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[Cin]

Originally Posted by Kobi

When Obama said on Thanksgiving Day, we should think of the Syrian refugees like the Pilgrims, it was a slap in the face to Native Americans.

Not only that, but I can't understand how he could think that was logical reference to use to make the point that the Syrian refugees aren't dangerous and aren't going to be a problem. I can't think of a more dangerous and a more serious problem faced by America's indigenous people than the pilgrims and their ilk. I mean that really didn't end well for Native Americans. I wouldn't compare the Syrian refugees to the Pilgrims. That's just scary and a really dumb example to boot.

Tick, you also posted an interesting article somewhere a while back. It was a study on how people, once they learn something or believe something, they are reluctant to let go of it, even when evidence to the contrary is staring them in the face, they will cling to what they know. Havent found the post yet for the reference. But this, is also sticking in my head these days.

I find this particular quirk of human beings quite fascinating and also very depressing. It kind of makes me not want to bother explaining and linking facts when making a point. But I recently came across an interesting article that looks at the issue in much more depth. Here's the link if you want to read it. There's a little hope. It's a bit long though.

http://lifehacker.com/can-rational-a...nds-1590008558

[Kätzchen]

Branding, marketing, and persuasion, is an conceptual progression whose roots are deeply embedded within Antonio Gramsci's doctrine of Hegemony:

"The rule of one class over another is not dependent on economics or physical power, but on persuading the ruled to accept an system of beliefs belonging to the ruling class,"
~ James Joll (U. K., 1977).

When I think of current political issues arising across the landscape of societies, here, near or abroad, I trend toward literature authored by Czeslaw Milosz (who formerly lived under two dictatorships during his early years, before defecting to the west (US), then taking up departmental studies as an professor at UC-Berkeley. And, available literature by Antonio Gramsci whose brilliant treatise was penned while imprisoned during fascist Italian dictatorship, during the end years of his life.

CBS news, this morning, released a video pertaining to women and children fleeing for their lives. And the journalist (Mandi Patikin?) iterated the fleeing women's narrative, as: " I saw death behind me....And I never stopped running."

There's so much to learn from those who've lived through or currently in the most harrowing of circumstances in life.

I have fled for my life, not like people I've mentioned above, but in circumstances of my own where there was no other choice but to flee for my life and the lives of my children. My heart is tender and filled with compassion for those who flee hostile situations where it's no other choice before you but life or death. It is those kinds of situations that ultimately shape your perspective in ways that deeply marks ones convictions, develops the kind of scruples which determine and add definition to an person's proverbial vocabulary of life experience.

Thanks for letting me share my thoughts, tonight.

[Cin]

Mainstream media aka corporate media is being blamed for Trumps popularity in some circles. It is certainly true that the media has favored the big orange head with more than his fair share of attention, but if that's all it took then he could just tap dance his way to popularity on the strength of his media favoritism. The real problem isn't that the media gives Trump too much attention, it's that the American people are listening because he's singing their tune. This didn't happen in a vacuum. The GOP with their outrageous politics has primed the pumps for decades. Encouraging hatred and anger with the Tea Party, radicalizing Congress with their far right fascist leaning fanatical candidates, they have been setting the stage for this for awhile now. You could crush Donald Trump and squeeze his orange noggin until pulp comes out but the anger and hate that is consuming Americans would still be there just waiting for someone to come along and manipulate that energy for votes.

[Andrea]

$700 million mine-hunting drone can't find explosives

http://www.cnn.com/2015/12/11/politics/remote-mine-hunting-drone-fails-tests/index.html

A mine-detection system the U.S. Navy invested nearly $700 million and 16 years in developing can't complete its most basic functions, according to the Pentagon's weapon-testing office.

The Remote Minehunting System, or RMS, was developed for the Navy's new littoral combat ship. But the Defense Department's Office of Operational Test & Evaluation says the drone hunting technology was unable to consistently identify and destroy underwater explosives during tests dating back to September 2014.

[Andrea]

Ex-Oklahoma City cop Daniel Holtzclaw cries after jury convicts him of rape

http://www.cnn.com/2015/12/11/us/oklahoma-daniel-holtzclaw-verdict/index.html

For about six months, Daniel Holtzclaw preyed on women in one of Oklahoma's poorest neighborhoods, exploiting his police badge to intimidate them into keeping quiet.

[Cin]

Canada welcomed its first planeload of refugees last night. 25,000 refuges will make Canada their home by March. And not only are they finding acceptance from all Provinces but Canada's very pretty Prime Minister was there in person to welcome the arrivals and help them find warm clothes to protect them against harsh Canadian winters.

Here are some remarks from Trudeau's speech concerning the refugees just before their arrival:
"First of all, thank you for being here. And thank you for the gorgeous smiles I see. This is a wonderful night where we get to show not just a planeload of new Canadians what Canada is all about, we get to show the world how to open our hearts and welcome in people who are fleeing extraordinarily difficult situations.

"But it's not just about receiving them tonight. It's about the hard work we're all going to do in the coming weeks, months and indeed years to ensure that everyone who passes through here tonight and in the weeks and months to come are able to build a life for themselves, for their family and also contribute fully to the continued growth of this extraordinary country."

