Osama is Dead, Long live Obama

Osama bin Laden has been killed by US forces.   It is such a relief to know he is not out there anymore, plotting more deaths.  One thing that really gets my goat is that he has been living in a mansion in the suburbs of Islamabad for the last six years-- in luxury-- not in caves, not in spider holes!! Well, maybe not in a whole lot of luxury, because the Wall Street Journal reports, " There were no airconditioning units, meaning bin Laden would have had to suffer through the Pakistan summer. " (I bet it is hotter where he is now). And what comfort could there be when, "No phone lines or Internet cables ran to the property"?  Ha!

Abbottabad, Pakistan-- Osama's home

The US military must have experienced tense moments when one of the helicopters used in the raid crashed and exploded into flames after it dropped off the Navy SEALs (Navy Sea, Air and Land Team) behind the walls of the compound. But, as we see, it didn't affect the operation.  Maybe it's like saying "Break a leg"!

Anyway, that is that. Don't want to think about the guy.  So many of my neighbors worked in or near the World Trade Center buildings--my husband too.  Kids were in school when planes crashed into those buildings that morning of Sept.11, 2001; some parents came home that night and some didn't.

What can be said about a man who terrorized the world and hid behind his wife when he was attacked? Life to him was precious then and not so precious when he incited men to suicide bombing.

God Bless America, my home sweet home.  And if, after all this, Obama does not win the 2012 election, I'll eat those hats in my previous post!!

Hats- At the Royal Wedding Of Someone to Someone Else

Must comment on the most posh event of the year.
What's with the hats?  They are all pasted on the foreheads these days--creating modern versions of unicorns.

Victoria stood stiff, trying to balance the hat and hide her baby bump(why, I have no idea).  She is dressed all dark and somber too--you know, dear, they are getting married, not buried.

Victoria--Can't Bend it Like Beckham

This hat in beige looks like an enormous door knocker.  Anybody home?

Princess Beatrice

Tara Palmer-Tomkinson

                         Methinks the blue hat on the right looks like a kayak.


Sigh! There was a time when hats actually sat on heads.

An old flame of William's

           Can't seem to get this out of my mind.




                                                                                                  

My all-time favorite is THIS hat :

Talk Amongst Yourselves

I've not written anything for a while which prompts me to quote Mike Myers from "Coffee Talk with Linda Richman" on Saturday Night Live.  "I'm a little verklempt.  Talk amongst yourselves.  I'll give you a topic. The chickpea is neither a chick nor a pea.  Discuss."
That ought to buy me some time...

Happy Ugadi 2011

The New Year Srikhara begins today.  Happy new year to all.

What's in a Name? Apparently Everything

You like potato and I like potahto, 
You like tomato and I like tomahto
Potato, potahto, Tomato, tomahto, 
Let's call the whole thing off.

Louis Armstrong (or was it Gershwin?) gave up too easily.  If tomato, tomahto confused him,  how would he have referred to the Libyan leader Gaddafi? (Qadafi? Khadaffy?...Never mind.)

The Library of Congress lists 72 variations of the Libyan leader Gaddafi's name and newspapers have added 40 more to that list in the last decade. Here goes:

3.bp.blogspot.com

Qaddafi, Muammar;  Al-Gathafi, Muammar;  al-Qadhafi, Muammar;  Al Qathafi,  Mu'ammar; Al Qathafi, Muammar;  El Gaddafi, Moamar;  El Kadhafi, Moammar; El Kazzafi, Moamer;   El Qathafi, Mu'Ammar;  Gadafi, Muammar;  Gaddafi, Moamar;  Gadhafi, Mo'ammar;  

Gathafi, Muammar;  Ghadafi, Muammar;  Ghaddafi, Muammar; Ghaddafy, Muammar;   Gheddafi, Muammar;  Gheddafi, Muhammar;  Kadaffi, Momar;  Kad'afi, Mu`amar al-;  Kaddafi, Muamar;
Kaddafi, Muammar;  Kadhafi, Moammar;  Kadhafi, Mouammar;   

Kazzafi, Moammar;  Khadafy, Moammar;  Khaddafi, Muammar;  Moamar al-Gaddafi;   Moamar el Gaddafi;  Moamar El Kadhafi;  Moamar Gaddafi; Moamer El Kazzafi;  Mo'ammar el-Gadhafi;  Moammar El Kadhafi; Mo'ammar Gadhafi;   Moammar Kadhafi;  Moammar Khadafy;  Moammar Qudhafi; Mu`amar al-Kad'afi;   

