Saturday, May 17, 2014


News Clips For The Day


http://news.yahoo.com/hampshire-town-urges-police-commissioner-quit-over-obama-165111862.html

New Hampshire town urges police commissioner to quit over Obama racial slur

(Reporting by Richard Valdmanis; editing by Gunna Dickson)
May 16, 2014
Reuters

BOSTON (Reuters) - Officials in a small New Hampshire town on Friday urged a police commissioner to resign after he admitted calling U.S. President Barack Obama the 'N' word and refused to apologize.

A resident said she overheard Wolfeboro Police Commissioner Robert Copeland use the racial slur at a restaurant in March, and Copeland later admitted it in an email to colleagues.

"I believe I did use the 'N' word in reference to the current occupant of the Whitehouse...For this, I do not apologize — he meets and exceeds my criteria for such," he said in the email to fellow commissioners, according to the Associated Press.

Residents expressed outrage at a public meeting on Thursday night calling for Copeland, who is 82 and white, to step down and apologize. Copeland sat silently with his arms crossed as angry residents took turns at the microphone.

Town Manager David Owen on Friday issued a statement on a town web site saying he and the town board of selectmen were powerless to remove Copeland from his position.

"Therefore, we are hopeful that Mr. Copeland will accede to the public outcry and finally do the right thing and resign from his elected position to save the Town any further embarrassment of his making," Owen said in the statement.

A police official was not immediately available to comment.




An 82 year old man has no business occupying a political office or any other responsible position, and this just proves it. Of course Ronald Reagan was nearly that old when he was president. His wife acknowledged that his Alzheimer's began during his term in office, so he should have been retired before that, too. They also, for the most part, shouldn't be driving a car, at least in a heavily trafficked city. It's a problem their kids have to face, how to get their parents to go to a retirement home or accept help around the house. Sometimes an old person forgets a pot on the stove and starts a fire. Sometimes they start wandering off by themselves and getting lost.

This man's time to retire has come. Hopefully he has a superior somewhere – the mayor of the town? I don't see why the town board of selectmen would be “powerless” to remove a police official unless there's no real structure in the government of the town. Maybe as another article suggested, the townspeople could declare a special election and vote him out. It is certainly clear from this that not all the rabid racists live in the deep South. Hopefully he will be involuntarily “retired” soon.





'Every Day, I Almost Quit': Confessions of a Racetrack Veterinarian – NBC
BY ANNA SCHECTER
First published May 15th 2014

Kate Papp has loved horses for as long as she can remember. That’s why her decision to become a veterinarian specializing in treating racehorses turned into an agonizing career choice -- one that she says forced her almost daily to wonder if it’s possible to do her job and still adhere to her professional oath to protect animals and prevent suffering.

“Every day, I almost quit,” she says of her mental debate, which she describes as springing from a culture that forced her to unnecessarily inject horses with painkillers and other medications. “Every day, I decide I don’t want to see 2-year-olds that haven’t even run yet be euthanized in a dirt pit at the back of the racetrack because somebody trained them too hard, medicated them too much, pushed them too far.”

Papp, 31, is part of a growing movement in the horse racing industry that aims to reverse what they and other critics see as an over-reliance on legal therapeutic drugs to keep horses training and racing – a practice that they say puts horses’ lives and health at risk.

“Everything that’s given to the horse is with the main goal in mind, which is having them run well, win races, pay well to the owners and to the trainers,” she said. “And anything that they can give the horses – whether it be legal, illegal, even non-necessary substances – they will do … in an attempt to have a winner or improve their horse.”

The medication issue has moved to the forefront during this year’s Triple Crown, which continues Saturday with the Preakness Stakes at Baltimore’s Pimlico Racecourse, as a result of an undercover investigation by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) of top thoroughbred trainer Steve Asmussen.

As first reported in March by the New York Times, videotape shot last year over four months by a PETA investigator who worked as a groom for Asmussen’s operation resulted in a series of accusations by the animal rights organization against the trainer, including animal cruelty and the illegal hiring of undocumented workers.

But the footage that aroused the most outrage — and sparked a renewed conversation about medication practices within the industry — showed vets giving numerous joint injections as well as tranquilizers, painkillers and supplements to horses under Asmussen’s care.

“These drugs don't appear to be used for genuinely therapeutic purposes — they're used to keep horses going when their legs and lungs are screaming ‘Stop!’” PETA says on its website.

