Friday, September 06, 2002

posted by PrinceValium September 6 5:17 PM | 6 comments. Buddy, we hardly knew ye. Vincent A. Cianci, Jr., mayor of Providence, R.I., heads off to jail on conspiracy charges, thus ending one of the most colorful relationships between a mayor and his city since Daley's Chicago. Whether revered for his astounding reconstruction of an embattled downtown, chastised for a career of shady dealings with shady people (and one unfortunate incident involving a fireplace, a lit cigarette, and his wife's lover), or turned into a cult figure by artsy college students, one thing is certain: Providence is a more interesting place because Buddy was a part of it. [MetaFilter] I still can't believe this guy got elected mayor of a major city. He's a friggin' character, alright.

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Berkeley Chancellor Overrules Students, Allows Patriotic Displays. Plastic::Work::School: "Red, white and blue ribbons don't offend anyone," says the Berkeley Chancellor, offending the student radicals who wanted them banned in the first place. [Plastic: Most Recent]
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Classroom karaoke. If California schools keep the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance, there will be kids like I was, who will remain silent, move their lips and hope that patriotic peers don't catch them. [Salon.com] Been there, done that, got in trouble for it in elementary school and again in high school...
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posted by pejamo September 6 9:52 AM | 2 comments. The Associated Press has written a summary of the Bush Administration's curtailment of civil liberties. This appears to an unbiased and factual catalog of the changes 9/11 has wrought on our justice system. It would appear that the Law and Order wing of the GOP has spanked the Libertarian wing but good. Let the Eagle Soar! [MetaFilter] The AP article is truly disturbing - just listing the rights that have been taken away from us is profoundly disquieting. On NPR this morning, they said something about a poll that said that Americans think we may have too many rights...eek.

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Bush hits stumbling block over Iraq [BBC World] Hurrah! Putin, Chirac, and Zemin have all said they don't like the idea of invading Iraq. Now if only Bush would listen...
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The armchair general. He's been beating the drums of war for a decade. Can Beltway hawk Richard Perle finally persuade the U.S. to wage war with Iraq? [Salon.com] Does he even have to try? It sure seems to me like the decision's been made already.
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Jets target Iraqi air defences. ·100 jets involved · Labour backbenchers oppose war · Blair: UK must pay blood price [Guardian Unlimited] What is this blood price Blair keeps talking about? Is he trying to say that the British owe us some deaths because of World War II? If so, that's pretty damned goofy. If not, what IS he trying to say?
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So, having to test my populist theories, I asked a co-worker of mine how come Labor Day is observed in early September instead of during May Day. This lead to a conversation where she mentioned that at school they taught her about the Chicago riots of 1886, but not about the Chicago Martyrs, whose death is rememberd worldwide during the Labor Day holiday on May 1st. Hmm... My parents were right: "Ask to learn." [Driver 8] Hey, it impresses me that she was taught about the Haymarket riots at all - we definitely didn't cover them in my high school history classes. I've read quite a bit about them on my own, but most schools don't spent much time on American labor history. Case in point: I grew up near Lowell and Lawerence, the great mill towns of Massachusetts. While we were taught about the mills a bit, and went on tours of the museums and state/national park here in Lowell, we never covered the abuses of the mill workers at all. Hell, Lawerence, the site of the massive Bread and Roses strike in 1912, wasn't even mentioned. American labor history is pushed aside in mainstream American public schools because it makes people uncomfortable. The conservative groups that vet textbooks have long frowned on labor history because it might be 'communist'. I don't know if this is at all different in more unionized areas than the white collar suburbs of Boston, but I'm afraid it most likely isn't much better anywhere else. Addendum: I'm actually living in one of the immense old mills of Lowell now. They have pictures of mill workers from the late 1800s on the hallway walls, along with replicas of help wanted signs and timetables from the 1840s and 1850s. In fact, as you enter the building and head towards the elevators, you can't help but see a timetable that very prominently shows the 11 hour work day. Made me feel a little better to see that the nasty history of the mills was being acknowledged, at least a bit.

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Xbox Linux project releases SuSE 8.0 howto. You weren't doing anything this afternoon, were you? [The Register] hmm...maybe I should buy that X-Box after all. =)
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China may break Aids drug patents. China will have "no choice" but to violate patents on foreign drugs unless pharmaceutical firms agree to price cuts¸ a top official says. [BBC News | WORLD] For once, I would whole-heartedly support Chinese patent theft - the drug companies that own the patents on the important AIDS drugs are profiteering, and their excessive focus on the bottom line is killing people in Southeast Asia, China, and Subsaharan Africa. If China's got any sense, they'll not only violate those patents, they'll export their cheaper copies of the drugs.

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ADHD Brains Want More Action. School kids with attention deficit disorder could be perfectly suited for today's hyperkinetic work environment. But not all educators think parking students in front of PCs is the answer. By Kristen Philipkoski. [Wired News] In my personal experience, computers have been a life saver. I honestly don't know if I could deal with working without the Internet, let alone computers - I've often joked that I have no idea how people worked before they had the Internet to waste a few hours on a day...but then I realize that I'm serious. How DID people function without the Internet? I certainly couldn't do well at all. Computers allow me to multi-task and get as many different stimuli as I need, which is a neccessity for an ADHD brain. I'm sure that just dumping a kid with a laptop won't solve all their problems, but it sure as hell would have made my childhood a lot more workable.

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Terror laws 'eat away at privacy'. The post-11 September world is one without privacy rights and technology is playing a huge part in their erosion¸ a report has found. [BBC News | TECHNOLOGY] The article says "The report found that Britain had one of the worse records for mass surveillance and cited a catalogue of alleged illegal spying and surveillance activities by UK agencies." And just imagine - that's without having John Ashcroft. Impressive!

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