Monday, November 25, 2013
CONTACT ME AT: manessmorrison2@yahoo.com


News Clips For The Day


Syria conflict: Assad's government, rebels to meet for 'Geneva 2' talks in January – NBC
By Alastair Jamieson, Staff writer, NBC News

Both sides in Syria’s deadly civil war will sit around the table for peace talks for the first time since the uprising against President Bashar Assad began in early 2011, the United Nations announced Monday.

Setting the January 22 date for the “Geneva 2” peace conference ends six months of wrangling over when Syria's government would meet the opposition for talks.
“We will go to Geneva with a mission of hope,'' U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a statement.

More than 100,000 have died and almost nine million forced to flee their homes by the conflict, the U.N. estimates.

Previous attempts to bring the two sides together have failed mainly because of disputes over who should represent the Syrian opposition and government, and whether Iran, Saudi Arabia and other regional powers should be at the table, Reuters reported.
“The conflict in Syria has raged for too long," the U.N. statement added. "It would be unforgivable not to seize this opportunity to bring an end to the suffering and destruction it has caused."


This is a hopeful news article, with the possibility of a resolution to the conflict in Syria. I look forward to progress and a stable government. I will continue to collect articles as I see them.



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What You Should Know About The Iran Nuclear Deal – NPR
by Eyder Peralta
­


Just before the sun rose on Geneva on Sunday, international negotiators emerged to announce Iran and world powers had reached a deal to curb Iran's nuclear program for six months while the two sides work out a permanent, more sweeping solution.

Today, the deal is being called historic. USA Today says it may be President Obama's most unlikely and most meaningful foreign policy victory during his time in office.
In short, it is the first time in about a decade that Iran has agreed to halt some of its nuclear activities. Also, this is the most tangible outcome of a newly thawed relationship between the U.S. and Iran. Remember, the two countries have had no formal ties since the 1979 Iranian Revolution. That all changed when Obama and Iran's new, moderate president, Hassan Rouhani, exchanged letters in September.

Later that month, after Rouhani set a new tone during his first visit to the United Nations, the two leaders exchanged a historic phone call. After marathon negotiating sessions, which included two trips to Geneva by Secretary of State John Kerry, Iran reached a deal with the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council (U.S., Russia, China, U.K., France) plus Germany.

During a rare Saturday night address, Obama told the country that while this is "just a first step, it achieves a great deal."

"Today, that diplomacy opened up a new path toward a world that is more secure — a future in which we can verify that Iran's nuclear program is peaceful and that it cannot build a nuclear weapon," Obama said.

Perhaps the most succinct analysis of the deal was tweeted by Ali Vaez, a senior Iran analyst for International Crisis Group, which describes itself as an "independent, non-partisan, source of analysis and advice to governments, and intergovernmental bodies."

Vaez tweeted: "Like hurdling track and field, springing over the first obstacle does not guarantee victory. But without it the race is lost."
With that, here is what you should know about this deal with Iran:
— The Fine Print: As the White House explained the deal in a "fact sheet," Iran has agreed to halt any enrichment above 5 percent and neutralize any of its stockpile that is near-20 percent.

Iran has also agreed to "unprecedented transparency and intrusive monitoring" of its nuclear program.
In return, the U.S. and its partners have agreed to drop some of its sanctions, amounting to about $6 to $7 billion in relief.

— On Some Enrichment, They've Agreed To Disagree: One of the toughest diplomatic dances that happened in this agreement is about Iran's "right to enrich." Iran has insisted that the world recognize it has a right to enrich uranium for peaceful means. The U.S. has insisted that it has never recognized that right for other countries and it would not do so for Iran.

As The New York Times reports, the two sides have agreed to let ambiguity rule in this case.
"American officials signaled last week that they were open to a compromise in which the two sides would essentially agree to disagree on how the proliferation treaty should be interpreted, while Tehran continued to enrich," the Times adds.
That is: Iran will claim the world has acknowledged its right to enrich; the U.S. will say it has not.

