Sunday, January 25, 2015


News Clips For The Day


http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/01/21/1359206/-Oregon-racist-utopia?detail=email

Oregon: racist utopia
Devil's Tower, Daily Kos staff
WED JAN 21, 2015

An article by Matt Novak over at Gizmodo revisits a slice of history that most people in the Northwest would just as soon forget.

When Oregon was granted statehood in 1859, it was the only state in the Union admitted with a constitution that forbade black people from living, working, or owning property there. It was illegal for black people even to move to the state until 1926. Oregon's founding is part of the forgotten history of racism in the American west.

While we sometimes want to believe racism—or at least institutionalized racism— was endemic only to the South, this is far from the truth. Racism wasn't just common and accepted practice in many, if not most, areas of the country, it was simply the law.

Waddles Coffee Shop in Portland, Oregon was a popular restaurant in the 1950s for both locals and travelers alike. The drive-in catered to America's postwar obsession with car culture, allowing people to get coffee and a slice of pie without even leaving their vehicle. But if you happened to be black, the owners of Waddles implored you to keep on driving. The restaurant had a sign outside with a very clear message: "White Trade Only — Please."

When I was a kid, the "whites only" signs had been replaced by "We retain the right to refuse service to anyone" signs—good for both uppity blacks and for any wandering hippies—but the lines were still drawn very clearly.

People who believe that the economic, educational, and social damage of racism is something from the distant past, are simply people who have benefited from racism.

Today, while 13 percent of Americans are black, just 2 percent of Oregon's population is black. This is not some accident of history. It's a product of oppressive laws and everyday actions that deliberately excluded non-white people from a fair shot at living a life without additional obstacles being put in their way.

A terrific and interesting article. Go read it all.




“When Oregon was granted statehood in 1859, it was the only state in the Union admitted with a constitution that forbade black people from living, working, or owning property there. It was illegal for black people even to move to the state until 1926. Oregon's founding is part of the forgotten history of racism in the American west.... But if you happened to be black, the owners of Waddles implored you to keep on driving. The restaurant had a sign outside with a very clear message: "White Trade Only — Please." When I was a kid, the "whites only" signs had been replaced by "We retain the right to refuse service to anyone" signs—good for both uppity blacks and for any wandering hippies—but the lines were still drawn very clearly.... Today, while 13 percent of Americans are black, just 2 percent of Oregon's population is black. This is not some accident of history. It's a product of oppressive laws and everyday actions that deliberately excluded non-white people from a fair shot at living a life without additional obstacles being put in their way.”

I do remember “we reserve the right to refuse service” signs and also segregated public restrooms. I don't remember ever seeing a segregated water fountain. My memories of things like that go back to around 1952 when I was 7 years old. That's when I started noticing. I am sorry to see that such things as Oregon's ban on blacks living there were actually on the books all across the US and not just in the South or West. Now virtually all laws like that have been repealed or declared unconstitutional, but as recently as ten or so years ago Bojangles and Cracker Barrel restaurants got into trouble for refusing service to blacks. I personally refuse to treat anyone that badly over their race or religion, or to support a business that does it. I live in a HUD housing apartment for the elderly and disabled and I am one of some 10 or 12 white people here. Luckily I like black people for their straightforward and simple approach to life and friendship. I am friendly with everyone and in all but two or three cases everyone here has been friendly to me. This is part of my contribution to an equal, fair and open society. My other contribution is to give money (in unfortunately small amounts) to the ACLU and ACTBlue and petition Congress, etc. as issues come up on the Net. I also read Daily Kos almost daily and do pertinent research on the Internet for this blog.





http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/01/21/1359060/--Like-That-Post-Lose-Your-Job-Your-Livelihood-Your-Future?detail=email

"Like" That Post? Lose Your Job, Your Livelihood, Your Future.
Dartagnan
WED JAN 21, 2015

Imagine yourself sitting with hands folded in your lap, as comfortably as possible in the stiff, padded office chair, its metallic arms gleaming in the soft fluorescent glow, while your interlocutor, a smallish, bespectacled man of about 50 flips slowly through a small pile of papers laid neatly on the smooth wooden table between you. An anonymous-looking, corporate-friendly framed print on the wall behind him depicts a soothing, pastoral landscape as he gently closes the dark green folder containing your resume and reference list.  He smiles faintly and says you appear to have a the right qualifications for the job. You inch forward in your seat, expectantly. "And we do have an opening," he says. "Once we run a final cross-check, we'll contact you."

You smile too, but your smile suddenly freezes and your heart sinks into the pit of your stomach because you've heard those words before. A final cross-check means the Personality program. The same program that the last interviewer casually mentioned, almost as an afterthought, before you never heard from him again. And the one before that. And the one before that.

