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(10/13/11 9:19pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>In this economy, it can be pretty difficult for workers to get a break. The labor market is a buyer’s market, and employers are able to be highly selective in hiring and retention. We believe, regardless of the economic situation, that employers deserve some basic rights and that they also have a moral and legal obligation to give their workers similar rights, as well.This week, Hertz indefinitely suspended 34 of its shuttle drivers at the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport for allegedly breaking a company policy. The shuttle drivers were not fired for incompetence or negligence; they were fired because they prayed too much on the job.All 34 drivers are devout Muslims. In accordance with Islam, they pray toward Mecca five times a day. In fact, seventy percent of the Hertz drivers at the airport are Muslim, yet not all were suspended in this incident.The issue at heart is whether or not the drivers should have to clock out while praying on the job. Officials for Teamsters Local 117 Union, which is representing the suspended workers, said while the managers negotiated a deal with the employees to clock out when praying, their contracts did not specify this requirement. The managers argued the policy was understood and that workers were repeatedly told to clock out. There is some evidence to support the managers’ claim. As was mentioned before, not all of the Muslim drivers were suspended. Roughly 60 percent of the remaining Muslim drivers had complied with the rule, clocking out when they needed time to pray. Hertz said only workers who failed to clock out were suspended. This sentiment is not shared by all the drivers; several claim they were unaware of the rule and were sent home for praying. One employee recalled that a manager had told her, “If you guys pray, you go home.” The workers earn $9.15 to $9.95 an hour and receive no paid sick or vacation days and no health benefits. It isn’t entirely clear who is at fault for the suspensions, and the reality is that both parties are likely to blame for not clearly communicating. We believe. Hertz does have the right to decide not to give the employees paid praying time. But they must make every effort to clearly communicate that decision to the employees, even if it means renegotiating a new contract. Hertz also has an obligation to ensure that whatever process is in place for the employees to clock out to pray is not overly complicated or confusing. Hertz cannot create an environment that makes it difficult for its Muslim drivers to practice their faith, even if they are not paid to do so.
(10/06/11 10:33pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>The Left’s dream of a Tea Party equivalent has come true with the Occupy Wall Street movement. Don’t let that stop you nonpartisans and conservatives from taking part in it. This movement will be consequential. I believe the movement will overtake the political discourse of the 2012 election in much the same way that the Tea Party influenced the 2010 sweep. It has already proven to be as potent or more so than the Tea Party with gatherings, protests and marches spreading from coast to coast and around the world. According to ABC News, the most recent marches had upward of 15,000 participants, including more than 700 protesters who were arrested. I believe union support is proving to be the turning point and is greatly strengthening the movement. While “big labor” might seem like an oxymoron these days, the national labor unions still hold clout and will give the Occupy movement more mainstream acceptance. The success of the Tea Party, and future success of the Occupy Wall Street movements, rests with their goals derived from a perceived notion of economic injustice. What is shared between the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street is their dissatisfaction with the status quo — where they differ is in their priorities and political philosophy. Income inequality in America rivals that of many Third-World countries, and it has for some time. In the United States, the richest 10 percent control two-thirds of Americans’ net worth. According to the Congressional Budget Office, this is a trend that has been occurring since the late 1970s. The participants of Occupy Wall Street seem to acknowledge these and similar statistics and are demanding a handful of reforms. Fundamentally, they would like the system to stop favoring the wealthy at the expense of the poor. There exists in America a persistent belief that if you play by the rules and try your hardest, you’ll be rewarded. Whether that reward is fame, riches or something else, we all deep down have the sense that we’re destined for greatness (or at least have the ability to achieve it). This belief is false. In the recession even people who have worked hard all their lives and did good things lost jobs, homes and even loved ones. The Occupy movement will allow President Obama to stake out a far more populist message as the campaign gears up. He will be emboldened to take on big business, to the dismay of the Republican nominee.Polls have shown that regardless of ideology, Americans want millionaires to pay a fair share in taxes. And now, just as quickly as the Tea Party advanced ground in Washington to a standstill, the administration will be provided cover to advance an agenda of real economic equalization. That is, if they choose to.— cdbabcoc@indiana.edu
(09/22/11 11:39pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>In a down economy with a large deficit, priorities matter. It is only when the money hose slows to a trickle that we realize we can only water our most prized policy petunias. Okay, that was a little corny. But the point should be made that we’re at a critical moment of introspection in American politics. Listening to conservatives speak, one gets the impression that our political possibilities exist on a scale of small to large government.It is clear where conservatives would like America to sit on the scale. What isn’t so clear, from a non-conservative’s perspective, is where liberals would like America to align itself.This is because the range of options conservatives have forced on America does not represent or include the true sentiment of liberal ideology. Conservatives have repeated the mantra of “big versus small” like a heartbeat, and the effect on policy has been deleterious.Liberals believe that government should be relatively more involved in doing what conservatives believe should be relegated to the private sector. The nuance of the disagreement between conservatives and liberals is lost in the “big versus small” mantra.Conservatives equate liberal ideology with a desire to increase the size of government. Beyond increasing the size of government, liberal ideology seeks to meet the citizens’ needs it believes cannot be fulfilled by the private sector.The lost nuance is the disagreement about what is done most effectively by the private sector and what is done most effectively by the public sector. To move beyond partisanship for the sake of the country, conservatives have to come to terms with the fact that both ideologies seek effective government.In this regard, conservatives have lost their way. Rather than seek to reform and improve government, conservatives boxed themselves in through their own rhetoric. They’ve consequently simplified their own ideology. It has reduced the modern conservative movement to seeking a reduction of all government at any cost.Instead of looking only at what can be trimmed away from the government, conservatives need to find ways to make the government function more effectively. To be effective is to use tax dollars wisely.Rather than eliminating large swaths of the Clean Air Act as House Republicans have proposed, conservatives should examine ways to reduce the regulatory costs on businesses while still protecting the health of those affected by pollution.Rather than refuse to include emergency disaster aid in the budget, Republicans should look at ways to strengthen infrastructure to reduce long-term disaster costs or force FEMA to innovate through internal reforms and cross-agency cooperation. Conservatism must come to terms with science, and it must accept secularism as an inherent and essential facet of American government. To do so would allow the right to declare its commitment to traditional conservative principles such as conservation, the appropriate protection of the free market through selective regulation, civil liberties and other critical issues.Republicans and Democrats should look past partisanship and work together to reduce the cost of government, not the scope of government.—cdbabcoc@indiana.edu