Mu'amar al-Kadafi;  Muamar Al-Kaddafi;  Muamar Kaddafi; Muamer Gadafi;  Muammar Al-Gathafi;  Muammar al-Khaddafi;  Mu'ammar al-Qadafi; Mu'ammar al-Qaddafi;  Muammar al-Qadhafi;  Mu'ammar al-Qadhdhafi;  Mu`ammar al-Qadhdhāfī ;  Mu'ammar Al Qathafi;  Muammar Al Qathafi;  Muammar Gadafi;  Muammar Gaddafi;  Muammar Ghadafi;  Muammar Ghaddafi;  Muammar Ghaddafy;  Muammar Gheddafi;  Muammar Kaddafi;  Muammar Khaddafi;  Mu'ammar Qadafi;  Muammar Qaddafi;  Muammar Qadhafi;  Mu'ammar Qadhdhafi;  Muammar Quathafi;

Mulazim Awwal Mu'ammar Muhammad Abu Minyar al-Qadhafi;

Qadafi, Mu'ammar;  Qadhafi, Muammar;  Qadhdhāfī, Mu`ammar; Qathafi, Mu'Ammar el; 

Quathafi, Muammar;  Qudhafi, Moammar;  Moamar AI Kadafi; Maummar Gaddafi; 

Moamar Gadhafi; Moamer Gaddafi;  Moamer Kadhafi;  Moamma Gaddafi;  Moammar Gaddafi;  Moammar Gadhafi;  Moammar Ghadafi;  Moammar Khadaffy;  Moammar Khaddafi; 

Moammar el Gadhafi;  Moammer Gaddafi; Mouammer al Gaddafi;  Muamar Gaddafi;  

Muammar Al Ghaddafi;  Muammar Al Qaddafi;  Muammar Al Qaddafi;  Muammar El Qaddafi;  Muammar Gadaffi; Muammar Gadafy;  Muammar Gaddhafi;  Muammar Gadhafi;  

Muammar Ghadaffi; Muammar Qadthafi;  Muammar al Gaddafi;  Muammar el Gaddafy;

Muammar el Gaddafi;  Muammar el Qaddafi;  Muammer Gadaffi,  Muammer Gaddafi;

Mummar Gaddafi,  Omar Al Qathafi,  Omar Mouammer Al Gaddafi;  Omar Muammar

Al Ghaddafi;  Omar Muammar Al Qaddafi;  Omar Muammar Al Qathafi;

Omar Muammar Gaddafi;  Omar Muammar Ghaddafi; Omar al Ghaddafi.

(courtesy blogs.abcnews.com)

Says The Straight Dope's Cecil Adams  (June 1986), "In most cases where there is doubt about how to spell somebody's name, the usual journalistic practice is to accept the preference of the namee. For many years, however, the Mummer was too busy promoting global chaos to devote much time to the niceties of orthography."  C.A. has a couple of suggestions too. "I say we just call him Duckbreath. It's short, it's easy to spell, and Lord knows it satisfies the soul" and "My personal feeling is to chuck all the preceding and just call him Poohead, which is easier to remember and has an undeniable evocative power as well. But to each his own."

Japan's Double Whammy--Earthquake and Tsunami

economywatch.com

Cannot bear to look at the pictures of devastation in Japan.  I hope Japan gets the help it needs.  Please donate generously to Red Cross and other relief organizations.

bh-news.com

Each day thousands of new pictures are posted on the internet of the destruction in Japan.  What a tragedy!  And now these folks have to battle the effects of radiation too?

Doing the Math

The New Jersey Turnpike Authority admits it lost $439,000 in 2009 because of human error and theft. And last year toll collectors' cash drawers came up short another $359,000. 

The turnpike authority says many drivers were also overcharged, which overall probably kept the turnpike's losses a lot lower.

(Toll collectors have also been accused of intimidating drivers.  One collector told a woman using a wrong lane that she would be strip searched.)

The Turnpike Authority is accepting proposals from private vendors to take over toll collection, one of the conditions being that the vendor will have to make up for any shortages.  Happily, 75% of the toll collection is now electronic so more accurate and will gradually phase out manual collection.  When that happens, I'll miss those sometimes friendly, sometimes surly men and women  because they are, at least, oases on lonely, dark winter morning commutes. Remember the sitcom "Dear John", and Ralph the toll-collector? "These civilians",  he would contemptuously say of car drivers -- sitting aloof from them and the traffic, cocooned in his little booth.