"Tonight they step off the plane as refugees. But they walk out of this terminal as permanent residents of Canada, with social insurance numbers, with health cards, and with an opportunity to become full Canadians.

"This is something that we are able to do in this country because we define a Canadian not by a skin colour or a language or a religion or a background. But by a shared set of values, aspirations, hopes and dreams that not just Canadians but people around the world share. And how you will receive these people tonight will be something they will remember for the rest of their lives, but also I know something that you will remember for the rest of your lives. And I thank you deeply for being a part of this because this matters, tonight matters, not just for Canada but for the world.

"Merci beaucoup, mes amis."

Some quotes from the article (not from Trudeau's speech LOL):
"Canadians eager to show their support for the newcomers weren’t deterred by the fact that they couldn’t do so face to face.

A handful of people gathered at the international arrivals gate at Pearson bearing signs and gifts.

...dropped off dozens of bags brimming with snacks and plush toys for the children, as well as hats and mittens for the adults. ...having made arrangements with airport security to have the items -and several hundreds more bags – brought to the designated terminal where the government flight landed."

Another plane arrives in Montreal tomorrow. So many people wanted to go to the airport to welcome them (including my wife) that for security and logistic reasons that's not going to be possible. But I think it will be clear enough to the refugees aka new permanent residents of Canada that they are very welcome indeed.

Damn those refugees hit the jackpot.

http://globalnews.ca/news/2394286/li...ees-to-canada/

[Corkey]

I for one am very glad and so grateful for Canada in many ways, this is but one. I hope they leave the door open to us if tRump wins.

[Cin]

Looks like Trump is no anomaly. Racism is as American as apple pie. Even the highest court in the land is not immune to racist rhetoric. We seem to be teetering on the edge of something wicked. To quote William Faulkner "the past is never dead. it's not even past." It's scary really. My fervent hope is that people's eyes will open and this will be the beginning of truth and healing. But then that's always my fervent hope and it hasn't come to fruition yet. But since I'm quoting how about a little Dickinson “Hope” is the thing with feathers - That perches in the soul - And sings the tune without the words - And never stops - at all -


NYT Rewrites Scalia to Make Him Sound Less Racist

New York Times Supreme Court correspondent Adam Liptak (12/9/15) recounted a startling moment in the Court’s oral arguments over the University of Texas’ affirmative action plan:

In a remark that drew muted gasps in the courtroom, Justice Antonin Scalia said that minority students with inferior academic credentials may be better off at “a less advanced school, a slower-track school where they do well.”

“I don’t think it stands to reason that it’s a good thing for the University of Texas to admit as many blacks as possible,” he added.

But part of the reason that the remark drew “muted gasps,” surely, is that that’s not what Scalia said–he didn’t say minority students “with inferior academic credentials” would be better off at worse schools, he said African-Americans in general would. Here’s the whole passage:

There are those who contend that it does not benefit African-Americans to get them into the University of Texas, where they do not do well, as opposed to having them go to a less–a slower-track school where they do well. One of the briefs pointed out that most of the black scientists in this country don’t come from schools like the University of Texas…. They come from lesser schools where they do not feel that they’re being pushed ahead in classes that are too fast for them.

He goes on to suggest that “really competent blacks” would be better off if they were “admitted to lesser schools”:

I’m just not impressed by the fact­­ that the University of Texas may have fewer [black students]. Maybe it ought to have fewer. And maybe some, ­­you know, when you take more, the number of blacks, really competent blacks, admitted to lesser schools turns out to be less. And I don’t think it stands to reason that it’s a good thing for the University of Texas to admit as many blacks as possible.

This is not a person talking about a subset of blacks with a particular kind of educational background; taking his words at face value, this is a person asserting that African-Americans as a whole belong in “lesser schools” that are not “too fast for them.” (Or that “there are those who contend” that that is the case, if you want to give Scalia credit for that circumlocution.)

The fact that a Supreme Court justice justifies eliminating affirmative action on the basis of openly racist views ought to be big news. By sugarcoating what Scalia actually said, the New York Times disguises that news–making the ethnic cleansing of America’s top schools a more palatable possibility. Perhaps that shouldn’t make me gasp.

http://commondreams.org/views/2015/1...nd-less-racist


Speaking on the Senate floor Thursday morning, CNN reports Minority Leader Harry Reid pushed back on the comments, saying, “These ideas that he pronounced yesterday are racist in application, if not intent. I don’t know about his intent, but it is deeply disturbing to hear a Supreme Court justice endorse racist ideas from the bench on the nation’s highest court. His endorsement of racist theories has frightening ramifications, not the least of which is to undermine the academic achievements of Americans, African-Americans especially.”

http://time.com/4144454/harry-reid-j...scalia-racist/

[Kobi]

Originally Posted by Miss Tick

Looks like Trump is no anomaly. Racism is as American as apple pie. Even the highest court in the land is not immune to racist rhetoric. We seem to be teetering on the edge of something wicked. To quote William Faulkner "the past is never dead. it's not even past." It's scary really. My fervent hope is that people's eyes will open and this will be the beginning of truth and healing. But then that's always my fervent hope and it hasn't come to fruition yet. But since I'm quoting how about a little Dickinson “Hope” is the thing with feathers - That perches in the soul - And sings the tune without the words - And never stops - at all -

I saw this today and did some digging. When one looks at it out of context, it sounds like something it may not be.