You stand up and shake the interviewer's hand, as much confidence in your face as you can muster. And you walk somewhat stiffly out of the conference room, not hearing his cordial goodbye, not really seeing the receptionist as the nausea begins to churn slowly upwards from your bowels. Because you know won't hear back. You've heard of others who've experienced the same thing. In fact, there's a veritable legion of people who've been denied jobs based on the "cross-check." Some have given up completely, taking lesser jobs such as pushing trashcarts, mowing lawns, cleaning the houses of others, anything that doesn't involve the "cross-check." A few, usually with family connections, have been offered the better jobs in spite of the "cross-check."  But you have no "connections." Your father couldn't "make a call." The same thing happened when you applied for that loan--despite a near perfect credit record the bank inexplicably declined to lend you the sum you needed and instead agreed only to a smaller amount at a higher interest rate.  And the same thing happened when your application at the University was rejected. No explanation.

In the not-too-distant future employers may determine your fitness for employment, extensions of credit, even admission to certain schools, based on personality traits divined by a computer program measuring, collating, and interpreting your "Likes" on Facebook and other digital markers, preferences and habits you leave behind every day.

Liking Nicki Minaj on Facebook may not seem like a momentous decision — but one day, it could help determine whether you get hired. A new study suggests that based on your Facebook likes, a computer model can predict your personality better than your friends — and in some ways, know more about your life than you do. This also means anyone who can see your Facebook profile could one day learn about your personality, and make determinations about your future job performance, your creditworthiness and more.

Research conducted by Wu Youyou, Michael Kosinski and David Stillwell of Cambridge University's Department of Psychology and the Stanford University Department of Computer Science,  has validated a computer model that assesses their subjects' personalities based on their "generic digital footprint" (in this case, Facebook "likes"). The research employed a "five-factor model", a standardized set of personality traits which might be of interest to employers, among others. The traits include: Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism (sometimes named by its polar opposite, Emotional Stability), and Openness to Experience, all to determine whether a computer could do a better job at assessing personality traits better than human beings.  From the abstract of their paper, boldly titled "Computer-Based Personality Judgments Are More Accurate Than Those Made By Humans":

Judging others' personalities is an essential skill in successful social living, as personality is a key driver behind people’s interactions, behaviors, and emotions. Although accurate personality judgments stem from social-cognitive skills, developments in machine learning show that computer models can also make valid judgments. This study compares the accuracy of human and computer-based personality judgments,using a sample of 86,220 volunteers who completed a 100-item personality questionnaire. We show that (i) computer predictions based on a generic digital footprint (Facebook Likes) are more accurate (r=0.56) than those made by the participants Facebook friends using a personality questionnaire (r=0.49); (ii) computer models show higher interjudge agreement; and (iii) computer personality judgments have higher external validity when predicting life outcomes such as substance use, political attitudes, and physical health; for some outcomes, they even outperform the self-rated personality scores. Computers outpacing humans in personality judgment presents significant opportunities and challenges in the areas of psychological assessment, marketing, and privacy.

Of course, Facebook and other social media sites already practice a form of digital "predictive analytics," as the science is coming to be known, when they target advertisers based on your "likes" and interests as fed into their secretive, data-thirsty maw. And the researchers note that their findings may have an immediate practical impact as product sellers, dating services and other commercial ventures that rely on personality profiling to serve their customers may be the first to widely utilize such programs based on digital data trolled from the internet. Others have written about "people analytics" in glowing terms as potentially "leveling the playing field" and promoting a more meritocratic hiring process. But like so many things digital, there is a dark side to all of this:

It has “the potential to completely change how we see the job market,” [Dr. Michael Kosinski, one of the paper's authors] said in an interview. Each person could get a computer-generated personality profile, and then prospective employers could search through the profiles for people whose personalities and skills matched their needs. Instead of posting a job and interviewing applicants, “you basically reach out to two or three people that match your profile.”

On a more prosaic level, this can be described as "taking the uncertainty out of hiring."  The problem is that once these psychological assessments are collected, digitally, they never go away:

And Danielle Citron, a law professor who has studied privacy, worries that data on people’s personalities could be stored and used in contexts they never expected. “What concerns me,” she said in an interview, “is the potential for keeping people’s assessments and scores in ways that have a much more lasting effect, can be merged, and then analyzed and propagated in ways that aren’t accountable.”
Personality assessments don’t just reveal positive attributes, she noted — “there’s also people whose personalities may have some negative implications, like they’re very absent-minded or they have short attention spans.” And if computerized personality screening and data collection become widespread, such people could lose out on jobs, be denied bank loans or even be flagged for extra security at airports.

