HILARIOUS treatment of the Winona Ryder shoplifting scandal by Andrew Hofer at More Than Zero. A magnificent tour de force of satire. Watch out Onion guys!
LBJ AFFIRMATIVE ACTION DEBATE UPDATE: Since last night's posting, there have been exactly zero responses to the posting I posted here. None of them have come from me. As he said, the debate rages on. There are many possible reasons for the lack of discussion, not least of which is the fact that exams are on and everyone's exhausted. Some people also don't believe that the listserv is an appropriate place for debate. Still, I can count on one finger the number of anti-racial preferences postings I've seen there. It wasn't me, either, but a foreign student from Central America.
I should admit that my first year in the program there was an organized public debate on affirmative action between some students. The anti-AA side, half of which was of color, ended up arguing from some sort of wacky critical race theory perspective, the details of which escape my memory. All I remember was that they routed the other side, which I seem to recall was completely of color, but appeared to be a stranger to critical race theory. I'm certainly not suggesting that that's a bad thing.
This wasn't merely the only debate on affirmative action I've seen here in three and a half years, but the only debate period. I'm pretty sure it came to pass solely through the efforts of one of the few conservative students there.
HERE'S WHY I BLOG: Reason A, at least. It keeps me off the LBJ School listserv, where I've gotten in some trouble on more than one occasion. Read the most recent provocation, from a student whose name I won't print, received last night:
To: lbjstudents@lists.cc.utexas.edu, lbjfaculty@lists.cc.utexas.edu, lbjstaff@lists.cc.utexas.edu
Subject: University of GA Lawsuits Settled: Affirmative Action
Date: Wed, 12 Dec 2001 19:55:07 -0600Below you will find an article about the ailing state of affirmative
action in our educational institutions. Perhaps one of the most
pressing public policy issues surrounding higher education today, I
encourage each of you to read along and formulate your own opinions.My money is on the fact that this will be another "Hopwood-like"
situation where thousands of minority and low-income applicants will be
shut out of more prestigious institutions for the sake of so-called
"equity." Needless to say, I find nothing equitable in this. The
debate rages on...
Except there is no debate at LBJ. I can only imagine what hell might break loose if some one were to actually try to debate this kind of touchy subject on the listserv. And anyway, what kind of debate can you have with someone who finds "nothing equitable" in the equal treatment of all races? Who views not accepting underqualified minorities as "shutting them out"? Here's the message he was forwarding. Notice that Georgia is eliminating ALL preferences including legacies. This complete focus on academic achievement alone seems supremely fair to me. That's just me, though.
Posted by shilohbucher at 11:16 AM
TONIGHT ON O'REILLY, one of my favorite LBJ profs, Bob Auerbach, a one-man crusade against Alan Greenspan. I'm thinking he'll get on well with Mr. Bill, who, as Fox Fans know, is just looking after the folks, as the powerful protect themselves. Since I may be the only person in this building who watches the Factor on a very regular basis, I tried to give Bob some tips. I advised him to answer all questions and push Greenspan's interest rate hikes as the economy crumbled last year. Which is probably what he was going to talk about anyway. I tried to reassure him that not everyone gets torn into pieces. If O'Reilly agrees with you, he'll just tell you you're a good American.
When I agree with O'Reilly, I just think he's being a good American. This happens more often than it doesn't. When I disagree with O'Reilly, I tend to think he is just saying stuff to appear to be more moderate than he actually is. He wants to be able to position himself as a centrist. (Just the other night he got some Jesse Jackson flunky to agree that the Factor was not conservatively biased, in contrast to the rest of Fox News.) I guess what this means is that deep down, I believe that Bill O'Reilly really agrees with me about everything, but won't always admit it on TV. What a strange thing to think.
TUVALU UPDATE in Tech Central Station. Also some nice swipes at Lester Brown, the Malthusian head of the Earth Policy Institute, whose goal is to create an 'eco-economy'. How do we do this? Brown suggests "a restructuring of the tax system that will simultaneously reduce income taxes and raise taxes on environmentally destructive activities." This is your typical green economic thinking. Sorry, Lester, but if you raise taxes too high on 'environmentally destructive activities' such as factory production or generating electricity for computers, no one's going to have any income to tax, anyway.
Here's one of their eco-updates from November 23rd, World Grain Harvest Falling Short by 54 Million Tons. One of the reasons they give for the supposed short-fall of grain production this year and last is "low grain prices." Clearly if there is a real grain shortage, this will cease to be a problem.
WHAT? BONO WRONG? William Easterly has a thought provoking article in Foreign Policy Magazine about Third World debt relief. The issue that brings together the Pope, Mr Vox ,and Senator Helms is taken as a no-brainer by many. However, Easterly has some great reasons why it may not be the panacea for poor countries it might seem. Here's two fine points:
Debt relief advocates should remember that poor people don't owe foreign debt‹their governments do. Poor nations suffer poverty not because of high debt burdens but because spendthrift governments constantly seek to redistribute the existing economic pie to privileged political élites rather than try to make the pie grow larger through sound economic policies. The debt-burdened government of Kenya managed to find enough money to reward President Moi's home region with the Eldoret International Airport in 1996, a facility that almost nobody uses.Left to themselves, bad governments are likely to engage in new borrowing to replace the forgiven loans, so the debt burden wouldn't fall in the end anyway. And even if irresponsible governments do not run up new debts, they could always finance their redistributive ways by running down government assets (like oil and minerals), leaving future generations condemned to the same overall debt burden. Ultimately, debt relief will only help reduce debt burdens if government policies make a true shift away from redistributive politics and toward a focus on economic development.
