An 81-year-old Livonia man died Thursday from injuries he suffered in a freak accident Saturday when a dog shouted "Allah Akhbar!" and jumped off a freeway overpass and fell through his windshield. Charles Jetchick was unconscious since Sunday and died early Thursday morning at St. Mary Mercy Hospital. His family was keeping an around-the-clock vigil at the hospital since the accident.
âAt first I thought it was a rock or concrete or something like that,â said Bill Jetchick, who needed stitches for a hand laceration caused by flying glass. âThen I look in the back seat and thereâs a dog.â
Charles and Bill were headed to West Bloomfield on Saturday afternoon. They were on westbound I-96, heading toward the I-275 interchange at about 12:45 p.m. Saturday. At about the same time, a dog ran out of his yard in a neighborhood off Schoolcraft, just west of Newburgh. Michigan State Police Sgt. Mike Shaw said the dog was chasing a vehicle moving west on Schoolcraft where it crosses I-96. The chase ended when the dog made a fatal leap off of the overpass, Shaw said. I only posted this because that's My home town (and because it's weird)
Aging is the name of the game when it comes to fine wine. Top producers mature their brews in oak barrels; connoisseurs will keep a bottle in the cellar for years so they can savor the complex bouquet at its peak.
For Hiroshi Tanaka, all that waiting is just a waste of time _ and he says he's got the machinery to prove it. Tanaka claims to have perfected a machine that can transform a bottle of just-fermented Beaujolais Nouveau into a fine, mellow wine in seconds, all by zapping it with a few volts of electricity.
"We can now electrolyze young wine and ship bottles of fine wine out in no time at all," declared Tanaka, president of Japanese startup Innovative Design and Technology Inc., which runs a small laboratory in Hamamatsu, west of Tokyo. "Think of the savings we'll make. Shorter production time, no need for storage, no need to invest in barrels," he said.
Wine connoisseurs are skeptical of the whole idea of immediate aging, but Tanaka's company is not the only laboratory chasing instant wine. He says his method is the most advanced and a key part of the machine that accomplishes the process has been patented.
The company is in talks with wineries in California and Washington state to start providing its U.S. affiliate, BW2 Holdings, with young wine to treat and sell, Tanaka said. BW2 hopes to sell the bottles on the Internet later this year for an affordable US$5.
The road to the Champs Elysees, however, won't be an easy one: the company has brought the machine around to Japanese wine producers, restaurants and even sake rice wine and "shochu" sweet potato spirit distillers, but so far only a small shochu maker in southern Japan has agreed to get involved.
In Europe -- where viniculture is considered a sacred cornerstone of civilization -- the idea of electrolyzed wine makes traditionalists blanche.
"I don't see how a machine could turn low quality wine into a magical and mature wine in seconds. I don't believe in it," said Emmanuel Delmas, Sommelier at the celebrated Fouquet's Restaurant on Paris's Champs Elysees.
Indeed, the techniques at Tanaka's laboratory are a long way from the vineyards of Bordeaux. In the natural maturation process, the taste of wine is enhanced by the mixture of alcohol with water molecule clusters, Tanaka says. Though the exact mechanism of water molecule clusters remain a matter of scientific debate, Tanaka claims the electrolysis treatment instantaneously breaks up water clusters in the wine, allowing the water to more thoroughly blend with the alcohol.
His company's machine is a two-chambered device roughly the size of a stereo. Wine passes through one and tap water passes through the other; a membrane the company has patented separates the two. Platinum electrodes provide the juice, driving negative ions -- the cause of acidity -- from the wine into the water.
To the untrained palate, a bottle of Beaujolais Nouveau 2005 strained through the machine became a more full-bodied, complex wine. Similar treatment to a Sauvignon Blanc 2004 resulted in a drier aftertaste.
The company has its eye on zapping other types of alcohol as well. "With acceptance, we can do well anywhere -- produce good wine for Europe, good sake for Japan, good vodka for Russia, good baijiu (white spirit) for China," Tanaka said. "The possibilities are endless."
On top of a faster production time, electrolyzed wine is healthier because it doesn't oxidize easily and requires no artificial anti-oxidizing agents that are present in almost all wines, according to Akihiro Hishima, another member of the development team. "Everybody who's tried our wine agrees -- this thing is revolutionary," Hishima said, swirling his wine glass and biting into a chunk of Camembert cheese.
The company's break into the U.S. market may prove to especially lucky. Americans downed about 2,443 million liters of wine in 2004, according to the California-based Wine Institute, and consumption is growing. A study by U.K.-based International Wine and Spirits Record says the U.S. will become the world's top consumer of wine as early as 2008.
In comparison, Japanese consumed a mere 247 million liters, where the drink lags behind beer, sake and shochu.
Still, Tanaka has no illusions about overturning millennia of wine history. "I know we'll face a lot of resistance from within the wine industry -- we already have," he said, recollecting a time in 2002 the firm took a prototype of the device to a wine producer in Italy. He declined to name the producer.
"We were told to leave the room, leave the country," he recalled. "And never come back."
#1
It's easy to laugh at this given Japan's decades of effort to replicate Scotch whiskey, but there is a bucketfull of money waiting to be made from technology that makes crap wine taste better.
To mark the Timkat festival, tens of thousands of Ethiopian Orthodox Christians march through the streets carrying replicas of the Arc of the Covenant, which they believe is kept safe in northern Ethiopia, reports the AP news agency.
"I don't really know what was happening to me. I was shot by the police twice, one on my stomach and one on my throat," Wubishet Solomon, 16, told the AP news agency.
He said he was listening to religious music when the shooting started. ...