(Asmussen, who fired an assistant trainer shown making offensive remarks on the tapes, has denied any conduct that put his horses at risk and noted that PETA did not uncover a single drug violation during its investigation. “It’s horribly misleading and untrue,” Asmussen said of PETA’s allegations in an interview with NBC Sports broadcast May 2. “It is simply false.” Investigations of the PETA charges are ongoing in multiple jurisdictions, but no charges have been filed.)
While not commenting specifically on the Asmussen case, Papp said trainers often do bear responsibility for the overmedication of their horses.

“Basically the trainers fancy themselves to be not only trainers of horses and their fitness but of their overall health regimen,” said Papp, who testified before Congress in 2012 in support of central regulation of horse racing and implementation of rules “to deter the overuse and abuse of drugs.” “They believe in certain medications because they’ve been used by … people they know, people they’ve heard from … (and) they will make the dictation of what medications the horses are to receive.”

The problem, she said, is that they fall into the habit of giving the drugs preventively, not to treat a specific ailment.

“They don’t want to spend the money to know what’s wrong,” she said. “They just want you to fix it.”

Papp said she encountered that mindset when she started her career as an assistant vet at the Fair Hill training facility in Maryland.

“I’d be required to go to the barn, look at the horse and administer the medications or substances of treatments that were requested by the trainer,” she said, adding that those medications most often were pain-killers, anti-bleeding medications and anti-inflammatory drugs, including cortical steroids injected directly into joints.

“It felt awful to waste medication that has potential side effects – bad side effects – and giving it to a horse that we don’t even know if we were giving it to the right place or not,” Papp said.

In a statement to NBC News, Fair Hill Manager Sally Goswell said, “I am not involved with the in barn care of horses except to make every effort to provide the best track conditions possible on a daily basis for training. The trainers and owners of the horses here, along with their veterinarians, manage the horses care.”

Papp said the indiscriminate use of legal therapeutic drugs often “masks” injuries and can lead to fatal breakdowns during training or racing.

She recalled one incident in particular, after she had left Fair Hill and opened her own practice, that she said drove her to re-evaluate that approach.

After she diagnosed a horse with a stress fracture in the hind leg at a racetrack in Pennsylvania, the horse’s trainer promised to rest it for three months to allow the injury to heal, she said. But the owner transferred the horse to another trainer, who ignored her advice, gave the horse painkillers and then entered it in a race.

"That horse raced and was pulled up with a broken leg, with his leg dangling, and had to be euthanized on the racetrack,” she said. “… It was crushing, because I felt like I had notified people … what was going on with the horse and no one seemed to care. … Nobody cared and that horse died because of it.”

Papp said she unwittingly contributed to another bad outcome by injecting the knee of a horse that had one small bone chip with a pain medication. It won its next race, but as a result of that race Papp found the injury was much worse, with numerous bone chips in the knee, when she examined it.

Papp, who rescued the horse and now keeps him as a “pasture ornament” at the farm she rents with her husband, Monti Neal Sims, said she still regrets her decision.

“I feel extremely guilty for medicating him in the first place in order for him to run,” she said. “I should have just taken him before he ever ran that race.”

Papp said those incidents led her to alter her career path and open her own veterinary practice in New Jersey. She still treats racehorses – mostly at Penn National racetrack in addition to pleasure and show horses, but insists on treating injuries as they occur, not prohibitively.

“I had to step aside in order to help myself sleep at night,” she said. “I have a good group of clients that want to do things right and are pretty successful and that’s what … keeps me working on the racetrack part-time.”

Papp is not alone in questioning the current state of affairs in racing and contemplating ways to improve governance of the sport.

The Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act of 2012, versions of which have been introduced in both the House and Senate, would institute for the first time a uniform national drug policy for horse racing and institute other changes, including a ban on race-day medications and the phase-out of use of the anti-bleeding drug commonly known as Lasix. It also would appoint the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency to test horses involved in races simulcast under federal law.

Rep. Joe Pitts, R-Pa., one of 26 co-sponsors of the House bill, said the legislation grew out of frustration.

“For decades, the horseracing industry has promised to better regulate the medications given to horses,” he said in a statement to NBC News. “There have been steps forward and back, but little lasting change. I introduced my bill in order to end race day medication and bring horseracing in line with other sports that have a national and uniform testing policy.”

Ogden Phipps, chairman of the Jockey Club, said in March that the private organization dedicated to the improvement of thoroughbred breeding and racing would reach out to federal lawmakers in August to demand action if state regulators fail to agree to implement a series of medication reforms recommended by an industry science-advisory group.