— Israel Is Not Happy: "What was concluded in Geneva last night is not a historic agreement, it's a historic mistake," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told reporters. "It's not made the world a safer place. Like the agreement with North Korea in 2005, this agreement has made the world a much more dangerous place."
Netanyahu especially objected to the lifting of any sanctions.

"Without continued pressure, what incentive does the Iranian regime have to take serious steps that actually dismantle its nuclear weapons capability?" Netanyahu said.
Obama addressed some of these concerns last night, saying if Iran does not meet its obligations, the sanctions can be rolled out again.

"The broader architecture of sanctions will remain in place and we will continue to enforce them vigorously," Obama said. "And if Iran does not fully meet its commitments during this six-month phase, we will turn off the relief and ratchet up the pressure."

Obama and Netanyahu spoke by telephone in the afternoon.
"The two leaders reaffirmed their shared goal of preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon," White House said in a readout of the call. "Consistent with our commitment to consult closely with our Israeli friends, the President told the Prime Minister that he wants the United States and Israel to begin consultations immediately regarding our efforts to negotiate a comprehensive solution."

— The GOP Isn't Happy: Politico reports that shortly after negotiators in Geneva announced they had reached a deal, Congressional Republicans began panning it.
Politico reports:
"Congressional Republicans questioned whether the deal would actually prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon because they will still be able to enrich uranium — something the nation says is needed for power plants.

"'This agreement will not 'freeze' Iran's nuclear program and won't require the regime to suspend all enrichment as required by multiple UN Security Council resolutions,' Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said in a statement. 'By allowing the Iranian regime to retain a sizable nuclear infrastructure, this agreement makes a nuclear Iran more likely. There is now an even more urgent need for Congress to increase sanctions until Iran completely abandons its enrichment and reprocessing capabilities.'"

During his speech last night, Obama warned lawmakers not to scuttle this deal by imposing new sanctions on Iran.
"Doing so would derail this promising first step, alienate us from our allies and risk unraveling the coalition that enabled our sanctions to be enforced in the first place," Obama said.

— Eyes Wide Open: Reacting to criticism from the GOP and Israel, Secretary of State John Kerry told CNN that they were going into this deal with "eyes wide open."
This deal is not about trust, he said. This a deal contingent on intrusive, on-the-ground inspections.

"We're going to verify and verify and verify and verify," Kerry said.
Plus, Kerry said, Iran has committed to neutralizing its higher-enriched uranium. So, under this plan, the country will go from having about 407 pounds of 20 percent-enriched uranium to zero.

That, Kerry said, will extend the amount of time needed for Iran to build a nuclear weapon and consequently make Israel and Gulf countries like Saudi Arabia safer.
"The clock is set backwards," Kerry said.

— Iran's Currency Jumped 3 Percent: The sanctions imposed by the U.S. and its allies against Iran have been crippling. Iran's currency, the rial, lost about two-thirds of its value against the dollar because of the sanctions.

But Reuters reports that after the deal was announced, the currency gained a bit of traction, rising 3 percent against the dollar on Sunday.
— Iranophobia Lost, Says Rouhani: During a press briefing in Tehran on Sunday, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said that these negotiations mean that "enemy" attempts to "promote Iranophobia" failed.

"The result of the negotiations is that the G5+1 or, in other words, the world powers have now recognized Iran's nuclear rights," Rouhani said, according to the official state news agency Fars. "During the talks, the world came to understand that respecting the Iranian nation would bear results, and sanctions would not work."
— Deal Reached Through Secret Talks? Quoting "three senior administration officials," the AP reports that this deal was built on a year's worth of secret "high-level, face-to-face talks."

The AP adds:
"The discussions were kept hidden even from America's closest friends, including its negotiating partners and Israel, until two months ago, and that may explain how the nuclear accord appeared to come together so quickly after years of stalemate and fierce hostility between Iran and the West.

"But the secrecy of the talks may also explain some of the tensions between the U.S. and France, which earlier this month balked at a proposed deal, and with Israel, which is furious about the agreement and has angrily denounced the diplomatic outreach to Tehran.