A prominent insurance expert has called for the introduction of insurance service to foreign pilgrims coming for Haj and Umrah as part of the government’s efforts to provide them with better health services and facilities. Dr. Abdalelah Saaty, chairman of the insurance council at Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry, however, said such insurance policies should not be made mandatory on pilgrims. “It will not be possible to impose insurance on all pilgrims,” Saaty told Arab News.
He said a number of Saudi companies have already expressed their desire to offer a variety of insurance policies to pilgrims, covering services such as health care, lost baggage, accommodation, air ticket and airlift of body in case of death. “Insurance is good for pilgrims as it’ll help them receive better services in addition to the services offered by the government,” Saaty pointed out. He said insurance premiums for such services must be moderate and affordable to pilgrims.
That makes a lot of sense. That way at least there's a payoff when they're trampled in the annual stampede.
Travel insurance. How ... 19th century.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/21/2006 00:00 ||
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Forget the insurance, I recommend they all purchase Segways with luggage racks.
UK taxes now higher than in Germany.
ITâS official: Great Britain is no longer a low-tax economy. For the first time in recent history, Germans will pay less tax than the British this year, signalling the end of an era and Britainâs 15-year dalliance with economic liberalism. I thought Britain's economic liberalism began with Thatcher in 1979. That would make it a 26 year dalliance.
It is a hugely significant milestone in Britainâs renewed economic decline but one which predictably has gone completely unnoticed by Westminster and the economically-illiterate media that covers it.
One of the longstanding concerns of this newspaper is that the once healthy gap between euro zone tax-and-spending rates and those of Britain is being slowly and stealthily eroded, thanks to Chancellor Gordon Brown and a belated recognition from euro zone economies that they had to slim their bloated states to survive in the global economy. Now our worst fears have come to pass.
For those who still think Britain a relative tax haven and Germany a paragon of socialism, the figures are shocking, painting an economic map which most will not recognise and the government has successfully hidden. As we report on page 1 today, the share of tax and non-tax government receipts in Germany has eased significantly from 46.7% of gross domestic product (GDP) in 1999 to an expected 42.1% in 2006, according to internationally comparable and reliable figures from the independent Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). In the UK, the share of tax and non-tax government receipts in GDP has risen from 40.7% to a forecast 42.4%. From a gap of six percentage points in the British taxpayerâs favour just six years ago, the advantage has now swung dramatically to Germany, albeit by just 0.3 points of GDP. Mr Brownâs highly-suspect Treasury figures paint a rather different picture; but unlike those produced by the OECD they are not internationally comparable.
A similar trend is true of public spending, as the OECD figures also reveal. German general government outlays have fallen from 49.3% of GDP in 1996 to 46.8% in 2005; and between 2000 and 2005 the UK share jumped from 37.5% to 45%. For 2006, the OECD expects the German share to fall to 45.7%, within striking distance of the UKâs 45.4% share.
#1
So, what is it with liberals?
Can't they retain anything actually, you know, useful?
Must be a congenital brain wiring problem or chemical imbalance. Hundreds of examples that prove that increasing taxation is regressive and economically counter-productive, yet time after time...
So, uh, how much for whackin' Brown?
Cheep. How about .01% of the relative gain over the first 4 years, with a cap at, say, â¬100M - tax free, of course, lol...
;-)
#2
There's a related article today in the Telegraph (UK), Red tape 'turning best firms away from Europe', on a report just issued summarizing Europe's business woes. Bottom line: instead of catching up to America, China and Japan in R&D spending and the creation of innovative new businesses, they're falling even farther behind.
Add that to their depressive demographics and the continuing influx of unassimilatable Muslim immigrant labor, and it looks to me like they're royally fucked.
I don't think these people are going to be much help in the future...
Posted by: Dave D. ||
01/21/2006 19:36 Comments ||
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#3
"economic patriotism"
Oh yeah, that's the ticket: corporate suicide.
"The total pool of risk capital investment spent in Europe had shrunk by 90 per cent since the height of the information technology boom in 2000."
Thud.
Of course, we can guess what will happen... they'll try to punish companies for this, if they can find a way, instead of "getting it" and giving them reasons to change this trend voluntarily.
#4
Yeah, I 'spect that's where we're at: the "buh-bye point".
Circling the drain. Death spiral. Cultural and economic suicide. Sure looks to me like my ancestors made the right decision three and a half centuries ago when they flipped Europe the bird and got on that boat for America...
Posted by: Dave D. ||
01/21/2006 20:09 Comments ||
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LA PAZ, Bolivia (AP) - Backing away from his tough campaign talk against U.S.-sponsored trade initiatives, Bolivian President-elect Evo Morales said Friday he no longer rules out a free-trade deal with the United States and three other Andean nations. But he did not say he supported such a deal, either.
The leftist coca grower who will be inaugurated Sunday said in an interview with The Associated Press that he is now open to the idea of a joining a pact he strongly opposed as recently as November. "I understand that governing is doing good business for your people," he said.
Is he getting a clue or just tap-dancing?
The comments seemed to be further evidence that Morales, an admirer of Fidel Castro and his communist regime, is softening his stance against the free market policies he railed against during his campaign. But analysts have said it could take months to determine whether Morales will take his country down a market friendly path or push a more radical agenda.
Morales, who has often criticized the United States and who once promised to be "Washington's nightmare," left his options open. He said Bolivia could consider negotiating to be included in the proposed bloc that would slash trade barriers between Colombia, Ecuador and Peru and the United States.
But he also said the impoverished nation could be better served by joining the Mercosur trade bloc comprising Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay or by seeking stronger trade ties with the European Union.
Get a subsidy from the EU and do a free-trade deal with us. Best of both worlds.