Scalia was speaking to the academic theory of "mismatch" which both sides filed briefs on. While the briefs were not the central argument of the cases, they are relevant.

Questioning legal arguments and briefs is part of the process of making your case.


“I don’t think,” Mr. Scalia said, “it stands to reason that it’s a good thing for the University of Texas to admit as many blacks as possible.” He was addressing Gregory G. Garre, the lawyer defending the University of Texas at Austin’s affirmative action policy, which supplements the automatic admission of top-ranking students from all high schools across the state with the use of race as one factor in a “holistic” approach to admissions.

In asking such a pointed question, Mr. Scalia was stepping into a long debate over what has been called the mismatch theory of college admissions.

The proponents of the “mismatch effect” say that large allowances based on a student’s race are harmful to those who receive them, that they learn less than they would if they attended a college more closely matched to their level of academic preparation, receive lower grades, become academically discouraged and socially segregated. Critics say that the “mismatch” research is based on flawed assumptions that cannot be validated by other researchers, and that the evidence is more likely to show that all students, regardless of race, benefit from enrolling at the most challenging college that will accept them.

Stuart Taylor Jr., a Princeton graduate, lawyer and writer who co-wrote the 2012 book “Mismatch: How Affirmative Action Hurts Students It’s Intended to Help, and Why Universities Won’t Admit It,” said Mr. Scalia’s lack of eloquence had made what he said sound worse than it was.

In the current case, Mr. Taylor is counsel on an amicus brief propounding the mismatch theory, on behalf of his co-author on that book, Richard Sander, a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, law school. “Students who are admitted with far lower grades and test scores and other indicia of academic capability are almost certain to do badly academically, and we think, and this is more debatable, that they’re also likely to do worse in their careers and other departments of life than they would if they were getting good grades at some less prestigious school,” Mr. Taylor said.

He said the idea was not to reduce the number of black students going to college, but to admit them to schools where they would be more likely to succeed. “Martin Luther King didn’t go to a fancy college,” he said. “Thurgood Marshall didn’t go to a fancy college. Colin Powell didn’t go to a fancy college.”

Oren Sellstrom, one of the lawyers on a brief attacking the mismatch theory, said that “there is a vast body of social science evidence that shows exactly the opposite of what the mismatch theory purports to show, that actually minority students who benefit from affirmative action get higher grades at the institutions they attend, leave school at lower rates than others, and are generally more satisfied in higher education, and that attendance at a selective institution is associated with higher earnings and higher college completion rates.”

Mr. Sellstrom called the mismatch theory “paternalistic,” and said that the concern Mr. Scalia’s remarks raised for him was that, “At root he does not believe that students of color belong at elite institutions. I hope that’s not the case, but the tenor of the remarks certainly suggests that that is underlying his thinking.”

The article.

[Cin]

Originally Posted by Kobi

[COLOR="Navy"]
I saw this today and did some digging. When one looks at it out of context, it sounds like something it may not be.

I think in any context it sounds exactly like what it is.

[Cin]

More on that Supreme Court case.


Abigail Fisher Deserves an 'F' for Her Race-Baiting Supreme Court Case Aimed at Boosting Subpar White Students

The admissions case in front of SCOTUS is about putting mediocre white students ahead of talented people of color.

Wednesday, the Supreme Court heard arguments in what is easily the most baffling case it’s going to hear this session, yet another attack on affirmative action policies at state universities, in this case the University of Texas at Austin. If ever there was a case that has no business in front of the high court, it is this one. The suit is a nuisance suit, it’s poorly argued, it’s disingenuous, it’s been heard before and, to make everything even more bizarre, the plaintiff’s claim to injury is demonstrably untrue. This is a case that should have been laughed out of court years ago, but instead, this is the second time — second time! — it’s being presented in front of the Supreme Court.

At stake is the claim made by Abigail Fisher, now 25, who hails from a wealthy suburb of Houston called Sugar Land, that she was deprived of her rightful admission at UT Austin because, in her view, some person of color who didn’t deserve it stole it from her.

Throughout her now seven-year campaign to make the school pay for not letting her in, Fisher has never been able to produce any evidence that the school tossed her application to make room for a less qualified minority applicant. That’s because, as UT Austin has maintained throughout this ordeal, Fisher was never getting in to their school. Fisher’s GPA and SAT scores weren’t high enough, and she didn’t have enough external accomplishments to convince the school to give her a shot otherwise. As Pro Publica explained at the time:

It’s true that the university, for whatever reason, offered provisional admission to some students with lower test scores and grades than Fisher. Five of those students were black or Latino. Forty-two were white.
Neither Fisher nor Blum mentioned those 42 applicants in interviews. Nor did they acknowledge the 168 black and Latino students with grades as good as or better than Fisher’s who were also denied entry into the university that year.

Fisher’s case only makes sense if you assume that people of color are inherently less worthy than white people. How else do you justify an argument that assumes that every white person should have been given a shot before minority students do?

