Monday, March 27, 2017
I Love This Dad!
http://ftw.usatoday.com/2017/03/dad-called-out-son-bad-grades-sign-cavaliers-game-amazing-photo
Contesting the Truth
From Slate -
Trump’s Terrifying Comey Tweet
The president is using his office as a platform to contest the very nature of truth.
By Jamelle Bouie
But Trump sees no advantage in accountability, no reason to honor the truth or even gesture toward its existence. Both he and his White House have made a conscious decision to destabilize public discourse, to fracture and undermine common understanding. President Trump isn’t just lying to the American people; he’s saying, almost openly, that the truth just doesn’t matter either way.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2017/03/trump_s_comey_tweet_was_one_of_his_most_terrifying_lies_yet.html
Trump’s Terrifying Comey Tweet
The president is using his office as a platform to contest the very nature of truth.
By Jamelle Bouie
But Trump sees no advantage in accountability, no reason to honor the truth or even gesture toward its existence. Both he and his White House have made a conscious decision to destabilize public discourse, to fracture and undermine common understanding. President Trump isn’t just lying to the American people; he’s saying, almost openly, that the truth just doesn’t matter either way.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2017/03/trump_s_comey_tweet_was_one_of_his_most_terrifying_lies_yet.html
Sunday, March 26, 2017
All Alone
From the Guardian -
Into the woods: how one man survived alone in the wilderness for 27 years
At the age of 20, Christopher Knight parked his car on a remote trail in Maine and walked away with only the most basic supplies. He had no plan. His chief motivation was to avoid contact with people. This is his story
by Michael Finkel
Christopher Knight was only 20 years old when he walked away from society, not to be seen again for more than a quarter of a century. He had been working for less than a year installing home and vehicle alarm systems near Boston, Massachusetts, when abruptly, without giving notice to his boss, he quit his job. He never even returned his tools. He cashed his final pay cheque and left town.
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/mar/15/stranger-in-the-woods-christopher-knight-hermit-maine?CMP=oth_b-aplnews_d-1
Into the woods: how one man survived alone in the wilderness for 27 years
At the age of 20, Christopher Knight parked his car on a remote trail in Maine and walked away with only the most basic supplies. He had no plan. His chief motivation was to avoid contact with people. This is his story
by Michael Finkel
Christopher Knight was only 20 years old when he walked away from society, not to be seen again for more than a quarter of a century. He had been working for less than a year installing home and vehicle alarm systems near Boston, Massachusetts, when abruptly, without giving notice to his boss, he quit his job. He never even returned his tools. He cashed his final pay cheque and left town.
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/mar/15/stranger-in-the-woods-christopher-knight-hermit-maine?CMP=oth_b-aplnews_d-1
Living Large on Our Dime
From the Washington Post -
Brace yourself, taxpayers: Trump’s plutocracy doesn’t come cheap
By Dana Milbank
The average family of four in the United States pays about $4,000 a year in federal income taxes. That means the entire tax bill for 15,000 families for the year will go toward these additional protection measures for Trump. And the Secret Service is just a slice of the overall expense. Figure in costs incurred by authorities in Florida and New York, the Pentagon and others, and costs related to the Trump sons’ international business trips, and we’re well over $100 million a year.
That’s the annual federal income-tax bill for some 25,000 American families. Each trip Trump takes to his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, where he has gone most weekends since his inauguration, is estimated to cost taxpayers in excess of $3 million.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trumps-plutocracy-doesnt-come-cheap/2017/03/24/9a1f79d8-10a5-11e7-ab07-07d9f521f6b5_story.html?utm_term=.9002bd954e04
Brace yourself, taxpayers: Trump’s plutocracy doesn’t come cheap
By Dana Milbank
The average family of four in the United States pays about $4,000 a year in federal income taxes. That means the entire tax bill for 15,000 families for the year will go toward these additional protection measures for Trump. And the Secret Service is just a slice of the overall expense. Figure in costs incurred by authorities in Florida and New York, the Pentagon and others, and costs related to the Trump sons’ international business trips, and we’re well over $100 million a year.
