Category: News You Need to Know

If at First You Don’t Succeed Lower Your Standards

People mistakenly believe that the goal of public schools is to educate children. This isn’t the case. In fact one of the top priorities of public schools is to provide circuses for local communities. What happens when continuously diminishing academic standards threaten the participation rate in sports? School boards consider lowering the standards:

The Minneapolis School Board was considering adjusting the GPA requirements to keep athletes interested in school by keeping them in sports — but they have tabled the plan because there are too many unanswered questions.

Though board members had planned to vote on the concept on Tuesday, the meeting didn’t go as planned.

The proposal would have lowered the athletic GPA standard from 2.0 to 1.0, but many board members say they simply don’t know whether the move would hurt or help students in the long run at this point.

“Many of our students slip through the cracks because of a lack of academic support at school and at home,” said Rebecca Gagnon. “National research shows that students engaged in school via student activities and sports do much better academically than their disengaged peers.”

Most school districts don’t have a GPA bar, Chief Commission Officer Stan Alleyne told FOX 9 News — but he said the 2.0 standard sets the school system apart from others in the state.

Perhaps a student with a GPA below 2.0 should be concentrating on something besides sports.

Nothing to See Here, Move Along

What happens when the family of an American citizen who was killed by his government without trial files a lawsuit against the murderers? The murderers ask their fellow state agents in the court system to dismiss the case:

The U.S. Government on Friday asked a federal judge to dismiss a lawsuit over the killing of three American citizens in drone strikes in Yemen earlier this year: alleged Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula leader Anwar Al-Awlaki, his son Abdulrahman, and alleged AQAP magazine editor Samir Khan.

If the courts won’t dismiss the case the administration will simply make the problem cease to exist:

The administration also threatened to invoke the State Secrets Privilege if the suit is not dismissed on other grounds. The privilege, which 2008 presidential candidate Barack Obama regularly blasted the Bush administration for invoking, allows the government to seek dismissal of a suit if it could expose national security secrets.

Nothing to see here slaves, move along.

The Difference Between the Pirate Bay and the Library

Representatives of the recording, publishing, and movie industries constantly gripe about Internet piracy. They claim rampent piracy will lead to the death of music, literature, and movies because individuals will no longer pay money for them. Considering this why don’t those industries gripe about another source of obtaining such media for free? You never hear those representatives complain about public libraries, do you? Why is that? It’s because public libraries are too inefficient:

It begs the question why every author, filmmaker, and musician isn’t up in arms about the New York Public Library’s rampant sharing, while there’s a ton of opposition to the sharing habits of BitTorrent peers who use The Pirate Bay. After all, The Pirate Bay’s community shares significantly less than the New York Public Library: just 1 million items in 2008 (and the collection certainly hasn’t grown 5000% since then). The reason that The Pirate Bay is offensive, and the New York Public Library is not, is because of its efficiency.

Before the New York Public Library can share an item with you, you first need to schlep all the way to 5th Avenue and 42nd Street in Manhattan. Then you have to walk around the massive building to find what you’re looking for. That is, if the item isn’t checked out. See, the New York Public Library has a peculiar system of storing their items: in finite, physical form. If you want to read a book or watch a film, there are only a few copies available. You can take an item home for a limited time (which forces other people to wait until you return it), but only if you live in New York State.

Were libraries as efficient as online piracy sites representatives from the recording, publishing, and movie industries would be demanding their immediate shutdown. So remember, you can borrow intellectual property for free so long as you do it in an inefficient manner.

Obama’s Crocodile Tears

After the shooting in Connecticut Obama, apparently believing not tragedy should be wasted, went on television and gave a speech. The speech was the usual political affair with vague statements about the need for change and some shed tears. Shedding tears was a nice touch but they can be considered nothing more than crocodile tears. While Obama lamented on the death of 20 children in Connecticut his drone strikes have murdered 168 children in Pakistan:

As many as 168 children have been killed in drone strikes in Pakistan during the past seven years as the CIA has intensified its secret programme against militants along the Afghan border.

When Obama said there needs to be “meaningful action” he was right. He can start but ceasing further bombings in Parkistan, Yemen, and other Middle Eastern countries. More children have been killed by American drone bombings that the last several school shootings combine.

