grif...@gmail.com

Is there anybody out there?

I am contemplating getting this lil ball rolling again...

Fighting for our Right to Party

While I remain a lukewarm Beastie Boys fan I had an experience last week here at EMU that has brought one of their most famous songs to life. I would like to preface the following account with these contentions: Dangerous and out of control parties call for a police presence. Parties that involve minors consuming drugs and alcohol call for a police presence. Parties that involve the eruption of violence call for a police presence. The event that I am addressing was none of the above. Being only five months removed from the loss of a fellow EMU student Keith Cholette, due to a possible drug and alcohol overdose, I certainly understand the need for diligence concerning safety in and around our University. That being said, I find it absolutely ludicrous to break up a well-under- control graduation party in which EMU faculty were in attendance. What is worse is that the police arrested one of the only African-Americans in attendance: while she was walking away, as she was directed.
The party I am writing about took place on the evening of May 1st of this year. It was the graduation party of a friend a few blocks off campus. I am not much of a party person myself but I knew there would be a number of people I would like to see there including one of my favorite professors. Most of the parties I have been to in college are just plain obnoxious. Many of them are so loud it is impossible to carry on or even start a conversation. People are crammed in wall to wall with no room in between- it is easier to write a term paper than try to get from one side of the room to the other. Unlike many of the parties I have been to here in Ypsi this one in particular was quite pleasant.
When the Police arrived at about 1:30am I was having a conversation about the U.N. with two of the teaching faculty here at Eastern. Unless you are John Bolton this isn’t exactly worthy of a call to the local law enforcement agency. And besides last I checked pontification is well within our rights as Ypsilanti residents. The party had died down quite a bit at this point. The band that was playing had stopped about 45 minutes prior when people left the area in which they were performing in favor of finding a place to talk. A quick glance around the room I was standing in revealed two professors, two symposium presenters, and three students in the honors college. While I don’t intend to say these qualifications exclude one from leading a wayward life of crime I am saying that this was not a typical party packed full of freshman and rowdy drunkards. We were a bunch of adults hanging out, listening to music, and talking about our plans for life after college. It was quite civil and rather enjoyable.
When YPD showed up we were told everyone who didn’t live in the house had to leave. The host of the gathering and recent EMU graduate conveyed this message to the partygoers and subsequently everyone began to slowly file out. Here is where things start to get exciting. An EMU honor student, Sakina Hughes approached the officers and asked what was going on. It was a perfectly legitimate question but apparently the officers didn’t like this too much for they wouldn’t even let Sakina go in and retrieve her belongings. She was told that she had to leave but was unable to go in and get her jacket and purse? When her friends were unable to find her things they allowed her to go in and look. When she came back out and was standing on the public sidewalk she was told she had to leave or face trespassing charges. Trespassing on a public sidewalk? When Sakina complied and started to walk away one of the officers grabbed her firmly by the arm and put her under arrest. He was excessively forceful given that there was no attempt to resist or elude the officer.
The entire situation is ridiculous. Nobody at the party was doing anything wrong. We were simply a group of responsible students celebrating the graduation of a friend. The Ypsilanti Police Department website expresses their organizational values to be Integrity, Professionalism, Commitment and Compassion. None of which were present that night. What I witnessed were overzealous officers arresting students for no good reason. It seems that the police department would have better things to do on a Saturday night than arresting students for being black and asking questions.

A few more days...

nochild
Originally uploaded by enduring hegemony.

Hey all.
Sorry there has been a lack of posting action. It is after all finals week. Almost through though! Anway in place of a post I thouoght I would throw out a little something I have been working on. One of those 3 am papers we all love that are due the next day- what in may lack in logos and organization it makes up for in pathos and intent. Lemme know what you all think...


There are many ways in which inequality is not only perpetuated but also enforced in public education today. There are a striking number of children from all different racial, ethnic, and religious backgrounds being marginalized on a daily basis for no other reason than for being born where they are and for who they are. These inequities range and vary in severity and cause but all lend in maintaining an unequal public education system in our country.
Funding for public schools is one of the most overt and damaging inequities facing education in the U.S. It is an atrocity when in a nation that spends 50% of its annual discretionary budget ($351 billion more than it's nearest competitor) on military spending and only 10% on education. We have a federal committee handing down national standards while holding back funding for schools that don't make the grade are most likely schools that are under-funded in the first place.
The way in which funding is determined is inherently flawed and does little but perpetuate and reinforce further inequity. Funding for public schools is determined by the district's respective property taxes. The more one pays for one's home, the more tax revenue is allotted to the area school. The more taxes an area takes in, the more it can spend per child. This system well serves students in Bloomfield Hills, a district that spent $12,191 in 2001-2002. But what about students in Allen Park that get $7,068 per year? The difference in spending between Bloomfield Hills and Allen Park is $45, 165,472 per year. Jonathan Kozol suggests that this funding system not only reflects socio-economic status but has racial implications as well. He writes in Savage Inequalities, "Race appears to play a role in this as well according to the speaker of the Michigan House of Representatives. People in affluent Farmington, he says, are not going to vote for more taxes so the poor black kids in Ypsilanti can get better reading programs"

