Other News

  On Friday September 7, 2012, Canada closed its embassy in Tehran and ordered all Iranian diplomats to leave the country within five days. The travel and warnings section of the Canadian federal government website ordered all citizens to avoid travel to Iran. Many neutral observers in the world have concluded that military action by Israel against Iran is imminent and this is a pre-emptive decision by Canada as a close ally and confidante of Israel in anticipation of military conflict. Last week, General Hossein Salami, Deputy Chief of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, said that any attempt to attack Iran would expand the warfare to the enemies’ land. “Any aggression against Iran will expand the war into the borders of the enemies,” he warned. “They know our power, and we won’t allow any aggression against our land.”

  Israel has made no secret of its desire to attack Iran before the November 6 American election date in order to maximize its leverage on the Obama administration which would be forced by the pro Israel stance of the Republicans to show that it’s tough on the “Muslim threat”.  While Israel by itself or with American collusion could deliver a significant attack on Iranian infrastructure, the expected Iranian military response perhaps by one of its “silkworm” anti shipping missiles against a tanker or naval vessel in the Strait of Hormuz would certainly draw America into a protracted trillion dollar budget busting, Middle Eastern war.

I’m amazed at the lack of coverage by American mass media that seem fixated on the 2012 election cycle with its outlandish character attacks and ignore obvious global events. The situation is deteriorating rapidly and events are moving along at a fast pace. Today the Toronto Star stated:

  At a news conference Monday, (Canadian immigration minister)Jason Kenney told reporters

Officials have been told to comb through applications from Iranian nationals to ensure anyone deemed allied with or part of the Iranian government — declared last week a state sponsor of terrorism — is barred from entering Canada.

“Many in the Persian community in Canada have been concerned that people who have been close to or members of the regime and their relatives, they believe, have in too many cases been able to establish residency in Canada and we want to ensure that people who may be inadmissible, that is to say those who perhaps are associated with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, the Al Quds force, the Basij, or senior members of the regime are not admissible to Canada under s. 34-36 of the Immigration Refugee Protection Act,” Kenney said.

UPDATE (Today):

Twenty five countries led by the US will hold a 12-day long naval exercise (starting Sept. 15, 2012) nearby Iranian waters, said sources in the British military .

During the maneuvers, participants will practice securing traffic in the Gulf of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf in hostile environment of an opponent. Western military makes no secret, the latter is Iran.

The US delegated three carrier strike groups. Presently, American nuclear-powered aircraft carriers USS Enterprise and USS Dwight D. Eisenhower are deployed in the region. Third carrier USS John C. Stennis will arrive in the area in the nearest time.

Great Britain, France, Saudi Arabia, and United Arab Emirates dispatched large naval forces as well. Some episodes will be held with participation of NATO command authorities.

Except for securing and mine clearing activities in the Strait of Hormuz, the exercise includes strikes upon opponent’s warships, coast-based air defense batteries, missile and gun positions located near the Strait of Hormuz.

Learn about data visualization software.

Legitimate Rape

Everyone has been talking about Todd Akin’s concept of legitimate rape but if you really want to know about the legitimate rape of women’s rights then all you have to do is observe the voting record of the elected officials in the Congress. It’s been a banner year for the Congressional Conservative’s aim to push women’s rights in America back to the fifties with an average of more than one anti-women vote per week in the 112^th congress according to a new report released today. The executive summary of a report prepared by U.S. House of Representative’s committee on Energy and commerce (minority staff) says the following:

The House of Representatives have voted repeatedly for an extreme anti-women agenda in the 112th Congress. Since January 2011, the Republican-controlled House has voted 55 times to undermine women’s health, roll back women’s rights, and defund programs and institutions that provide health care and support for women.

House Republicans have voted to strip women of access to preventive health care and contraception, to eliminate federal support for reproductive and maternal care services, to cut funds for important nutrition programs for pregnant women, nursing mothers, and families, and to allow insurers to discriminate against women and charge them more than men for health insurance policies. They have voted against passing, improving, and funding important programs like the Violence against Women Act and the Paycheck Fairness Act. They have voted to end the basic guarantees that the Medicare and Medicaid programs provide to low-income women or women who are seniors. They have voted to increase the exposure of pregnant women and women of childbearing age to dangerous toxic chemicals. And they have voted numerous times to restrict women’s access to legal abortions.