Double Tapping

Most defensive firearm instructors will tell you to fire two shots at your target in rapid succession. This technique is known as a double tap and it seems somebody operating the United States drone fleet has taken this concept to a new and absurd level:

NYU student Josh Begley is tweeting every reported U.S. drone strike since 2002, and the feed highlights a disturbing tactic employed by the U.S. that is widely considered a war crime.

Known as the “double tap,” the tactic involves bombing a target multiple times in relatively quick succession, meaning that the second strike often hits first responders.

In a self-defense situation double tapping is a method of compensating for the generally anemic ballistics of handgun cartridges. I’m not sure what practical aspect double tapping somebody with a $68,000 Hellfire missile has other than posing a threat to first responders and therefore generating a great deal of justifiable animosity and hatred towards the United States.

In a rather ironic twist the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) has something to say about double tapping in regards to explosive ordinance:

A 2007 report by the Homeland Security Institute called double taps a “favorite tactic of Hamas” and the FBI considers it a tactic employed by terrorists.

The more you fight the enemy the more you become the enemy.

The State Incentivizes Illiteracy

Most people believe the state wants to promote literacy. If the state was actually interested in promoting literacy you would think it would avoid incentivizing illiteracy but the opposite is true:

THIS is what poverty sometimes looks like in America: parents here in Appalachian hill country pulling their children out of literacy classes. Moms and dads fear that if kids learn to read, they are less likely to qualify for a monthly check for having an intellectual disability.

Many people in hillside mobile homes here are poor and desperate, and a $698 monthly check per child from the Supplemental Security Income program goes a long way — and those checks continue until the child turns 18.

“The kids get taken out of the program because the parents are going to lose the check,” said Billie Oaks, who runs a literacy program here in Breathitt County, a poor part of Kentucky. “It’s heartbreaking.”

When an employer wants to attract top talent they generally do so by offering incentives in the form of money and benefits. If you’re a company that wants to hire away a top employee from another company you generally approach that employee with an offer for higher pay and improved benefits. Money is also a common tool to incentivize good behavior. Parents may make their children’s allowance dependent on good behavior, which includes performing chores satisfactorily. Not surprisingly money can be used to incentivize bad behavior, which is what the state does when it makes checks dependent on poor performance.

If a child can net a family a check for being illiterate then that family has a direct interest in preventing their child from becoming literate. Human action is performed in self-interest. When it’s in the interest of the parents to keep their children ignorant they are likely to keep their children ignorant. By rewarding illiteracy the state demonstrates that it doesn’t care whether or not a child remains illiterate, it does demonstrate a desire to keep people dependent on the state though.

Zimmerman Sues NBC Over Edited 911 Call

When the Zimmerman case first hit the public spotlight NBC released an edited 911 tape to make it appear as though Zimmerman’s actions were race related. NBC’s actions may make Zimmerman a very wealthy man:

Lawyers for George Zimmerman are seeking punitive damages from NBC over edits of a police call he made on the night Trayvon Martin was killed.

They allege heavily edited extracts of the call made Mr Zimmerman appear racist in the eyes of the public.

NBC issued over the incident but by then the damage had been done. In the eye’s of the public Zimmerman was viewed as a racist who gunned down Trayvon Martin not because he was pounding Zimmerman’s head into the pavement but because he was black. To this day people are still stating that Zimmerman’s actions were race related even though evidence strongly supports Zimmerman’s claim that he was being attacked by Trayvon and fired in self-defense.

All “Undesirables” Report to the Ghetto

When discussing my opposition to the state advocates of the state are quick to bring up countries like Norway, Sweden, and the Netherlands as examples of states that do good for their people. What these state advocates fail to comprehend is the fact the state uses coercion to achieve its ends. Social programs are paid for with taxes that are paid because the alternative is suffering state violence. When an individual resorts to the use of coercive means to attain one end they generally become more comfortable with using coercive means to attain other ends. If the state finds coercive means acceptable to achieve its ends of providing education or healthcare it will also tend to find coercive means acceptable to deal with “undesirables.” A method that has been favored by states to deal with “undesirables” is to collect the “undesirables” and force them to live in inhuman conditions. Traditionally these communities of “undesirables” have been referred to as ghettos although Amsterdam is planning to refer to them as scum villages:

Amsterdam is to create “Scum villages” where nuisance neighbours and anti-social tenants will be exiled from the city and rehoused in caravans or containers with “minimal services” under constant police supervision.