Morales, wearing his trademark maroon, white and blue striped sweater, said recent talks with U.S. Ambassador David Greenlee focused on improving relations between the two countries and maintaining the war on drugs.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/21/2006 00:00 ||
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Evo, here's a tip, get on over to Joseph A. Banks and buy a nice suit.
Europe's most successful companies are turning their backs on EU markets because of red tape, a high-level report said yesterday.
The companies that Europe needed to survive were instead investing more money than ever in the United States and Asia, concluded the report, presented to the European Commission in Brussels.
The lack of investment was so dire that it threatened Europe's "comfortable" way of life. "Europe has to act before it's too late," said the report's author, Esko Aho, the former prime minister of Finland.
The findings made unsettling reading for the EU leaders, ripping into their pledges to build a "knowledge-based Europe" that would overtake America in 10 years.
The reality was the opposite. Not only were US, Chinese and Japanese firms outspending Europe on research and development, the gap with Europe was growing.
Perhaps most damagingly, Europe's most important countries were pouring more and more of their technology investment overseas, as they despaired of the European Union becoming "innovation friendly".
Unless EU governments took bold action to increase spending on research, freed labour markets so skilled workers could move more easily, and stopped pouring taxpayers' money into dying industries, Europe's post-war way of life was doomed.
The report said: "Europe must break out of structures and expectations established in the post-Second World War era that leave it today living a moderately comfortable life on slowly declining capital.
"This society, averse to risk and reluctant to change, is in itself alarming but it is also unsustainable in the face of rising competition from other parts of the world. For many citizens without work, or in less-favoured regions, even the claim to comfort is untrue."
Mr Aho refused to follow the lead of French or German politicians, who have attacked major corporations for investing overseas and called for more "economic patriotism".
He said: "We cannot blame them. They are trying to take care of global competitiveness. Unfortunately, these companies can survive without Europe, but Europe cannot survive without these companies. That is why Europe has to act before it's too late."
His report listed a string of gloomy indicators. In 1992, six out of the 10 top-selling pharmaceuticals were produced by European companies. In 2002, this figure had fallen down to two. European firms invested billions more in the United States than US firms invested in Europe.
The report called for better access to venture capital funding to finance innovative companies and more movement between universities and business. The total pool of risk capital investment spent in Europe had shrunk by 90 per cent since the height of the information technology boom in 2000.
European governments were criticised for continuing to pour state aid into dying industries such as cars, steel and textiles. As part of the so-called Lisbon agenda of 2001 EU leaders committed themselves to spending three per cent of their gross domestic product on research and development.
Halfway through the 10-year Lisbon agenda programme, the EU still spent a meagre 1.9 per cent, far behind the US or Japan.
The commission recently predicted that China, for long seen a source of nothing more than basic manufacturing, is spending so much on higher education and research that it would itself overtake the EU on research spending by 2010.
In productivity, the report noted that Europe badly needed to extract more productivity from each worker.
#3
I still say the UK should buddy up to us. You know, they're bigger than Rhode Island, they could be a state, we'll let Scotland be it's own state too. Not sure about Ireland. Maybe if they behave.
#9
We want the Scots who can toss the Caber at least 1 pole.
Posted by: ed ||
01/21/2006 21:16 Comments ||
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#10
It's well past time to split the less suicidal Europeans from the who insist on jumping off the cliff. Start with a free trade agreement with England and extend it east to those who want to pursue economic growth and strong defence. Downgrade relations with France and her courtiers who are headed down towards civil war and extinction.
Posted by: ed ||
01/21/2006 21:25 Comments ||
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#11
Tell Blair that we're willing to add four stars to the flag, England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. The UK with US taxes would be a thing to behold.
#12
Kodos (as Bill Clinton): My fellow Americans, as a young boy I dreamed of being a baseball. But tonight I say: we must move forward, not backward; upward, not forward; and always twirling, twirling, twirling towards freedom.
ANKARA, Turkey - Turkeyâs agriculture minister accused several neighboring countries on Friday of concealing bird flu outbreaks and hampering an effort to prevent the spread of the disease.
Preliminary tests indicate that 21 people in Turkey have been infected with the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, four of whom have died. The country has reported confirmed or suspected H5N1 outbreaks in poultry in 26 provinces, including areas just kilometers (miles) away from the borders with Armenia, Iran, Iraq, Syria and Georgia. Turkey also borders Bulgaria and European Union-member Greece.
âWe know through unofficial channels that the disease exists ... in neighboring countries, which are ruled by closed regimes,â Agriculture Minister Mehdi Eker said during a meeting with governors of Turkeyâs 81 provinces. âThese countries do not officially declare the existence of the disease.â He did not name the countries. âThis is something that we need to be careful about,â Eker said, urging governors of border provinces to be especially vigilant.
As part of efforts to control the outbreak in poultry, the government has imposed quarantines, culled 1.1 million fowl and launched campaigns warning people to avoid contact with sick birds, Eker said.
The World Health Organization has said it expects the number of new bird flu infections among humans in Turkey to decline. âThe situation is getting better,â WHO spokeswoman Cristiana Salvi told The Associated Press Thursday. She warned, however, that it was still too early to say the crisis was over. âWe can expect a few more casesâ of infection, she said.