If there is one thing that is certain in this world it is that corporations will make use of any technology which appears to have the benefit of saving them money. When these technologies reach their maturity (and the day isn't far off) we can expect they will be used in lieu of individual character and personality assessments now performed by human beings, particularly Human Resource Professionals. The difference will be that there will be no way for an individual to "hide" or "de-emphasize' some aspect of his personality (or past) that he might, with good reason, wish to.  For better or for worse the Internet is the center of many of our personal, social and political lives. As these technologies develop, much more than your work-friendly traits such as "agreeability," and "conscientiousness" are likely to be assessed.  WalMart's HR department may not like the fact that you "Liked" a Petition against fracking, because it shows you're a potential troublemaker. Target may not like the fact that you "like" a pro-life website, since it demonstrates "inflexibility." Companies may not appreciate the fact that you visit websites for childcare options, that you're divorced, that some algorithm has determined that the fact that you peruse dating sites makes you "unstable" or "neurotic."  Or perhaps the simple fact that you "like" a post by someone else with certain identifiable "traits" will automatically be deemed to associate you with that person's beliefs.  And, as noted by Scott R. Peppet, a law professor who studies privacy issues, "opting out" would not be a realistic option:

Even if revealing your information to an employer is technically voluntary, he said in an interview, if enough people do it, those who don’t may be at a disadvantage. “Let’s say employers routinely started asking for your Facebook information because they wanted to be able to look at your Likes and assess your personality, and you’re the one person in the group who says no,” he said. At a certain point, “the fact that you won’t reveal it is itself revealing about you, and people start to draw inferences based on that refusal.”

Peppet notes that analytics based on Facebook "Likes" are only the tip of the iceberg, as governments, marketers, and web and telecommunication services have been gathering data on everything we do on the web for years--the challenge is simply how to put it all together into a profile. The Cambridge and Stanford research indicates that such efforts are not only plausible, but provides hard data to support their effectiveness as well:

“There’s probably lots of inputs that we’re going to show over the next few years correlate or predict or assess personality,” he explained, from your Fitbit stats to your iTunes downloads. “In a world where lots of things reveal lots of things about you, it’s not so clear if you’re going to know which one you should or shouldn’t do to protect your privacy.”

Brave new world, indeed.




"And we do have an opening," he says. "Once we run a final cross-check, we'll contact you."... In the not-too-distant future employers may determine your fitness for employment, extensions of credit, even admission to certain schools, based on personality traits divined by a computer program measuring, collating, and interpreting your "Likes" on Facebook and other digital markers, preferences and habits you leave behind every day.... Research conducted by Wu Youyou, Michael Kosinski and David Stillwell of Cambridge University's Department of Psychology and the Stanford University Department of Computer Science,  has validated a computer model that assesses their subjects' personalities based on their "generic digital footprint" (in this case, Facebook "likes"). The research employed a "five-factor model", a standardized set of personality traits which might be of interest to employers, among others. The traits include: Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Neuroticism (sometimes named by its polar opposite, Emotional Stability), and Openness to Experience, all to determine whether a computer could do a better job at assessing personality traits better than human beings.  From the abstract of their paper, boldly titled "Computer-Based Personality Judgments Are More Accurate Than Those Made By Humans".... "predictive analytics," as the science is coming to be known.... using a sample of 86,220 volunteers who completed a 100-item personality questionnaire. …. On a more prosaic level, this can be described as "taking the uncertainty out of hiring."  The problem is that once these psychological assessments are collected, digitally, they never go away: And Danielle Citron, a law professor who has studied privacy, worries that data on people’s personalities could be stored and used in contexts they never expected. “What concerns me,” she said in an interview, “is the potential for keeping people’s assessments and scores in ways that have a much more lasting effect, can be merged, and then analyzed and propagated in ways that aren’t accountable.”...governments, marketers, and web and telecommunication services have been gathering data on everything we do on the web for years--the challenge is simply how to put it all together into a profile.“