"President Barack Obama personally authorized the talks as part of his effort — promised in his first inaugural address — to reach out to a country the State Department designates as the world's most active state sponsor of terrorism.
"The talks were held in the Middle Eastern nation of Oman and elsewhere with only a tight circle of people in the know, the AP learned. Since March, Deputy Secretary of State William Burns and Jake Sullivan, Vice President Joe Biden's top foreign policy adviser, have met at least five times with Iranian officials."

— So What's Next? NPR's Peter Kenyon, who has been covering these negotiations in Geneva, tells Weekend Edition Sunday that what this preliminary deal has told us is that future negotiations will be very difficult.

For example, Peter says, a grand deal would require the big sanctions on Iranian oil to be dropped. Those were passed by Congress and have to be dropped by Congress. If recent history is any indicator, getting anything through Congress will prove challenging.

On the positive side, Peter points out, Ayatollah Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader, praised the deal, saying it could serve as a "basis for future prudent measures." His buy-in was essential for any of this to have legs going into broader negotiations.


This article is a good summary of the Iran nuclear deal. The deal is only good for six months, so the permanent negotiations, which are expected to be more difficult, are yet to come. This is good progress, however, and a great improvement over the total lack of a relationship between our two countries which has existed since the Iranian students takeover of the American Embassy. I feel encouraged by the agreement.



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Hollywood's New Strategy: Supporting Chinese-Made Blockbusters – NPR
by Neda Ulaby
­ If you've seen the 2012 science fiction movie Looper, you might remember a telling exchange when a time-traveling hitman (Bruce Willis) sits down with a young version of himself (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) and offers some advice.
"You should go to China," Willis says firmly.

Gordon-Levitt resists: "I'm going to France."
"I'm from the future," Willis insists. "You should go to China."
It's almost as if Hollywood is giving advice to itself. Like every other gigantic business, Hollywood wants to sell its products in China. But selling movies in China is different from selling bubble gum or Coke. The country's official gatekeeper, the China Film Group, allows in only 34 foreign films per year, a number recently raised from only 20.

Many millions of dollars of ticket sales come along with snagging one of those coveted spots. So Hollywood's been trying — and trying and trying — to appeal to Chinese audiences while appeasing Chinese censors.

Working Together, Officially
As an "official co-production," Looper cast a certain number of Chinese actors, a certain number of Chinese crew, set a certain number of scenes in China and made other concessions, in exchange for a bigger cut of the box office than other U.S. movies and a preferential release date. (Movies released during major Chinese holidays perform significantly better at the box office.)

Last year's science-fiction thriller Looper, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, tried to go all in with an official Chinese co-production, sending its time-traveling hitman to China.

When you watch Looper in the U.S., the Chinese elements are not obvious. For example, none of the Chinese actors speak a single line, including the woman who plays Bruce Willis' wife. But in China, a version of the film was released that gave them more emphasis.

Official co-productions such as Looper have fallen out of fashion due to the difficulties involved, but similar attempts to attract Chinese moviegoers are ongoing. Take this summer's megahit Iron Man 3. It also released a Chinese version that played down its supervillian (so unfortunately named The Mandarin) and played up a Chinese good guy, while tossing in some Chinese product placements.

"The reaction on the part of many Chinese was, 'Oh well, you didn't really have to.' It felt tacked on," says independent film producer Janet Yang, who also notes the film was a colossal success in China. Yang is an American who's worked in both countries since the 1980s.

Not Everything Translates
Hollywood's learning curve is still notably steep when it comes to understanding what works and what doesn't in the world's second-largest movie-going marketplace. A 2010 remake of The Karate Kid, filmed in China with Jaden Smith and Jackie Chan stumbled, in part, because karate is Japanese, not Chinese. Maybe The Kung Fu Kid would have done better in China. The Karate Kid was a bust.

One American producer working in China told me, on background, that he's learned that the Chinese censors will never go for horror movies or supernatural elements, and they frown on buildings getting blown up. "Unless the buildings are in Hong Kong," he added. (As it happens, Pacific Rim, a movie extremely hard on Hong King real estate, happened to be one of the top grossing pictures in China this year.)