A number of people working in racing also are championing reform, whether via federal legislation or by the states agreeing on a common, more restrictive approach to medication.

“We need to bring horsemanship and sportsmanship back to racing," said Glenn Thompson, a trainer for more than 30 years and author of the book ““The Tradition of Cheating at the Sport of Kings.” "The people that have been in charge of the integrity of racing have and still are letting us all down in a big way. We need a National Horse Racing Commission that can deliver swift justice to the cheaters and insure the integrity of the sport."

Another supporter is Pam Berg, who runs the Glen Ellen Vocational Academy, a nonprofit rehabilitation and retirement facility for racehorses in Northern California.

“There are drugs in other sports: Lance Armstrong, Barry Bonds, people who have made the choice to use the drugs and that is by their own choice,” she said. “… The horses don’t have that ability. They can’t say: Don’t put the needle in me, don’t make me take this, I don’t feel like it, I don’t want to. They are the victims and they are the ones without a voice and they’re being forced to accept what’s being done to them.”

The National Thoroughbred Racing Association did not respond to a request by NBC News for comment. But in a letter sent to state horse racing commissions last year, the association’s President and CEO Alex Waldrop expressed support for uniform medication recommendations.





“The Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act of 2012, versions of which have been introduced in both the House and Senate, would institute for the first time a uniform national drug policy for horse racing and institute other changes, including a ban on race-day medications and the phase-out of use of the anti-bleeding drug commonly known as Lasix. It would also appoint the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency which will “test horses involved in races simulcast under federal law.”

Rep Joe Pitts, R PA is co-sponsoring the House bill along with 25 others. He states, “'There have been steps forward and back, but little lasting change. I introduced my bill in order to end race day medication and bring horseracing in line with other sports that have a national and uniform testing policy.'”

Ogden Phipps of the privately owned Jockey Club is also pushing for changes, saying that if the state regulators fail to act he will “reach out to federal legislators.” Another voice speaking out is Glenn Thompson, a trainer for more than 30 years and author of the book ““The Tradition of Cheating at the Sport of Kings.... We need a National Horse Racing Commission that can deliver swift justice to the cheaters and insure the integrity of the sport.'”

The immense amount of money involved in betting on the horses and the drive to win at all costs is behind these tortuously contrived schemes. One horse owner dismissed an honest trainer who refused to dope the horse to keep him running with a stress fracture and the horse's leg broke during the next race, causing him to be euthanized on the racetrack. Horses are too majestic and beautiful to be treated this way.

The all-too human sport of football has a history of coaches wanting players to “play hurt,” and administering pain killers. They also until recently were keeping players in the field who had concussions, which can cause brain damage, especially with repetitive injuries. A number of football players have committed suicide after their brain damage proved to be too much to tolerate.

At least one football coach was in the news within the last five years or so for telling his players to purposely hit a key player on the opposing team very hard and actually try to hurt him. That's not sportsmanship. Sportsmanship used to be about fair play. School sports in high school was highly encouraged because it teaches “team spirit.” I think that when the individuality goes out of a game, it ceases to be a good influence, especially on kids who are in their formative years. This bullying that has become so prevalent in high schools has sometimes involved “the jocks,” who are a little bit too much into “team spirit.” Wolf packs are ruled by “team spirit.”

Sports and gambling on sports of all kinds pushes these events up to a position of importance that, if rationality were to prevail, simply would not exist. And of course, behind that is the massive amount of money that is involved in sports. It affects how sports is considered at big name colleges as well as on the professional level. Even criminal gang connections have occasionally emerged in the news due to the gambling connection, with a few players being paid off to “throw the game,” or lose purposely so the mafia-backed team can win. I can't find much interest in a sport where so much cheating is involved.

The whole subject depresses me, and the application of these things to horse racing in which the poor horse can't sue for damages or even say “my leg hurts too much to run,” is grotesquely inhumane. I do hope this bill will pass, but it may not. When I looked it up I found https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/113/hr2012, on which site internet users can track the progress of the bill. The prognosis for the bill passing is given as 19%. That's not very good. You can click on a button and contact Congress about it from that site if you want to help.





Retired Military Leaders Fret Kids Will Be 'Too Fat To Fight' – NBC
BY ALLISON LINN
First published May 2nd 2014

Want to improve national security without spending billions on a new weapons system? Slim down America’s kids and teach them to read, some retired generals say.

