I'm not back

Still at the Youth ACTION Institute, part of the Campaign to End AIDS. It is awesome, and it is moving from the phase of conference to that of a solid, energetic, passionate movement of young people. Participants are at the airport now, and they'll be on their way home soon. Once there, I'm absolutely confident they'll begin organizing one of the most meaningful campaigns to fight apathy and racism, violence and pain that this country has seen. We will win.

I, meanwhile, am off for a much needed break in Rocky Mountain National Park. Keep the world together while I'm gone, won't you?

Hatchet Job

Still waiting on any more information from the GW Hatchet about the status of the adjunct faculty's unionization efforts. And the most recent article didn't even include a response from SEIU or the professors involved. I think we'll have an awful lot to do in the fall.

Fun for dorks

This is cool. And it helped me paint my room today.

Figure that one out.

Downing Street Memo

I finally got around to reading it. Anyone who's dug beyond page A-18 in their newspaper probably has heard of most of this stuff before, and shouldn't be surprised at the content. Still, it's definitely worth a read, if only so you can quote an even more unimpeachable source:

C reported on his recent talks in Washington. There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy. The NSC had no patience with the UN route, and no enthusiasm for publishing material on the Iraqi regime's record. There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action.

I found it (via BoingBoing) at a site dedicated to the memo.

Why NPR isn't so great

I know that Michael Jackson was acquitted today of all charges. What's more, I knew that probably moments after the announcement was made.

Why?

Because I was listening to NPR. Now, normally I wouldn't expect celebrity gossip to be synonymous with NPR coverage, but today, for what seemed an endless period of time but was probably at least 15 minutes, I was subjected to that height of news media fodder that is the celebrity trial.

I'd have been OK if the announcement had been made in a discrete manner typical to NPR coverage, with an aside during the reading of the important news of the day. But no, reporters were brought on to discuss the possible permutations of verdicts and jail time that might ensue for MJ. You know what? That's utterly useless information. There are ten thousand things going on in this world that are more important than the possible incarceration of a trite 80's pop star.

/rant

Debt Cancelled

18 countries will see $40 Billion in debts cancelled, due to a plan proposed by US and UK representatives to G-8 finance ministers. The Post has it:

Most are in Africa: Benin, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Ghana, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritania, Mozambique, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. Four others -- Bolivia, Guyana, Honduras and Nicaragua -- are in Latin America. Another nine African nations are likely to qualify soon, once they satisfy IMF and World Bank requirements for improving their governance and economic policies. Another 11 countries could also benefit eventually.

I'm still looking into this, so no opinion yet on whether this is as good as it sounds. But it definitely sounds like some of the best news I've heard in years, and a huge victory for debt activists.

... Thoughts:

Too few countries - many more will need cancellation, especially with the looming AIDS pandemic threatening to spread well beyond Africa. Important debtors are left off the list.

Sources I'd heard were right about the US favoring the use of IMF funds to cancel the debt, a move that may have endangered the organization's clout. Many activists I know were solidly behind such a solution, but the one worked out, involving increased rich country contributions to the Fund, seems a good one. With the John Bolton nomination to the UN, fears of increased US unilateralism seem real.

Arrrghh!

Turns out my favorite transit system (in the US) is, well, almost as poorly run as the state of Ohio.

The Washington Post has more:

- Metro spent $270,000 on two new window offices and a 1,440-square-foot law library that senior agency attorneys wanted.

- Metro paid more than $400,000 for a "culture change" project to teach managers to operate less like bureaucrats and more like business executives, an experiment officials now say was a bust.

- The agency's inability to control overtime has led to $100,000-plus salaries for numerous mechanics, bus drivers and train operators. (I don't have any problem with paying labor well, but this stinks when Metro's asking me to pony up more cash for each ride.)

It sucks that this will make it harder for Metro to raise money from the surrounding jurisdictions, so that poor management will likely punish riders with even more fare hikes.

Debt Relief?

Hope so.

More Ohio idiocy

Via Atrios:

COLUMBUS - The Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation admitted today that it lost $215 million in a high-risk fund that few people knew about.

The bureau had invested $355 million with a Pittsburgh investment firm, MDL Capital Management, beginning in 1998.

But last year, after diverting $225 million into a fund that works like a hedge fund, the fund lost $215 million. Although the bureau has known about the loss since last year, Gov. Bob Taft was notified about it today.

Honestly, if we can't parlay such blatent disregard for the public interest into a change in partisan control of at least one branch of Ohio government, Democrats here ought to be ashamed of ourselves.

Barf

You'll want to after reading this at Sadly, No!

If you can stop laughing long enough to read it, that is.

This, also via Atrios, may induce indigestion.

Apple to switch to x86?

I'll be watching here for the next hour.

Update: yes.

Update: OS X has been compiled for Intel chips for each of the past 5 versions, meaning this could have happened any time before. The Powermac used to demo Tiger during the keynote was actually using an x86 of some kind. Compiling will not take a lot of extra time, and the tools for doing so will be available soon. Many PPC applications will be able to run without recompiling, with the use of translation software built into Leopard, the next version of OS X. The transition begins in 2006.

Blackwell

A win for Blackwell in an Ohio Republican primary is a win for the conservative movement.
- Tim Holloway, American Conservative Union Foundation

Alright, then, we know what we have to do.