Producer Janet Yang has stories of her own, as when she worked with the Walt Disney Company to create a Chinese version of High School Musical. They partnered with a Chinese company, Huayi Brothers Media. As she recalls, Huayi Brothers advised Disney, "You can't expect a movie with no stars to do well." Chinese blockbusters tend to be star-driven. To drive up the film's ticket sales, Huayi Brothers suggested building a fan base for the film's young actors by making them into a band and taking them on a song and dance tour around the country.

"Basically, Disney rejected that idea," Yang said ruefully, "They said no, because the brand that were the whole reason we're doing this movie is to promote High School Musical as a brand, and not this whole other thing as a brand."

Yang is quick to point out she can see both points of view, but cultural problems persisted. High school is a miserable time for Chinese teenagers. They're cramming for college, not singing and dancing. So they changed the name to High School Musical: College Dreams, with students singing upbeat songs about the joys of calculus. All the back-and-forth made the Chinese partners eventually lose interest. The movie did not do very well in China.

Home Grown Hits
"I think Hollywood's finally, maybe, slowly beginning to figure out it's not that easy," says Stephen Saltzman, a lawyer who often negotiates deals between Hollywood and China. "We can't just walk in there, soak up all this capital and not provide a real quid pro quo."

The quid China wants for its pro quo is help making its own global hits. Jeffery Sharp is among a new wave of Hollywood insiders investing in what's now being called "Chinawood." He produced major independent movies including You Can Count On Me and Boys Don't Cry. Now he's focused exclusively on China.

"We are working with filmmakers who are Chinese — either mainland Chinese, Hong Kong or Taiwan," he said from his office in Santa Monica. "It's basically building partners on the ground."

Sharp's also working with a publishing company, teaching his Chinese partners about financing, how to option popular books, and package and develop them into movies.
"They're all Chinese authors, and we're developing a lot of these with U.S. screenwriting talent," he said.

The idea is injecting Hollywood DNA into an industry already worth billions. Hollywood is learning to leverage its expertise and learning to pay attention to what Chinese people are watching. Not what Hollywood thinks they want to watch.


I would really like to see a Chinese movie, and some good documentaries on television (on NPR, maybe) about the lives of modern day Chinese. Maybe there are some books by Chinese authors that I could get on the Amazon or Barnes and Noble websites. I got to know a young Chinese woman at one of my jobs and she was very up-to-date, independent and lively in her outlook. She did say that her brother-in-law considered her to be “too independent.” The monolithic government of China is forbidding, but it would be good to learn more about their cultural policies and trends.



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Vatican Puts St. Peter's Bones On Display For The First Time – NPR
by Eyder Peralta
­ That's Pope Francis, the 266th Bishop of Rome, holding what the church believes are the bone fragments of St. Peter, the apostle and the first bishop of Rome.
­ Pope Francis cradled the relics during a mass at St. Peter's Square, which marked the end of the global church's Year of Faith. It was also the first time the Catholic Church has displayed the relics in public.

The Guardian reports there is much mystery and intrigue concerning the eight pieces of bone. No pope has ever definitively said the bones are the remains of St. Peter, but in 1968 Pope Paul VI said the bones found underneath St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican had been "identified in a way that we can consider convincing."

The Associated Press reports that archaeologists dispute the finding.
But the story is still alluring. The Guardian bases its story on The Ears of the Vatican, the 2012 book by Bruno Bartoloni. According to the book, the relics were discovered in 1939, as archaeologists were excavating in the grottoes of St. Peter's Basilica to bury Pope Pius XI.

As they worked, they discovered a casket with an engraving in Greek that read, "Peter is here."

The Guardian continues:
"The scholar of Greek antiquities Margherita Guarducci, who had deciphered the engraving, continued to investigate and learned that one of the basilica workers had been given the remains found inside the casket and stored them in a shoe box kept in a cupboard. She reported her findings to Paul VI, who later proclaimed there was a convincing argument that the bones belonged to Peter.

"Leading Vatican Jesuits and other archaeologists strongly denied the claim, but had little recourse.