The House of Representatives averaged one anti-women vote for every week that the House has been in session since Republicans took control in January 2011. Almost 5% of all House legislative floor votes since the beginning of 2011 have been anti-women votes. During these roll calls, 95% of Republican members voted for the position that was harmful to women, while 90% of Democratic members voted for the pro-women position.

This analysis, prepared at the request of Energy and Commerce Committee Ranking Member Henry A. Waxman, Subcommittee on Health Ranking Member Frank Pallone, Jr., Subcommittee on Communications and Technology Ranking Member Anna G. Eshoo, Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations Ranking Member Diana DeGette, and Committee members Lois Capps, Jan Schakowsky, Tammy Baldwin, Doris O. Matsui, Donna Christensen, and Kathy Castor, provides a summary of the 55 times that House Republicans have voted against women in 2011 and 2012. Among these votes are:

• Seventeen votes to allow health insurance companies to discriminate against women by charging women higher premiums than men or denying women coverage based on “pre-existing conditions” like being pregnant.

• Eleven votes that cut women’s access to preventive care, including votes to repeal Affordable Care Act provisions that provide free preventive care for women and votes to eliminate the Prevention and Public Health Fund, which is used to support breastfeeding and immunizations and is budgeted to pay for breast and cervical cancer screenings for hundreds of thousands of women in 2013 and beyond.

Ten votes to restrict or roll back abortion rights or access to legal abortion, including votes to ban the use of federal funds to train medical students in the provision of abortions, votes to allow hospitals to deny emergency abortions to women’s whose lives are in jeopardy, and votes to prohibit the District of Columbia from using local funds to pay for abortions.

• Seven votes to cut funding for key nutrition programs for women, including votes for significant cuts in the Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) that provides nutrition, food counseling, and support for more than nine million low-income pregnant women, new mothers, and infants each month.

• Six votes against protections for women from violence and discrimination, including votes against protecting the confidentiality of domestic violence victims, votes to oppose additional funding for grants under the Violence Against Women Act, and votes to place new restrictions on the citizenship rights of legal, foreign-born women who are victims of domestic violence.

• Three votes to block access to reproductive and maternal care services, including votes for a budget that prohibits funding of Planned Parenthood and eliminates funding for the Title X Family Planning Program, which provides family planning services for millions of low-income women every year.

• Three votes to undermine Medicare and Medicaid programs, including votes to end the basic Medicare guarantee and votes to turn Medicaid into a block grant, slash $800 billion in existing federal support for state Medicaid programs, and repeal $640 billion of new Medicaid funding from the Affordable Care Act over the next ten years.

• Fourteen votes to weaken environmental laws that protect pregnant women, including votes to block EPA regulations that would protect pregnant women and women of childbearing age from exposure to mercury, a potent neurotoxin that poses particular risks to the brain and nervous system of unborn children.

 

 

 

"The English are waking up!"

A historic Quebec election that returned the Parti Québécois to power ended in tragedy Tuesday when a gunman killed one person and wounded another, then tried to start a fire at the Montreal venue where PQ Leader Pauline Marois was celebrating her minority mandate.

Police said a suspect entered a vestibule at the back of the Metropolis nightclub and fired shots, wounding two people critically. The suspect then started a fire and ran away on foot.(Globe and Mail)
 

 An unidentified man wearing a balaclava, shorts and a bathrobe was heard to say in broken French, “The English are waking up, the English are waking up ... It's payback ... Yeah, yeah, that’s enough." as police detained him. Too early for more information (He was armed with a handgun and an assault rifle as well as an incendiary device. Police have identified the shooter as Richard Henry Bain, 62, from La Conception, Quebec who owns a hunting & fishing lodge in Mont Tremblant, PQ. He has a facebook page under this name but the website for the lodge has been taken down.) but this is a dangerous beginning to a separatist government. The new premier of Quebec began her victory speech with "As a nation, we want to take ourselves the decisions that affect us. We want a country. And we'll have it." The Canadian Prime Minister, Steven Harper, has consistently ignored the feelings of Quebec and appointed Anglophone members to traditionally bilingual positions. In Alberta, Quebec is considered to be a cesspool of indulged,spoilt complainers who would be better out of the country and the tar sands wealth have given Albertans a sense of superiority to the hated Easterners. They compare Canada to a cow that eats in the west, gets milked in the center and craps on the maritimers.