THAT SINKING FEELING: Andrew Hofer did a good job of pointing out some of the reasons why the Pacific island of Tuvalu will have a hard time in court proving that US SUV usage caused the sea to swallow it up. I would add one minor point to his argument: It's not sinking! As was documented in the October 26th issue of Science magazine, Tuvalu has experienced falling sea levels for 50 years now and this is predicted to continue. (NOTE: Unfortunately Science is not available online for free, but I was able to access it from UT and can confirm that the article I'm linking to, from the pro-CO2 site, The Greening Earth Society is correctly quoting the journal and accurately reproducing their images. They are indeed funded by electric companies, but that doesn't mean everything they say is a lie.)
It seems that the scientists have scared the people of Tuvalu into thinking that global warming will sink them, but as The CIA World Factbook -- Tuvalu makes clear, many of their environmental problems have been caused by their own poor stewardship, which has exacerbated the ill-suitability of the island for human habitation (emphasis mine):
Environment - current issues: since there are no streams or rivers and groundwater is not potable, most water needs must be met by catchment systems with storage facilities (the Japanese Government has built one desalination plant and plans to build one other); beachhead erosion because of the use of sand for building materials; excessive clearance of forest undergrowth for use as fuel; damage to coral reefs from the spread of the Crown of Thorns starfish; Tuvalu is very concerned about global increases in greenhouse gas emissions and their effect on rising sea levels, which threaten the country's underground water table.
The scientific evidence for falling sea levels, when so many scientists have told Tuvalu they are sinking has left their prime minister confused, according to the Tuvalu News
TUVALU PM ADMITS CONFUSION OVER CONFLICTING REPORTS ON SEA LEVELSFUNAFUTI, Tuvalu (February 24, 2000 ? Radio Australia)---Tuvalu Prime Minister Ionatana Ionatana admits he is confused by conflicting reports about sea levels surrounding Tuvalu.
Tuvalu is a low-lying island nation which has been experiencing abnormally high spring tides in recent years, which Tuvaluans believe will eventually force them to evacuate to another country.
But Prime Minister Ionatana said scientists who have been monitoring sea levels since 1980 say Tuvalu's sea levels have been falling and not rising.
"Scientists have confused us.
"The Australian government has recently told us from the facts, from the figures, that these tide gauges have provided to Flinders University that there is not going to be a sea rise in the immediate future for Tuvalu. It has been noticed that the sea is falling," he said.
"So here we are with the situation. We are threatened by rising sea levels and here are these tide gauges telling us there is no sea rise. There is likely to be a sea level fall.
"Now where do we stand here?"
I would hopefully guess that they stand not to gain from frivolous environmental torts.
FISH IN A BARREL: Hey, try to guess which comment on the 'Abdul Hamid' article below belongs to my dear husband, the indymedia troll.
GUYS! GUYS! YOU HAVE IT ALL WRONG: Yeah, as Ken Layne, Moira Breen, Little Green Footballs, Matt Welch, Steven Den Beste, Fevered Rants, Andrew Sullivan, and Damian Penny have all misguidedly reported, the San Francisico Chronicle piece on our American Taliban was ill-conceived. What my fellow warboggers have failed to grasp, though, overly-wedded as they are to logic and common decency, is that Freedberg didn't go nearly far enough to praise Walker's parents. The patriots at indymedia.org don't think it would be right to just let him go. Why, the boy's a freakin' hero!
AWARD ABDUL HAMID [JOHN WALKER] THE MEDAL OF HONORThe Taliban are known for their "gallantry" towards women, of course. I wonder how many women Johnny Walker beat for wearing white socks. Yes, let us not stop with giving Walker the Medal of Honor. Surely it's not to late to also give it posthumously to Jefferson Davis or the Desert Fox.Abdul Hamid (John Walker), the convert to Islam from the US who joined the Taliban, is the ONLY American in Afghanistan who has shown gallantry and courage in the face of danger. When the history of this conflict is written (assuming it doesn't end in terminal world war) the name of John Walker will be writ large in its annals of heroism. (article 1)
Abdul Hamid (John Walker), the convert to Islam from the US who joined the Taliban, is the ONLY American in Afghanistan who has shown gallantry and courage in the face of danger.
After fighting the US terrorists and Bush regime stooges, Walker withstood the infamous basement siege by Bush-backed terrorists that included (1) tossing bombs in it; (2) burning alive with diesel fuel; (3) attempted drowning by flooding the basement (4) starvation for 10 days.
Through it all he was not the least bit intimidated and remained defiant in the face of CIA war criminals. And that's documented on film.
Walker is on the right side in this conflict and his actions have gone far above and beyond the call of duty. When the history of this conflict is written (assuming it doesn't end in terminal world war) the name of John Walker will be writ large in its annals of heroism. He stands for what America SHOULD be all about.
The terms of the Medal of Honor are "conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity of the risk of loss of life, above and beyond the call of duty in action involving actual confict with an an opposing armed force."
John Walker has met, indeed exceeded those requirements.
The Movement to Award John Walker the Medal of Honor calls for Abdul Hamid - John Walker to be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. And encourages everyone else to support this.
As for the scumbag cowards who specialize in bombing civilians from 60,000 feet using electronics - well, piss on them.