" 'No pope had ever permitted an exhaustive study, partly because a 1,000-year-old curse attested by secret and apocalyptic documents, threatened anyone who disturbed the peace of Peter's tomb with the worst possible misfortune,' Bartoloni wrote."
Rocco Palmo, who runs Whispers in the Loggia, the blog of record on the Vatican, writes that today's mass brings to an end to what's been an extraordinary "year of faith" for the church in an extraordinarily surreal way.

During the past year, Palmo explains, we saw the first papal resignation since the 14th century and then the College of Cardinals chose the first pope "from outside Europe in over a millennium."


http://whispersintheloggia.blogspot.com/
One of global Catholicism's most prominent chroniclers, Rocco Palmo has held court as the "Church Whisperer" since 2004, when the pages you're reading were launched with an audience of three, grown since by nothing but word of mouth, and kept alive throughout solely by means of reader support.

A former US correspondent for the London-based international Catholic weekly The Tablet, Palmo's served as a church analyst for The New York Times, Associated Press, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, BBC, NBC, CNN, National Public Radio and many other mainstream print and broadcast outlets worldwide.


Those of you who read this blog may be interested in the Vatican blog by Rocco Palmo. I have become very much involved with this Pope, who shows so much forward looking imagination and interest in bringing the Catholic Church ahead into what I consider to be modern times. I have added Palmo's blog to the favorites list on my computer.



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Can Child Marriages Be Stopped? – NPR
by Jennifer Ludden
­ Christina Asima seems tired for a 13-year-old. I meet the shy mannered girl in the remote farming village of Chitera, in the southern African nation of Malawi. She wears a bright pink zip-up shirt and a blue print cloth wrapped up to her chest. Snuggled in that, hugging her side, is a chubby-cheeked baby boy.

My gut assumption is that the infant must be Christina's little brother. I know 8-month-old Praise is actually her son. Still, it's startling when, as we speak, she shifts him around front to nurse.

"I was 12 years old when I got married to my husband," she explains softly. "My mom had run away, so I was forced to get married to help my other siblings."
Despite decades of international and local efforts to curb child marriage, Christina is hardly alone. Across the developing world, it's estimated that one in three girls still marries before age 18; one in nine before age 15. And the numbers are even worse in Malawi.

"When they see a girl child, in our country, you don't think of anything else but marriage," says Faith Phiri, a Malawian trying to change such attitudes. Five years ago she created a non-profit, the Girls Empowerment Network, to challenge the complex mix of culture, economics and sexism that drives child marriage

­Pregnancy Is Leading Cause Of Death
Here, as in many places, offering up a daughter for marriage can bring parents a dowry, or pay down a debt. Some see it as a way to protect a girl's virginity. The common thread is that the girl herself has no say.

­ Many soon become pregnant, which can have devastating consequences. Phiri says many girls' bodies are simply not developed enough to support a baby, or push it out.
"I've seen a lot of girls dying," she says, "one of whom was my closest friend. She was forced into marriage, got pregnant, and she did not make it."

In fact, pregnancy and childbirth are the leading causes of death worldwide for girls ages 15 to 19.

In Chitera, Phiri guides me down a rutted alley, to the concrete courtyard of a mud-brick home. A girl in a denim skirt is leaning over a plastic bucket, washing white cloth diapers.

Arinafe Makwiti, 13, says her parents forced her to drop out of school and get married to an older man last year to help with the family finances. Makwiti has divorced her husband, but now has a 9-month-old daughter.

Arinafe Makwiti, 13, says the diapers are for her 9-month old daughter. Out of earshot, she blames her parents for her situation. "They didn't want me to go to school," she says, "but rather to get married."

There was no ceremony. No celebration. Arinafe simply moved in with her new husband's family. She says it was awful.
"My in-laws shouted at me," she says. "I had no peace of mind. I only got one meal a day."

Patriarchy runs deep in Africa. When a girl marries young, experts say she's often little more than a servant and vulnerable to domestic violence. Arinafe says her husband was older — she's not sure by how much — and taller.