The Quebec Liberals deserved to lose with their corrupt, lazy and entitled sense of political power but the PQ is going to indulge its fantasies of an independent Quebec again without dealing with the realities that have come up in previous incarnations of being in power.

1) Quebec is indivisable. Unfortunately the native people of Quebec disagree and they hold vast tracts of the province. If an independent Quebec sends the police, then the natives have treaties with the federal government going back to confederation to stop them.

Native tribal regions of Quebec in red(Wikipedia)

2) Quebec will have successor rights to Canada's international treaties. In the last separatist referendrum, United States made it clear that any treaties with a newly independent Quebec would be negotiated from scratch with Quebec in a much less favourable negotiating position.

Professor Peter Russell has pointed out,"(Aboriginal peoples) are not nations that can be yanked out of Canada against their will by a provincial majority.... With few exceptions (they)wish to enjoy their right to self-government within Canada, not within a sovereign Quebec." International human rights expert Erica-Irene Daes warns that to deny the right of self- determination to indigenous peoples "will leave the most marginalized and excluded of all the world's peoples without a legal, peaceful weapon to press for genuine democracy...." This concern is connected to the fact that if Quebec were to be considered its own autonomous nation-state then it need not honour the treaties and agreements that were formed between Aboriginal peoples and the British and French monarchies and is now maintained by the federal Canadian government. This is a concern for many Aboriginal peoples in Quebec, whose rights, which include among others, the right to protect their Indigenous culture, would be without the legal or constitutional protection which is currently provided for in Canada. Concern for this may stem from what Aboriginal peoples perceive as neo-colonial or eurocentric attitudes which persist in the leadership of contemporary separatist leaders, such as Robert Bourassa, former Premier and self-proclaimed "Conqueror of the North".(Wikipedia)

3) Quebec is sustainable. The province can't feed its population with the local food production nor can it supply the energy it requires for heating or transportation. The balance of payments would soon bankrupt the country. Also a lot of the hydro Quebec electrical generating capacity lies in the tribal regions and the natives would expect compensation which would be a long term financial issue.

4) Quebec residents would keep their Canadian passports. With the Anglo backlash, this is highly unlikely and if they did then they would be responsible for the obligations of all Canadian citizens. I don`t buy Souveraineté-Association or in more defined terms an independent Quebec within a united Canada which some separatists have tried to sell as part of the ``le beau risque."

5) Quebec would have an independent monetary policy. Not a chance. If Quebec adopts a Canadian or American dollar then it gives up any monetary levers and would lack any input into monetary policy of the country whose currency it adopts. It would be in the same situation as Greece with the same consequences.

I was involved in the vote over the Meech Lake Accord of Conservative Prime Minister, Brian Mulroney, during the last separtist outbreak and I don't want to go through that again.

The failure of the Meech Lake Accord—an abortive attempt to redress the constitutional problems brought on by the adoption of the 1982 amendment without the Quebec government's approval—strengthened the conviction of most sovereigntist politicians and led many federalist ones to place little hope in the prospect of a federal constitutional reform that would satisfy Quebec's purported historical demands (according to proponents of the sovereignty movement). These include a constitutional recognition that Quebecers constitute a distinct society, as well as a larger degree of independence of the province towards federal policy.(Wikipedia)

Quebec is losing its political influence because of most immigrants which represent the majority of Canadian population increase settling in other parts of Canada. Also Quebec which used to have the highest birthrate in the country and bragged about the "revenge of the craddle" now has the lowest birthrate. This has lead to a resurgence of separatism due to fear of the future decline which has been encouraged by the Prime Minister's actions. On the other side, Quebec commentators like Gilles Proulx have a great time unloading on the têtes carrées or block heads as they call Anglos and he will have a field day with this shooting incident involving an Anglo so be prepared for some tough times if you live in Quebec.