Because of the way schools are funded many children are starting off in the hole. We have effectively created an educational caste system in America. If your family has the privilege and the economic resources to live in Bloomfield Hills then you are given a first class education. Subsequently if your family cant afford to live in a wealthy district than you are given a second rate education. Strangely enough both cases are held to the same standard. The funding also plays a role in many other areas of public education such as the employment of teachers. Why would a teacher choose to teach in under funded impoverished schools when given the choice otherwise? Not only are children being cheated of proper learning materials and building conditions conducive to learning, they are being cheated of highly qualified teachers that are being paid better in wealthy school districts.
Kozol said in his presentation at the University of Michigan MEDVED forum "when we rob our poorest children, we rob our entire societ". Thomas Jefferson once said, "No nation is permitted to live in ignorance with impunity". Studies consistently show a positive correlation in about every thing good: economic productivity, health, and low crime rates to name a few. By cheating our nations poor we are cheating ourselves. And if we can not look at it from a moral standpoint (which I fear we have lost the ability) than we should look at it from an economic standpoint. If we level the playing field of education in the U.S. the entire country would benefit. A more educated aggregate would produce more engineers, scientists, doctors, professors, teachers, less crime, and what so many Americans feel ever so important - more consumers.
The fear of every affluent parent is that equal funding in public schools will take away from their children. Instead of than the Robin Hood approach I propose we raise the amount of money spent on under-funded schools rather than lowering money spent on wealthy districts. The U.S. is the most wealthy and powerful country in the world. We have the economic resources to supplement the funding of poor communities to meet the education standards of the wealthy. An educational welfare system if you will. It is a sad nation we live in when we can afford to spend billions of dollars to invade another country while we ignore the needs of the children in our own nation. There is no logical reason as to why we cannot reallocate a portion of the $416 billion dollars we spend annually on the military to the children in our own country who really need it. The U.S spends more on defense than the next 24 closest spenders combined! Is there any sane reason that we cannot afford to buy our children sufficient textbooks? Is there an acceptable answer as to why we rob our nations children of the opportunity at an equal education? No.

Just a reminder- Thursday 4-14-05

sjmhummv
Originally uploaded by enduring hegemony.

Make sure to get there early so you can get a seat.
Thursday, April 14
6pm - 8:30 pm
Halle Library Auditorium, EMU Campus

Meet retired Marine Staff Sergeant
and outspoken antiwar activist Jimmy Massey.

For nearly 12 years, Staff Sergeant Jimmy Massey was a hard-core, some say "gung-ho," Marine. For three years he trained fellow Marines in one of the most grueling indoctrination rituals in military life -- Marine boot camp.
The Iraqi war changed Massey. The brutality, the sheer carnage of the U.S. invasion, touched his conscience and transformed him forever.
Jimmy was a platoon sergeant in 7th Marines during the 2003 invasion of Iraq. After witnessing first hand the horror of war he refused to continue this pointless war. After a hard fight he was discharged and has since been telling people the truth about the war in Iraq.

Others like him have formed the IVAW, or Iraqi Veterans Against the War to organize the antiwar movement & bring the troops home, now!

"I used to tell my Marines our job is not to be over here playing politician, [but to] secure Iraq for a free market democracy, and thats what well do. However, I didnt see any way for America to accomplish that. When I became vocal about that, the Marine Corps did not like what I had to say.

I killed innocent people for our government. For what?Where is the good coming out of it? I feel like I've had a hand in some sort of evil lie at the hands of our government. I just feel embarrassed, ashamed about it.

What [you] need to know is we killed a lot of innocent people. The occupation hurt the Iraqis. And I didn't see any humanitarian support [for the Iraqis]."

Come and Listen to Jimmy Massey speak:
Thursday, April 14
6pm - 8:30 pm
Halle Library Auditorium, EMU Campus
(Taken from event flyer)

good NYT article

MAPLEWOOD, N. J., April 1 - Columbia High School seems to have it all - great sports teams, great academics, famous alumni and an impressive campus with Gothic buildings. But no one boasts about one aspect of this blue-ribbon school, that its classrooms are largely segregated.