"The first day, it was like he was big and I felt very small," she says. I ask about her first night with the man, and she looks down to the side as she answers.
"I cried because the pain was very unbearable," she says. "He asked, 'Why are you crying?' I said I'm feeling too much pain, but he continued. Unfortunately, I got pregnant."

She and her husband have since divorced. Arinafe's mother, Rose, is not happy about the split. "My daughter was running around too much," she tells me. "I thought marriage would settle her down." Arinafe says she wants to go back to school, but when I ask her mother about that possibility, her face hardens.

"It's more difficult than ever to come up with the school fees," she says. "My daughter used to sell oranges and mangos. Now, she has to carry a baby on her back."
Trinitas Mhango, of the Girls Empowerment Network, leads a Girls Club in the farming village of Sandrack. The girls write out their life stories thus far, including the daunting challenges they've faced, then set goals for what they want to be doing in five or 10 years.

Helping Girls Re-Imagine Their Future
"All along the girls have been so silent," says activist Faith Phiri. "It was the communities who have been thinking for the girls. They think that, 'Marriage is good for you girls.' But we're saying, 'Girls, what do you think?'"

To that end, the Girls Empowerment Network creates girls' clubs, like the one I visit in another dusty farming village an hour away, Sandrack.

Two dozen girls are squeezed into a tiny community hall, dancing in a circle, taking turns singing in the center. Girls Empowerment organizer Trinitas Mhango greets them with a "Whoo hoo!" and they shout back with big smiles.

Mhango has the girls tell the story of their young lives, complete with the daunting challenges they've faced so far. Then she asks them to dream, and to plan. "Ruthie," she asks one 17-year-old, "in five years, what do you want to be?"
"An accountant," Ruthie ventures. To which Mhango whoops again, and rallies the group in a round of applause.

It may seem hokey; saying you want to be an accountant doesn't get you there. But in fact, the few studies done on child marriage prevention say building this kind of social network is key. With it comes skills for public speaking, negotiating and standing up for oneself, even in front of the whole village.

The next day, it's show time. The girls club and other young people in Sandrack are putting on their own play. A shady patch of dirt under some glycedia trees has been transformed into a stage. Village leaders settle into a front row wood bench. Dozens more form a large circle; they've come by bike and foot from miles around to see this.
Act One: A charming man comes to court a young girl. Her parents are thrilled when he offers a backpack bursting with money. The knot is tied; the girl drops out of school.
In her life story, 17-year-old Ruth Black describes how her father died while seeking work in South Africa. Black wants to be an accountant when she grows up, and Girls Club members have pledged to help her achieve that.

But in Act Two, when she goes to sell her new husband's vegetables at market, her math skills fall short. The audience hoots as she counts on fingers and toes. The young bride sells for too little. The husband is not pleased. No subtlety there. Yet getting the message across can be tough.

Changing Laws, One Village At A Time
In both villages I visit, pretty much every adult I ask about the Girls Empowerment Network says the same thing:
"At first, we were thinking it's a matter of wasting our time," says Emanuel Mandam, a "headman" in Chitera. He didn't like the idea of ending child marriage at all, because "early marriage to us was a weapon for reducing poverty."

A girl's husband may bring a family much-needed money, he says, either through a dowry or simply helping out with expenses. At the least, marrying off a girl means one less mouth to feed. But after the village girls presented their grievances, Mandam says he came around.

"Education can make somebody prosper," he says. "Maybe for my daughter to do better in the future."
Mandam's daughter is 12, and he says he's already begun planning the extra work he must do to continue paying her school fees.

Malawi law permits marriage at 15 with parental consent, and merely "discourages" it at younger ages. But last summer Chitera passed its own legal age of marriage — 21 — with the ambitious goal that every girl attend college.

To minimize distractions, there's a new 6 p.m. curfew for young people. And there's been a change at the local movie house, a thatched hut with an old TV and videotape machine. The day I visit, a horror flick is playing at high volume, completely innappropriate for the kids lining wooden benches watching. But they used to show porn here; that's no longer allowed.