A Bizarro Robin Hood

Teachers should take cuts, pay more for health benefits and pensions while the rich should get tax breaks.  Hmm.  Governor Walker of Wisconsin has now donned the role of a bizarro Robin Hood!!  Or is he using the deficit as an excuse to hurt public sector unions? 

...even as he proclaims that Wisconsin faces a terrible fiscal crisis, he has been pushing through tax cuts that make the deficit worse. Mainly, however, he has made it clear that rather than bargaining with workers, he wants to end workers’ ability to bargain.

Paul Krugman, "Wisconsin Power Play" (Feb 20, 2011)

The Senate Democrats in the State of Wisconsin went into hiding because at least one Democrat needs to be present to vote on the bill to ban collective bargaining rights of public employees in the State.  

 Teachers protest

It must be catching---the fleeing bit, I mean --because the Democrats in the State of Indiana are also AWOL, battling the same issue. 

At this rate, the people of Wisconsin might as well try and become like Belgium which has managed without a government for 255 days, longer than Iraq.   An absence of a government in Belgium does not worry its people although the unemployment rate there is 8 %.  A "nonexistent national government is unable to spend any money, which has proved an economical policy". 

No pay for Governors and Senators and Wisconsin can still keep the unions.  An answer to its prayers!

Bolsa Família -- A Success Story in Brazil

Launched in 2003, as part of the Fome Zero (Zero Hunger) program by the  Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Bolsa Família (Family Stipend) is seen as the world's leading wealth redistribution system.  It is a conditional cash transfer program that has benefited about 46 million poor people in Brazil, almost a quarter of its population.

The program provided income supplements to poor families subject to certain conditions such as 85% school attendance for children ages 6-15 and mandatory participation in socio-educational activities after school, 75% attendance for teenagers ages 16-17, vaccinations for children, nutritional monitoring and health education for women.

plastic id card for members

Besides reducing the income inequality, the program provides tremendous support to women.  93% of the program's beneficiaries are women and 27% of those are single mothers.  It strengthens their position in their households and communities, gives them more respect and increased influence within their family and has reduced domestic violence.  It has also initiated policies for development of labor skills.  The Ministry of Labor and Social Development works together with the local governments to link employment and social protection policies to ensure poverty reduction.  Bolsa Família gives poor families their first experience with banks, debit cards and credit cards thereby offering them "financial inclusion".  These people have access to small business initiatives and financing.

Bolsa Família gives children freedom from bonded labor and works in cooperation with the Ministry of Education.  It targets households with monthly per capita income lower than US $52.  The program offers US $13 per child/pregnant woman and US $19 per teenager (16-17 yrs. old).  Extremely poor families receive upto US $79 dollars a month.  The government does not put conditions on how the money is to be spent.

Enrollment is conducted at the municipal level and families are registered into a unified central database called the Cadastro Único.

Of course, the program has its glitches.  This blogger quotes a UNDP report,

Bolsa Família uses unverified means-testing conducted at the municipal level to select its beneficiaries. Given the programme’s large size, it would be very costly to use verified means-testing or proxy means-testing to identify eligible households. The programme’s unverified selection method has been criticized on the grounds that its highly decentralized process could lead to selection distortions, such as patronage and leakage.

And so, sometimes absurd things happen.  According to the blog SEMANCOL:  NOTÍCIAS ABSURDAS e PENSAMENTOS (Absurd news and thoughts)

Mother of ex-BBB Grazi gets Family Allowance

The seamstress Cleusa Massafera Smith is a 3204 recipient of the Bolsa Familia in Jacarezinho, in northern Paraná. The federal program of income transfer is aimed at families in poverty and extreme poverty. The problem is that Cleusa is the mother of actress and model Grazielli Massafera, known to participate in the program Big Brother Brazil.

(translated from Portugese by Google)

The main criticism about Bolsa Família is that while it ensures children go to school it has not improved the quality of education and it will not provide higher education.  One comment on BrazzilMag reads:

First, this money doesn't change miserable people into real citizens! If they were just poor, now they are the ones who receive "alms" from the government.
Second, the main criterion to receiving the money is something ridiculous: you just have to send your children to school. if they have attendance, it's ok. They don't need to really learn, just pass. what is not difficult, since teachers can't fail them.
What seems to be good is actually malefic, because when these students are aged to get to University, they won't. First, because there won't be Bolsa Familia when they are to enter High School, second because they won't have learned the basics of the subjects.

