Ontario Empoblog

"We are surprised at the hastiness of wanting to recognize Israel." Hamas spokesman Mushir al-Masri. Frankly, this whole "recognize" thing is a little silly. Imagine Yasser Arafat walking up to someone in the 1970s. "No, I don't recognize him," the politically correct person would say. "I don't have any idea who that guy is." But times changed by 1988 : Mayor Andrew Young, who was forced more than nine years ago to resign as the chief United States delegate to the United Nations for meeting with a representative of the Palestine Liberation Organization, today applauded the American decision to initiate contacts with the P.L.O.... The meeting in a Manhattan apartment between Mr. Young and the P.L.O.'s United Nations observer aroused fear in Israel and in the United States that the Carter Administration was embarking on some accommodation with the group and breaking with its longstanding policy. In my view, recognition does not equate w...

Every generation has their revelation. However, this unmasking was not planned by the band in question. Nearly 200,000 Finns have signed an online petition to express their dismay after tabloid magazines published pictures of Eurovision winners Lordi out of their trademark monster suits. Though viewers around the world were curious about the real identity of the five monsters who shot to fame with their song "Hard Rock Hallelujah," many Finns were annoyed to have them unmasked and had signed the petition by Friday. The band had asked media not to run pictures of them out of character.... Band leader Mr Lordi is recognizable to millions around the world since achieving victory in a silver monster suit, with horns and blazing red eyes. But Tomi Putaansuu, as he is also known, was revealed to be a bespectacled 32-year-old with long brown hair and a goatee, when his picture was published in the magazine 7 paivaa (7 days) this week. But oldsters like me (heh..."oldsters...

Whether you are going for your doctorate or your GED, the most important thing that an educational institution can teach you is how to think. How to process and evaluate information. A certain intellectual level is required to evaluate certain messages. For example, Stag links to dmho.org : Welcome to the web site for the Dihydrogen Monoxide Research Division (DMRD), currently located in Newark, Delaware. The controversy surrounding dihydrogen monoxide has never been more widely debated, and the goal of this site is to provide an unbiased data clearinghouse and a forum for public discussion. Here is some of the shocking information that is provided: The dangers, uses and potential threats posed by this chemical, Dihydrogen Monoxide, are widespread, and some feel, terrifying. Here is just a small taste of what Dihydrogen Monoxide (DHMO) is.... Dihydrogen monoxide was found at every recent school shooting Athletes use DIHYDROGEN MONOXIDE, or DHMO, to enhance performance Dihydrogen Mono...

First off, I'm going to defend myself against my own immaturity by not explicity referring to the name of the Turkish city from which this report originates. Trust me on this one. From Reuters/Yahoo : Bahar Sogut was 14 when she shot herself in the head with her father's gun. Her mother and grandmother, who live in a small mud-built house in a village...in Turkey's poor southeast, said it was her fate. "She died with Allah's (God's) bidding," her mother, Nefise Sogut, told Reuters. Fate was the only explanation either gave for what happened. Bahar Sogut was one of 14 people -- 10 of them women and girls aged under 23 -- who have killed themselves this year in...a city of 250,000 people, activists say. Another was aged 12 and threw herself off a building opposite her school. Rising suicides among women in the mainly Kurdish southeast has prompted the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, Yakin Erturk, to visit the region, where rights activists...

From merry olde England : Maverick British politician George Galloway has claimed it would be "morally justified" for an assassin to target Prime Minister Tony Blair, but he said he was not advocating an attempt.... "It would be entirely logical and explicable — and morally equivalent to ordering the deaths of thousands of innocent people in Iraq as Blair did," the monthly GQ magazine quoted Galloway as saying.... Galloway, currently in Cuba, verified the accuracy of his comments in a statement posted on the Web site of his political party, Respect.... Galloway was kicked out of Blair's Labour Party in October 2003 for urging British soldiers not to fight in Iraq.... In his magazine interview, Galloway claimed to been the best fighter at his school, and said he would like to go a few rounds with both Blair and Bush. "I'd take them both at once," Galloway said. "That's what really upsets me. They are the sort of men who are ready to fig...