The UN health agency said on its Web site that âthe number of these cases is, however, expected to decline as high-risk behaviors become less common and culling operations ... reduce the number of infected birds.â By culling birds, Turkey hopes to limit contact with humans in this largely rural country, where most villagers raise their own chickens, turkeys and geese.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/21/2006 00:00 ||
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Long and interesting... To enter Columbia University's graduate school of journalism is to enter the highest temple of a religion in decline. A statue of Thomas Jefferson guards the plaza outside the doors, and the entry room is suitably grand. Two raised platforms proclaim the missions in bold gold letters: "To Uphold Standards of Excellence in Journalism" and "To Educate the Next Generation of Journalists." The marble floor tells you that the school was endowed by Joseph Pulitzer and erected in 1912 in memory of his daughter Lucille. A bronze quotation from Pulitzer's 1904 cri de coeur in the North American Review is on the wall:
Our republic and its press will rise or fall together. An able, disinterested, public-spirited press, with trained intelligence to know the right and courage to do it, can preserve the public virtue without which popular government is a sham and a mockery. A cynical, mercenary, demagogic press will produce in time a people as base as itself. . . .
On my first day at Columbia's graduate school of journalism (CSJ), the poster boy for all that has come to plague elite American media--former CBS anchor Dan Rather--took to the podium at Fordham Law School to denounce the "new journalism order." On day two, the New York Times Company announced a cut of 500 employees from its already pared down workforce of 12,300. (The company employed 13,750 as recently as 2001.) On that same day Knight-Ridder slashed its Philadelphia papers' editorial staff by 75 positions at the Inquirer and 25 at the Daily News. "I get 50 calls a day about the crisis in journalism," Lemann deadpanned when I posed the "crisis" question. "Only 50?" I thought.
The story of what is going on at CSJ cannot be separated from the collapse of credibility of the mainstream media, also known as "elite media" and "old media" among its detractors. The fortunes of the big five papers--the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, and the Wall Street Journal, as well as the old TV networks and big weekly newsmagazines--are visibly in decline. The upstart blogosphere is ever at the ready to "deconstruct" the work product of the old media's old guard. The very best investigative reporting is being done not by big names at the big papers, but by people like the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies' journalist in residence Claudia Rosett, who almost singlehandedly unraveled the U.N.-Saddam Oil-for-Food scandal, with much of her work published online. Dan Rather's CBS, eager to impugn George W. Bush's service in the Texas National Guard, got duped by fraudulent documents it took months to obtain and only hours for bloggers and readers to shred.
This story in its small way partakes of the seismic shift underway. Its origin is an email request from Lemann last spring: Would I be willing to be the subject of a New Yorker profile? I agreed, on the condition that I could have reciprocal access to Lemann and the Columbia Journalism School for this piece. Hedged with some qualifiers--he could not commit any of his faculty to talk to me or guarantee access to classrooms, though everyone proved to be very welcoming--Lemann agreed. Reactions to his profile of me varied among family and friends, but I thought it complete and fair. Before I sat down with Lemann I had read everything he'd written for the New Yorker and was impressed with his profiles of Dick Cheney and Karl Rove. (The Cheney profile earned Lemann some animosity among colleagues, who thought him too gentle with the only man the left fears as much as Rove.) The scorn on the center-right for the "objectivity" and "professionalism" of the mainstream media is deep and sincere. I went to Columbia to see if Lemann was the exception that proves the rule, and to test the rule itself.
What's the rule? That the elite media are hopelessly biased to the left and so blind to their own deficiencies, or so in denial, that they cannot save themselves from irrelevance. They're like the cheater in the clubhouse, whose every mention of a great round of golf is met with rolling eyes and knowing nods.
Pulitzer's acolytes at Columbia undoubtedly believe that they are members of an "able, disinterested, public-spirited press," and not a "cynical, mercenary, demagogic" one. But the widespread perception in the country is that the prestige newsrooms are filled with the latter pretending to be the former. "Public attitudes toward the press, which have been on a downward track for years, have become more negative in several key areas," the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press reports. It is beyond argument that Pulitzer's dream of the press preserving public virtue has been abandoned, but Lemann is on a mission to help restore credibility to a "profession" without licensing or standards or governing bodies of any sort.
The first person I met on campus, Bruce Wallace, is a student enrolled in the school's traditional program, intended to result in a Master of Science degree after an intensive year of studies. Lemann has also instituted an ambitious new Master of Arts course of study, which has provoked deep suspicion in many of the school's alums and among the faculty. But with 205 students in the M.S. program and 27 in the M.A. division, there is no doubt that the training of front-line reporters is still the core mission. "How to cover a fire in Brooklyn on deadline" is one catchphrase I hear repeated. It is difficult to picture Pat Buchanan, Newsweek's Rick Smith, CBS's Susan Spencer, or writers Mitch Albom and James McBride--CSJ grads, all--covering fires in Brooklyn on or off deadline. But the M.S. program is in essence a 10-month education in the details and practice of that craft.
Wallace is a native of Baltimore who left his job as the manager of the classifieds at the San Francisco Guardian, an alternative weekly, to hone the skills that he hopes will take him to a daily to do local political reporting. The 1999 graduate of Kenyon College had done a little campus radio before heading off to tend bar in Alaska. In San Francisco he got hooked on city hall gossip, and though he was no fan of Mayor Willie Brown, or of "corporate power allied with politicians" generally, he's certain he'll be able to bring fairness to his future job as a political reporter. When I trot out my list of "parameter" questions I use to test for basic ideological disposition--Wallace doesn't own a gun; he favors same-sex marriage--there are no surprises.
Soon Mike Hoyt, executive editor of the Columbia Journalism Review, arrives. With Michael Shapiro, Hoyt team-teaches the class "Advanced Reporting," into which Wallace and 15 other students are headed, and introduces me to Shapiro, who quickly welcomes me to observe the hour. Shapiro is a gifted teacher who, three weeks into the term, already knows all of his students' names and engages them with ease and good humor. The first half of this hour is given over to outlining a large assignment--a profile of some recently deceased person or the reconstruction of a crime. Shapiro is clearly hoping the students will go for the profile, and spends considerable time instructing his charges on how they might go about selecting their subject. He fences his instructions with cautions about engaging the bereaved ("You need to know, but you can't be a vampire") and tips on tracing the details of the life to be profiled. Hoyt contributes key bits of experience, and the students are curious and attentive to these practical lessons. "You need to make your first phone call today," Shapiro insists. "Tomorrow becomes the next day, which becomes next week. Good reporters make the first call on the first day."
