Month: December 2012

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Say what? Europe wins the Nobel Prize

The European Union has accepted the Nobel Peace Prize at a ceremony in Oslo’s City Hall, despite criticism from past winners that the bloc is based on “military power”.

A number of Europena leaders were in attendance, including Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, and Francois Hollande, the French president, who were seated beside each other.

The prize was received jointly by European Council President Herman Van Rompuy, European Parliament President Martin Schulz and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso.

The prize was awarded for the stability and democracy brought to the continent more than five decades after two world wars. Continue reading “Say what? Europe wins the Nobel Prize”

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Marijuana support now exceeds 50 percent

Celebrated poll-analyst  Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight reports that national opinions on marijuana are moving over the 50% mark, up from a bit from just a month ago. As Micah Cohen reports, “As the Obama administration weighs its response to the legalization of the recreational use of marijuana in Washington and Colorado, a new YouGov poll has found that a slim majority of adults believe the federal government should not enforce federal laws — under which marijuana use is still illegal — in those states.

“The YouGov survey, conducted for The Huffington Post on Dec. 5 and 6, found that 51 percent of the 1,000 Continue reading “Marijuana support now exceeds 50 percent”

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World Human rights

Yesterday, the White House issued the statement below on the occasion of U.N. Human rights Day. Say what you may about American government, sometimes it gets it right. This statement by UN Ambassor Susan Rice was featured in today’s JoeMyGod:

“Today, we pledge to live up to Eleanor Roosevelt’s inspirational example, for in far too many places human freedoms are still denied. As long as a family anywhere is tormented by a state-sanctioned killer; a peaceful agitator is hounded by a violent brigade; an artist is locked away for expressing what she thinks; an LGBT individual is harassed because of whom he or she loves; a community is beleaguered because of how it worships; a person with a disability is marginalized by those who ignore plain injustice; or a girl is threatened for having the audacity to pick up a book; all of our rights have been violated. Continue reading “World Human rights”

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The politics of disability

Fresh on the heels of repeated, reasonably high profile forays into insulting Obama voters, minority voters, Asian-Americans, Latino-Americans, and whoever they’ll figure out they hate next, it turns out there are a fair number of disabled people in this country. As reported in Bal’oon Juice,

”How many? According to the US Census Bureau, as of 2010, 56.7 million Americans from the civilian, non-institutionalized population had a disability—that’s 18.7% of the US population.  Of those, 38.3 million, 12.6 percent, had a severe disability. Bringing it down to the sharp edge of what it takes to make it through the day,  ‘About 12.3 million people aged 6 and older (4.4%) needed assistance with one or more activities of daily living (ADLs) or instrumental activities of daily living (IADLs). That’s a lot of folks, no matter what level of disability you choose to emphasize.  They’ve all got families—and that’s a lot more people.  They have friends too…and you get the point.”

Read more at: http://www.balloon-juice.com/2012/12/05/alienating-the-electorate-nineteen-million-americans-at-a-time/

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Habits Learned from Being Bullied

In our continuing series on bullying, here is a bit that has gone viral in recent weeks, authored by Annalee Newitz and found on a site called io9.

“Like a lot of geeks, I spent several years in social hell as a kid. You know the routine. They passed mean notes about me in class. They got together in big groups at lunchtime, surrounded me, and asked me weird, sneering questions. They punched me, insulted me, crank called my house at 3 AM, and smeared pizza sauce on my favorite white shirt. And the strange thing is that I think they made me a better person. Here are six life lessons I learned from being bullied when I was a geeky kid.

1. Ignore Insults and Keep Going

2. Everybody Is Probably Laughing at You, But It’s Not Really A Big Deal


3. There Is Nothing More Important than Friendship

4. Fantasies Are More Powerful Than Pain


5. Always Distrust Popularity


6. Give Up On Revenge

For full story, see: http://io9.com/5966749/six-lessons-i-learned-from-being-bullied-as-a-geeky-kid

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Do college admissions overlook brilliant artists?

“The truth is that many future poets, novelists, and screenwriters are not likely to be straight-A students, either in high school or in college.” Helen Vendler writes in the current Harvard Magazine about the pitfalls of by-the-numbers admissions practices that can overlook creative brilliance. “The arts through which they will discover themselves prize creativity, originality, and intensity above academic performance; they value introspection above extroversion, insight above rote learning. Continue reading “Do college admissions overlook brilliant artists?”