I believe that most, if not all, of what we define as "attractive" is based upon our surroundings. If I lived in Saudi Arabia, I'd probably have an unhealthy obsession with exposed women's ankles. Well, I've never lived in Saudi Arabia, but I went to Reed College. And, as a result, I developed a love for women who do not wear gobs of makeup. (I also developed a love for women with fuzzy legs, but that has faded over the years.) At Reed, the women (and the men) just plain don't bother with makeup and stuff like that. I remember one weekend when some of us Reed students gathered with Christians from other Oregon colleges. One of the Reed women (sorry, "wymyn" or whatever the non-oppressive term is) was regaling us with tales about the women from the other colleges, and how many tons of makeup and hair dryers they were bringing into the bathrooms. This particular wymyn graduated from Reed and eventually became a Quaker pastor. Quaker. Plain. It all adds...

When "Family Feud" is just a TV show in the world's largest democracy. More here . Neo-conservatism and the cult of personality. The authoritarian cultist movement. Here's one that I didn't write. Taken from Annika's Journal . From the Ontario Empoblog (Latest OVVA news here )

Followup , concentrating on the question "What should a school district consider as inappropriate behavior for an off-campus student?" This started with the original article ( emphasis mine): The board of Community High School District 128 voted unanimously on Monday to require that all students participating in extracurricular activities sign a pledge agreeing that evidence of "illegal or inappropriate " behavior posted on the Internet could be grounds for disciplinary action. In my original post , I asked: The question is - what exactly is inappropriate? As an example, I cited the case of a Myspace user who had offensive views (Nazi) and who engaged in offensive activity (spamming). This user's account was deleted by MySpace. Here's part of what Scott says about the "inappropriate" portion of the school board's decision: ...Now, "inappropriate" - there's a term that's not so solid in it's definition. Is the Libertyvi...

Warning - I'm going to come off very fatherly and old and geezerly in this post. Deal with it. Buerba.net references an article about an Illinois school district. The city in question is named Libertyville. The board of Community High School District 128 voted unanimously on Monday to require that all students participating in extracurricular activities sign a pledge agreeing that evidence of "illegal or inappropriate" behavior posted on the Internet could be grounds for disciplinary action.... District officials won't regularly search students' sites, but will monitor them if they get a worrisome tip from another student, a parent or a community member. Some parents think that the school district is acting like Big Brother here: Mary Greenberg of Lake Bluff, who has a son at Libertyville High School, argued the district is overstepping its bounds. "I don't think they need to police what students are doing online," she said. "That's my job...

Just saw this : Iran has suspended publication of its official state newspaper after it printed a cartoon that sparked violent ethnic protests in the northwestern city of Tabriz, a senior judiciary official said on Tuesday. Cartoonist Mana Neyestani and the editor-in-chief of the "Iran" newspaper, Mehrdad Qasemfar, were arrested over the drawing that was deemed to insult Iran's Azeri minority, Tehran's chief Prosecutor Saeed Mortazavi said. "Some charges were brought against both of them and they were transferred to Evin prison," he told state television. He did not specify the charges.... The cartoon, which appeared in Friday's edition of Iran, showed a boy repeating the Persian word for cockroach in different ways while the uncomprehending bug in front of him says "What?" in Azeri. Neyestani's relatives told Reuters he had not intended to insult Azeris. The Azeris of northwestern Iran speak a language related to Turkish. Although Azeris, ...

From the U.S. Constitution, Article 1 Section 6 (emphasis mine): ...They shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place.... Wikipedia says the following : Members of both Houses have certain privileges, based on those enjoyed by the members of the British Parliament (see parliamentary privilege). Members attending, going to or returning from either House are privileged from arrest, except for treason, felony or breach of the peace. Their speeches may not be questioned in any place outside Congress; thus, one may not sue a Senator or Representative for slander occurring during Congressional debate. Here's some background on parliamentary privilege ( emphasis mine): Parliamentary privilege, also known as absolute privilege, is a lega...