Canadian Immigration Infographic by

Birthday Thoughts

My mother, grandmother and I in Trafalgar Square, London

    Two weeks ago was my birthday and as part of a long standing tradition, I had a special birthday dinner. When I was young, my mother prepared it at home but as time progressed and my circumstances became more affluent it was succeeded by dinner at a restaurant - at first with friends in a local  chain  followed by an outing with my ex in a more exclusive affair and finally with my adult children. Thus two of my daughters and I went to an ornate Italian restaurant on the evening of my birthday with the name of “La Fenice” on King Street in heart of the theatre district of downtown Toronto and not far from the location of the Princess of Wales theatre which is  playing, ”The War Horse”. The dinner reservation was for 7:30 pm so we could miss the theatre folk that usually pack the place after the Saturday performance and it wasn’t crowded so we got the window table where we could observe the exotic folk on the sidewalk pass by and see the latest fashionistas with their designer clothes strutting on the pavement. My youngest daughter who got her diploma in fashion management at George Brown College and goes with me on shopping expeditions for clothes to ensure that I’m up to date as well as meet her standards for dress, liked to critique the sidewalk parade which was quite thick on the balmy evening. She`s quick to notice a Christine Laboutine shoe or a Tilley shirt. The restaurant name is Italian for “the Phoenix” and references the opera house of the same appellation in Venice, Italy which is famous both for its premieres of such operas as Rigoletto as well as burning down several times over the years hence the name, rising from the ashes of its prior incarnation. One of the pictures on the walls shows the front of the opera house in the 1890s. The venue is known for the quality of its seafood and the charming / discrete waiter brought a platter of a number of freshly caught fish on ice that had recently been flown from the Mediterranean so the species were particular to that region. It was good that he was knowledgeable since my second daughter, the chef, has never found a restaurant that she couldn`t critique at length and send back any food that was perfectly cooked and plated. I found the fish on the small side and not that interesting although a native of the region would find them reminiscent of home. When I first went to “La Fenice” many years ago I would order the arctic Char which is related to the Salmon but more delicate and the fish would be big enough to feed two well. It’s hard to find the fish now days because of restrictions due to over fishing and the available Char are much smaller than in the past. I couldn’t take any pictures because my daughters now have a rule that dad doesn’t take pictures of the food when I go out with them. Frustrating but I understand.

My Uncle, Me, Grandmother and Aunt on their farm in the Yorkshire Dales.

 

  Started out with a bottle of rosé Zinfandel and a basket of fresh bread with olive oil and sweet aged balsamic vinegar that you mix yourself on a side plate. The wine didn’t have much body and was too sweet to have balance but the kids like it. For the appetizer, I ordered the “Bresaola della valtellina con mozzarella” which is cured beef with fresh bocconcini and “La Fenice” extra virgin olive oil that is their private estate brand. For the salad, I had the “Insalata caprese” which is a dish consisting of a variety of heritage tomatoes, fresh mozzarella and basil. For the main course, I had their seafood platter which consisted of poached salmon, calamari and four large scallops with seasonal vegetables. Everything was perfectly cooked with none of the usual chewiness that comes from overcooking. For desert, I ordered the”Zabaglione”, warm whipped custard flavoured with Marsala wine and served with fresh strawberries. My second oldest daughter couldn`t finish her desert, ”Chocolate Orange Hazelnut Torte”, sponge cake that had layers of ground hazelnuts with a whipped milk chocolate ganache flavored with orange and Grand Marnier so I ate that as well. I finished with a Cappuccino. Usually I finish with a Niagara region ice wine or a glass of port but I’d had enough at that point with the extra desert. Ate more than I should but it was my birthday so I suppose that I had some justification.  Afterwards, they gave me a new leather wristband for my watch and a pair of new walking shoes for presents.