Another criticism is that the program has a rural bias; the urban areas demand a higher cost of living and the stipend is just not adequate to alleviate poverty.
No one, however, can dispute that poverty has fallen from 22% of the population to 7% of the population which is a remarkable feat. It costs only about 0.5% of Brazilian GDP and about 2.5% of total government expenditure.

Most people use that extra income to buy their children clothes and shoes. That is how it should be.

A similar program called Opportunity NYC was a privately funded $63 million initiative, the first of its kind in the United States.  The pilot program, however, closed on August 2010. I believe that these ventures must have the backing of the government and must involve several social, educational and economic reforms which are outside the reach of private enterprise.

Serious Farts

The world is a chaotic place what with the civil unrest in Egypt, war in Afghanistan, floods in the Philippines, Baby Doc in Haiti...the list is endless.  But we do have comic relief--in the shape of an anti-trouser cough (fart) law gaffe in Malawi.

Malawi's Minister for Justice and Constitutional Affairs, Dr. George Chaponda said in a radio interview with Straight Talk that he would table a bill in the parliament to make farting in public a punishable offence.  “We are entitled to introduce order in the country..I think the government has a right to ensure decency,” he justified.  "You can control your farting. Why not go to toilet instead of farting in public?" It is as disgusting as urinating in public, he said.  "Of course nature can be controlled, when somebody wants to go to the toilet is advised to go to toilet and if somebody maybe you are in public there you decide farting left and right it becomes a nuisance.”

Gosh! Left and right?

He later said he misinterpreted this clause in the legislation:

“Any person who vitiates the atmosphere in any place so as to make it noxious to the public to the health of persons in general dwelling or carrying on business in the neighbourhood or passing along a public way shall be guilty of a misdemeanor.”

The solicitor-general Anthony Kamanga explained to him that the clause was alluding to "pollution" and not farting.

Dr. Chaponda will now let people "break wind" in peace in public.

Read more on this in the Nyasa Times.

Boot Out the Looters

 This is the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Nine men managed to enter the museum on Saturday, January 29th, 2011, and break a few things belonging to King Tutankhamen of the 14th century B.C.  So sad.  I took this picture when I went there last year.  Pity we were not allowed to take our cameras inside the museum. I hope the present unrest in Egypt does not take away from this world all the priceless treasures in this building and other parts of the country.  I'd like to go back there again some day.  There was so much to see and such little time!!
Tourism is Egypt's main industry; it's ancient peoples are such an inspiration to all of us. I hope we can keep everything and everyone safe.

Time on their hands

This school year, there were 90 pregnant girls in Frayser High School, Memphis, Tennessee.  That is absolutely tragic!!  These kids need to be involved in other extra-curricular activities.  The township should be responsible since, clearly, there isn't much of an age difference between the parents and the students either and so the parents are in no way competent to take responsible decisions.  Also, these  student mothers and infants are very likely to become a burden on the State. The township could also consider all-girls public schools?  How is it that a deeply religious South fails in teaching its communities the importance of marriage as a condition to parenthood? Churches have to wake up to this issue as well.

More on this from Sylvia Gayle, on Saturday, January 15, 2011:

This is absolutely ridiculous. Don't they have a sex education program that makes them take care of an egg or doll? Where are these teenagers parents? I do not intend to offend anyone's morals, but I also blame the extreme religious values of the South. There are some cases that abortions should be allowed. Up North we don't have these problems, maybe one pregnancy every 500 students. These children need to be educated, by both their parents and their school system, as well as their church.

Guns off their hands

On Saturday, January 8, 2011, Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, an Arizona State Democrat was shot in the head at an event held outside a grocery store in Tucson, Arizona by gunman Jared Lee Loughner (22) who later opened fire into the crowd killing 6 people and wounding 18 others.  Loughner has had a history of mental instability and was even suspended from Pima Community College because of his erratic behavior; however, he had no problem getting his handgun legally.   Giffords, who is pro-gun and called gun ownership an "Arizona tradition" is now, ironically, a reason for us to enforce stricter gun laws.  Madmen simply should not tote guns.

Fog Harvesting

Image by: Evan Leeson/ecstaticist

Small communities in Chile, Peru  and South Africa are harvesting fog for their water needs.  Fog harvesting is an ancient technique of collecting water -- dates as far back as 2,000 years ago when people collected fog water dripping from trees.  Serious harvesting started only a hundred years ago.  The idea for a mesh fog collector probably came from observing dew on a spider web.  Apparently, humidity changes the structure of the protein fibers of a spider web creating knots in them.  The water droplets slide down the smooth part of the fiber in-between the knots and collect at the knots.