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Far from the tree

For anyone who hasn’t heard about Andrew Solomon’s Far from the Tree, this book is much more than a tome (900+ pages) about parents and special-needs kids. Solomon has written a tour-de-force discussion on difference and identity worthy of anyone’s attentions, especially those of us who do not conform to the tyranny of normativity. Julie Myerson wrote a wonderful piece on the book in a recent New York Times Book Review. While the later chapters in Far From the Tree each could be their own separate books about specific conditions of being, the first 200 pages are pure gold. As Myerson begins her review,

“How does it feel to be the mother of a teenage dwarf who’s desperate to start dating? What if you love the daughter you conceived when you were raped but can’t bear to be touched by her? And, as the father of a happy, yet profoundly deaf son who’s forgotten how it feels to hear, how do you deal with your memories of the times you played music together? Continue reading “Far from the tree”

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Why you don’t feel happy

“Few aspirations are seen as more worthwhile and self-evidently desirable than the pursuit of happiness. These days, no one is against it. All of us can become happy, whether poor or rich, Christian or Muslim, conservative or libertarian.” So writes Carl Cederstrom in today’s Al Jazeera

“It is no wonder then that Freud – the father of psychoanalysis – is often regarded with suspicion. Categorically, he claimed that man is not designed for happiness. If happiness would fully come out and realise itself, he claimed, we would not be prepared for it. We simply wouldn’t know what to do with it. Admittedly, this sounds rather disconcerting. Yet, there’s a profound and important point here, one that is worth considering at a time when we are told, again and again, that happiness is the one true way to a meaningful life. Continue reading “Why you don’t feel happy”

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Drone strikes on Afghanistan break records this year

As if there was any doubt, official statistics show more deadly drone strikes against Afghanistan in 2012 than the U.S. has ever done anywhere. As Danger Room reports,

“Last month, military stats revealed that the U.S. had launched some 333 drone strikes in Afghanistan thus far in 2012. That made Afghanistan the epicenter of U.S. drone attacks — not Pakistan, not Yemen, not Somalia. But it turns out those stats were off, according to revised ones released by the Air Force on Thursday morning. There have actually been 447 drone strikes in Afghanistan this year. That means drone strikes represent 11.5 percent of the entire air war — up from about 5 percent last year.

“Never before in Afghanistan have there been so many drone strikes. For the past three years, the strikes have never topped 300 annually, even during the height of the surge. Never mind 2014, when U.S. troops are supposed to take a diminished role in the war and focus largely on counterterrorism. Afghanistan’s past year, heavy on insurgent-hunting robots, shows that the war’s future has already been on display.

 

For more see: http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/12/2012-drones-afghanistan/

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American maxing out their credit cards

We like to crack a joke about this, but the reality is just too sobering. Consumer credit-card debt in the US has hit an all time high. The poor economy, a consumption-driven culture, and predatory banks offering credit to those who can’t pay. These facts from the current Huffington Post contradict a recent article in Time Magazine celebrating an apparent decline in overall household debt. But if you read the fine pint in the Time article, you see that the gross number drop is cause by massive loan defaults across the country. As Martin Crutsinger writes in Huff Post,

Americans swiped their credit cards more often in October and borrowed more to attend school and buy cars. The increases drove U.S. consumer debt to an all-time high.

The Federal Reserve said Friday that consumers increased their borrowing by $14.2 billion in October from September. Total borrowing rose to a record $2.75 trillion. Continue reading “American maxing out their credit cards”

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And now, fees to apply for art teaching jobs

“A tenure-track job is surely a valuable commodity, but would you pay for a shot at one?” Inside Higher Education reports that  “A listing for a faculty painting position at Colorado State University attracted some heat on Twitter when several academics noticed the $15 fee attached to the position.

“The job ad states simply: ‘In lieu of postage and duplication costs you will be charged a fee of $15.’ Gary Voss, chair of Colorado State’s art department, confirmed in an e-mail to Inside Higher Ed that there is a fee for applying for the position. The fee, he said, is paid to SlideRoom.com, the site that hosts the job listing and that applicants use to submit their portfolio. SlideRoom, which is used by a number of colleges and universities, is an applicant management system that allows for the transmission and organization of forms, references, creative materials Continue reading “And now, fees to apply for art teaching jobs”

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Temper tantrums mean the child is crazy

Anyone paying attention knows that the forthcoming DSM-5 guide book for psychiatrists been getting plenty of advance criticism.

Because this medical volume influences very non-medical factors like insurance coverage and definitions of mental “health,” exactly who gets classified and in what manner can have huge material and social consequences.  The new DSM will redraw the lines on conditions ranging from autism to transgender identity. As Slate reports today, yet another diagnosis is drawing fire:

“Nothing burns the critics worse than “Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder,” a new diagnosis for kids 6 to 18 years old who three or more times a week have “temper outbursts that are grossly out or proportion in intensity or duration to the situation.” It actually started out as “temper dysregulation disorder with dysphoria” (tantrums, plus you feel bad) but got changed so as not to openly malign tantrums. But the diagnosis still focuses on them, and critics say it is Continue reading “Temper tantrums mean the child is crazy”

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Sense of taste fades with age

“As we get older, there may come a time when we find ourselves drawn not to food with good taste or food that tastes good but simply to food that has any flavor at all.” This depressing statement came from today’s New york Times.”