The U.S. Army says more than three-fourths of 17- to 24-year-olds today are not eligible to join the military because they aren’t fit enough or don’t meet other basic requirements, such as having a high school diploma or being able to read or write properly.

That’s got some of the nation’s highest-ranking retired military officials advocating for a radical way to improve national security — improve the lives of children.

“It’s not just a school problem. It’s not just a Department (of Education) problem. It’s a national security issue and it needs to be prioritized that way,” said retired Major General D. Allen Youngman.

He’s one of hundreds of former military brass who have gotten involved in Mission: Readiness, a nonprofit organization whose “Too Fat to Fight” reports attack junk food in schools and other issues, and whose members lobby lawmakers for improved school lunches and more widely available pre-K education.

These military officials say such interventions are necessary for increasing the pool of people who both want to serve in the military and would be able to do so.

“If you have a very small (group) who are interested to begin with, and then the majority are not qualified, you can get into a pickle quickly,” Youngman said.

A serious problem

Current military officials agree that the nation’s obesity epidemic has created a serious problem, currently and for the next generation of soldiers. They say the military also is starting to address the issue, with efforts such as improving nutrition for current service members and by trying to help military families promote healthy eating and exercise habits with their children.

“If we really need the service now and of the future to be more physically fit and healthy, we certainly find that we can engage as a country .. how to address strategies of healthy living,” said Public Health Service Capt. Kimberly Elenberg, program manager for population health at the Defense Health Agency.

The effort comes amid proposals to reduce the number of U.S. troops significantly following lengthy conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, and it also coincides with an ever-more technologically advanced military operation. Despite those two trends, experts say it’s still going to be just as important to have fit, able soldiers in a generation to come.

“There’s nothing about war that is becoming fundamentally less physically demanding, for at least half the people on the battlefield,” said Michael O’Hanlon, director of research for the foreign policy program at the Brookings Institution, a think tank.

O’Hanlon said that’s because, despite its best efforts, the military may not be able to avoid messy, on-the-ground conflicts in countries where there are massive humanitarian violations or other lawlessness.

Even if their military duties don’t require on-the-ground combat, Elenberg said troops need to be in good shape. Nurses must be able to carry a large load of equipment to help the wounded. Service members on ships need to be able to nimbly climb vertical ladders from deck to deck. And personnel on submarines need to be fit enough to stay alert for hours on end.

Youngman said many civilians also don’t realize that the soldiers of today and tomorrow are expected to be more prepared in other ways. Gone are the days when high school dropouts could show up and expect the military to whip them into shape. The military now says many potential candidates are rejected because they don’t have a high school diploma or meet basic literacy requirements.

A different military

“This is a very, very different military now,” Youngman said.

Advocates say they are pushing for things like healthy food for school children and better early childhood education because that can provide the building blocks for healthier American adults, in the military and out of it. But they emphasize that they are by no means trying to recruit young children.

“Nobody’s trying to put toddlers in camo,” said Amy Dawson Taggart, national director of Mission: Readiness.

The nonprofit, an arm of the Council for a Strong America, receives funding from Boeing, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Pew Charitable Trusts and many others. It does not receive government funding, Taggart said.

Taggart concedes that retired, high-ranking military personnel are not your “usual suspects” for lobbying on children’s health and well-being. She said that might be one reason they have been able to command the attention of lawmakers and other people who might not have heeded these issues in the past.

“I think what we are seeing is the kind of traction (of) that unexpected messenger,” she said.




“The U.S. Army says more than three-fourths of 17- to 24-year-olds today are not eligible to join the military because they aren’t fit enough or don’t meet other basic requirements, such as having a high school diploma or being able to read or write properly....'It's a national security issue, and it needs to be prioritized that way,” said retired Major General D. Allen Youngman.”

Amy Dawson Taggart, of Mission Readiness, says that the new emphasis on education and health by retired military leaders can help bring it to the attention of “lawmakers and other people who might not have heeded these issues in the past.” For that, read “Conservative Republicans,” I would say. Pre-K for kids is not thought by them, generally, to be the sort of thing that federal funding should be spent on.

The military, in complaining that recruits can't read and write is joining that other Republican stronghold, business leaders. For several years now they have been saying that basic skills are lacking in too many job applicants. In my opinion the present-day emphasis on a college diploma covers up that most basic problem. What those kids can't do is not college level study material, but high school and even grammar school work. I applaud these business leaders and military people for their strong backing of the effort to educate America's youth better.