That’s the annual federal income-tax bill for some 25,000 American families. Each trip Trump takes to his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, where he has gone most weekends since his inauguration, is estimated to cost taxpayers in excess of $3 million.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trumps-plutocracy-doesnt-come-cheap/2017/03/24/9a1f79d8-10a5-11e7-ab07-07d9f521f6b5_story.html?utm_term=.9002bd954e04
Haunted by the Truth
From the Huffington Post -
Haunted By ‘Get Out’ — But Not Because It’s A Horror Film
It highlighted for me how we can all make buffoons of ourselves in the face of diversity.
By Shira Hirschman Weiss
The film may also have another message for its audience about Caucasians adopting black culture, glorifying it and even including parts of it as its own without acknowledging origins. Because I love pop culture, I’ll look there for examples: While Eminem frequently credits his predecessors and professional influences, do other white rappers pay homage to those who paved the way? When Tom Hanks youngest son talks like an African American in a video - despite the fact that we know he’s Rita and Tom’s son - is it fine to just chalk it up to immaturity?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/haunted-by-get-out-but-not-because-its-a-horror_us_58d6e9e1e4b06c3d3d3e6e7e?
Haunted By ‘Get Out’ — But Not Because It’s A Horror Film
It highlighted for me how we can all make buffoons of ourselves in the face of diversity.
By Shira Hirschman Weiss
The film may also have another message for its audience about Caucasians adopting black culture, glorifying it and even including parts of it as its own without acknowledging origins. Because I love pop culture, I’ll look there for examples: While Eminem frequently credits his predecessors and professional influences, do other white rappers pay homage to those who paved the way? When Tom Hanks youngest son talks like an African American in a video - despite the fact that we know he’s Rita and Tom’s son - is it fine to just chalk it up to immaturity?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/haunted-by-get-out-but-not-because-its-a-horror_us_58d6e9e1e4b06c3d3d3e6e7e?
Saturday, March 25, 2017
The Sacrifices Paid Off
From the Undefeated -
STUNTIN’ LIKE HIS DADDY: HOW DEVIN BOOKER’S FATHER PAVED HIS PATH TO THE NBA
The preservation of a basketball legacy strengthened Melvin Booker’s relationship with his son
BY MARC J. SPEARS
It took a lot of persuading for former NBA player Melvin Booker to get his son to move to Mississippi away from his mom to best aid his hoop dream. It wasn’t an easy move for a teenager who only knew suburban life to switch to an “urban environment” at a high school where his dad was a star. While going back to Michigan did get strong consideration, Devin Booker’s perseverance not only led to an NBA career but also a close bond with father.
https://theundefeated.com/features/stuntin-like-his-daddy-devin-booker-father-paved-his-path-to-the-nba/
STUNTIN’ LIKE HIS DADDY: HOW DEVIN BOOKER’S FATHER PAVED HIS PATH TO THE NBA
The preservation of a basketball legacy strengthened Melvin Booker’s relationship with his son
BY MARC J. SPEARS
It took a lot of persuading for former NBA player Melvin Booker to get his son to move to Mississippi away from his mom to best aid his hoop dream. It wasn’t an easy move for a teenager who only knew suburban life to switch to an “urban environment” at a high school where his dad was a star. While going back to Michigan did get strong consideration, Devin Booker’s perseverance not only led to an NBA career but also a close bond with father.
https://theundefeated.com/features/stuntin-like-his-daddy-devin-booker-father-paved-his-path-to-the-nba/
Waving or Drowning?
From NY Magazine -
Is Political Gravity Finally Sinking Donald Trump?
By Andrew Sullivan
Is he waving or drowning? Swimming or sinking?
I ask this question because we’re more than two months in and the trauma has not subsided, but it has, perhaps, bifurcated. Sure, Trump still shows alarming potential as a would-be tyrant, contemptuous of constitutional proprieties, and prone to trashing every last norm of liberal democracy. But he is also beginning to appear simultaneously as a rather weak chief executive, uninterested in competent management or follow-through, bedeviled by divisions within his own party, transfixed by cable news, and swiftly discrediting himself by an endless stream of lies, delusions, and conspiracy theories. Even the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal challenged his credibility last Tuesday. They did this because, at this point, among sane people, he quite obviously has none.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/03/sullivan-is-political-gravity-finally-sinking-donald-trump.html
Is Political Gravity Finally Sinking Donald Trump?