This assumption of the inherent superiority of white people, even above those people of color who have more appealing applications, was reflected in Antonin Scalia’s remarks during today’s case.

From transcript, what Scalia said today on whether black people would be better served at "less advanced" schools pic.twitter.com/ikYGnjqM5p
— Irin Carmon (@irin) December 9, 2015

Instead of telling her where to shove it, the Supreme Court sent Fisher’s case back to the appeals court. Now she and her lawyers are back again. This time, they’ve tweaked their argument a bit, trying to argue that diversity itself is an illegitimate goal for schools and, to add a bit of extra nastiness sauce to it, they’re claiming that diversity is bad for students of color.

In other words, Fisher and her lawyers are concern-trolling the Supreme Court.

Most of UT Austin’s admissions are on the basis of high school class standing — about 80 percent of its class in the year that Fisher applied. But the other 20 percent are determined in a holistic fashion, by looking at grades, extracurricular activities, test scores, writing samples, the usual stuff. Because of the school’s commitment to diversity, race and class background is also taken into consideration. Someone who shows potential but faced some obstacles gets a closer look than someone who hasn’t had similar obstacles.

When you read about this case, it quickly becomes self-evident why the admissions committee didn’t think Fisher had some hidden potential that wasn’t reflected in her grades. Fisher, however, has decided her unparalleled genius is going unnoticed because of the notorious racism against white people. But since that argument hasn’t gotten her very far, her lawyer, Edward Blum, is now trying a different tactic to argue that schools should admit mediocre white people over talented students of color: His claim is that giving students of color an opportunity somehow hurts them.

“Rigorous judicial review,” Blum’s new petition argues, “would have revealed that UT’s ‘qualitative’ diversity interest is in fact illegitimate. It depends on the assumption that, as a group, minorities admitted through the Top Ten Percent Law are inherently limited in their ability to contribute to the university’s vision of a diverse student body, merely because many come from majority-minority communities.”

Translated from legalese to English: It’s supposedly racist to let students of color with middling grades into UT Austin, because you’re assuming they can’t do better. It’s a particularly rich argument, considering that Fisher is arguing that she should have been given the first shot, before any students of color, at getting in with middling grades.

But the school is arguing that they should have a right to evaluate a student beyond grades, at least in the 20 percent of cases at stake here. Students who get in with less than stellar grades (most of whom are white, we must remember) usually do so by making a case that they have potential. Taking someone’s racial background and the obstacles they faced from it is part of making that case.

Blum’s argument says more about his and Fisher’s racial prejudices than it does about the school. It’s they who assume that non-whites students must have been given a leg up because they couldn’t hack it on their own. But when it comes to Fisher, they employ a different assumption, believing, against all evidence to the contrary, that she must be good enough to deserve a spot. There’s a word for casually assuming the worst about people of color while assuming the best, even in the face of contrary evidence, of white people. Needless to say, it’s not a word commonly associated with doing well by people of color.

The “diversity is bad for students of color” argument is clearly disingenuous, but it’s really just cover for the larger argument that Blum is making, which is that universities have no interest in having diverse student bodies. Unfortunately, this claim, even without the doing-it-for-the-black-kids justification, has a warm audience with the conservative justices. As the Wall Street Journal liveblog demonstrates, Samuel Alito was arguing from the bench that as long as you have some black students, then you don’t really need to work to make sure that the student body’s diversity is reflexive of the country at large.

John Roberts got snotty, asking, ““What ‘unique perspective’ does a minority student bring to a physics class?” It’s interesting how he assumes the purpose in having black students is not to educate those students, but only if they can bring a “unique perspective” for the benefit of white students.

But of course, the purpose of universities, especially land grant colleges like UT Austin, is not just about giving white people a good college experience. It’s about improving society, as a whole. And that whole includes black people, who are currently underrepresented in higher education. UT Austin found a way to balance its duty to provide education to improve lives for people, all kinds of people, with their duty to maintain a level of educational excellence. Let’s hope the Supreme Court doesn’t chuck that in favor of a system whose only purpose is to elevate white mediocre students like Abigail Fisher over promising students of color.

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-pol...aimed-boosting

[Kätzchen]

Concern-trolling: what a catchy phrase for a jacked up way to subversively apply an disingenuous tactic meant to upend hard won civil rights land mark cases.

It's no small wonder that racism is hard to dismantle, when iit's like a cancer cell, spotted on an x-ray picture that a highly trained technician took from a fully robed justice, sitting on a bench bought and paid for by (....).

Excellent article, Miss Tick.

[Kobi]

Originally Posted by Miss Tick

More on that Supreme Court case.


Abigail Fisher Deserves an 'F' for Her Race-Baiting Supreme Court Case Aimed at Boosting Subpar White Students

The admissions case in front of SCOTUS is about putting mediocre white students ahead of talented people of color.

Wow. Interesting choice of articles.

I tend to look for a different type of article i.e. one that is likely to explain the legal issues and arguments and engage me on an intellectual and cognitive level rather than an emotional one. Plus, I prefer to come to my own conclusions after weighing the information rather than being told what I am supposed to think. But, I'm weird like that.

I liked this one because it provided information to digest and research.