Though the school is majority black, white students make up the bulk of the advanced classes, while black students far outnumber whites in lower-level classes, statistics show.

"It's kind of sad," said Ugochi Opara, a senior who is president of the student council. "You can tell right away, just by looking into a classroom, what level it is."

This is a reality at many high schools coast to coast and one of the side effects of aggressive leveling, the increasingly popular practice of dividing students into ability groups.

But at Columbia High, the students nearly revolted. Two weeks ago, a black organization on campus planned a walkout to protest the leveling system. Word soon spread to the principal, who pleaded with the students not to go. The student leaders decided to hold an assembly instead, in which they lashed out at the racial gap.

The student uproar is now forcing district officials to take a hard look at the leveling system and decide how to strike a balance between their two main goals - celebrating diversity and pushing academic achievement.

Educators say that leveling allows smarter students to be challenged while giving struggling ones the special instruction they need. But many students, especially those in the lower levels, which often carry a stigma, say such stratification makes the rocky adolescent years only harder. And at Columbia High, there is no dispute that it is precisely the leveling system that has led to racial segregation.

Anthony Paolini, a senior at Columbia, is one of the few white students in a lower level math class. The fact that most of his classmates are black does not bother him, he said. But the low expectations do.

"It makes you feel like you're in a hole," he said.

The school, about 15 minutes from downtown Newark, draws from the cosmopolitan towns of Maplewood and South Orange. Some students live in million-dollar homes. Others rely on government lunches. Of 2,024 students, 58 percent are black, 35 percent white, 4 percent Hispanic and 3 percent Asian. The public school sends more than 90 percent of graduates to college, has a dropout rate of less than half a percent and won a national Blue Ribbon award from the federal government for its academic excellence during the 1992-93 school year. Notable alumni include the actor Zach Braff and the singer Lauryn Hill, and the fact that the two stars, one white, one black, graduated in the same class is seen as a symbol of the diversity Columbia strives to project.

But racial tension is becoming more of an issue. In recent years, the number of black students in the school district has eclipsed the number of white students even though Maplewood and South Orange still are majority white. In the past year, the district has been sued twice for discrimination: once by two former black students who said they were mistreated by teachers after a food-fight in the cafeteria, and also by a group of teachers, mostly black, who accused the principal, who is white, of racial bias.

The superintendent of the district, Peter P. Horoschak, acknowledged that there were, in a sense, two Columbias. The de facto segregation is most visible at the extremes. Statistics for this year show that while a Level 5 math class, the highest, had 79 percent white students, a Level 2 math class, the lowest, had 88 percent black students. Levels 3 and 4 tend to be more mixed, though a school board member, Mila M. Jasey, said, "Some white parents tell me that they know their kid belongs in a Level 3 class but they don't want them to be the only white kid in the class."

Though parents and students are granted some input, students are supposed to be placed in levels primarily based on grades and test scores. Many black students complain that they are unfairly relegated to the lower levels and unable to move up.

Quentin Williams, the 17-year-old leader of the Martin Luther King Association at the school, calls it "contemporary segregation." He said that his organization, one of the largest on campus, had tried to meet with the administration over the issue several times but "got the runaround."

So in mid-March his group planned to walk out of school. They even had the backing of several parents, who volunteered to help. As the date approached, Quentin, a senior, said he felt "a lot of pressure coming in from a lot of different angles."

Student leaders eventually decided that holding an assembly would give them a better opportunity to publicly confront administrators, especially the principal, Renee Pollack. At the assembly, which was mandatory for all students, she stood in front of the student body and apologized for saying anything that might have been construed as insensitive.

Ms. Pollack said later that complaints about her were being spread by teachers on her own staff.

"They were trying to manipulate the kids in order to get at me," said Ms. Pollack, who has been the principal for three years and is up for tenure this month.

The flashpoint of the assembly came when Nathan Winkler, a skinny, intense senior who says he wants to be governor some day, grabbed the microphone and announced that he had no sympathy for people in lower levels because all it took was hard work to move up.

His short outburst was like a cleaver, splitting the student body in two. Many blacks booed him. Many whites cheered. He was then accused of using the term "you people" in his speech - though he did not, according to a videotape of the assembly. After the assembly, he said, he was stalked in the hallways.

He now admits that he spoke out of fear.

"I felt extremely isolated during that assembly," he said. "For the first time I was aware of being part of the minority. White kids are outnumbered at Columbia. I knew that, but I hadn't really felt it before."

Student leaders and administrators are now discussing ways to narrow the so-called achievement gap, like granting students more say in which level they are in; better identifying which level students belong in; expanding a summer school program for students who want to take upper level classes. Administrators say they had been working on all this before the walkout threat.

