culture, Christianity and an appreciation of the differences between ladies and gentlemen." Shannon Reeves, a black Oakland resident who is secretary of the state's Republican Party, was reportedly incensed over reports about the newsletter, telling friends he was outraged it was distributed as an official Republican document. Copies of the newsletter began circulating among California Republicans earlier this week and even reached the White House. A spokeswoman for President Bush declined to comment on the controversy, calling the dispute -- and the upcoming party elections -- a California matter.
Per Karsten's post, two things. First, I consider The Guardian a rag. They were so zealous to show that the US was making a mess of the campaign in Afghanistan (which, in fact, ended up being the case, but at the time, it was not) that they printed things that seemed completely insubstantiated; no other newspaper or media outlet, in Britain or otherwise made mention of them. In particular, they printed that we sustained casualties in the token raid we performed one night on several Taliban-held areas just to show that we could. However, casualties are the type of thing that the media can pretty easily substantiate - if The Guardian prints that Johnny got his foot blown off, to double-check, someone could just contact Johnny's parents. The point is, unless we're speaking of clandestine missions, the type of story The Guardian ran, if it is as false as it seems, is a farce. While I consider the charges that the mainstream media in the US has a liberal bias to be ridiculous, I would not say the same of The Guardian.
Secondly, while I disagree with the application of the death penalty at all, I think that if one is going to apply it, juries should have it at their disposal for dispensation upon juveniles. It is implausible to think that 12 people would give the death penalty (in a fashion more unfair or unreliable than that in which it is carried out against adults, at least, which is the only standard we can compare it to) to someone too young to deserve to be accountable for their crime. Were I to believe the death penalty to be an acceptable means of punishment, and even understanding myself and virtually all of my non-retarded (pardon the political incorrectness) peers to have been 17 at the time of commiting an egregious murder, I would advocate responsibility for the crime. As for my retarded peers, even if I considered the death penalty generally useful, I would find fault in its application to such individuals.
Posted by Jonathan,
12:01 AM
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Monday, January 06, 2003 Did they miss this?
I guess the people over at The New Republic missed this one...funny, I remember it vividly as it's pretty recent, I believe...
"Older age, physical inactivity, obesity, and family history are the main risk factors for type 2 diabetes." (from the results of a CDC study)
Seems to me like they named obesity in addition to inactivity. So not only is TNR mincing words, as Laura mentioned below, but they seem to have ignored some newer information. Anyway, health aside, obesity is a problem in this country if only because of the expense of upgrading public accomodations for grotesquely fat people.
Posted by Jonathan,
8:14 PM
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TNR: Compulsively Contrary
I admit to not being an avid reader of the New Republic, probably because they never fail to attempt to surprise their readership with "original" opinions. After awhile, it seems that the editors just want contrary opinions for the hell of it, and the articles aren't backed up with much substance. And sometimes, they just go way too far. This is from the latest New Republic:
Indeed, subject to exceptions for the most extreme cases, it's not at all clear that being overweight is an independent health risk of any kind, let alone something that kills hundreds of thousands of Americans every year. While having a sedentary lifestyle or a lousy diet--both factors, of course, that can contribute to being overweight--do pose health risks, there's virtually no evidence that being fat, in and of itself, is at all bad for you.
So now TNR is stepping into the field of medicine and telling public health officials and epidemiologists how to do their job. Politics is one thing; its their forte. But they've definitely overstepped the bounds on this one, particularly since the article makes such a miniscule distinction into the argument of the whole piece. If eating poorly and not exercising are bad for you, who cares if being overweight is technically, by itself, bad for you? Go back to covering the White House. Give me a break.
Posted by Laura,
6:38 PM
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More on racism among republicans
All American politicians are liars and hypocrites about race, from Democrats like Hillary Clinton posing as champions of the downtrodden black masses while buying a house in the whitest town they can find, to Republicans pretending not to know that (a) many millions of nonblack Americans seriously dislike black people, (b) well-nigh every one of those people votes Republican, and (c) without those votes no Republican would ever win any election above the county level. (Am I being beeped out yet?)
Posted by Timothy,
6:07 PM
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Freedom of Press on Campus
Check out this interesting article on the freedom of college papers under threat (but it doesn't mention the specific reasons of what the college paper was investigating):
In late October 2000, an administrator at south suburban Governors State University called the company that printed the school newspaper and ordered it to stop publication. The reason given by Dean of Student Affairs Patricia Carter: No one from the university had reviewed the paper for journalistic quality and that it may have contained "grammatical errors." That action prompted a legal battle between the student editors and the university over freedom of speech and alleged censorship by the administration that will be played out Tuesday in a federal appeals court in Chicago. College administrators, constitutional law experts, journalism groups and students at other colleges across the country are closely watching the case. College journalists at public schools and free-press advocates worry that a ruling on behalf of the university will choke off their 1st Amendment right to free expression in the often-lively campus press. In particular, they fear a 1988 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Hazelwood, Mo., that gave wide powers to high school principals to control student publications will be broadened to the college level.
Republican Does Something Right!