[…]

Holland’s capital already has a special hit squad of municipal officials to identify the worst offenders for a compulsory six month course in how to behave.

Social housing problem families or tenants who do not show an improvement or refuse to go to the special units face eviction and homelessness.

Eberhard van der Laan, Amsterdam’s Labour mayor, has tabled the £810,000 plan to tackle 13,000 complaints of anti-social behaviour every year. He complained that long-term harassment often leads to law abiding tenants, rather than their nuisance neighbours, being driven out.

[…]

The new punishment housing camps have been dubbed “scum villages” because the plan echoes a proposal from Geert Wilders, the leader of a populist Dutch Right-wing party, for special units to deal with persistent troublemakers.

“Repeat offenders should be forcibly removed from their neighbourhood and sent to a village for scum,” he suggested last year. “Put all the trash together.”

One of the countries often cited by statists attempting to demonstrate the great rewards bestowed upon people by democracy/socialism/progressivism is establishing ghettos and forcing “undesirables” to live there. The country in question isn’t just any country though, it’s a country that has traditionally been known for extreme tolerance of behavior that is generally looked down upon such as prostitution and drug use.

Something that should be noted about these ghettos is that individuals displaying “anti-social tendencies” are being relegated to them. This is noteworthy because “anti-social tendencies” is such a vague term that is can be applied to anybody. As a general rule states tend to expand their power. While individuals that are generally considered bad neighbors will be the first cast into these new ghettos the program will likely expand to include other “undesirable” groups. Individuals failing to show proper support for the ruling royal family or other state entities could easily be labeled “anti-social” and cast into one of these ghettos. This is generally where a self-proclaimed progressive attempts to stop me and claim such a scenarior could never happen. Such a claim has already been rendered irrelevant by the fact ghettos are being established at all. Incrementalism is the name of the game and the state is already incrementally increasing its power so it’s not illogical to believe it will continue to incrementally increase its power.

I think the lesson to be learned here is that accepting coercive means to achieve ends you find desirable will lead to widespread acceptance of coercive means. That acceptance will make it far more difficult to oppose coercive means when they’re being used to achieve ends you find undesirable. In other words slippery slopes are dangerous and you should avoid them as much as possible.

You Keep Using that Word

Do you find something amiss in this excerpt:

More than 200 women’s rights groups are calling for laws to make paying for sex a crime across the European Union.

More than 200 women’s rights groups openly acknowledge that women have many rights but having sex for money isn’t one of them. This stance seems contradictory to the advancement of women’s rights. Women’s rights groups generally fight against the idea that men own women, which is still prevalent throughout the world. One would think that a rights group fighting the idea that one person can own another would fight that idea that any entity can own a person. By demanding the state use its monopoly on violence to prohibit women from having sex for money these groups are stating that they believe the state owns women. If the state owns women then the state has the right to do with women as it pleases including transferring its ownership to another entity either temporarily or permanently. Supporting the idea that the state can own women also supports the idea that men can own women so long as the state gives its blessing.

Claiming to be a rights group while campaigning to restrict voluntary behavior through coercive force is hypocritical.

It’s Like Stalin Never Left Russia

Most people are probably familiar with the Pussy Riot case in Russia. An all female band named Pussy Riot did a gig at a Moscow cathedral that didn’t sit well with the current Russian rulers. After what was likely a sham trial the members of Pussy Riot were found guilty of hooliganism and one of the members was sentenced to two years in a remote Siberian prison. Sentencing dissidents to Siberian prisons was a tactic often used by Joseph Stalin but the similarities between his regime and the current regime haven’t stopped there. Now the current Russian government is moving to erase all memory of Pussy Riot by blocking any website that posts the video of their act at the cathedral:

A Moscow court has ruled that websites must remove video clips of the Pussy Riot female punk band, two of whose members are in jail.

The clips include a crude anti-Kremlin song which they performed in Moscow’s main cathedral in February, for which they were convicted.

The “punk prayer” has been viewed nearly 2.4m times on YouTube.

In its ruling, the court called the clips “extremist”. Websites that fail to remove the clips may be blocked.

I wonder if the next step will be to find and remove all photographs that picture any Pussy Riot members.