Robert Schemenaeur,  Emeritus research scientist in the Department of the Environment in Canada developed the first fog catching project in Chungungo, Chile at the edge of the Atacama desert.  A fog collector consists of ultraviolet-resistant polypropylene mesh, stretched horizontally between two upright poles. The net is positioned at right angles to the prevailing winds. As fog passes through the net, it forms larger water droplets. The droplets run down the mesh and drip into gutters. The water then flows into pipes, which feed into a reservoir.
The project provides 40 liters of water per person per day.

Encouraged by the success of this project,

two German conservationists, Kai Tiedemann
and Anne Lummerich, tried the same technique in

Bellavista, Peru a settlement close to its capital city Lima.  Lima gets only a few drops of rain a year but a thick fog covers the city eight months in a year. The Germans who run an NGO called the Alimón enlisted the help of the members of the community in building these meshes, planting the trees, laying the gutters and creating a reservoir/tanks for the water.  Alimón is a Spanish term for 'working together'.  This project would not be possible without the participation of the entire community.  For more on the work of this NGO click here.


The 200 people that live on the steep slopes of Bellavista had no running water and are considerably poorer than the residents that live downhill and enjoy municipal water.  They spent one-fourth of their incomes on water which was delivered to them in trucks.  Fog harvested water has very little impurities and is much cheaper. A single net alone catches about 560 liters of water.  “At the beginning,” Lummerich said, “the people from the village thought Kai carried the water uphill during the night to fill the tanks, because they couldn’t believe there was so much water.”

Funnel shaped contraptions tied to Tara/casuarina trees also collect fog water; they drip down into gutters or tiled channels and transported storage tanks.  What is wonderful about fog harvesting is that people actually plant trees and there is no threat to the environment. 

It is also heartening to know that communities bond when there is a common cause.


The fog harvesting pictures on the blog are from this National Geographic website

Cop Cuts in Camden, NJ

Camden plans to lay off half of its police officers and a third of its firefighters this fiscal year. What is to happen to this city that had the highest crime rate in the country in 2008? Although 2009 saw a little improvement, the city is still the second most dangerous place in the US. It has a population of about 78,000 and these alarming crime statistics:

Crime	2004 TOTAL	2005 TOTAL	2006 TOTAL	2007 TOTAL	2008 TOTAL	2009 Year to Date (November)
Murder	49	35	33	45	53	30
Rape	56	47	66	67	66	55
Robbery	822	702	771	781	813	690
Agg Assault	897	898	818	865	832	915
Burglary	1,159	1,020	1,178	1,128	1,218	919
Theft	2,775	2,332	2,424	2,311	2,680	2,036
Auto Theft	1,357	955	1,180	1,161	993	922
Arson	172	142	129	115	120	122

(Source:  Camden Police Department, UCR Status Report and Walter Rand Institute for Public Affairs, Rutgers University)

Camden against Downtown Philadelphia Backdrop

And what of the police officers, firefighters and other city workers who will be laid off?  How will they support their families and their mortgages?  Camden depends considerably on state aid; it has no tax base to raise revenue or cover its deficit.  From 2002 to 2010, the city was forbidden to raise property taxes.  PILOTs  or payments in lieu of taxes, were approved by state appointees so that large corporations in the city did not pay much taxes.  The New Jersey state budget cuts have further crippled the city.  Since the state takeover in 2002, not much effort has been put into luring investors here; the city has now been dropped like a hot potato. Whoever comes here these days, visits the aquarium or the Rutgers University (never after dark); the glory days of Campbell Soup, Lockheed Martin and RCA have long since been erased from its memory.  All we can look forward to are days of lawlessness.  Gangs will get a firmer foothold, and people who want a better life will just move. 

Camden--Near Drop

I think the government should now think in terms of planned demolition of the city.  Urban planning to bring about urban renewal. Maybe that will provide more jobs?  Companies could be persuaded to build around the Rutgers University campus providing employment to new graduates thereby extending the safety zone in the city.  Schools hours could be extended, so children's activities could be supervised.  They would have no time for gangs and would learn a little civic sense.  Salaries are a small price to pay for the overall mental and economic health of the community. Society needs growth--maybe this is the way to help it grow.

Thoughts?

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Thanksgiving is fun for everyone except the turkeys.

Each year, the President of the United States "pardons" two turkeys on Death Row. Here is the story of the first official turkey pardon.