Farm with Angus the dog

  Life seems so short sometimes. One minute you`re changing diapers and next the children are off to university. The meal at the restaurant got me thinking about my childhood when I lived on my uncle’s farm in the Yorkshire Dales not far from the Brontë parsonage in Haworth where the Brontë sisters grew up.  I certainly understand the bleakness of the moors and the feeling of stepping on a wet spongy surface in the treeless fields under the constant cold rain. My uncle’s farm was on top of a hill overlooking a grey stony mill town which lay in one of the valleys that crease the Pennines. The area really hasn’t changed since Charlotte wrote ``Wurthering Heights `` which was situated in the local region although under a false name. He had a goat herd and bees as well as a greenhouse where he grew a variety of vegetables that certainly wouldn`t survive on the moors. The farm house known as Rock Cottage was modest but felt warm and safe especially on stormy nights when the wind would blow against the banging window shutters and the house seemed like an isolated pocket of humanity in the vast empty expanse of the moors. We ate exceptionally well compared to the general population since rationing continued in Britain until 1954 with cheese, meat and clothing being available in small amounts that could be obtained only with government coupons while we had access to fresh goat milk, cheese and butter as well as sugar from the honey while the people in the mill town below had to struggle. I, of course, being young was unaware of this until much later in my life because my relatives and family never discussed it.

Rock Cottage

  Britain at that time was a class society (and still is in many regards) so I with my North American accent and the cowboy boots that my mother had bought before we left for England, garnered the “cousin from the colonies” comments and was always an outsider although my mother’s side of the family were local and my great grandfather’s eldest son who was killed in World War 1 had his name inscribed on the plaque in the sanctum sanctorum of the private school in the area near the coast.

My uncle with his chickens

  Later after we moved back to Canada, I could always maintain a distance and study the scene and behaviour of the folks in the community from the aspect of a curious but intelligent observer - a trans Atlantic hybrid with my own unique nationality. Since then I've travelled much and learned a little.

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.

T.S. Elliot

Honey gathering

 

Restaurant review: Cellars (Elora)

This is a review based on two visits this month to this pricey but charming river side gastro pub in the former mill town of Elora, Ontario which is about three miles west of Fergus where my mother is staying in a nursing home. Elora is about a hundred kilometres North East of  Toronto and in the middle of Wellington county. The pub is on the north side of the Grand River that flows westerly through the center of both Fergus and Elora. You can see a photo of the river taken from the middle of the Elora bridge below with the restaurant just through the trees on the left.

The town of Elora was founded in 1832 by a Captain William Gilkinson and the name came from the Ellora caves near Aurangabad in India where the name of  the Captain's brother's ship originated. The river has a well known waterfall called the Tooth of Time just east of the restaurant. In order to reach the back patio by the river, you have to walk down a brick path on the west side of the building and pass some very attractive flower arrangements.

On my first visit, I had as an appetizer the Baked Goat Cheese which was baked in a phyllo pastry with mango beet chutney. Very good. Tasted like more.

And for the entre, fresh salmon on a spinach salad with poached pear and tossed in a raspberry vinaigrette topped with spicy walnuts and blue cheese. The wine was a Niagara region vidal.  Also very good. Portion controlled.

 On my second visit this month, I had the Grilled Calamari which was tossed in a tomato vinaigrette served on a warm bed of greens, peanuts and craisins ( dried cranberries), and topped with a balsamic vinaigrette.  Excellent and the calamari wasn't chewy which is the sign of a properly prepared dish and not over cooked like a lot of restaurants. The pink colour comes from the sun shining through the red umbrella which you can't see in the picture. Good presentation. The wine was an Argentine shiraz.

For desert, I had the lime cheese cake with fresh coffee. Acceptable. Could put more lime in the recipe.

The service was slow but then I find that most of the restaurants in the country have slow service. The view was certainly entertaining while I was waiting for the food to arrive.

I would have to say that the wine was moderately priced but the selection was mediocre for the quality of the food. I only tried the lunch menu.  Overall quite good and right in the middle of town on the south side of Mill Street. Within a short walking distance of most downtown stores.