AIDS in Japan

worrying new HIV and AIDS expansion:

"Japan is on the brink of going under," says Dr. Tsuneo Akaeda, a gynecologist who raises AIDS awareness by offering free 15-minute blood tests in Tokyo's nightclubs and streets. "They're ignoring that they have diseases. They're ignoring that they are sick."

The official toll of 10,070 people with HIV/AIDS in a nation of 127 million pales next to some countries. Even if the actual figure is closer to 40,000, that would mean roughly 1 in 3,000 are infected, compared with about 1 in 100 in Thailand or 1 in 1,500 in China, according to estimates by UNAIDS, the U.N. body waging the global war on AIDS.

But many in Japan are alarmed at the dangerous mixture of chronic underreporting of cases, a sexually freewheeling youth culture that's less inclined to use condoms or other protection, and the powerful social stigma of a sexually transmitted disease.

The story is always the same - repress open discussion about sexuality and the need for protection, and the kids are the ones that suffer. Young people all over deserve better.

Ohio for Jesus

For the record, I really wouldn't mind if Jesus actually got elected. I just don't think we should elect a corrupt cabal of right-wing Republicans in His stead.

Values

And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.
- Matthew 6:5

Project activities are scheduled up to the 2006 election, including statewide pastor policy briefings, "Ohio for Jesus" radio spots featuring Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, voter-registration drives and a statewide Ohio for Jesus rally in early 2006.

If Parsley's declaration that he will be silent no more sounds incongruous coming from a man who heads a $40-million-a-year ministry accessible worldwide via 1,400 TV stations and cable affiliates -- including, through the Trinity Broadcasting Network, channels 51 in Kirtland/Cleveland and WDLI 17 in Canton-Akron -- Parsley has a ready answer.

For too long, he says, the secular left has intimidated Christians. Ministers also have surrendered their First Amendment right to engage in partisan politics, he says, relegating their churches to the status of "social clubs."
- Plain Dealer on Rod Parsley



And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.
- Matthew 19:24

President Bush said during the third election debate last October that most of the tax cuts went to low- and middle-income Americans. In fact, most - 53 percent - will go to people with incomes in the top 10 percent over the first 15 years of the cuts, which began in 2001 and would have to be reauthorized in 2010. And more than 15 percent will go just to the top 0.1 percent, those 145,000 taxpayers.
- New York Times

Tron

The MCP was occupying my computer last night. I'm glad to have it back.

Suburban quagmire

Atrios had an important post on suburban life, which i tried to post on yesterday. He's an admitted suburb hater, and I guess that fits me as well.

I grew up outside Cleveland, yet was able to get to almost anything I needed without a car. I regularly walked to school for 13 years. The public library was only 3 blocks away. A comic book shop was just a little further, and a few blocks beyond that, a grocery store. When, a few years ago now, I got a job in downtown cleveland, I could make use of the RTA's Rapid light rail train to get there. All this convenience was the result of the suburb having been built over 80 years ago, a time when street cars brought workers to downtown banks, stores, steel mills and other factories. Neighborhoods were walkable because there weren't really a whole lot of options besides that for most people.

Now I visit people in the outer suburbs and wonder what they'd do without a car. I'm not absolutely against the automobile, mind you. I just think that most daily tasks shouldn't require one. In DC, I wouldn't dream of owning a car - outlandish parking prices and traffic make it seem rather foolish, and Metrorail and Metrobus make up a great system. In inner-ring suburbia, around both Cleveland and Washington, it seems like car ownership makes sense, but there's the option of walking to most necessities - seems like a good mix. The new suburbs, though, strike me as desolate, lonely places, which especially isolate young people.

I wonder sometimes what hazards we as a society subject our children to by keeping them stuck in subdivisions, separated from everything.

Class

I'm still thinking about it. Don't worry.

Bad news on AIDS

Annan says worldwide efforts to stem the growth of the disease don't match its spread:

"Last year saw more new infections and more AIDS-related deaths than ever before. Indeed, HIV and AIDS expanded at an accelerating rate on every continent," Annan said (AP/Boston Globe, 6/3). Annan added that only 12% of people who need antiretroviral treatment worldwide are receiving it, antiretroviral drugs are still too expensive for most of the HIV-positive people in the world, and effective prevention, counseling and testing services were the "exception to the rule," Reuters reports (Leopold, Reuters, 6/3).

Oh, and take this, SGAC vision statement critics - even Annan recognizes AIDS as the crisis of our generation:

"The fight against AIDS may be the great challenge of our age and our generation. Only if we meet this challenge can we succeed in our efforts to build a humane, healthy and equitable world. Let us ensure we are equal to the task."

GW Dems

Wow, this blog is pretty bad. They're the next generation of beltway insiders, and happily so. And I don't know who's writing over there, but they don't seem to have a handle on the grammar thing.

Enlistment

So Kos is writing about the May armed forces recruitment figures, how they're so low that the Pentagon has delayed reporting them. I think what we're seeing is the product of actions taken by an administration very naive about the complexity of our volunteer army. When a huge demand is put on the armed forces, like that of two concurrent, extended conflicts in which an essentially police duty is expected beyond plain combat, there will be consequences. This would surely impact the general interest in serving, especially if the case made for one of said wars is shown to be somewhat misleading. And perhaps there wouldn't be so many problems if the administration had been more responsive to soldiers needs, like body armor and armored humvees. Rumsfeld says we go to war with the army we have; shouldn't we have considered what army we will have, if we were to jump into such a protracted conflict?

And they ran saying Democrats were naive about foreign policy. What a great time to be draft age.