The 16 students are not evenly split--there are 14 women and just two men. Two-thirds of the M.S. class this year are women, a reflection of what Lemann calls the "feminization" of journalism programs across the country. Robert Mac Donald, the assistant dean for admissions and financial aid, ran down the demographics for me: The average age of an M.S. student is just shy of 28, the mean is 26, the youngest is 20, and the oldest is 63. Whites make up 69 percent of the new class; 11 percent are African American, 7 percent Hispanic, 6 percent Asian, 3 percent Middle Eastern, and 4 percent South Asian. The school doesn't yet keep stats on religious background, though Mac Donald believes there has been a significant increase in Muslim students post 9/11. A fifth of the students are from the New York area, and between 37 to 40 percent are from "the corridor"--from Boston to Washington. Another fifth are from the west coast, and 10 percent are foreign. It is a pretty "blue" student body, and willing to pay handsomely for the privilege of their credentials. A year at CSJ--tuition, living expenses, incidentals--comes to $59,404 according to Mac Donald, though 85 percent of the students receive some financial aid, with packages ranging from $1,000 to $50,000. The average scholarship is $5,200, which means that these students are putting a lot of money into the program.
The "blue" nature of the student body is further confirmed by my polling of the class I attended, done with the permission of Shapiro. Six of the 16 were English majors, two studied history, and the balance spread across the humanities. No one had a background in the physical sciences. No one owned a gun. All supported same-sex marriage. Three had been in a house of worship the previous week. Six read blogs. None of them recognized the phrase "Christmas Eve in Cambodia"--though Shapiro not only got the allusion but knew the date of the John Kerry Senate speech in which he made the false claim about his Vietnam war experience. Three quarters of them hope to make more than $100,000 as a journalist, 11 had voted for John Kerry, and one for George Bush (three are from abroad and not eligible, and one didn't vote for either candidate). I concluded by asking them if they "think George Bush is something of a dolt." There was unanimous agreement with this proposition, one of the widely shared views within elite media and elsewhere on the left. The president's Harvard MBA and four consecutive victories over Democrats judged "smarter" than him haven't made even a dent in that prejudice.
The intake valve at the elite media's equivalent of the Army's war college isn't pulling in many conservatives. In fact, it isn't pulling in many moderates. After the class, a few students linger. Their backgrounds are interesting. Rachel Templeton is from Alaska, graduated from the University of Washington, and has spent a few years at the Henry Jackson Foundation. She's moving to Israel after this year, where she hopes to pick up freelance work. Bree Nordenson is from Freeport, Maine, a graduate of Minnesota's Carleton College, and is transitioning from her work as a psychiatric counselor in Boston. Andreea Plesea is from Rumania and her Facebook entry announces her goal is to "become a top notch investigative reporter" and to "pursue a degree in law." Stina Lunden is from Sweden, and spent her last year as a Washington Post intern in France working for Keith B. Richburg. Lanie Shapiro was in PR for Simon & Schuster and Random House. Sophia Chang, originally from Texas, has been a reporter for the past four years.
These six want to pursue the idea of "objectivity," and most had read Lemann's profile of me, which included my very skeptical assessment of the objectivity of the mainstream media. Lunden is particularly animated. "You can't draw conclusions that our opinions will influence our reporting," she says, launching into a familiar defense of the ability of journalists to put aside their points of view. Shapiro stresses that all of her professors have been teaching "the value of objectivity," but Nordenson isn't buying it. "It is dangerous to think you are objective." Plesea is cynical: "You don't get truth in political reporting," an opinion she didn't confine to the countries of the former Soviet Union, with which she is familiar.
I am not here to debate the proposition, but find it interesting that the three-week wonders are already committed to the defense of their new profession's reputation for objectivity. With a faculty that does not appear to count among its number even one prominent name from the center-right, but does include respected voices of the left such as Todd Gitlin and Victor Navasky, it is difficult to see where they will acquire any useful skepticism about their own craft's motives and abilities.
The worst moments in recent history for the mainstream media--Rathergate, Jayson Blair's fabrications at the New York Times, the slander by CNN executive Eason Jordan that the U.S. military in Iraq was targeting journalists for assassination--were all still in the future when Columbia president Lee Bollinger was presented with an opening in the deanship by the retirement of Lemann's predecessor, Tom Goldstein. Bollinger, a First Amendment expert, former president of the University of Michigan, and former dean of its law school (I took media law from him in the spring of 1983, and the quiet, brooding, and even moody Bollinger hasn't changed much in 22 years, according to reports) seized the moment. He launched a controversial top-to-bottom look at the journalism school, empaneling a committee that met a dozen or so times to debate the future of the school. Lemann was among the panel's members, and delivered a paper to the group in the spring of 2003 that urged the one-year M.S. degree be replaced by a two-year Master of Arts program. Bollinger obviously warmed to some part of the Lemann pitch, and offered him the deanship.
Lemann quickly realized that alumni and faculty would unite to kill any idea of a uniform two-year degree at CSJ. "Of 24 or 25 faculty," he told me, "I'd have had maybe two votes." But there are other ways to pursue change and reform. After another year of meetings with industry types, he launched a second degree track: a year-long Masters of Arts program open only to practicing journalists, aiming to enhance and deepen their skills. Lemann is clearly hoping that the best and brightest of the M.S. grads will be willing to stay a second year and also go for the M.A. This year a pool of 70 applicants yielded a class of 27. The goal is a class of 60 drawn from 250 applicants.