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Plantation Nation: Guns

Time magazine has a cover story this week entitled “How Guns Won” by Joe Klein about the end of the argument in the States about gun control with the NRA side winning.  While homicides have declined over the last twenty years so has opposition to guns and the current discussions aren’t over gun control but the limits on the types of weapons that can be purchased. This has lead to an arms race between the citizenry and law enforcement. The article was a response to the mass shooting at the theatre in Aurora, Colorado. The activity graph (the red line represents the word "mass shooting`` and the blue line "gun control") below demonstrates the lag phase between the shooting and discussions about gun control. The quick reduction in volume is due to the decoupling of the immediate event from more general considerations by media’s discourse boundaries on this subject.

If this wasn’t bad enough then TIME had a side bar piece, “The case for gun control” which was written by well known CNN host, Fareed Zakaria, who in the text plagiarised a story by another writer. He was then suspended for one month for breaching TIME’s standards (?). I’ll wait for another time to discuss mass media’s cut and paste journalism as well as the use of unpaid interns to do the heavy lifting at news organizations. Fareed’s faux pas revealed the magazine’s casual disregard for a balanced viewpoint and its interest in a superficial ``on the other hand`` rebuttal. On August 10, 2012, he made the following statement:

Media reporters have pointed out that paragraphs in my TIME column this week bear close similarities to paragraphs in Jill Lepore’s essay in the April 22nd issue of The New Yorker. They are right. I made a terrible mistake. It is a serious lapse and one that is entirely my fault. I apologize unreservedly to her, to my editors at TIME, and to my readers."

The core argument of Lepore’s essay was in this paragraph:

The assertion that the Second Amendment protects a person’s right to own and carry a gun for self-defense, rather than the people’s right to form militias for the common defense, first became a feature of American political and legal discourse in the wake of the Gun Control Act of 1968, and only gained prominence in the nineteen-seventies.

The debate over gun control in the States involved special interest groups lobbying politicians with money and contesting legal interpretations of the second amendment but in fact the foundation of the effort was fear of the “other”. This has been traditionally the territory of the Appalachian Scots Irish isolationists but with the rise of the Plantation Nation, their concerns have become aligned with the Deep South mentality of needing personal protection from anticipated slave rebellions which has moved the center of the debate towards their end of the discourse spectrum and involves the total freedom to carry all the firepower you want. These others could be those of a different race or socio-economic background and is particularly in force when travelling in foreign countries. The pictorial below is a common American perception of Mexico in America which is projected by the mass media.

Actually there were only 120 American deaths in Mexico last year and this is equivalent to the number of murders in some small US cities not to mention the fifteen thousand total murders in the US last year but perception is strong when people are uninformed. This was true in the case of Walter Wawra, a Kalamazoo Michigan police officer on vacation in Calgary, Alberta last week who perceived the actions of two youths in Nose Hill Park to be threatening after they asked him if he had been to the stampede which is the annual Calgary Rodeo. Unfortunately, he didn’t have his usual concealed weapon with him due to Canadian gun laws. He later wrote a letter to the Calgary Herald newspaper complaining about the national gun laws and his right to react to any perceived threatening situation with lethal force.  His home town with a population of seventy five thousand had 9 murders last year so maybe he transferred his anxiety to dangerous hosers in the north, no telling what those socialist thugs strung out on raw maple syrup could do. You can watch the video below to see the response by the social media in Canada. As of the present moment, this story has not been reported in US mass media so the American echo chamber of false information continues.

The worship of lethal force continues with debut of NBC’s new reality show tonight – Stars earn Stripes. Just watched the first episode where the basic theme is laid out. A celebrity from TV land and a real life military operative are paired in a competition between teams to win points termed stripes. Each stripe is worth money to a charity designated by the celebrities.

