Saturday, May 01, 2004 The Village Voice on Grad Students
Grad students have always resigned themselves to relative poverty in anticipation of a cushy, tenured payoff. But in the past decade, the rules of the game have changed. Budget pressures have spurred universities' increasing dependence on so-called "casual labor," which damages both the working conditions of graduate students and their job prospects. Over half of the classroom time at major universities is now logged by non-tenure-track teachers, both graduate teaching assistants—known as TAs—and adjuncts. At community colleges, part-timers make up 60 percent of the faculties.
Average teaching loads for grad students have increased, while benefits are often cut off after five years. Humanities TAs are paid stipends ranging from less than $10,000 at a public school like SUNY-Buffalo to $18,000 at unionized NYU. Adjuncts, more and more likely to be recent post-docs who couldn't find a better position, earn less than $3,000 a course—usually without benefits, and far less than the $60,000 yearly national average for full-time professors. Meanwhile, the debt burden has grown: The average holder of a graduate degree spends 13.5 percent of his or her income paying back loans (eight percent is considered manageable). Fifty-three percent of those holding master's degrees, 63 percent of those holding doctorates, and 69 percent of those holding professional degrees are over $30,000 in debt. If they end up as "marginal employees," the academic freedom and security of tenure is replaced by a constant anxiety and alienation.
Posted by Timothy,
3:56 PM
-
Friday, April 30, 2004 Cutting out foreign students
Four university presidents, including Lawrence Summers, met with Tom Ridge:
This year, foreign applications to graduate schools in the United States have fallen by 32 per cent with applications from China, India and western Europe showing a dramatic drop.
The decline is raising concerns that the US could lose a longtime source of competitive advantage in research, science and engineering.
The danger, some argue, is also that the US is forfeiting its successful tradition of educating and befriending the world's brightest students and probable future leaders.
Posted by Nikhil,
4:57 PM
-
Thursday, April 29, 2004 Abuse of Iraqi Prisoners
You should all watch the CBS news clip of some of the photos coming out recently in relation to certain American soldiers' abuse of prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad. The AP reports that, "Six members of the 800th Military Police Brigade faced court martial for allegedly abusing about 20 prisoners at Abu Ghraib. The charges included dereliction of duty, cruelty and maltreatment, assault and indecent acts with another person."
Two quotes are worth highlighting. Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt tells CBS in the video: “So what would I tell the people of Iraq? This is wrong. This is reprehensible. But this is not representative of the 150,000 soldiers that are over here. I'd say the same thing to the American people... Don't judge your army based on the actions of a few."
But more disturbing is the quote from the accompanying news story which didn't make it into the video. Army Reserve Staff Sgt. Chip Frederick is one of the soldiers facing a court martial. CBS reported his comments in a letter to his family: "Military intelligence has encouraged and told us 'Great job.' They usually don't allow others to watch them interrogate. But since they like the way I run the prison, they have made an exception. We help getting them to talk with the way we handle them. ... We've had a very high rate with our style of getting them to break. They usually end up breaking within hours."
According to the Army’s own investigation, that’s what was happening. The Army found that interrogators asked reservists working in the prison to prepare the Iraqi detainees, physically and mentally, for questioning. But so far, none of the interrogators at Abu Ghraib are facing criminal charges. In fact, a number of them are civilians, and military law doesn’t apply to them. The military has recommended disciplinary action against seven U.S. officers who helped run the prison, including Brig. Gen. Janice Karpinski, the commander of the 800th Brigade, a senior military official said Wednesday in Baghdad.
I'm actually studying torture in my criminal procedure class right now. My own personal belief is that torture is an inappropriate excessive force tool of law enforcement -- in the same way as a police shooting. When torture is used against prisoners, it should be investigated and there should be penalties if there is an ex post facto finding that it was not necessary to save lives. Torture in a military context is a different subject, but I'm pretty sure these tactics in Iraq would violate our various treaties governing treatment of POWs. It's more likely that these are pictures of enemy combatants -- a whole other can of worms.
Posted by Dan,
1:36 PM
-
White House braced for latest assault by hardback No, that's not an Onion headline. That's The Independent announcing that Joe Wilson has a new book coming out. Guess this whole no-leaking-to-the-press policy of the Bushies is coming home to roost. (Prediction: the next Republican administration will learn a strange lesson from this, that they must get even more loyal people, showing they have not understood the title of the book about Paul O'Neill)
The Bush administration is bracing itself for the latest memoir by a former insider. Joe Wilson, a former ambassador, will this week reveal the name of the government official who "outed" his wife - revealing her identity as a CIA operative in apparent revenge for his role in proving the White House made false claims about Iraq's efforts to develop nuclear weapons.
But in what has increasingly becoming the habit during Mr Bush's presidency, Mr Wilson will not make his claims on television, at a press conference or even in a newspaper column but between the covers of a "must-read" book. His memoir, The Politics of Truth: Inside the Lies that Led to War and Betrayed My Wife's CIA Identity, is published tomorrow.