The Republican emphasis during the last ten years or so on backing private schools and magnet schools takes the best or the most wealthy students out of the public school system entirely, while limiting funds to the underprivileged and those with average abilities. This is one version of letting the public school system “die on the vine.” There are too many students to too few teachers in the public schools as it is, with a constant need for tutoring or special education for students who are behind. This problem starts young and continues as their coursework becomes more difficult. It should not be a surprise that a student who tests at the 7th grade level when a senior in high school is not going to qualify for jobs or the modern military.

A student graduating from high school should be able to read the daily newspaper, an encyclopedia, a business letter, a business document and a classic work of fiction. They should be able to do business math and know something about American and world history. They should know how the federal government works, at least basically. I would like to see them pass much higher on achievement tests as compared to kids from Third World countries than they currently are able to do. You can't get our average citizens to do that without a good public school system. Maybe with these military people speaking out for it, the Congress will quit defunding education bills and do what is necessary to revamp the public schools. If kids have to be segregated by sex or wear uniforms, I don't think that should be too great a problem.

While I'm ranting about schools, I must mention one other thing – the increasing lack of discipline in public schools. It lowers a child's ability to concentrate on learning, and even endangers him – not to mention the teachers. Just today on the news a teenage student pushed a 60 year old teacher down to the floor at a school in an altercation over his cell phone. If he isn't supposed to play with his cell phone in class, he should peaceably stop doing it. Too often the parents of such a child will complain when he is punished, so the School Boards in an effort to avoid law suits by parents are failing to back the teacher in any disciplinary efforts he may use. When I was going through, teachers were known to march the kid down to the Principal's office, where he may actually be paddled. Nowadays that wouldn't happen, but the schools should be able to expel a really badly misbehaving student.




Teacher helps student forge tough path to college diploma
By Steve Hartman CBS News May 16, 2014

NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. -- This really shouldn't be happening. Statistically, as a foster kid, Gina Pearson was more likely to wind up behind bars than under a mortarboard. And yet here she is, graduating from Rutgers University in New Jersey with a degree in social work -- with a Master's ahead of her and so much baggage behind her.

See, Gina didn't live in just one foster home.

"I would just always act out or something, and then I would either get kicked out of the home, or I would just run away or something like that," she says.

And how many times did that happen?

"A lot, like thirty," she says.

Thirty foster homes, from first grade right through high school, where freshman math teacher Cherylyn Straubmuller remembers her behavior all too well.

"She had her own voice, wanted to be heard," Cherylyn says. "She was rough at first. She was very rough at first. She's in the classroom and the next thing I know, I get hit upside the head with a golf ball. She threw a golf ball in my direction and hit me in the head."

And that was just one episode. Cherylyn had dozens of other reasons to suggest Gina for expulsion, but instead, she took a different tack.

"She sent me an email and she asked me to babysit the kids," Gina says. "I think she just saw something that I didn't even see in myself."

Saw it and cultivated it, long after Gina was out of her class.

"She was so consistent in sitting with me every day, even though she may have had something else to do," Gina says. "And we would just talk. She kind of helped me find myself."

Cherylyn encouraged Gina to buckle down, talked her into going to college, and the rest -- is future.

"I'm so proud of her, I really am so proud," Cherylyn says. "She made her own way. She realized what brains she had and she finally used it. That's the best part about it."

This graduation season, every kid under a cap and gown should be able to point to at least one person who made it all possible. And if they're as wise as their degrees suggest, they will take Gina's advice -- to not just say thank you to that person, but to show thank you.

"Continuing to strive for success and for greatness -- that is my thank you to her," Gina says.




"And we would just talk. She kind of helped me find myself." Anybody who has ever gone through mental health counseling with a good one-to-one therapist understands this process. The difference is that this was a teacher, not a psychologist, and not even her current teacher. Most teachers simply don't – and probably can't – invest this much in one student. In this case they bonded, became friends, and the struggling young person took hold of the reins and started to guide the horses herself, so to speak, changing her own behavior and thoughts in a positive direction. Thank goodness she discovered a healthy inner person to work toward becoming. Many girls from this kind of background end up doing drugs or being prostitutes. This is a most encouraging story. Congratulations to Cherylyn Straubmuller who saw her potential.