[Soon]

Dear Justice Scalia: Here’s what I learned as a black student struggling at an elite college

By Afi-Odelia Scruggs

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia might have thought he was simply debating the merit of race-based admissions at the University of Texas. But he lit a fire when he cited a friend-of-court brief that argued some blacks would do better at “slower-track” schools instead of being “pushed ahead in classes that are too fast” for them.

Scalia’s comment came from “mismatch theory,” which ironically advocates for the soft bigotry of low expectations.

According to its proponents, affirmative action harms students who aren’t ready for a strenuous academic environment. In a ripple effect, they will avoid struggle by opting for easy majors or dropping out altogether. Therefore, it’s best that they be guided to the shallow end of the educational pool: less-selective institutions where they can be more comfortable and successful.

The only thing new about the mismatch theory is the name. It’s actually the same old institutionalized racism that steered generations of African Americans into trade schools instead of universities. It’s the pernicious whisper beneath current suggestions that perhaps college isn’t for everybody.

The mismatch theory gets one thing right: Under-prepared black students will struggle at a demanding educational institution.

I know, because I was one.

Affirmative action helped me get into the College of the University of Chicago back in 1971. The school had not been closed to blacks. Carter G. Woodson, the originator of Black History Month, got a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree from the university around 1907. But pressure to integrate brought dozens of African Americans to the college, not two or three.

The university touted its “life of the mind.” The atmosphere was so intense, college students joked it was the place where fun went to die. I remember an institution with meager student services and a stunning insensitivity to black youngsters. During a weekend recruiting visit for students of color, economist Milton Friedman explained how laws barring discrimination interfered with a business owner’s right to determine his customers.

Still, I figured I could hang. My standardized test scores were among the highest at my integrated school in Nashville, Tenn. I thought I was a prodigy.

I was 16 when I moved into my dormitory. Immediately, I realized how inadequate my education had been. My high school teachers had just made mention of Plato and Aristotle. Several of my college classmates had read them. I had two years of high-school Spanish, but I couldn’t pass the college’s proficiency test. By the end of freshman year, I knew I’d have to grind to graduate.


I finished in four years with a degree in Russian and a 2.5 grade-point average. Perhaps I’d have made better grades at a “slower-track” school. But all lessons aren’t academic. Here’s what struggling at an advanced institution taught me:

How to set my own standards for success: My second-year Russian teacher calculated his grades on mistakes made. By chance, I compared notes with a white, male student. I’d made 11 mistakes. He’d made 10.5. Yet I was a C+ and he was B-. When I approached the teacher, he suggested I consider another major.

The pattern continued throughout the year. Clearly, the professor had made up his mind. He was the only instructor for the required class, so I couldn’t avoid him. Instead, I studied for knowledge instead of a grade. I relied on intrinsic motivation, instead of going for the extrinsic reward.

That teacher helped me make another major decision. After reading “The Death of Ivan Ilych” in Russian three times to prep for his final, I was thoroughly done with Russian literature. I got my doctorate in Slavic linguistics.

How to advocate for myself: My teachers showed me subtly and overtly that they didn’t think I was smart enough to attend the university. I stopped trying to show them otherwise. My goal was to become a University of Chicago alumna. I found a mentor. I pulled all-nighters studying and writing papers. I raised the money to attend a summer language institute in Vermont. My teachers marveled when I returned speaking fluently. I knew then that my work had paid off.

How to become entitled: I watched the white kids around me with awe. If they wanted to drive across country, somehow they finagled a car, gas, and places to stay. If they decided to learn the blues, they ended up hanging out with the best guitarists on the South Side of Chicago. They took their good fortune in stride, as if it was the way of the world.

Until I came to college, I’d never lived intimately with people who assumed life would unfurl for them. My expectations swelled. I might have to yank at the knobs, but doors would open for me.

How culturally limited white people really can be: My dorm kitchen was the hangout, where we cooked and chatted. One evening a couple friends glanced at the vegetable I was chopping.

“What’re you fixing?” one asked.

“It’s a sweet potato,” I said, puzzled.

“A what?”

I was stunned. If sweet potatoes were foreign to them, what else was? More importantly, what did I know that they didn’t? Growing up in the South, I’d placed white folks on a pedestal. In college, I began to dismantle that throne.

Compassion: My tenure at the University of Chicago was punishing, competitive and life- changing. Throughout my academic career, I’d been one of the smartest kids in my school. My test scores were high. So were my grades. At college, I wasn’t just ordinary; I was ignored.

In Nashville, my teachers expected great things from me. At Chicago, my teachers expected nothing — and seemed surprised when I disappointed them.

Ultimately, my confidence in my intellectual abilities got me through. Along the way, however, I wondered about students who didn’t have my assurance. What would happen to them?

The mismatch argument is flawed because it assumes under-prepared black students will opt to fail instead of push to succeed. Ultimately, I wonder what proponents are actually trying to protect: a system that includes black students who are like I was, or a status quo that keeps them out?

[Cin]

Originally Posted by Kobi

Wow. Interesting choice of articles.

I tend to look for a different type of article i.e. one that is likely to explain the legal issues and arguments and engage me on an intellectual and cognitive level rather than an emotional one. Plus, I prefer to come to my own conclusions after weighing the information rather than being told what I am supposed to think. But, I'm weird like that.