Here I am living right in the middle of the world's hugest Big Brother file, the Internet. Will I be refused at the polls when I go to vote one day, or even put in jail for my beliefs? I have two kinds of dangerous beliefs, my political views and my religious views. I have joined Facebook and have freely participated, even in expressing or showing political/social issues. It's way too late for me to back out now and pretend I'm always going to err on the side of political safety. Occasionally I'm glad I'm nearing the inevitable end of my life. Right now I feel like Sol Roth, played by Edward G. Robinson, in the really magnificent sci-fi movie Soylent Green, as he made his final life decision. He went into the government center set up for those who want to go through an assisted suicide. The beautiful music plays while he lies down and watches video of a lovely male deer – long extinct. A government report referenced in the movie was dated 2015. The movie was made in 1973. Sol dies peacefully as the hero comes rushing in, too late, to rescue him from the “home.“ Hollywood should reissue that film with the original actors and play it to today's audiences. It's also time for me to reread A Canticle For Leibowitz by Walter Miller, Jr. Go to the library and get a copy of that. If the library doesn't have one, Amazon does, because I bought one last year from them.







http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/01/20/1359126/-Senior-FBI-agents-revealed-to-be-leading-civil-rights-investigation-into-death-of-Eric-Garner?detail=email

Senior FBI agents revealed to be leading civil rights investigation into death of Eric Garner
shaunking
TUE JAN 20, 2015

Although NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo continues to expect us to deny our own eyes by stating that he never actually choked Eric Garner, it was just revealed that a senior team of FBI agents has been investigating the case for nearly a month since a Staten Island grand jury failed to indict Pantaleo.

The New York-based agents have come together in recent weeks following a December grand jury decision to not indict the police officer, the sources told CNN.

The goal is a "fresh look" into the July death of Eric Garner at the hands of police Officer Daniel Pantaleo, in a case that led to anti-police demonstrations throughout the nation, a senior law enforcement official said.

The veteran investigators include an agent from the white-collar crime division who specializes in long-term criminal investigations, a supervisor in the public corruption unit and an agent who investigated the infamous 1997 police torture case involving Haitian immigrant Abner Louima, the source said.

It was fairly widely believed by a diverse cross section of people that Pantaleo, at the very least, would be indicted for choking Eric Garner to death. The disappointment and frustration when he wasn't is about deep as it gets. While it feels as if apathy toward the justice system is setting all the way in, one can only hold out hope that this new civil rights investigation will find that choking a man to death while he screams "I can't breathe" over and over again isn't just sad, but it must be illegal.





“... it was just revealed that a senior team of FBI agents has been investigating the case for nearly a month since a Staten Island grand jury failed to indict Pantaleo.... The New York-based agents have come together in recent weeks following a December grand jury decision to not indict the police officer, the sources told CNN. The goal is a "fresh look" into the July death of Eric Garner at the hands of police Officer Daniel Pantaleo, in a case that led to anti-police demonstrations throughout the nation, a senior law enforcement official said. The veteran investigators include an agent from the white-collar crime division who specializes in long-term criminal investigations, a supervisor in the public corruption unit and an agent who investigated the infamous 1997 police torture case involving Haitian immigrant Abner Louima, the source said.”

I remember the Louima case well. It tops most vile stories I've ever heard in terms of sheer horror. It's clear to me that police departments across the country have hired a noticeable number of sociopaths and other sadists. As long as the authorities in command do not first fire them and then put them in a maximum security prison they will continue to do what they do. I'm glad the FBI is looking into this Garner case which is just as clear cut as the Louima case in that it was unnecessary violence which was pursued to the point of death.





http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/01/19/1358721/-Young-Woman-Serving-30-Years-For-A-Miscarriage-Receives-No-Pardon?detail=email

No Pardon - Young Woman To Serve 30 Years For Miscarriage
Leslie Salzillo 
MON JAN 19, 2015

With some stories, I'm not sure where to begin, because the news has me stunned and almost speechless. I want to turn away, block it out and find something happy to do, or something else to think about, or write about. But I can't. And so I begin.

Last week, a young woman in El Salvador who goes by the alias name of 'Guadalupe,' had very high hopes, and was all but assured she would receive a pardon from her 30-year sentence. She had already served seven years, starting in her teens. Her alleged crime? Fetal homicide. She miscarried, and was charged with murder.

Her pardon didn't come. Guadalupe's freedom was one vote short. Her fate was determined by a Right-Wing congressional majority of 43-42. I can't write about something like this and not feel like I've been punched in the stomach again and again. Guadalupe represents every woman. This is what happens when abortion is illegal. El Salvador is known to be one of the worst countries in the world for women's reproductive rights.

According to Tim Rogers at Fusion.net:

All forms of abortion are illegal in El Salvador. And though there was no indication that Guadalupe, a mother of one, intentionally terminated her pregnancy, the doctors snitched her out to save themselves from any criminal liability.

Guadalupe, who never saw the inside of a fifth grade classroom, was interrogated in her hospital bed without a lawyer. The Kafkaesque trial was brutal and swift. Before Guadalupe knew what was happening, she was sentenced to 30 years in jail and thrown behind bars with convicted murders.