There are eight teams where the military operatives belong to such groups as the Green Berets, Navy Seals, Army, Delta force etc. They use live ammunition, use the latest in military hardware and are billeted in military training centers for realistic encounters. They are observed by former NATO Supreme Allied Commander General Wesley Clark in a high tech observation center with all the fancy tech toys such as point of view personal cams or remote sensing and given their instructions by Dancing with the stars co-host Samantha Harris: gun porn with attractive mostly white good guys taking out brown people or their constructed representations with the latest automatic weapons including machine guns and grenade launchers. Diplomacy and negotiation have no place in this TV world where it’s kill or be killed. At the end of each episode, the teams are evaluated by the retired General in an after action review or as they say in the show’s parlance, an AAR. Speed and body count are important. Finally a stripe is given out to the winner and the winner’s designated charity receives a donation. This is war for couch potatoes where the subliminal message is permanent war and lethal response.

The show which has as celebrities such notables as Todd Palin who is Sarah Palin’s husband, Terri Crews - a former NFL footplayer and actor in several action movies, Picabo Street - a former alpine skier and Gold Medallist at the Olympics, Nick Lachey - a former singer and reality TV participant, Laila Ali – a professional boxer and daughter of Mohammed Ali, Eva Torres - American dancer, model, professional wrestler and actress, Dolverr Quince who was a trainer on the TV show “The Biggest Loser” and Dean Cain - actor, has already been criticized in an open letter to the NBC chairman by Nobel Peace Laureates including President Oscar Sanchez and Archbishop Desmond Tutu in which they state that the reality show glorifies war and sanitizes conflict by treating it like an athletic competition. The real world isn’t binary. There are usually multiplicities of options and life isn’t a zero sum game for the majority of folks in most developed countries. All of the previous instances treat realities as a series of win/lose scenarios involving the use of deadly force and this is being propagated in society as cultural memes which permeates all areas including education.

In a recent UC Davis newsletter, the following was stated about a speech by the current Chancellor P. B. Katehi on the aftermath, investigations and action plans with respect to the pepper spraying incident last year that saw Lt. Pike’s response to peaceful, sitting protestors go globally viral with the various photos and video clips.

In her speech this week, she said she considers herself accountable “for all the actions that need to be taken to make sure our campus is a safe and welcoming place"

In October, 2010 Chancellor Linda Katehi was appointed to the National Security Higher Education Advisory Board, the primary national nexus between academia and Homeland Security. According to the UC Davis statement, “The board was established in 2005 and includes about 20 presidents and chancellors of major research universities. The chair is Graham Spanier, president of Pennsylvania State University. Because of the nature of some of the material they discuss, board members must hold “secret” security clearances.” Of course, Graham Spanier who initially recruited Katehi, was fired after the systemic cover-up of assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky’s activities.

UC Davis was in the process of purchasing a Bearcat armoured personal carrier for its campus storm troopers when the decision was discovered by student activities this year. The purchase was not generally known since it was entirely funded by a two hundred thousand dollar Homeland Security grant probably under the $832 Urban Areas Security Grant program which has recently had its allocation profile extended from “high intensity risk areas”(read low income brown people communities) to include educational campuses based on terrorist risk assessment updates. Since there is only one University of California administrator on the primary HDL/Academia consultation committee, it’s not too hard to conjecture who was in a position to expedite the awarding of the grant. I guess that this part of all the actions needed to make the campus a “safe and welcoming place.”

The name BearCat stands for Ballistic Engineered Armored Response Counter Attack Truck as it is the smaller cousin to the Lenco B.E.A.R.

The Bearcat is based on a Ford F-550 6.0-liter turbo­diesel, four-speed automatic transmission commercial truck chassis. The 1.5-inch-thick steel armored bodywork is completed with ballistic glass capable of multi-hits, blast-resistant floors, specially designed gun ports, roof hatches/turret and agency specific equipment and/or modifications such as lights/sirens/battering ram/winches/thermal cameras and spot lights. (Wikipedia)

Law enforcement likes to refer to the carrier as an armoured rescue vehicle but to understand the true nature of the beast, watch the video below.