I liked this one because it provided information to digest and research.

When I'm looking for something to engage me on an intellectual level, I won't search the Washington Post for it, nor will I depend on it to explain legal issues and arguments. I don't depend on any one newspaper article to conclude things for me. I don't see reading a heartfelt article as being in danger of being told what to think. Facts are not even that persuasive for most people. Thought does not have to be separate from emotion. I have always believed thinking and feeling are both equally important in coming to any conclusion. Feeling your way through thoughts opens you up to all sides and all the dark corners of issues. But when it comes to the mismatch theory, I don't need to weigh the information on an intellectual and cognitive level rather than an emotional one, I already know what racist crap it is. To me it is almost as startling to hear a Supreme Court justice spewing this bull as it is to hear Trump's racist, xenophobic hate speech. Almost as startling but even more nefarious because it masquerades as a perfectly logical theory when in reality it is more racist rhetoric used as a popular argument against affirmative action. On the surface it seems to profess that students with lesser academic qualifications don't benefit from being admitted to a more competitive college, but it is really saying we don't want universities to concern themselves with diversity. However we will continue to encourage them to over extend other less academically qualified students for all kinds of reasons other than race. But responding only to the idea that students with lesser academic qualifications don't benefit from being admitted to a more competitive college, in actuality there is no proof that this is so. It's a racist mime that hides it's ugly face behind concern and when I hear these kinds of things I almost long for Trumps openly hateful words that cannot be construed as anything but what they are. Here is a less emotional argument although I can't imagine this kind of thing doesn't warrant some emotion.


http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politi...tion-mismatch/

The argument that black students, or less prepared students of any race, don't end up benefiting from affirmative action because they can't keep up with the work is known as mismatch theory. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas is its most prominent advocate. In his dissent in Grutter v. Bollinger, the court's last high-profile affirmative action case, in 2003, he described elite colleges as "tantalizing" underprepared students with admissions offers.

"These overmatched students take the bait, only to find that they cannot succeed in the cauldron of competition," Thomas writes.

The only way to prove the mismatch theory true or false would be to randomly assign minority students with similar academic backgrounds to different colleges and see what happens. That's obviously impractical. But the bulk of research suggests that in fact, students who are admitted to competitive colleges despite being less academically qualified than their peers end up doing fine.
•Students from underrepresented communities who attend selective colleges are more likely to graduate than students with similar academic qualifications who do not.
•A 2013 study from two sociologists, Michal Kurlaender of the University of California Davis and Eric Grodsky from the University of Wisconsin, looked at an unusual situation at the University of California. Budget struggles led the university to admit fewer students than it had expected to, and it cut out students who were on the academic margins, weaker than other applicants. Then the budget situation improved, and so students were admitted after all. Those students who barely made the cut performed no worse than students from a similar educational background who were admitted through the normal admissions process.
•A 2007 study of students whose SAT scores were lower than the average SAT score of other students at their college found those students were not less likely to drop out, although in some cases they earned lower grades.
•Students from minority groups benefit more, in terms of lifetime earnings, from attending a selective college than their white peers, according to research from economists Stacy Dale and Alan Krueger.

Some research has supported the mismatch idea. A 2012 paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research found that after California banned affirmative action, graduation rates went up for black and Latino students, and attributed part of the increase to a better academic fit between students and colleges.

But the paper didn't consider that graduation rates for these students were already on an upward trend. An analysis by Matthew Chingos, now a senior fellow at the Urban Institute, found that graduation rates grew less than they otherwise would have if the affirmative action ban had not passed. In other words, banning affirmative action ended up holding back minority students.

Mismatch theory is always brought up in the context of affirmative action. But universities admit less academically qualified students for all kinds of reasons — because they're the children of alumni or donors, due to athletic or musical talent, and so on. There isn't nearly as much concern about how those students fare, and some research has found they're more likely to drop out than other students, including those admitted through race-based affirmative action.


Scalia was right about one thing: Many black scientists don't graduate from big public research universities like the University of Texas.

But that's not because they struggle to keep up with the work. It's because historically black colleges punch far above their weight when it comes to enrolling and graduating black science majors.

Nationally, black students are 11 percent of the undergraduate population, but they make up only 9 percent of degree recipients in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, known as STEM.

Fewer than 10 percent of black college students are enrolled at historically black colleges and universities, and those colleges typically have smaller endowments and fewer resources.

Yet one-third of black students who received an undergraduate degree in math or statistics did so at an HBCU. So did 37 percent of black students who received a degree in the physical sciences. Among black students who went on to earn a PhD in the STEM fields — a tiny slice of PhD recipients — more than one-third started their education at a historically black college.

This doesn't mean historically black colleges are "lesser schools" or "slower-track schools," as Scalia implies. It suggests that they might have something to teach the University of Texas about diversity in the sciences.

