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The Department of Education just released its annual study on civil rights in our education system. The report, Attorney General Eric Holder summarized, "shows that racial disparities in school discipline policies are not only well-documented among older students but actually beginduring preschool."
Pre-school? Yes, from preschool on, boys of color are disproportionately afflicted by suspensions and zero-tolerance policiesin school. They are more likely to be disciplined, more likely to be suspended, and more likely to be held back a grade. Suspended students are less likely to graduate on time and more likely to be suspended a second time. They are more likely to drop out, and to end up in trouble.
The report shows that preschool is not a reality for much of the country, particularly in poorer districts. Where it does exist, students of color -- blacks and Latinos -- are more likely to be suspended. This has been documented repeatedly in older grades, but now we learn it starts even in preschool.
And that's not all.
People living with mental illness share many common traits. In the advocacy world, we share many of them openly. We discuss the symptoms of the illness, the uncertainty, the fear, and we share ways that people with mental illness can receive better treatment, better services, more understanding, and have better outcomes.
We have another common trait that is seldom shared. We all experience it, on some level, and most of us share it only with our trusted friends and family. When we sit alone with other mentally ill people, we swap stories. That is when the true, unaltered, unpolished feelings come out. And what comes out is anger. More than anything, people with mental illness are pissed off.
I am pissed off.
This should not come as a surprise. The surprising thing would be if I wasn't. Pissed off should be expected. I have been discriminated against, marginalized, ignored, insulted, talked down to, and cast out by the greater society. I am viewed as defective.
My accomplishments are meaningless when compared to a medical diagnosis that I just happened to be unlucky enough to have.
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The Ohio Roller Girls may be fresh back from a 2 and 1 charter team showing at the Quad Cities Chaos tournament in Toronto, but Canada pursued. The Tri-City Roller Girls from Kitchener-Waterloo Ontario traveled South to feel the warmth at the Lausche building in the Ohio Expo Center on April 5. A hot reception from the crowd and two very physical bouts was what they got. Their charter team, Tri-City Thunder, faced OHRG's All Stars while their B-team, Plan B, faced Ohio's Gang Green. In the end, Tri-City's Thunder was stolen and their Plan B was not a backup as OHRG claimed two definitive wins over the forty-first ranked division two team.
OHRG All-Stars Vs. The Tri-City Thunder
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On April Fool’s Day, Wired magazine reported that long imprisoned journalist Barrett Brown had accepted a plea agreement. Brown's pending case on hacking charges that many called flimsy at best. The best-selling author of Flock of Dodos: Behind Modern Creationism, Intelligent Design and the Easter Bunny, Brown was facing over 100 years for posting a link in a chat room. The link was to a list of clients of the defense and intelligence firm Stratfor that included some credit card information. None of the information linked to publicly and openly by Brown was used to defraud anyone.
Brown is accused of posting the link in a chat room used by other journalists working on a project he founded known as Project PM. Project PM was founded in part to examine information released by hacktivists associated with the group Anonymous about domestic spying by corporations on private citizens. Brown is also accused of hiding his laptop at his mother's home to avoid it being found during the execution of a search warrant. Brown's mother was charged with obstruction of justice and remains on federal probation.
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It’s a common conceit that any new series of superhero movies has to start with the origin. It doesn’t matter if 90% of the world’s population already knows that the death of Batman’s parents drove him to become a ludicrously rich vigilante, or that Superman came from the planet Krypton, or that Spider-Man was bitten by a radioactive spider. Movie studios are convinced that the story still needs to be retold on the screen, and then retold yet again if the series gets a new lead actor or director or executive producer or key grip.
It’s a rare case—say, the upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy—where the first movie of a superhero series gives us anything terribly new. More often they come into their own with the second movie. With the origin retelling out of the way we get The Dark Knight, we get Iron Man 2, we get The Avengers. We get Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
There was one thing that made Captain America: The First Avenger different from most superhero franchise setups: It was a World War II movie, a period piece. As a result, The Winter Soldier had to carry a little of the weight of setting up Cap’s supporting cast since the bulk of them have died of old age by now.
Fifteen years ago, NATO was bombing Yugoslavia. This may be difficult for people to grasp who believe the Noah movie is historical fiction, but: What your government told you about the bombing of Kosovo was false. And it matters.
While Rwanda is the war that many misinformed people wish they could have had (or rather, wish others could have had for them), Yugoslavia is the war they're glad happened -- at least whenever World War II really fails as a model for the new war they're after -- in Syria for instance, or in Ukraine -- the latter being, like Yugoslavia, another borderland between east and west that is being taken to pieces.
The peace movement is gathering in Sarajevo this summer. The moment seems fitting to recall how NATO's breakout war of aggression, its first post-Cold-War war to assert its power, threaten Russia, impose a corporate economy, and demonstrate that a major war can keep all the casualties on one side (apart from self-inflicted helicopter crashes) -- how this was put over on us as an act of philanthropy.
The killing hasn't stopped. NATO keeps expanding its membership and its mission, notably into places like Afghanistan and Libya.
Franklin County voters will be faced with Issue 6 on their May ballots. Issue 6 proposes a permanent 1.25 mil property tax levy, which amounts to a 110 percent property tax increase from the amount the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium is currently receiving in Franklin County property taxes.
If Issue 6 passes, the additional money would enable the Zoo to build a downtown satellite facility, expand the aquarium, build a new animal hospital and make other improvements.
Franklin County voters have passed four zoo levies since the first in 1985. The last levy, in the November 2004 presidential election cycle, passed handily winning approval of its 10year, 0.75 mill operations and construction levy by a vote of 312,998 – 154,205 (67 percent – 33 percent). In that levy campaign, the Zoo put a Eurasian eagle owl on display at High Street and 15th Avenue as part of the Zoo’s advocacy on behalf of the levy request. This year, the Zoo has trotted out a black footed penguin and cheetah cubs at Columbus Zoo and Aquarium.
If you liked Columbus City Schools’ 24 percent tax hike proposal last November (and most people didn't), you will love the Columbus Zoo’s 110 percent tax hike proposal coming this May. Voters overwhelmingly rejected the school’s proposed Issue 50 property tax levy boondoggle, and should do the same with the Zoo’s proposed Issue 6 property tax levy overreach.
Have these publiclyfunded agencies lost their collective minds?
The Columbus Zoo and Aquarium is asking voters in May to more than double the Franklin County property tax dollars directed toward the zoo, in large part to fund the Columbus Zoo’s third facility in central Ohio: a proposed $5070 million new downtown zoo. Franklin County taxpayers have been very generous to the Zoo in the past, raising our property taxes twice to fund the Columbus Zoo (which, though located in Delaware County is not funded by Delaware County property taxes), and The Wilds (also owned by the Columbus Zoo, which, though located in Muskingum County, is not funded by Muskingum County property taxes).
I was just reminded of a memory after hearing someone's hilarious story of kicking the ice off of the grill of a car that he later realized was not his, when he saw the actual owners of the car looking at him like "Hey man, WTH?"
My story is about my best friend and I as we were driving through the desert in Southern California on our way back from our first trip to Las Vegas. We were 20, too young to drink or gamble, but we did have a blast while I was home on leave from my USAF tour in Germany. Headed in the same direction we were, I was awestruck by the beauty of the monarch butterfly migration as they passed through the area in what seemed like a fantasy. What a stunningly wondrous sight of millions and millions of orange and black butterflies peacefully fluttering by as they silently headed south for the winter escorting us on our journey.
At some point we had to pull over and fuel up the car. As we walked toward the station to pay for the fuel and buy cold drinks, I saw a truck parked in front of the building.