By far the biggest change: a steep penalty if parents marry off a daughter before age 21. "They have to give five goats to the chief," says another local official, Roben Ndrama, "and eight chickens to the village headmen."

In a more humiliating measure, some parents have been made to scrub clean the local health center. Ndrama laughs when I ask if parents get mad about that.
"It's worked!" he says. "Since the new by-laws took effect, there've been no early marriages."

More than 20 communities have passed similar rules. Still, in a country the size of Pennsylvania, Faith Phiri faces heavy push back as she tries to change centuries of thinking. But she hopes new attitudes are sinking in, and spreading, village by village, girl by girl.


Here is another article bearing good news for human progress. Though the article says that men rule in these villages, these head men are interested in a better life for the young girls, and as a result for their society. Real progress is often a grass-roots effort, a gradual building up of new attitudes. It doesn't always require a bloody revolution.

If we could only prevent all teenaged girls from marrying in the US, it would be good. Too often young girls here get pregnant when they are 15 years old or less and marry rather than toughing it out as an unwed mother. If they marry a mature, gentle man they may do okay, but their husband is usually also a teenager who can't get a job above the rank of laborer, and they end up divorcing. Then they end up on welfare if their parents can't keep them up, and raise children who often have a greater tendency to become juvenile delinquents. It's an ongoing cycle of sadness and poverty.

We need some Girls Empowerment Networks here in this country. Of course we do have the Girl Scouts and church youth groups, but I don't think it's as popular among young people as it used to be when I was young. Too many kids are too involved with Facebook pages and peer-group ranking of a negative kind to focus on studying and self-development. Parents frequently seem to be clueless about what their children are doing, and don't intervene. It concerns me a great deal, but all I can do at this point is observe and hope for things to get better.




Bullied girl's mom announces lawsuit, "Rebecca's law" – CBS

The mother of a bullied Fla. pre-teen who committed suicide in September announced Monday morning that she and her attorneys intend to file civil suits in the case and draft a law that criminally punishes bullies. “My goal is to use my personal tragedy to make society a better place,” said Tricia Norman, whose daughter, Rebecca Sedwick, jumped to her death from a tower in an abandoned cement plant near her home.

Norman said she planned to bring a wrongful death lawsuit against those she believes are responsible for her death, but declined to name specific people or entities.
Sedwick had allegedly been bullied, and two girls, ages 12 and 14, were arrested on felony stalking charges for allegedly sending Sedwick harassing messages and encouraging others to fight her. Experts said it was the first time stalking had been invoked as a means to punish alleged bullies. Late last week, the state attorney dropped all charges against both girls.

But for Tricia Norman and her attorneys, the fight goes on.
“Bullying has become a problem of epidemic proportion in our society,” said Norman’s attorney, Matt Morgan.

Morgan told reporters that his firm, which includes former, and perhaps future, Governor Charlie Crist, has “created an entire department” to deal with “nothing but bullying.” He warned parents that if their child is bullying another child, “you may find yourself on the wrong end of a lawsuit and your personal assets in jeopardy.”

Morgan said they plan to draft and push to enact “Rebecca’s law,” which would create criminal penalties for bullying. He also announced a second law, “The Safe Schools Improvement Act of 2013” which would state that in order to receive federal funding, schools must have “policies and procedures” in place to combat bullying.


I knew they had dropped charges against the younger girl, but I didn't know about the older one. I'm sorry to see that. The things she said on Facebook show a hardened personality. I'll be glad to see criminal punishment for bullies, if that law goes through. Bullying isn't just a part of the normal “rites of passage” of being a teen – it is an assault or at the very least severe harassment. This, along with bringing weapons onto the school ground, should be punished by the courts.

Too many young hoodlums are allowed to get away with their actions. They are old enough to know better. Good students need an environment in which they can flourish. Our schools are failing partly because of this very problem. American students don't rank even close to the top internationally in academic achievement, and that is a shame. I support the American public school system – our society wouldn't stay afloat without it – but school boards and teachers need to be controlling things more closely in order to produce better students. The suggestion has been made that we should require uniforms at school. I think they should try that. The professionals are failing us.