[Kobi]

Originally Posted by Miss Tick

When I'm looking for something to engage me on an intellectual level, I won't search the Washington Post for it, nor will I depend on it to explain legal issues and arguments. I don't depend on any one newspaper article to conclude things for me. I don't see reading a heartfelt article as being in danger of being told what to think. Facts are not even that persuasive for most people. Thought does not have to be separate from emotion. I have always believed thinking and feeling are both equally important in coming to any conclusion. Feeling your way through thoughts opens you up to all sides and all the dark corners of issues. But when it comes to the mismatch theory, I don't need to weigh the information on an intellectual and cognitive level rather than an emotional one, I already know what racist crap it is. To me it is almost as startling to hear a Supreme Court justice spewing this bull as it is to hear Trump's racist, xenophobic hate speech. Almost as startling but even more nefarious because it masquerades as a perfectly logical theory when in reality it is more racist rhetoric used as a popular argument against affirmative action. On the surface it seems to profess that students with lesser academic qualifications don't benefit from being admitted to a more competitive college, but it is really saying we don't want universities to concern themselves with diversity. However we will continue to encourage them to over extend other less academically qualified students for all kinds of reasons other than race. But responding only to the idea that students with lesser academic qualifications don't benefit from being admitted to a more competitive college, in actuality there is no proof that this is so. It's a racist mime that hides it's ugly face behind concern and when I hear these kinds of things I almost long for Trumps openly hateful words that cannot be construed as anything but what they are. Here is a less emotional argument although I can't imagine this kind of thing doesn't warrant some emotion.


http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politi...tion-mismatch/

The argument that black students, or less prepared students of any race, don't end up benefiting from affirmative action because they can't keep up with the work is known as mismatch theory. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas is its most prominent advocate. In his dissent in Grutter v. Bollinger, the court's last high-profile affirmative action case, in 2003, he described elite colleges as "tantalizing" underprepared students with admissions offers.

"These overmatched students take the bait, only to find that they cannot succeed in the cauldron of competition," Thomas writes.

The only way to prove the mismatch theory true or false would be to randomly assign minority students with similar academic backgrounds to different colleges and see what happens. That's obviously impractical. But the bulk of research suggests that in fact, students who are admitted to competitive colleges despite being less academically qualified than their peers end up doing fine.
•Students from underrepresented communities who attend selective colleges are more likely to graduate than students with similar academic qualifications who do not.
•A 2013 study from two sociologists, Michal Kurlaender of the University of California Davis and Eric Grodsky from the University of Wisconsin, looked at an unusual situation at the University of California. Budget struggles led the university to admit fewer students than it had expected to, and it cut out students who were on the academic margins, weaker than other applicants. Then the budget situation improved, and so students were admitted after all. Those students who barely made the cut performed no worse than students from a similar educational background who were admitted through the normal admissions process.
•A 2007 study of students whose SAT scores were lower than the average SAT score of other students at their college found those students were not less likely to drop out, although in some cases they earned lower grades.
•Students from minority groups benefit more, in terms of lifetime earnings, from attending a selective college than their white peers, according to research from economists Stacy Dale and Alan Krueger.

Some research has supported the mismatch idea. A 2012 paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research found that after California banned affirmative action, graduation rates went up for black and Latino students, and attributed part of the increase to a better academic fit between students and colleges.

But the paper didn't consider that graduation rates for these students were already on an upward trend. An analysis by Matthew Chingos, now a senior fellow at the Urban Institute, found that graduation rates grew less than they otherwise would have if the affirmative action ban had not passed. In other words, banning affirmative action ended up holding back minority students.

Mismatch theory is always brought up in the context of affirmative action. But universities admit less academically qualified students for all kinds of reasons — because they're the children of alumni or donors, due to athletic or musical talent, and so on. There isn't nearly as much concern about how those students fare, and some research has found they're more likely to drop out than other students, including those admitted through race-based affirmative action.


Scalia was right about one thing: Many black scientists don't graduate from big public research universities like the University of Texas.

But that's not because they struggle to keep up with the work. It's because historically black colleges punch far above their weight when it comes to enrolling and graduating black science majors.

Nationally, black students are 11 percent of the undergraduate population, but they make up only 9 percent of degree recipients in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, known as STEM.

Fewer than 10 percent of black college students are enrolled at historically black colleges and universities, and those colleges typically have smaller endowments and fewer resources.

Yet one-third of black students who received an undergraduate degree in math or statistics did so at an HBCU. So did 37 percent of black students who received a degree in the physical sciences. Among black students who went on to earn a PhD in the STEM fields — a tiny slice of PhD recipients — more than one-third started their education at a historically black college.

This doesn't mean historically black colleges are "lesser schools" or "slower-track schools," as Scalia implies. It suggests that they might have something to teach the University of Texas about diversity in the sciences.

THIS is more what I am used to seeing in your arguments. Thank you for the information.

[Cin]

Originally Posted by Kobi

THIS is more what I am used to seeing in your arguments. Thank you for the information.

I guess you really didn't care for that other article. Well I am happy that you found this one more to your liking.

[*Anya*]

Antidepressants taken during pregnancy increase risk of autism by 87 percent
14th December 2015

Researchers came to their conclusion after reviewing data from the outcomes of 145,456 pregnancies.