Historically black colleges still seeking equality in Md.
By Paula Reid CBS News May 17, 2014

BALTIMORE -- Attorney General Eric Holder marked the 60th anniversary of the Supreme Court's historic decision in Brown v. Board of Education, which overturned the doctrine of "separate but equal," by addressing graduates at a Maryland university that is at the center of the ongoing fight for equality and integration.

A federal judge recently ruled that the state of Maryland continues to violate the constitutional rights of students at historically black institutions like Baltimore's Morgan State University, where Holder spoke Saturday.

Federal District Judge Catherine Blake ruled in October that Maryland's educational policies violate the 14th Amendment's equal protection clause by depriving historically black colleges and universities of unique, high-demand programs that would attract a competitive and diverse student body.

The court found that Maryland's traditionally white institutions have an average of 42 unique programs while historically black institutions have an average of 11 per institution.

"Throughout the states where there are historically black colleges, you will find the pattern of having separate institutions is still a major problem," said Earl S. Richardson, the former president of Morgan State University.

Richardson was one of the plaintiffs' supporters who turned out for a town hall meeting at Coppin State University in Baltimore to discuss the case.

In 1992, the Supreme Court held in U.S. v. Fordice that eight public universities in Mississippi needed to take more action to promote integration to comply with the equal protection clause.

In October, Blake declared that Maryland's efforts toward integration were lacking.

"This disparity is highly suspect in light of the history of Maryland's system of higher education," she wrote in her opinion.

She held that Maryland never made a "serious effort" to address the issue of duplication that existed before Brown.

"Duplication is basically two systems - one for blacks and one for whites," Richardson said.

Duplication makes it harder for historically black colleges to attract students, especially since Maryland has several public institutions all concentrated in the Baltimore area and competing for the same students.

Blake also held that Maryland didn't prevent additional, unnecessary duplication over the past several decades, to the detriment of historically black institutions in Maryland.

"Do you need all of those institutions offering the same programs to the same audience?" Richardson asked.

Prior to the Brown decision, the state of Maryland forced black students to attend schools that were insufficiently funded and lacked the resources and opportunities afforded to white students. Blake pointed out that Maryland failed to adequately remedy the disparity for decades after the Brown decision was issued.

By 2000, Maryland had to enter into a partnership agreement with the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights in an effort to bring the state's higher education system into compliance with federal law. Maryland was required to take specific steps to address issues in recruitment, retention and funding for historically black colleges and universities.

The agreement required Maryland to abide by its commitment not to duplicate unique programs at historically black colleges and universities at traditionally white institutions, which would have the effect of siphoning students from the former to the latter.

According to court documents, in June 2006 Maryland wrote to the Office of Civil Rights seeking an acknowledgment that it had fully implemented its commitments, but the state never got a response and no further action has been taken on the agreement.

Then came another lawsuit. The Coalition for Equity and Excellence in Maryland Higher Education, an organization of prospective, current and former students of Maryland historically black institutions of higher education, filed suit in 2006.

The plaintiffs argued that the inequality continues to exist between historically black institutions and traditionally white institutions in terms of missions, programs, funding, infrastructure and duplication of programs that would attract high quality students over half a century after Brown.

"States have not grown and developed historically black colleges in the same way they have supported traditionally white institutions," said Richardson. "Our states continued to fund a dual system."

It took almost seven years for the case to wind its way through the courts. When Blake issued her opinion in October, she found that on the issue of duplication Maryland is comparable to and in some cases worse than duplication found in Mississippi.

Blake ordered the parties to try to mediate the issue and to focus on ways to address unnecessary program duplication and to expand the offering of unique programs at historically black institutions.

The parties are due to report to the judge on the status of the mediation by May 30.

At that time, Michael D. Jones, lead counsel for the plaintiffs, said he is hopeful that the state will give a remedial proposal that will address the constitutional violations that the court found.

"In case they do not remedy those constitutional violations ... we are fully prepared as soon as the court is ready to accommodate us to have a full-blown hearing," he said.

Acting secretary of the Maryland Higher Education Commission, Catherine Schultz, issued a statement to CBS News: "The state is committed to good faith mediation of the Coalition lawsuit. That mediation is on-going. We hope that the mediation will lead to a satisfactory resolution for the students of Maryland."

According to Richardson, "It is only when we have all of our institutions equally competitive regardless of race, that we will have desegregated the system."





