Nov 7, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
The crackdown reached the near-absurd yesterday when [Russian oil company] Yukos faced possible fresh charges for allegedly failing in its duty properly to monitor rabbit coupling at a farm in Siberia. Regional agriculture ministry inspectors found that female and male rabbits were often kept together in groups of up to four, a violation of the norms. "Couplings take place unsystematically, and no zoological-technological records are kept," the Interfax news agency quoted a ministry report as saying. [Daily Telegraph, 11/7/03]
Nov 7, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
New York Sun columnist Andrew Wolf on how to use schools to destroy cities:The test for the city's "science" schools, Stuyvesant, Bronx Science, and Brooklyn Tech, has become the ultimate high-stakes test. The reason is simple. These schools are among the best anywhere, but the choices beyond are abysmal, particularly the schools that children can attend as a matter of right without a special admission process. In Riverdale and dozens of other similar communities in the city, it has long been the widely held belief that if you don't "make" Science or Stuyvesant, you're in deep trouble....
This was recognized by the New York Times, which reported in early 1997 that Kennedy's principal told another prospective Riverdale parent that in order to ensure the safety of her son, she should "teach him to strut, not walk, and to watch what was going on behind him." ...What was left to this parent was the city's Education Option, known as "Ed-Opt" high schools....Places are assigned according to a curve: 16% of the places are reserved for the highest-scoring students, 68% for those in the vast middle, and 16% for those at the bottom....
New York magazine examined this issue more than five years ago, using the Baruch College School as an example of how the system worked. For the 100 openings, 553 students applied from the top scoring group, vying for just 16 places; 878 came from the mid-range group, from which 68 were chosen, and just 63 of the applicants came from bottom, vying for 16 places. Thus, the odds that a low-scoring child would be admitted exceeded 1-in-4; 1-in-13 for the child in the middle, and 1-in-35 for the best performing students. This is meritocracy turned on its head. Of course, this system was created with the best of intentions, not to "leave any child behind." The presumption was that the middle class would fend for itself. And they did, more often than not with their feet. [New York Sun, 11/7/03]
Nov 6, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
This cartoon was inspired by Charles Johnson's LGF post, Press In Quagmire Frenzy:
Well, this was entirely predictable; taking a run around the major media sites this morning reveals the press in full bore Quagmire Mode after yesterday's missile attack that brought down a US helicopter and killed 16 soldiers.The New York Times: News Analysis: As Casualties in Iraq Mount, Will Resolve Falter?
The Washington Post: New Attacks Intensify Pressure on Bush.
And of course, what would a quagmire be without the Spectre of Vietnam?
Nowhere in any of these reports is the slightest hint of awareness that if the US were to pull out of Iraq now, jihadis around the world would be emboldened to launch more attacks against US interests everywhere, seeing the US as a paper tiger. Osama bin Laden said this outright -- that our withdrawal from Somalia (where there was much less at stake) proved to him the US had no spine.
The media is on the side of the enemy. Their desire to see the US fail in Iraq is palpable. And the Democrats aren't far behind, as their primary concern (after mouthing empty sympathies) is, very obviously, how to use this attack against President Bush.
The war isn't only taking place in the Middle East -- it's right here in America too.
Nov 6, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
The Pacific Legal Foundation, a prominent constitutional public interest law firm, has sued the Federal government over its denial of a family's only access road to its property trapped inside the Wrangell-St. Elias Park in Alaska. The National Park Service has been bullying this family for most of the year, refusing to allow it access over an existing right of way. The Bush Administration has so far refused to intervene and reign in the agency. This case is typical of National Park Service behavior and should be a clear warning against this agency's presence anywhere. The National Park Service not only exemplifies government mismanagement of its own land, its authority and exercise of power supersedes the moral right of private property.One reason why this case is very important to the viros is that they are trying to redefine guaranteed rights of way to private property to exclude "motorized vehicles". Another is that they are trying to establish that a 'right of way' across Federal land is subject to 'environmental review' and therefore denial.--Erich Veyhl
Nov 5, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From LifeNews.com:Shortly after President Bush signed the partial-birth abortion ban into law, a federal judge in [Lincoln,] Nebraska said the pro-life law is unconstitutional and issued a temporary injunction against it. "It seems to me the law is highly suspect, if not a per se violation of the constitution," said U.S. District Judge Richard Kopf. Kopf agreed with a previous Supreme Court decision and said the law should have included a health exception.