From CSU Long Beach : Monopoly, Pay Day, and Cash Flow are board games that are fun to play while teaching simulated experiences of real-world concepts. Spare Change is a new board game designed to be fun to play while teaching experiences of measurement and process improvement concepts. Roll the dice, tally the numbers, and analyze your data every 90 spaces. Get breakthrough ideas for lively team building...or play at home while spending quality time with your kids, and reduce the fear of metrics. From the Ontario Empoblog (Latest OVVA news here )

Courtesy Annika , courtesy Victor. By the way, I've actually watched Star Trek 2.0, but I've never participated. More information here . Nicholas Bradshaw opined : G4 has added a number of features combining the best elements of C-SPAN and VH1's pop-up video to enhance the Star Trek viewer's experience. In addition to watching the sci-fi classic, viewers now can participate online via a number of interactive features. First, there is the "Spock Exchange" which involves buying and selling shares of various Star Trek characters and commodities, including Captain Kirk, the phaser and the Enterprise, earning a fortune in "federation credits." The value and the level of trading on stocks are continuously scrolled across the screen a la the New York Stock Exchange. Also, the Spock Market is open online, 24 hours a day, so investors can buy, sell or trade their stock at any time during the day and monitor the changes online. The Star Trek 2.0 online experie...

Pastor Ruy Silva, Pastor Emma Gerald, and others have been indicted over an immigration issue, as reported in the Brockton News and elsewhere: A church pastor and five others face charges they took more than $200,000 from illegal immigrants in exchange for helping them gain amnesty by lying about when they entered the United States. An indictment unsealed Thursday in federal court in Atlanta says one of the defendants, Emma Gerald, used money from the scam to buy a home and a Mercedes. Gerald and the others held meetings related to the scam in Brockton, Mass.; Boca Raton, Fla.; and at least twice at a Marietta, Ga., church where co-defendant Ruy Silva was the pastor, the indictment says. According to prosecutors, Gerald cast herself as an immigration consultant and charged illegal immigrants, mostly from Brazil, as much as $1,100 per married couple for help falsifying applications under the Catholic Social Services Amnesty Program. Applicants are eligible for temporary legal residence...

This is not a two-sides debate. Despite my posturings , it's not even a three-sides debate. Take the Orange Card. Here's what a blog called Philadelphia says : la raza action alert support senator feinstien's orange card program ammendment for immigrants.the current proposals put an unnecessary burden on immigrants and they should be granted amnesty.the compromise which sounds as if they won't even vote on it is hard to implement and a waste of time.call senator feinsteins aid peter cleveland and take him out for a hamburg. If anyone can decipher the message above, please let me know. Representative Sensenbrenner said the following to Senator Feinstein (while also speaking about slavery), as quoted at Expose the Left: But who’s going to pay for all this bureaucracy that Senator Feinstein has talked about? Are we just going to add it to the deficit? Are we going to raise taxes to do it? Or are we going to have the employers who want to hire these folks pay for this with...

As I previously mentioned somewhere or another, I went to Hollywood on Saturday. When I get around to it, I'll talk more about the trip itself (including possible multimedia experiential stuff), but first I want to talk about my relationship with Hollywood over the last 23 years. For most of that time I hardly ever went to Hollywood. I live over 40 miles away from Hollywood, and it wasn't really in my list of things to do. In fact, I can only think of two times that I visited the Hollywood areain the twentieth century. The first occurred when an old college roommate came to town. He works in the music industry and had to be in the area on business. I can't remember what we did, but I do remember that I ended up valet parking on Rodeo Drive to see him. (And yes, I know that Rodeo Drive is not in Hollywood, but from an Inland Empire perspective the two neighborhoods might as well be one.) The second time was when a European journalist was visiting the Los Angeles area. This j...