Separate education for black students is still occurring in some states, said Earl S. Richardson, the former president of Morgan State University. Federal District Judge Catherine Blake ruled in October that Maryland's program is in violation of the law and, she said, is in many cases worse than the deep south state of Mississippi. “Prior to the Brown decision, the state of Maryland forced black students to attend schools that were insufficiently funded and lacked the resources and opportunities afforded to white students. Blake pointed out that Maryland failed to adequately remedy the disparity for decades after the Brown decision was issued.”

“Unique programs at traditionally black colleges” doesn't like sound as good to me as full acceptance of black students at the now white-oriented state colleges would be. Why are there any “black colleges” left? The state colleges – as opposed to private institutions like Duke – in North Carolina have both black and white students, and the tuition fees plus the required college board scores are aimed at including a broad range of students rather than just the cream of the crop. Of course, once there, they have to apply themselves assiduously sometimes in order to stay in school. The trick is graduating, not getting in. To me that is how it should be. Not everybody is going to succeed in college, but the difference shouldn't be the color of their skin, and there should be scholarships, campus work opportunities and loans for those who need help with tuition and books.




NY man who raped girl, killed mom gets life term
By Crimesider Staff CBS/AP May 16, 2014


SYRACUSE, N.Y. - A New York man has been sentenced to life in prison without parole for raping a girl and killing her mother after cutting off his ankle monitor last year.
David Renz was sentenced Friday in Onondaga County Court after a judge said he hoped the penalty would comfort the victims' family.

The 30-year-old had pleaded guilty to first-degree murder, admitting that he carjacked the woman and her 10-year-old daughter on March 14, 2013. Renz stabbed and strangled the mother as she tried to stop him from raping her daughter.

He had been under federal monitoring on child pornography charges but cut off his ankle device. Renz was sentenced earlier this year to 30 years in federal prison for possessing more than 11,000 images and 1,100 videos of child pornography.

Authorities say Renz attacked the woman, a school librarian, and her daughter after they left a gymnastics class at a mall in the Syracuse suburb of Clay. Police said he used an air pistol to force the woman to drive her car to a remote section of the mall's parking lot, where he bound both of them and raped the girl.

Prosecutors say Renz was trying to use cable ties to bind the woman to a headrest in her car when she fought back and shouted for the girl to bolt from the vehicle. As the girl ran off and was rescued by a passing motorist, her mother was strangled and repeatedly stabbed in the head and chest, officials said. Renz was captured by police shortly after.

Weeks after the attack, a report by a federal judge found that the officers failed to do monthly checks on Renz that would have included inspection of the bracelet. Federal probation officers in Syracuse who were monitoring Renz were fired or demoted.




“He had been under federal monitoring on child pornography charges but cut off his ankle device.” Two things are wrong in this case. One, people who are addicted to pornography aren't actually “normal” psychologically, and when it's child pornography they are doubly deviant.

Two, sexual crimes need to be treated as a serious issue, especially as they tend to be repeated as soon as the criminal gets out of prison and has the opportunity again, with increasingly violent actions. A “peeping Tom” may rape the next time he offends, and after that he is likely to torture or kill the victim. A simple ankle bracelet monitoring device is all too easy to get rid of, as this man did by just cutting it off and leaving his house to go on the hunt for a victim. “Renz was sentenced earlier this year to 30 years in federal prison for possessing more than 11,000 images and 1,100 videos of child pornography.” That's an awful lot of kiddie porn. Then, after being sentenced to 30 years in prison he was out on the streets again with just an ankle bracelet. That is really ridiculous. That is some judge's fault.

The probation officers had failed to examine his bracelet as they were supposed to, so the fact that it was gone was not noticed. They were “fired or demoted,” but the damage was still done. He is now sentenced to life in prison without parole. That is a reasonable charge, but a brutal rape and the loss of her mother's life will not easily be forgotten by the little girl. Hopefully she will get some years of mental health counseling to help her through it.




Why The U.S. Shunned The Man Who Will Now Lead India – NPR
by Greg Myre
May 16, 2014

Until a few months ago, the U.S. government was effectively boycotting Narendra Modi, the man who is virtually certain to be India's next prime minister following the landslide victory by his party in the country's parliamentary elections.

So will the U.S. now warm to Modi as the elected leader of the world's largest democracy?

Before answering that, let's look at why Washington refused to deal with him.

The Americans, along with other Western governments, turned their back on Modi after widespread rioting in 2002 in Gujarat state, where he had become chief minister a year earlier.