[Anti-abortion] groups say a health exception is unnecessary and would make the ban useless as any reason can be given to justify a partial-birth abortion as necessary to protect a mother's health. "While it is also true that Congress found that a health exception is not needed, it is, at the very least, problematic whether I should defer to such a conclusion when the Supreme Court has found otherwise," Kopf said.
[...] U.S. Justice Department attorney Anthony Coppolino told Kopf that he should show deference to Congress' findings that the abortion procedure is not medically necessary. [...]
Kopf also said the bill did not present "an objective" presentation of the facts and had a "serious vagueness problem." He also wondered why Congress didn't invite those who perform partial-birth abortions to testify [to Congress]. [LeRoy Carhart, who performs partial-birth abortions in Omaha] has been in court before in an attempt to block a ban on partial-birth abortions. He sued to overturn Nebraska's state ban and, in 2000, the Supreme Court agreed that the law was unconstitutional. [It] was Kopf who originally ruled that the Nebraska ban was unconstitutional.
Recommended website: www.AbortionisProLife.com
Nov 5, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From the NY Post:NEW YORK — A 14-year-old New Jersey schoolboy [Scott Switzer, of Colts Neck] — whose dad [a Navy engineer aboard the USS Detroit in the Persian Gulf] and stepdad are in the military — was suspended for five days because he drew a "patriotic" stick figure of a U.S Marine blowing away a Taliban fighter, officials said yesterday. "He's been punished for the drawing," said Tinton Falls [Middle] school superintendent Leonard Kelpsh. "We felt it was highly inappropriate, and we took it very seriously."
...Scott, who turned 14 Tuesday and was headed back to school Wednesday, said he was unjustly disciplined for his sketch of "a war scene." "Truth be told, it's a Marine shooting a terrorist Taliban," he told The Post. "It's just a picture. What upsets me most is that the principal would dare say it's not normal. To me, it's patriotic."
...a local psychologist who examined the teenager said the sketch was benign...Scott's mother said school officials described the drawing as "not the work of a normal mind." Scott said he understood the school's concern for student safety, but was offended by the principal's comments. "Truth be told, I'm more upset that he'd insinuate that I'm mentally unstable," he said. "I'm the class clown. I'm not a bully." ["'Patriotic' Stick Figure Drawing Troubles School", October 29, 2003]
No Scott you are the class hero. The bullies are the monsters who run your school. Compare this action to the professor in the U.S. who advocated the death of American soldiers:
At an anti-war "teach-in" this week, a Columbia University professor called for the defeat of American forces in Iraq and said he would like to see "a million Mogadishus" -- a reference to the Somali city where American soldiers were ambushed, with 18 killed, in 1993. "The only true heroes are those who find ways that help defeat the U.S. military," Nicholas De Genova, assistant professor of anthropology at Columbia University told the audience at Low Library Wednesday night. "I personally would like to see a million Mogadishus." The crowd was largely silent at the remark. They loudly applauded De Genova later when he said, "If we really believe that this war is criminal ... then we have to believe in the victory of the Iraqi people and the defeat of the U.S. war machine." ... [Teach-in organizer Eric] Foner said that because of the university's tradition of freedom of speech, it was unlikely De Genova would suffer professionally in any way because of what he said. "A person's politics have no impact on their employment status here, whether they are promoted, whether they are fired or whether they get tenure," Foner said. [Newsday, 3/27/03]
Related: Academic "Freedom" at Columbia U. and Columbia's Anti-American Professors and Freedom of Speech.