This is the future of campus police according to the University of California and coming to a campus near you soon. There is a program to help combat veterans transition to law enforcement officers. Consider coming back from an extended period in a combat zone and being given the same weapons and vehicles in a law enforcement role. Wouldn`t those protesting students start to look like a domestic version of dangerous “rag heads” that needed to be taken out?

This is all being done in secret. With regard to the UC Davis bearcat, the following was stated at the local town council:

Because the vehicle is being purchased by the university, and not a city governed by elected bodies, and because no matching funds were required – which the council would have had to approve – the Berkeley police department was not required to disclose the grant application.

Berkeley citizens found out about it only when the watchdog organisation, Berkeley Copwatch, discovered the project as a result of a Public Records Act request for general information on police equipment, according to Andrea Prichett of Copwatch.

The armoured vehicle has not been publicly discussed in Albany, and no such discussions are scheduled, according to Albany’s city clerk. Occupy Cal activists contacted for these stories were unaware that the university was buying the armoured vehicle.

So much for the new spirit of openness and transparency at the university. Fortunately after this became public knowledge, the purchase was cancelled.

Men in Black

 

According to the Ohio dispatch, the quiet and humble Amish are having a population explosion with their numbers doubling every 22 years and expected to reach one million by mid century. This is due to their refusal to use contraception methods, a tradition of large families and a low exodus of children from the communities due to strong social cohesion. Because of the high fertility rate, there is a diminishing supply of land so only 17% of Amish are farmers today versus 75% forty years ago.

Holmes County, in northeastern Ohio, could in the next 20 years become the first county in the United States to have more Amish than English (the common term for their non-Amish neighbors).

"For the past 10 years, I have told myself that they can’t keep growing at the pace they are,”said Joseph Donnermeyer, a rural sociology professor at OSU who led the Amish census project as part of a larger study on religions. “I’ve been wrong every single year.”

There has been a shift in the population in a westerly direction with an increase in Amish sightings in Wyoming and Idaho from spotters bringing back photos of horses and buggies driven by men in black to verify their claims at the local Legion halls.

Amish Population distribution 2012
(courtesy Indiana.edu)

Maybe Arizona law enforcement will stop them for documentation. The GOP certainly has them in their sights for the current 2012 election cycle with their prevalence in this year`s swing states where even a small movement from the Democrat to Republican ledger could have a significant effect on the national electoral college numbers. Their social conservatism has already brought them to the attention of conservative strategists who have read (some of those right wingers can actually comprehend text with a low Gunning fog index) the paper by  Donald B. Kraybill and Kyle C. Kopko entitled, `` Bush Fever: Amish and Old Order Mennonites in the 2004 Presidential Election, `` which documents the efforts by Republicans to register and encourage Amish to vote in Pennsylvanian during the 2004 election with comparisons to Mennonites.

OBAMISH
(courtesy visciousbabushka.com)

In a book entitled, `` An Amish Paradox: Diversity and change in the world`s largest Amish community,” the authors, Charles E. Hearst and David L. McConnell referring to the paper by Kraybill and Kopko  state that while 43% of the Amish registered to vote in the 2004 election, only 17% actually voted due to their belief in the separation of the “material and spiritual kingdoms.” Republican voter suppression techniques in the 2012 election cycle involving requiring photo ID for voting have backfired with respect to the Amish since they refuse to have their pictures taken due to biblical injunctions against ”graven images” so some states like Illinois are preparing special no picture voter IDs especially for the Amish.

For the past decade, a member of the Amish community could simply present a letter from his bishop stating that he was in good standing with his church and a non-photo ID would be administered. However, with the new voter identification law, the Amish and other religious groups opposed to posing for photos are required to complete an 18 question open-ended survey with short essay responses. Dr. Donald Kraybill, distinguished college professor and senior fellow at the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies, described the questionnaire as “onerous and complicated,” stating: “I myself would not vote if I had to fill out an 18 point survey. It’s just ridiculous.”

Some applications have been denied because the applicants left questions blank. Some questions included: “What is your religion?”; “What are the main beliefs of your religion?”; “How many people are in your congregation?”; and “Do other members of your family share the same beliefs?” “[The survey] was poorly conceived,” Kraybill said.