The National Turkey Foundation and the Poultry and Egg National Board, since 1947, have presented the President with a turkey each year at a White House ceremony.  And the Presidents have always eaten it.

JFK was an exception; he said, "Let's just keep him". In 1989, the senior Bush started the practice of pardoning turkeys--two a year.  Till 2004, the pardoned turkeys were sent to Kidwell Farm (also ironically called Frying Pan Park),  a petting zoo in Virginia.  But now they go to Disneyland as the honorary grand marshals of the Thanksgiving Day parade. They are even given names.  This year's chosen ones are Apple and Cider.

 President Obama pardons a turkey 2010

I don't see what difference it makes to pardon two turkeys a year when, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, more than 45 million turkeys are cooked and eaten in the U.S. at Thanksgiving!!

TEACHING TO CHEAT

One of the funniest things that I ever saw is this video on Youtube on how to cheat in an exam.  It involved a scanner, a coke bottle and some glue.  Mystified?  Well, here it is

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91lQK5SCzlQ

First of all, it bothers me that the author of the above video gives it a serial number.  There are many more of these.  And then, I think the students could better utilize their time simply memorizing what would fit on the teeny Coke bottle label. 

Yet another student teaches to cheat by writing notes on a stretched rubber band. What?  Are they going to write on the heads of pins next? 

Professor Quinn of the University of Central Florida in Orlando, caught 200 of his 600 business-course students cheating in a midterm exam. 

He offered the students an ultimatum: Come clean and take a four-hour ethics course, and your records would be wiped clean. If they chose not to come forward, they'd run a risk. 

The risk of expulsion, that is. The move to make these students attend a class on ethics was a stroke of genius.

 Also, all 600 students had to redo their midterms.

Student Konstantin Ravvin accused the university of "making a witch hunt out of absolutely nothing, as if they want to teach us some kind of moral lesson." (Mind you, a moral lesson!! Who needs that?)
"This is college. Everyone cheats, everyone cheats in life in general," Ravvin said. "I think you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone in this testing lab who hasn't cheated on an exam."

Really, the Professor has nothing to worry about.  Those that do not learn the "moral lesson" his way, will learn it the hard way.  And then maybe they will learn that they are, in fact, only cheating themselves.  As Kiki Kho, a producer of similar "cheating" videos said, the viewers don't really have to follow the videos.  If they do, it is all their own fault.

Google does not know Gandhi

Usually, Google acknowledges the birthday of a great soul by including an art banner about him on its home page.  I am disappointed that there was no art for Mahatma Gandhi.  The two 'O's in "Google" would have done nicely for Gandhi's glasses and the 'g's for his ears. 

Gandhi's favorite hymn was "Vaishnava Janato"--that carried a message of equality of all men and their obligations towards one another.  Let us listen because we have yet to learn how to live with others in harmony.

Happy Birthday, Gandhiji!

R.I.P. Tyler Clementi

courtesy of http://milosjanusoutlook.blogspot.com

Tyler Clementi's suicide confirms two things: that man is essentially a hostile being and that education does nothing for him.  Education does not seem to teach tolerance but breeds arrogance instead.  It was not enough that Tyler was minding his own business--he neglected to be watchful of others minding it for him.  Not content with a giggle or a snicker, the voyeur had to publicly humiliate Tyler.  What are schools teaching children?  What are parents teaching their children? Why is their energy so misdirected? Thanks to social networking sites like Facebook and Myspace, private lives are on public display, cyber bullying is rampant. No one takes the responsibility of controlling the content on these sites.  No one even cares until something extreme like this happens.

My elementary school would set aside an hour every day for "Moral Science", a period dedicated to teaching children decent, moral behavior and social etiquette.  It wasn't my favorite part of the day, but I think that is what is missing in children's lives today.  Decency has to be taught and cultivated.  And their energy should be properly channeled. Children do not play out on the streets nowadays; tag and hide-and-seek are lame games. No one uses a punching bag to vent his/her frustrations on. Even Playstation and Xbox are getting obsolete now that there is more fun in being mean on the internet.  Let us wind-up the toys and watch them run pell-mell!! Let the mind games begin.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/30/nyregion/30suicide.html

"Design"-er Locks

  Stephen Hawking in his book "The Grand Design" says God did not create the Universe and that the Big Bang was inevitable according to the laws of  physics.
   But how does he account for this?  Even he would agree that this grand design is not wholly the work of "Head and Shoulders" shampoo.  Troy Polamalu, the star of the Steelers football team, had his 36" long curly Samoan hair insured for one million dollars.
  Awesome.