Sunday, December 26th, 2010
Stephan: The New Year will soon begin. Here is something to help you realize both how much the world has changed, even as in many ways it remains the same.
MILWAUKEE - For students entering college this fall, e-mail is too slow, phones have never had cords and the computers they played with as kids are now in museums.
The Class of 2014 thinks of Clint Eastwood more as a sensitive director than as Dirty Harry urging punks to ‘go ahead, make my day.’ Few incoming freshmen know how to write in cursive or have ever worn a wristwatch.
These are among the 75 items on this year’s Beloit College Mindset List. The compilation, released Tuesday, is assembled each year by two officials at this private school of about 1,400 students in Beloit, Wis.
The list is meant to remind teachers that cultural references familiar to them might draw blank stares from college freshmen born mostly in 1992.
Of course, it can also have the unintended consequence of making people feel old.
Remember when Dr. Jack Kevorkian, Dan Quayle or Rodney King were in the news? These kids don’t.
Ever worry about a Russian missile strike on the U.S.? During these students’ lives, Russians and Americans have always been living together in outer space.
Being aware of the generation gap helps professors craft lesson plans that are more meaningful, said Ron Nief, a former public affairs director […]
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Sunday, December 26th, 2010
CHRIS ISIDORE, Senior Writer - CNN Money
Stephan: Further evidence of the vast transfer of wealth from the middle class to the uber-rich.
NEW YORK — The gap between the rich and the middle class is larger than it has ever been due to the bursting of the housing bubble.
The richest 1% of U.S. households had a net worth 225 times greater than that of the average American household in 2009, according to analysis conducted by the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal think tank. That’s up from the previous record of 190 times greater, which was set in 2004.
The widening gap came even as wealthy households’ average net worth tumbled 27% — to about $14 million — between 2007 to 2009. That’s the first time that they suffered a decline since the three-year period of 1992 to 1995.
Meanwhile, the average family’s net worth plunged 41% — to just $62,200 — from 2007 to 2009, according to EPI’s calculations.
‘The typical person lost more because a bigger percentage of their wealth in 2007 had been the value of their home,’ said Heidi Shierholz, an economist with EPI.
The poorest U.S. households have had a negative net worth in every reading dating back to 1962, meaning that their debts and other liabilities outweigh their assets. They fell deeper into a hole the last two years, with […]
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Saturday, December 25th, 2010
Stephan: I send all of you who read SR my very best wishes that you and those you love may have a wonderful holiday season, and a joyous Christmas day. May we keep the promises we make to ourselves, and to others, and be guided to always choose the way of compassion.
-- Stephan
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
by Robert Frost
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
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Friday, December 24th, 2010
Michael Kinsley, - Politico
Stephan: Why do we venerate men who kill multitudes with wild abandon in pursuit of their power dreams? The Viet Nam War was a horrible insane mistake, triggered by a wildly and intentionally distorted event. Is it, as Stalin said, that 'one death is a tragedy, a million is a statistic?' I think this is a very important question to ponder, and this essay raises some of the salient issues.
So where is the Great American Umbrage Machine when we really need it? The microscandal over Williams’s reflections was a top story for days. The outrage over MoveOn and ‘General Betray Us
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Friday, December 24th, 2010
CHRIS COUGHLIN, - Courthouse News Service
Stephan: This is a horrible report, and one that can be directly tracked back to the sexual repression and hypocrisy that permeates so much of our culture. Rape is about power more than sex. When units of soldiers, individuals whose lives are in each other's hands, rape it should be the final evidence that we need to put aside the distorting hand of religiousity and deal appropriately, and candidly, with our sexuality. It's not that we don't know how to create a society in which rape is a rare mental illness aberration, but that we choose not to create it. Just as we know that prenatal care is essential if a child is to have a healthy brain, but do little to assure the availability of such care support. These are self-inflicted wounds arising from self-righteous moral judgments.
NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Rape, sexual assault and sexual harassment ‘occur nearly twice as often within military ranks as they do within civilian life’ and are the leading cause of post-traumatic stress disorder in women veterans, but the Pentagon refuses to release information on it, or on its feeble efforts to help women who suffer from it, the Service Women’s Action Network says in a federal FOIA complaint.
‘Service members still are not adequately protected from MST [military sexual trauma] while they serve, and victims still are not adequately cared for after they leave,’ the complaint states. ‘The government has resisted releasing information that might show the true scope of the problem or highlight its own negligence – information that must be known for the problem to be solved.’
With the ACLU as co-plaintiff, the Service Women cite surveys which ‘indicate that between 6 and 23 percent of women experience one attempted or completed rape during their service period, depending on the decade. And the story gets worse: 37 percent of military rape victims experience multiple rapes, and 14 percent experience gang rape.’
The complaint continues: ‘Due to underreporting, the prevalence of MST is likely far greater than current reports […]
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