"But the students forced the issue," Ms. Pollack acknowledged.

Ms. Pollack also pointed out that this year, more students of color from Columbia have been accepted into Ivy League universities than white students, with two Hispanic, three black and two white students gaining early admission.

The debate over leveling here boils down to fairness. Is it fair just to ensure equal access to upper level classes? Or does fairness go farther than that and require administrators to truly level the playing field so that the racial makeup of upper classes better resembles the racial makeup of the school?

Stewart Hendricks, a senior whose father is from Guyana and whose mother is Swiss, said that some teachers do seem to have lower expectations for black students but that he did not let them get him down.

"The purpose of high school is to prepare you for the real world," he said. "And in the real world, you can't listen to other peoples expectations, because in the real world, people are just waiting for you to fail."

Because of his mixed racial heritage, he said, "I guess you can say I'm in the middle of all this."

And in a way, that is why he sympathizes with the principal.

"She's got an entire black population that wants to get rid of the leveling system and an entire white population who would leave this town if they did that," he said. "What's she supposed to do?"

Uh oh! here it comes...

Delay
Originally uploaded by enduring hegemony.

Okay, I realize that Tom DeLay is not the Devil -nor is he Hitler. GRANTED. But one could argue he is certainly a Hitleresque in his rationale and demonic in nature.

From the man who supports BOTH war in Iraq AND "culture of life" - the same guy who has said, "My friends, there is no Palestinian-Israeli conflict. There is only the global war on terrorism."

"I am the federal government."

and

"I have seen these liberal psychologists and sociologists talk about there is no need for the man in the family. The woman can take care of it. A woman can take care of the family. It takes a man to provide structure. To provide stability."

- From a radio interview. His wife, Christine DeLay quickly asked to "edit this out," then turned to Tom and said: "This is not a good thing for you to be saying."

But don't worry folks the hits just keep on coming! DeLay is really upset at the courts for not doing what he wants and has made it his personal mission to take away power from the Judicial Branch. As our friend Dave said a few post earlier- Checks and Balances? Who needs em!

From the NY Times :
Mr. DeLay criticized Congress as failing to act vigorously enough. "I believe the judiciary branch of our government has overstepped its authority on countless occasions, overturning and in some cases just ignoring the legitimate will of the people," he said. "Legislatures for too long have in effect washed our hands on controversial issues from abortion to religious expression to racial prejudice, leaving them to judges who we then excoriate for legislating from the bench. This era of constitutional cowardice must end."

This is my absolute favorite! From the same group that brought us the patriot act comes the words- "This era of constitutional cowardice must end!" Oh and this! Impeaching judges deemed to have ignored the will of Congress! Where in the hell do we live?I think I understand the logic- We are going to take away the balance part of the checks and balance system so that we can better enforce the constitution that we incessantly work to poke holes through so that we we do have move power we can make you observe our religion in public and take away the right of women to make decisions about their own bodies! It makes perfect sense to me. We need to spread this freedom people! I am no longer against invading other countries.

Also from the NY Times:
The organizers of the conference and Congressional staff members who spoke there called for several specific steps: impeaching judges deemed to have ignored the will of Congress or to have followed foreign laws; passing bills to remove court jurisdiction from certain social issues or the place of God in public life; changing Senate rules that allow the Democratic minority to filibuster Mr. Bush's appeals court nominees; and using Congress's authority over court budgets to punish judges whom it considers to have overstepped their authority.

"I am in favor of impeachment," Michael Schwartz, chief of staff to Senator Tom Coburn, Republican of Oklahoma, said in a panel discussion on abortion, suggesting "mass impeachment" might be needed.

From Moveon.org :

Republican Majority Leader Rep. Tom DeLay has a pattern of legal and ethical scandals. Yet he remains in one of the most important positions in our government—deciding what legislation Congress considers. Sign our petition to urge Congress to fire Tom DeLay as Majority Leader.
Sign It!

Why God? Why!?!

31schiavo.1845
Originally uploaded by enduring hegemony.

Well it finally happend - Terri Schiavo has moved on to a better place.

So i can just imagine what the guy in the picture on the right is crying about.
"Why God? Why did you have to let Terri die? She never deserved it ! Iraqis- they deserve it God- but not Terri! Couldn't you see she was white God? I just wanna kill those godless liberal judges so we can create a culture of life"


The thing I find most ironic about the whole thing is that she has been kept alive all that time on programs that the republicans work so hard to abolish - such as medicaid. I love that issues such as public health and sanctity of life end up making the right look so righteous while the are simultaneously killing women and children in Iraq and cutting the programs that make here fifteen year life as vegetable possible.