“Blame your aging taste buds, if you want. You’ll probably be wrong, but there are a lot more of them (about 9,000) to point the finger at than the likely real culprit, your nose. “When people talk about their taste, they’re really talking about the smell rather than the taste,” said Dr. Scott P. Stringer, chairman of the otolaryngology department at the University of Mississippi Medical Center.

“As it happens, taste buds do diminish as people get older, usually starting at 40 to 50 in women and 50 to 60 in men (why later for them is unknown). And those that remain do not, so to speak, step up to the plate to make Continue reading “Sense of taste fades with age”

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Australian prime minister warns of apocalypse

Today Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard told her nation the world was about to end:

“My dear remaining fellow Australians, the end of the world is coming. It wasn’t Y2K, it wasn’t even the carbon price,” Gillard said, referring to her controversial environmental tax on business. “It turns out that the Mayan calendar was true.”

“Whether the final blow comes from flesh-eating zombies, demonic hell-beasts or from the total triumph of K-Pop, if you know one thing about me it is this — I will always fight for you to the very end,” Gillard added in the mock-apocalyptic warning, carried by Australian radio station Triple-J..

But there’s always a silver lining: “And at least this means I won’t have to do [political talk show] Q&A again.”

Read more: http://www.upi.com/blog/2012/12/06/Australian-PM-Julia-Gillards-warns-of-zombie-K-pop-induced-apocalypse/2531354802605/#ixzz2EJ7sDjV7

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France’s new male problem

French men are having problems these days, and Viagra isn’t going to help them, According to Al Jazeera “A new study has found that the sperm count of an average Frenchman fell by one-third between 1989 and 2005.

:The findings of the report, published by the Human Reproduction journal on Wednesday, found that the number of sperm in one millilitre of the average 35-year-old French man’s semen fell from about 74 million to about 50 million – a decrease of roughly 32 per cent. That’s certainly within the normal range, but if you think about it, if there continues to be a decrease, we would expect
that we’ll get into that infertile range,” said Grace Centola, president of the Society for Male Reproduction and Urology in
Birmingham, Alabama. Continue reading “France’s new male problem”

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Gender bending in the toy aisle

“Barbies are for girls and construction sets are for boys. Or are they?” asks today’s New York Times. Stephanie Clifford writes that “For the first time in Barbie’s more than 50-year history, Mattel is introducing a Barbie construction set that underscores a huge shift in the marketplace. Fathers are doing more of the family shopping just as girls are being encouraged more than ever by hypervigilant parents to play with toys (as boys already do) that develop math and science skills early on.

“It’s a combination that not only has Barbie building luxury mansions — they are pink, of course — but Lego promoting a line of pastel construction toys called Friends that is an early Christmas season hit. The Mega Bloks Barbie Build ’n Style line, available next week, has both girls — and their fathers — in mind. Continue reading “Gender bending in the toy aisle”

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Climate change stalemate continues

Disagreements seem to continue at the current United Nations climate change meeting in Doha. As Al Jazeera reports, “

“Ban Ki-moon, the secretary-general of the United Nations, has called on world leaders to confront a global warming “crisis” and show “strong political commitment” and compromise in dealing with it.

“Speaking at the annual UN climate talks in Doha, Ban noted that there were “mixed feelings” among delegates who were negotiating deals, but that the situation posed an “existential challenge for the whole human race”. Continue reading “Climate change stalemate continues”

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On drinking oneself blind

To put aside one urban myth,  alcohol sold legally for drinking purpose will not cause blindness, although it can kill you in sufficient quantity. But blindness can and does occur from mythl alcohol and various ‘moonshine” concoctions. As Slate reports,

“A New Zealand man recently went blind after drinking lots of vodka while on diabetes medication. Thankfully, doctors were able to restore his sight by administering him Johnnie Walker Black Label whiskey. Can you really drink yourself blind? Continue reading “On drinking oneself blind”

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Falling birth rates worry conservatives

Right wing bloggers have long been concerned with the U.S. birth rate, for a number of reasons. As Roy Edroso writes in today’s Village Voice,

“For one thing, they worry that if America doesn’t outbreed its enemies, democracy is in peril. ‘The Islamic world is reproducing at a rate far above replacement level,’ Continue reading “Falling birth rates worry conservatives”

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America’s love affair with its generals

Few things have characterized the post-9/11 American world more than America’s worshipful embrace of its generals, states a think-piece in Le Monde.  They’ve become heroes, sports stars, and celebrities all rolled into one. It’s all a bit creepy when you think about it.

“Even after his recent fall from grace, General David Petraeus was still being celebrated by CNN as the best American general since Dwight D. Eisenhower,” , writes William J. Astore.   “Before his fall from grace, Afghan War Commander General Stanley McChrystal was similarly lauded as one tough customer, a sort of superman-saint.

Continue reading “America’s love affair with its generals”