By Andrew Sullivan
Is he waving or drowning? Swimming or sinking?
I ask this question because we’re more than two months in and the trauma has not subsided, but it has, perhaps, bifurcated. Sure, Trump still shows alarming potential as a would-be tyrant, contemptuous of constitutional proprieties, and prone to trashing every last norm of liberal democracy. But he is also beginning to appear simultaneously as a rather weak chief executive, uninterested in competent management or follow-through, bedeviled by divisions within his own party, transfixed by cable news, and swiftly discrediting himself by an endless stream of lies, delusions, and conspiracy theories. Even the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal challenged his credibility last Tuesday. They did this because, at this point, among sane people, he quite obviously has none.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/03/sullivan-is-political-gravity-finally-sinking-donald-trump.html
Latina & Muslim
From the LA Times -
Like an invisibility cloak, Latina Muslims find the hijab hides their ethnicity — from Latinos
By Cindy Carcamo
Like an invisibility cloak, Latina Muslims find the hijab hides their ethnicity — from Latinos
By Cindy Carcamo
http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-muslim-latinas-20170324-story.html
When We Fail Kids
As an educator, I'm a mandated reporter of suspected abuse. In my personal dealings with CPS workers, I was alarmed and frustrated at the indifference on display the few times I made contact.
One incident that stands out is when a 6th-grade student came to me to share what was happening in her home that she shared with her father. It was alarming. She asked that I call CPS to request that she be moved. She understood what she was asking as she had been in and out of foster care most of her life. I made the request and the CPS worker I spoke with flipped it off as "typical kid stuff" and dismissed it as she felt the complaint was without merit. I was livid. I told her that if anything happened to this child, it was on her. Further intervention on the school's part lead to the student moving out to live with relatives.
I'm sure there are wonderful, hard working CPS workers who care about the children they are responsible for monitoring, but this does not describe the ones I dealt with, at all.
~~~~~~~~~~
From the LA Times -
4 L.A. County social workers to face trial in horrific death of 8-year-old boy
Melissa Etehad and Richard Winton
Los Angeles County judge ruled Monday that four social workers should stand trial on child abuse and other charges in the death of an 8-year-old Palmdale boy they were assigned to protect, allowing prosecutors to push ahead with a case that has sent a chill through the ranks of child protection workers nationwide.
Superior Court Judge Mary Lou Villar said that “red flags were everywhere” during the months before Gabriel Fernandez died and that the social workers mishandled evidence of escalating abuse and failed to file timely reports on what was happening in the boy’s home before he was allegedly killed by his mother and her boyfriend in 2013. The judge said the workers’ conduct amounted to criminal negligence.
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-social-worker-charges-20170320-story.html
One incident that stands out is when a 6th-grade student came to me to share what was happening in her home that she shared with her father. It was alarming. She asked that I call CPS to request that she be moved. She understood what she was asking as she had been in and out of foster care most of her life. I made the request and the CPS worker I spoke with flipped it off as "typical kid stuff" and dismissed it as she felt the complaint was without merit. I was livid. I told her that if anything happened to this child, it was on her. Further intervention on the school's part lead to the student moving out to live with relatives.
I'm sure there are wonderful, hard working CPS workers who care about the children they are responsible for monitoring, but this does not describe the ones I dealt with, at all.
~~~~~~~~~~
From the LA Times -
4 L.A. County social workers to face trial in horrific death of 8-year-old boy
Melissa Etehad and Richard Winton
Los Angeles County judge ruled Monday that four social workers should stand trial on child abuse and other charges in the death of an 8-year-old Palmdale boy they were assigned to protect, allowing prosecutors to push ahead with a case that has sent a chill through the ranks of child protection workers nationwide.
Superior Court Judge Mary Lou Villar said that “red flags were everywhere” during the months before Gabriel Fernandez died and that the social workers mishandled evidence of escalating abuse and failed to file timely reports on what was happening in the boy’s home before he was allegedly killed by his mother and her boyfriend in 2013. The judge said the workers’ conduct amounted to criminal negligence.
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-social-worker-charges-20170320-story.html
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