If your son or daughter came home from school last week to tell you that they voted on official Canada Election ballots, they’re not kidding. Ballots marked by students in Canadian classrooms were bona fide Elections Canada ballots.
Can the CBC guarantee us that none of the ballots sent through "special code" by Canadian schools will make their way to Election Night ballot boxes? And from a blog citing a news article in Edmonton...
Almost 100 apparently nonexistent addresses in Edmonton's downtown core - in some cases, the addresses listed fictional residences in between two genuine buildings
Hundreds of people registered to vote out of their law offices, medical offices, accounting offices, and Government of Canada offices - in some cases these may be genuine errors, but in other cases, entire families are registered to vote out of high rise office space
Dozens of people registered to vote out of office towers, but who did not list a suite number, causing the address to read similarly to ordinary residences - in many cases, these people are also registered to vote in other ridings using their home addresses, and in other cases, voters living in other ridings are only registered in Edmonton Centre
Dozens of people registered to vote out of small mail box locations and from self-storage yards - there is no legitimate way for a person to appear on the list of Electors from a self-storage yard
Eighteen people registered to vote out of a truck stop
People registered to vote out of karaoke bars, lingerie stores, dance lounges, galleries, etc...
The deadline for revising the list of Electors has now passed, and these irregular voters will remain on the list. Be sure to notice the people running the "fake" student election on REAL ballots, and their connection to local & national Liberal party and election officials, as well as the notoriously liberal CBC which has tried to whitewash the entire scandal for the Liberals. They are lining up to STEAL the government - incredible!
And the Grits may well succeed. If the Tories have less than a 10 point lead on election morning, they're going to lose ...
#1
This would cause a real revolution here in the US. Not up there however. The "scientific socialists" have power and will not let go. Look for them to align closer with China in the future. Baka!
#2
SPOD - apparently you weren't aware during the last couple elections. From St. Louis to Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Washington state - the losers (democrats here, liberals there) are erasing election laws and their appointed judges allow them to do so with near-impunity. Disgusting. Of course, Jimmy the C would sign off on the results as valid
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/21/2006 17:13 Comments ||
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Follow up on: US Army Denies Honor Guard Weapons
U.S. Rep. Jim Oberstar, DFL-Chisholm, announced Friday that he has cleared the way for American Legion groups to reinforce their dwindling ranks at veterans' funerals with family auxiliary groups. Oberstar said that after he made a plea to the U.S. Army, the Defense Department reversed a policy that prohibited legion members' spouses, children and grandchildren from firing ceremonial rifles at funerals.
The issue came to light last month after the head of the Duluth Combined Honor Guard objected to the Army's refusal to allow him to supplement his volunteers with the adult children of veterans. The Army had a policy that prohibited nonveteran members from firing theM-1 rifles, which the Defense Department provides. However, Army officials determined this week that the entire American Legion family of organizations, including the Sons of the American Legion and the Ladies Auxiliary, can perform the duty, according to Oberstar's office.
John Marshall, captain of the Duluth honor guard, told the News Tribune in December that the Army considered it a liability issue. Marshall said if something didn't change soon, the Duluth group, which includes the Veterans of Foreign Wars, would run short of volunteers and may be unable to honor the up to a dozen requests they receive each week to perform at veterans' funerals.
Oberstar's staff approached the Army Donations Program with Marshall's concerns. Marshall received a letter Friday from Ed Wolverton, chief of the program, notifying him of the decision. Oberstar said it will have a national impact. In 1999, Congress passed a law requiring all eligible veterans to receive full military honors at their funerals. "As the U.S. population ages, we are faced with the reality that approximately 1,800 American veterans die every day," Oberstar said in a news release. "As a result, American Legion posts are stretched thin to provide enough personnel to give the veterans the time-honored ceremonies that they earned during their lifetime."
Department of Defense officials could not be reached for comment.
The Duluth Combined Honor Guard performed at about 200 funerals in 2005. Only about 20 of the honor guard's 30 members are fully active, and the group tries to get 10 people to each service. "I'm very happy that they came to the right decision," Marshall said Friday evening from the American Legion Post 71 in West Duluth. "The bottom line is, the honor guards and veterans service organizations are the ones picking up the slack yet again. The government makes a lot of promises but doesn't always back them up."
Marshall said he's already received pledges of support from about 20 SAL members. Among them is Don Johnson Jr., 26, of Duluth who said he was discharged from the Army because of a detached retina. "I'd love to do it," Johnson said. "I appreciate the opportunity."
This story popped up earlier in the week but I didn't see it here. A hat tip to the Gates of Vienna, who has more information in later posts at his site.
A federal arrest warrant has been issued for a Chesterfield man after an ATF explosives investigation. NBC12 first brought you the story about the search of the man's Brandermill home one week ago. Behind bars on domestic charges in Chesterfield, Chetanand Sewraz, 24, now faces federal charges of possessing a destructive device or bomb in Florida.
A bomb-maker, you say? And a young one, too. Where'd he learn to do that?
County police spent the beginning of last week searching after a belief 24-year-old Sewraz and his then wife, Mariea Gamble, had been stealing computer equipment and making fraudulent returns at a Midlothian Staples store in March 2005.
But, while Chesterfield Police were taking pages worth of evidence out of Sewraz's home a federal search was also underway at the home by ATF agents. Federal agents now tell us they were looking at Sewraz in an attempted bombing investigation in the Vero Beach, Florida area. As a result, they say Sewraz now faces charges of possessing a destructive device on December 4, 2005 in Indian River County, Florida.