The trouble began when some 60 Hindu pilgrims were killed in a train fire blamed on Muslims. Hindus then went on a rampage, killing more than 1,000 people in revenge, mostly Muslims.

Critics accused Modi, a Hindu nationalist, of not doing enough to stop the carnage, if not worse. Politicians close to him were convicted of involvement, including one of his Cabinet ministers who was sentenced to 28 years in prison.

Modi has always denied any wrongdoing, and subsequent investigations did not implicate him. However, human rights groups criticized those inquiries and Western governments kept their distance.

During President George W. Bush's administration, the U.S. went so far as to deny Modi a visa in 2005 on the grounds of "severe violations of religious freedom."

Modi did address the riots in a blog post last December.

"I was shaken to the core," he wrote. He did not offer an apology, which many victims and their relatives had sought.

But as it became increasingly likely that Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party would win the election, Western countries reversed course and began reaching out.

The U.S. ambassador to India, Nancy Powell, traveled to Gujarat's capital, Gandhinagar, and held talks with Modi at his residence in February, which effectively ended the boycott. European countries also re-established contact.

And with the election victory, any doubts about Modi's political standing in Washington quickly evaporated. Just hours after the results were announced, President Obama called Modi, congratulating him and inviting him to Washington.

Foreign affairs commentator Fareed Zakaria called the U.S. ostracism of Modi "selective, arbitrary and excessive." In addition, Zakaria said the two countries needed a closer partnership, particularly at a time when Obama is calling for the U.S. to pivot to Asia. Zakaria wrote:

"If the United States and India, the world's oldest and largest democracies, could create a genuine partnership, it would be good for Asian stability, for global prosperity, and, most especially, for the cause of democracy and human rights around the world."

To cite just a few key issues, the U.S. and India are both concerned about the instability in Afghanistan and Pakistan and are also keeping close watch on China's growing clout in Asia.

While Modi, 63, was unwelcome in the West until recently, he has been a regular visitor to China. His pro-business agenda has included encouraging Chinese investment in Gujarat, a western coastal state that also borders Pakistan.

His election campaign stressed the economic development in the state, which has seen unprecedented growth since he took over in 2001. However, critics say that powerful businessmen have been the big winners and that many of the poor have seen few benefits.

Modi, the son of a train station tea vendor, will have a strong mandate after such an overwhelming electoral win. It appeared his BJP would have an outright majority in Parliament and would not be required to find coalition partners. This would mark the first time in three decades that one Indian party has so dominated an election.

Modi should also push for a larger Indian role in regional affairs, according to Zakaria.

"New Delhi's ruling elites remain ambivalent about the kind of foreign policy they should conduct, trapped between their old, Third World, anti-colonial impulses and the obvious requirements of a new Asia in which China is emerging as the dominant power," he wrote. "The result is that India has shied away from the kind of robust relationship with the United States that would help it economically, militarily and politically."




The incident which caused the US to “shun” Modi happened in 2002. A train was burned, killing 60 Hindus and the Islamists were blamed for causing it. Hindu groups then went on a rampage and killed 1000 Islamic citizens. Modi, a Hindu nationalist, was blamed for doing too little to prevent the killings and some his followers were blamed for being partly behind the event. When it became clear that his party would probably win the upcoming election, the US and Europeans warmed up to him. He has now been invited to visit President Obama in Washington.

The US will probably be courting Modi now, especially since China has already made business investments in his home region of Gujarat state. TV commentator Fareed Zakaria is recommending that the US and India, as the two oldest democracies, have a closer “partnership,” and that does seem to make sense since we need a non-Islamic state in the region. Afghanistan is very iffy about their relationship to the US and Pakistan is all but ruled by the Islamic extremists.

Too many of the people in Pakistan are what I can't help calling “backward” in their treatment of girls and women; and their idea of education as being the ability to memorize the entire Koran and very little else is hardly what I would consider to be an improvement. India, on the other hand, has at least in part benefited by a long history of Western contact, even if it was under the colonial rule of England.

There are still leftovers of the old caste system, but there have been constitutional improvements to the treatment of the lower classes. India also has its own history of abuse of women, of course. The horrific “wife burnings” happened among Hindus in India when the wife's family proved unable to pay her dowry, and the unfortunate marriage of very young girls also still goes on. Old customs are still firmly entrenched in both places. They won't become westernized completely, but the Indians have proven themselves capable of electing their leaders without having to call out the riot police and they at least speak the language of Western law rather than Sharia law. I have hope for good government there.