The study published today in JAMA Pediatrics used data from the Quebec Pregnancy Cohort and studied 145,456 children between the time of their conception up to age ten. The study accounted for a number of other factors that have known links to autism, including genetic predisposition to autism (i.e., a family history of it), maternal age, depression itself, and certain socio-economic factors such as being exposed to poverty. Exposure to antidepressants was defined as the mother having had one or more prescription for antidepressants filled during the second or third trimester of the pregnancy.

Researchers suspect that because serotonin is involved in numerous pre- and postnatal developmental processes, antidepressants that inhibit serotonin (particularly selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors known as SSRIs) will have a negative impact on the ability of the brain to fully develop in-utero.

The study published today in JAMA Pediatrics used data from the Quebec Pregnancy Cohort and studied 145,456 children between the time of their conception up to age ten. The study accounted for a number of other factors that have known links to autism, including genetic predisposition to autism (i.e., a family history of it), maternal age, depression itself, and certain socio-economic factors such as being exposed to poverty. Exposure to antidepressants was defined as the mother having had one or more prescription for antidepressants filled during the second or third trimester of the pregnancy.

Researchers suspect that because serotonin is involved in numerous pre- and postnatal developmental processes, antidepressants that inhibit serotonin (particularly selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors known as SSRIs) will have a negative impact on the ability of the brain to fully develop in-utero.

We spoke with study senior author Professor Anick Bérard, Université de Montréal and the CHU Sainte-Justine Research Centre about the study. The full research team includes: Odile Sheehy, CHU Sainte-Justine, Laurent Mottron, Hôpital Rivière-des-Prairies, and Takoua Boukhris, Université de Montréal.

ResearchGate: What were your results?

Anick Bérard: Using antidepressants, especially selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRI), during the 2nd/3rd trimesters of pregnancy increases the risk of having a child with autism (87 percent increased risk of autism with any antidepressants; more than doubling the risk with SSRI use specifically) – this risk is above and beyond the risk associated with maternal depression alone (maternal depression was associated with a 20 percent increased risk of autism in our study). Given the mounting evidence showing increased risk of adverse pregnancy outcome with antidepressant use during pregnancy, our study shows that depression should be treated with other options (other than antidepressants) during this critical period.

Indeed, 80-85 percent of depressed pregnant women are mildly to moderately depressed; exercise and psychotherapy have been shown to be efficacious to treat depression in this sub-group. Therefore, we acknowledge that depression is a serious condition but that antidepressants are not always the best solution.

RG: We normally think of the first trimester as being the riskiest time for the fetus, but this study was actually in the second and third trimesters. Why is the risk greater later in pregnancy?

AB: 1st trimester exposure is problematic for embryogenesis; 2nd/3rd trimesters are critical for brain development. Hence, the critical time-window for our study was the later part of the pregnancy.

NOTE: Rest of this important article at research gate, link below:

https://www.researchgate.net/blog/po...-by-87-percent

[Cin]

This is hilarious. And by hilarious I mean horrifying with a side order of spit in the face and a kick in the gut to women everywhere.

Apparently it is possible to trip and fall and accidently stick your penis inside someone's vagina...along with your hand filled with semen. Women need to be careful to date only guys with good balance. And it goes without saying if someone dates a clumsy guy that automatically will make the whole thing her fault. Although it seems as thought this is considered to be a no fault sex act. Aw man penises are going to be falling into vaginas all over the place.

http://jezebel.com/man-who-claimed-h...red-1748294505

... the English guy from last week who deflected rape charges by saying he had probably fallen inside his 18-year-old victim? Turns out he was recently acquitted! So, I was wrong, courts will actually believe anything that comes from the mouth of a rich middle-aged man.

Developer and millionaire Ehsan Abdulaziz, 46, reportedly took two women, aged 18 and 24, home with him after a night at a club. The 18-year-old reported that early in the morning, she woke up to Abdulaziz forcing himself on top of her. Abdulaziz, however, explained to very understanding authorities that he had gone to check if the girl had wanted a t-shirt to sleep in or a taxi home, when she pulled him on top of her. His penis must have been poking out of his underwear, which led to accidental penetration.

His semen and DNA were found inside the victim, which he said was probably because he had gotten it on his hands after having sex with the 24-year-old. Which means he somehow fell penis and hand first into a woman.

During the trial, Judge Martin Griffiths reportedly allowed the defense to present 20 minutes of evidence in private. The jury acquitted Abdulaziz after a half an hour of deliberations.

“I’m fragile,” Abdulaziz said. “I fell down but nothing ever happened between me and this girl, nothing ever happened.”

---it turns out Abdulaziz is fragile and women are holes.

[Kobi]

WASHINGTON, Dec. 21 (UPI) -- It will be hard to tell where your beef and pork comes from with the repeal of the country of origin labeling in the United States.

Congress repealed the rules, which began in 2009, with a measure added to the omnibus budget bill passed on Friday. Obama signed the bill into law Friday.

The repeal comes after the World Trade Organization found the labels were unfair to meat producers outside the United States. Canada and Mexico last week were granted permission to impose more than $1 billion in import tariffs on U.S. goods if the labels were not removed.

A wide range of industries lobbied Congress to remove the labelling requirement out of fear that tariffs would spread to other U.S. exports, from furniture to frozen orange juice.

Story

HuffPost
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The unintended hazards of a global economy, global law, and global sanctions.