On Tuesday at Sewraz's Brandermill home his father told us his son is innocent. He says the charges come after someone blew up his daughter-in law's vehicle and her mother's vehicle in Florida.
"Lies! All lies!"
ATF agents clarify their investigation came after the discovery of an explosive device in Mariea Gamble's vehicle that was not detonated. The ATF is also looking into a vehicle fire in her mother's vehicle.
In recent weeks, both Sewraz and his now estranged wife have filed assault and other domestic charges against each other in Chesterfield. Sewraz claims his wife threatened to blow up his Brandermill home. She's now out of jail on bond.
According to the Gates of Vienna post, the young lad is a native of Mauritius. There's no overt link to a terror group which is why I'm putting this on Page 3, but there's something fishy going on.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/21/2006 00:34 ||
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#1
Chetanand Sewraz. Obviously from a fine Olde Virginian family. Why he hates cars so much is unclear.
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A fine young son of Virginia is expected to drink a fine whiskey, to sit a good horse, and to have a working knowlege of vehicular improvised explosive devices.
The H5N1 avian influenza virus can survive for more than a month in bird droppings in cold weather and for nearly a week even in hot summer temperatures, the World Health Organization said on Friday.
When people become infected with bird flu, they get a high fever and pneumonia very quickly, according to an updated factsheet from the WHO...
The new factsheet incorporates the most recent findings on the avian flu virus, which WHO says is causing by far the worst outbreak among both birds and people ever recorded.
It has been found from South Korea, across Southeast Asia, into Turkey, Ukraine and Romania. It has infected 149 people and killed 80, according to the WHO figures, which do not include the most recent deaths and infections in Turkey. Bird droppings may be a significant source of its spread to both people and birds, the WHO said.
"For example, the highly pathogenic H5N1 virus can survive in bird feces for at least 35 days at low temperature (4 degrees C or 39 degrees F)," the WHO site reads.
"At a much higher temperature (37 degrees C or 98.6 degrees F), H5N1 viruses have been shown to survive, in fecal samples, for six days."
Poultry, especially those kept in small backyard flocks, are the main source of the virus.
"These birds usually roam freely as they scavenge for food and often mingle with wild birds or share water sources with them. Such situations create abundant opportunities for human exposure to the virus, especially when birds enter households or are brought into households during adverse weather, or when they share areas where children play or sleep," WHO says.
H5N1 has different qualities from seasonal flu, the WHO said.
"The incubation period for H5N1 avian influenza may be longer than that for normal seasonal influenza, which is around 2 to 3 days. Current data for H5N1 infection indicate an incubation period ranging from 2 to 8 days and possibly as long as 17 days," it said.
"Initial symptoms include a high fever, usually with a temperature higher than 38 degrees C (100.4 degrees F), and influenza-like symptoms. Diarrhea, vomiting, abdominal pain, chest pain, and bleeding from the nose and gums have also been reported as early symptoms in some patients."
And with H5N1 infection, all patients have developed pneumonia, and usually very early on the the illness, the WHO said.
"On present evidence, difficulty in breathing develops around five days following the first symptoms. Respiratory distress, a hoarse voice, and a crackling sound when inhaling are commonly seen."
There is bloody sputum, it said.
"Another common feature is multiorgan dysfunction, notably involving the kidney and heart," WHO said.
The WHO recommends using Tamiflu, Roche AG's flu drug known generically as oseltamivir, as soon as possible to treat bird flu.
WHO stresses that H5N1 remains mostly a disease of birds, with tens of millions infected in two years.
"For unknown reasons, most cases have occurred in rural and periurban households where small flocks of poultry are kept. Again for unknown reasons, very few cases have been detected in presumed high-risk groups, such as commercial poultry workers, workers at live poultry markets, cullers, veterinarians, and health staff caring for patients without adequate protective equipment," it adds.
"Also lacking is an explanation for the puzzling concentration of cases in previously healthy children and young adults."
#1
In the early stages of a flu epidemic as many as 80% of cases are children and they seem to be the primarily early stage vector. So getting a high proportion of children is not unusual and indicative of human to human clusters that then die out, presumably because the virus is not infectious enough to sustain its transmission outside groups of susceptible children. However the clusters in turkey do seem to be getting larger, perhaps twenty or more infected in a single cluster.
A prostitute who has had a sex change has escaped caning for drug dealing in Singapore after a doctor confirmed her new gender, the Straits Times reports. The confusion arose because Mongkon Pusuwan, from Thailand, was identified as a man - her original gender - in her passport, the paper reported. A man could have faced up to 15 strokes of the cane, but women are exempt.
Mongkon Pusuwan pleaded guilty to charges including cocaine trafficking was sentenced to six years in jail. She underwent a sex change from man to woman 10 years ago, the Straits Times said. But her fate had been uncertain for weeks while the court waited for a medical report confirming her new gender.
She was arrested in December and charged with trafficking 1.52 grams of cocaine and 2.5 grams of ketamine. A larger amount of drugs in her possession could have earned her the death penalty.
Lest we forget. Thank goodness for the Aussies, and damn the UN for not letting the Aussies go sooner. And damn the murderers most of all.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/21/2006 00:00 ||
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I worked in Indonesia for a while, in Aceh Province. Nothing I saw there leads me to doubt in the slightest what the E. Timorese claim about the Indo military. I saw up close and personal what the Indos did to their Chinese population in Aceh in the late 90's and believe me, it wasn't pretty.