Posted by Timothy,
1:37 AM
-
Tuesday, April 27, 2004 Iraqi Flag Controversy
Iraqi's are upset that their new flag looks like this:
Posted by Timothy,
5:50 PM
-
Sunday, April 25, 2004 More on Kerry and Catholicism
Tim's quote below left out some of the link's more poignant observations of conservative American Catholics' hypocrisy when it comes to their criticism of John Kerry. Read this:
George W. Bush, though not a Catholic, holds decidedly un-Catholic views on life and war. He instigated a war against Iraq which the Pope railed against quite loudly. He gleefully executed over 150 inmates during his tenure as governor of Texas. The Church of course has no ability to withhold communion from a non-Catholic; nevertheless they seem to feel no sense of hypocrisy in indirectly promoting the candidacy of Bush. Why is the Church so obsessed with fetii, but perfectly OK with pro-death George W. Bush who kills actual, living human beings by execution and by war?
I don't claim to be an expert in Catholicism, but those of you that are can perhaps explain to me how the Church can justify denying communion to pro-choice Catholic Democrats while offering communion to pro-death penalty and pro-war Catholic Republicans?
Posted by Dan,
10:39 PM
-
Kerry's medals If Drudge is to be believed, then I think we're about to find out how good at damage control the Kerry team really is.
In interview published Friday in the LOS ANGELES TIMES, Dem presidential hopeful John Kerry claimed he "never ever implied" that he threw his own medals on the Hill in 1971 to appear as an antiwar hero -- but a new shock video shows John Kerry's saying he did! ABC's GOOD MORNING AMERICA is set to rock the political world Monday morning with an airing of Kerry's 1971 boast, sources tell the DRUDGE REPORT.
ABC News is currently running a web headline which reads: "Medal Dispute, EXCLUSIVE: Did Kerry lie about Vietnam War medals?" Here's a question. Can someone tell me the last time ABC used the "L" word about President Bush? Or is it always 'exaggeration' when it's President Bush? And yes, I noticed Chris Vlasto's name too.
Late Update: As of 2:54 PM, the headline now reads: "Medal Dispute, EXCLUSIVE: Why did Kerry change story about Vietnam medals?" That, and why did ABC change its headline?
By the way, Marshall is referring to the headline on ABCnews.com's homepage. Marshall's reference to Chris Vlasto (one of the co-authors of the article who works at ABC news) was confusing to me; Evidently, he was a big Clinton-hater who tried to shape events somewhat during the Ken Starr investigations. (More here on producer Vlasto's apparent creative editing.)
Here's an excerpt from the ABCnews article itself, which on its face seems pretty damning to Kerry:
Calling it a "phony controversy" instigated by the Republican party, Kerry said on Good Morning America today that he has always accurately said what took place. "I threw my ribbons. I didn't have my medals. It is very simple." He also said he ? and the military ? didn't make a distinction between medals and ribbons. "We threw away the symbols of what our country gave us for what we had gone through," he said. And in an interview with ABCNEWS' Peter Jennings last December, he said it was a "myth."
But Kerry told a much different story on Viewpoints. Asked about the anti-war veterans who threw their medals away, Kerry said "they decided to give them back to their country." Kerry was asked if he gave back the Bronze Star, Silver Star and three Purple Hearts he was awarded for combat duty as a Navy lieutenant in Vietnam. "Well, and above that, [I] gave back the others," he said.
The statement directly contradicts Kerry's most recent claims on the disputed subject to the Los Angeles Times last Friday. "I never ever implied that I did it, " Kerry told the newspaper, responding to the question of whether he threw away his medals in protest.
Update Again from Drudge:
OLIPHANT IN COMING BOSTON GLOBE: 'I was 4 or 5 feet behind John Kerry. I watched Kerry reach with his right hand into the breast pocket of his fatigue shirt. The hand emerged with several of the ribbons... There couldn't have been all that many decorations in his hand -- six or seven -- because he made a closed fist around his collection... From what I could observe firsthand about Friday, April 23, 1971, Kerry did not make even the slightest effort to pretend that he was throwing all of his military decorations over that fence.... Kerry had arrived here with only the ribbons he wore on his shirt...
OLIPHANT: 'I have always found the political junk served up by Kerry's detractors to be undignified as well as largely inaccurate. I write now because the political junk is much higher profile now, though no less misleading -- and not, by the way, because in her fourth job in the public arena, my daughter just joined Kerry's staff. I just happened to be there that long-ago day. I saw what happened and heard what Kerry said and know what he meant. The truth happens to be with him...' Impacting Hard Late Monday...
Also, Drudge has a link to a "D-Bunker" on the Kerry website regarding the medals. It looks like this is not the first time Oliphant has talked about this:
2004: "Never Any Confusion" from Reporter Who Covered Kerry in 1971: “Thomas Oliphant, who was reporting on the event the event that day for the Boston Globe, recalled that Kerry reached over the fence to place his own service ribbons as well as medals he had received from other veterans. ‘I never had any confusion about what he did,’ said Oliphant, now a Boston Globe columnist, ‘that he had kept his Silver Star, Purple Hearts and Bronze Star.’ ” [John F. Kerry: The Complete Biography by the Boston Globe Reporters Who Know Him Best, pps 127-128; 2004]
Even those Oliphant saw Kerry throw his ribbons, and Oliphant knew Kerry kept his Silver Star, etc., Oliphant still wrote in 1971 that Kerry "threw his medals over the fence." So I suppose a newspaper person's contemporaneous use of the term in that way lends credence to the defense that ribbons were sometimes referred to as medals.