If Guadalupe’s story sounds crazy, that’s because it is. Not only does El Salvador have one of the most draconian anti-abortion laws in the world, but authorities there apply the tyrannical law with an aggressiveness that borders on obsessive. Dozens of Salvadoran women — mostly young, and all poor — are behind bars for homicide

At least 29 women are behind bars in El Salvador for abortion/miscarriage. A group of them called, #Las17, are serving between 12-40 years with the oldest being 29, reports Rogers.

Here is a short video by the Center For Reproductive Rights created to expose El Salvador's atrocious treatment of women. Most victims of reproductive injustices are from impoverished communities. No, these are not laws for the rich. 

Sadly, we can't say this would never happen to us in America, because it's happening.
Currently, at least 38 states have fetal homicide laws. The states include: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia and Wisconsin. At least 23 states have fetal homicide laws that apply to the earliest stages of pregnancy ("any state of gestation," "conception," "fertilization" or "post-fertilization"). Read more at NCSL.

Last fall, I wrote a Daily Kos diary entailing five horrific American injustices against pregnant women, via a study reported in the New York Times. I must warn it also contains stories, like this, that may be emotionally triggering:  

DC Judge Forces Woman To Have Cesarean & She Dies - 5 Shocking Injustices Against Pregnant Women

The battle for reproductive freedom is an ongoing struggle that will most likely continue past our lifetimes. We continue this fight for our daughters, and granddaughters, because our mothers, grandmothers, and pro-choice supporters (male and female) did the same for us. There are many ways we can show our support. Here are 10 large/small pro-choice organizations/Facebook pages you can visit/join now. They offer ways to help and be helped.

Planned Parenthood
Emily's List
NARAL/Pro-Choice America
NOW
NAF/National Abortion Federation
UniteWomen.org
Abortion.com
Fight Laws Against Women
Pro-Choice Liberals
Abigail Adams Brigade
_____
The Guttmacher Institute is an excellent source of current reproductive rights legislation.

The only way I can think to end this story, is to ask folks to share it, whether it's this diary, the video, or any article(s) about the story. By getting the information out to the public, we keep Guadalupe, and others like her, from getting lost in the shuffle. Nothing will change until more of the world becomes aware. Only then can we find solutions, create positive change and prevent it from happening again.

Thanks to Collier Meyerson/Jezebel for sharing the story.
Special thanks to, Kossack ExpatGirl. The camaraderie in the Daily Kos Community is amazing. If you're not a member, take a minute to register. Then join us in the comments or think about writing your own diaries and articles. This is a wonderful platform to get your voice/causes heard by larger audiences.)
ORIGINALLY POSTED TO LESLIE SALZILLO ON MON JAN 19, 2015 AT 10:36 AM PST.




“Last week, a young woman in El Salvador who goes by the alias name of 'Guadalupe,' had very high hopes, and was all but assured she would receive a pardon from her 30-year sentence. She had already served seven years, starting in her teens. Her alleged crime? Fetal homicide. She miscarried, and was charged with murder. Her pardon didn't come. Guadalupe's freedom was one vote short. Her fate was determined by a Right-Wing congressional majority of 43-42. I can't write about something like this and not feel like I've been punched in the stomach again and again. Guadalupe represents every woman. This is what happens when abortion is illegal. El Salvador is known to be one of the worst countries in the world for women's reproductive rights.... Most victims of reproductive injustices are from impoverished communities. No, these are not laws for the rich.  Sadly, we can't say this would never happen to us in America, because it's happening. urrently, at least 38 states have fetal homicide laws. … At least 23 states have fetal homicide laws that apply to the earliest stages of pregnancy ("any state of gestation," "conception," "fertilization" or "post-fertilization"). Read more at NCSL. (National Conference Of State Legislatures). Go to http://www.ncsl.org/ncsl-in-dc.aspx. .... The battle for reproductive freedom is an ongoing struggle that will most likely continue past our lifetimes. We continue this fight for our daughters, and granddaughters, because our mothers, grandmothers, and pro-choice supporters (male and female) did the same for us. There are many ways we can show our support. Here are 10 large/small pro-choice organizations/Facebook pages you can visit/join now. They offer ways to help and be helped."

In addition to this article on a nation like El Salvador, not known for forwardlooking government, see my blog today on manessmorrison2.blogspot.com called "A Brand New Crime – Miscarriage." Unfortunately we are beginning to look more and more like this nation which is the origin of many of those Hispanic children who are coming across the Rio Grande. I am no more proud of that than of our educational achievements when compared to other countries. Depressing, to say the least.