I think more people--you know, like the ones at Kos or DU--should have the opportunity to walk around a burned-out town where a minority group has been slaughtered or driven off by the majority. It's a real eye-opener, particularly when you hear first-hand accounts of the rapes and murders. When the unimaginable suddenly becomes very tangible and near, paradigm shifts are a common occurrence.
Posted by: mac ||
01/21/2006 8:26 Comments ||
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#2
I amde the calculatuion that on average more Timorese were killed by year by the Indos that Palestinians by the Israelis during the 38 years of occupation.
I made the calculation that on average the left made more demonstrations, meetings, fund collecting you name for Palestinians in a month that it did for the Timorese in the over twenty five years of occupation and tyhis despite the fact that unlike the Palestinians the Timorese didn't hijack planes, slaughtereed babies in cold blood or tried to blow up maternities.
#3
I made the calculation that on average more Timorese were killed by year by the Indos that Palestinians by the Israelis during the 38 years of occupation.
I made the calculation that on average the left made more demonstrations, meetings, fund collecting you name for Palestinians in a month that it did for the Timorese in the over twenty five years of occupation and tyhis despite the fact that unlike the Palestinians the Timorese didn't hijack planes, slaughtereed babies in cold blood or tried to blow up maternities.
A federal grand jury in Oregon has indicted 11 members of two extremist environmental groups on charges of arson and destruction of an energy facility in what the government said was a campaign of domestic terrorism in five Western states.
The 65-count indictment, unsealed yesterday in U.S. District Court in Eugene, Ore., accuses the Earth Liberation Front (ELF) and the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) members of committing acts of terrorism in Oregon, Wyoming, Washington, California and Colorado from 1996 through 2001 -- including conspiracy, arson, attempted arson, the use and possession of a destructive device, and destruction of an energy facility.
Eight persons were arrested before the indictment was handed up, and three are thought to be outside the United States. Cancel their passports.
"The trail of destruction left by these defendants across the Western United States caused millions of dollars in damage to public and private facilities," Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales said. "Today's indictment proves we will not tolerate any group that terrorizes the American people, no matter its intentions or objectives."
The indictment said the group committed arson with improvised incendiary devices made from milk jugs, petroleum products and homemade timers in a series of attacks in the five states. The targets included U.S. Forest Service ranger stations, Bureau of Land Management wild horse facilities, meat-processing companies, lumber companies, a high-tension power line and a ski facility in Colorado.
According to the indictment, Joseph Dibee, Chelsea Dawn Gerlach, Sarah Kendall Harvey, Daniel Gerard McGowan, Stanislas Gregory Meyerhoff, Josephine Sunshine Overaker, Jonathan Mark Christopher Paul, Rebecca Rubin, Suzanne Savoie, Darren Todd Thurston and Kevin M. Tubbs conspired to commit the acts as part of a group they called "the family," identified as members of ALF and ELF. Their parents must be so proud.
The indictment follows a series of arrests last month in Oregon, Arizona, New York and Virginia.
FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III described the investigation and prevention of extremism in animal rights and environmental causes as one of the bureau's highest domestic terrorism priorities.
"We are committed to working with our partners to disrupt and dismantle these movements, to protect our fellow citizens and to bring to justice those who commit crime and terrorism in the name of animal rights or environmental issues," he said.
The two organizations are accused in 17 separate attacks: 12 in Oregon, 2 in Washington and one each in Wyoming, Colorado and California. Bizzy hands are happy hands.
The cases are being prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney's Office in Oregon and were investigated by the FBI, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, Eugene Police Department, Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Forest Service, Oregon State Police, Portland Police Bureau, Oregon Department of Justice and the Lane County, Ore., Sheriff's Office. Thank you.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Aging is the name of the game when it comes to fine wine. Top producers mature their brews in oak barrels; connoisseurs will keep a bottle in the cellar for years so they can savor the complex bouquet at its peak.
A prominent insurance expert has called for the introduction of insurance service to foreign pilgrims coming for Haj and Umrah as part of the government’s efforts to provide them with better health services and facilities. Dr. Abdalelah Saaty, chairman of the insurance council at Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry, however, said such insurance policies should not be made mandatory on pilgrims. “It will not be possible to impose insurance on all pilgrims,” Saaty told Arab News.
LA PAZ, Bolivia (AP) - Backing away from his tough campaign talk against U.S.-sponsored trade initiatives, Bolivian President-elect Evo Morales said Friday he no longer rules out a free-trade deal with the United States and three other Andean nations. But he did not say he supported such a deal, either.
ANKARA, Turkey - Turkeyâs agriculture minister accused several neighboring countries on Friday of concealing bird flu outbreaks and hampering an effort to prevent the spread of the disease.
To enter Columbia University's graduate school of journalism is to enter the highest temple of a religion in decline. A statue of Thomas Jefferson guards the plaza outside the doors, and the entry room is suitably grand. Two raised platforms proclaim the missions in bold gold letters: "To Uphold Standards of Excellence in Journalism" and "To Educate the Next Generation of Journalists." The marble floor tells you that the school was endowed by Joseph Pulitzer and erected in 1912 in memory of his daughter Lucille. A bronze quotation from Pulitzer's 1904 cri de coeur in the North American Review is on the wall:
A prostitute who has had a sex change has escaped caning for drug dealing in Singapore after a doctor confirmed her new gender, the Straits Times reports. The confusion arose because Mongkon Pusuwan, from Thailand, was identified as a man - her original gender - in her passport, the paper reported. A man could have faced up to 15 strokes of the cane, but women are exempt.
A federal grand jury in Oregon has indicted 11 members of two extremist environmental groups on charges of arson and destruction of an energy facility in what the government said was a campaign of domestic terrorism in five Western states.