(09/15/11 11:49pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>The Defense Department is cannibalized by the defense industry. As a result, our active duty military personnel and national security are compromised.U.S. military spending is at an all-time high; the national defense budget for 2011 is $549 billion, not including war spending of $159 billion. Facing cries for austerity, the president and Congress have issued a mandate to reduce our spending in all sectors of government. For defense, this may seem to be a simple task if one is just looking at the numbers. Total military spending in 2001 was $316 billion, and in only 10 years the total military budget increased 124 percent. Certainly the terrorist attacks of 2001 triggered some necessary spending increases by the military, but I am skeptical of a 124 percent increase being wholly vital to our security.I am not questioning the motives of our top military brass or acquisitions departments; I do not doubt their intent is to provide the military with sufficient means to defend us. I do believe, however, that the private sector defense industry, which would not exist without taxpayer money, has exploited the increase in defense spending through cost overruns, contractor waste and an outright abuse of the system. An important piece of context to consider when looking at these numbers is the type of threat we currently face and expect to face for quite some time. War fought against terrorism is asymmetrical by nature. Asymmetric warfare brings with it a unique set of requirements from our military. It does not require usual spending — as the Cold War did — or a conventional military threat, such as Germany during World War II. These requirements tend to fall on the cheaper side in relative military spending. For instance, a tank is not effective in an urban asymmetric environment — an armored Humvee is. A billion-dollar stealth bomber may be utilized at times, but not nearly as often as a Predator drone or remote spy plane.Through reason, then, it would seem the acquisitional requirements for our current and long-term threats are relatively cheaper than they were during past conflicts or times of war.One could also argue that increases in technology and the reduced costs associated with the mass production of innovations would drive military spending costs further down.This is not, apparently, how the private defense industry works, which brings us to our current predicament. Tasked with reducing government spending, the Congressional Super Committee will undoubtedly look at defense. It will be faced with difficult questions about where exactly to cut. Should there be reductions in total active duty force or reduction in research and development, reductions in acquisition of new military equipment or reductions in replacement of aging fleets? There will be a zero sum answer, but those questions pose a false choice. What really must be considered is defense contracting and acquisitions reform. We can and should have more for less when the reduced costs associated with technological advancement and military threat types are considered. If we do not demand reform, we all could pay the price of a weakened military. — cdbabcock@indiana.edu
(09/13/11 12:12am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Unfortunately, hyper-partisan environments do not lend themselves well to passing of great legislation. The Tea Party has been extremely successful in one facet of politics: moving the Overton Window of Political Possibilities farther right. The Overton Window is a political science theory that describes the spectrum of acceptable public policy. Outside of that spectrum exist policies too extreme to be considered. The key point of the Overton Window theory is the spectrum is not static; it is receptive to the ebbs and flows of political discourse. By proposing extremely far right policies, the Tea Party has not been able to necessarily pass its optimal legislation, but it has influenced the outcome of the legislation by dragging it farther right. This Overton Window effect is why we won’t have any great jobs legislation from the President. A bill that consists equally of tax cuts cannot truly meet the needs of our limping economy. Instead of Obama’s good (but not great) jobs plan, I propose my own. First, the plan will be paid for by a drastic overhaul of the tax system that would make it simpler but not flatter. The reforms (similar to those floated by both Republicans and the President) would eliminate nearly all deductions, credits and exemptions for individuals and corporations. That would allow all rates to be lowered while still raising more revenue. The rate for the wealthiest Americans would go down very slightly but not proportionally to the lower brackets. The revenue raised from tax reform would pay for research and development in the public sector through the creation of a new agency. The agency would supersede the largest public research and development programs of the federal agencies (exempting the most secretive of defense). The purpose of the agency would be to prioritize public R&D spending toward those projects that would have the highest rewards for not a single agency or department, but would benefit America as a whole. R&D plays a large part in moving the economy forward, and my plan could put Americans back to work.— cdbabcoc@indiana.edu
(09/08/11 11:43pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Exactly ten years ago on this date, our world entered a new era. Eras, as with many things, are generally best understood in retrospect. It is then that a clear picture emerges of how events lead to one another, how the subtleties we took for granted during the moment ultimately dictated the grand scheme. While we cannot predict the future, we can search for these subtleties in order to tease out a semblance of direction.Some discuss the post-9/11 world as a police state. It’s a place where governments of all forms begin to pull back our personal freedoms and dismantle our notions of privacy. Others speak about the post-9/11 world as an era marked by a decline of American influence abroad. Some still may invoke the tension brought about by a higher power’s lost grip on an increasingly secular Western world. There is a final group that speaks of the lost influence of neither America nor a higher power, but instead of authority in every form. They believe our governments and institutions have struggled to comprehend and react to the rapid changes technology has wrought. They argue that this change has not reinforced the power structure as it stands, but instead has empowered individuals rather than states.I should be counted among those who believe the new era, which began after the horrific attacks ten years ago, is an era of institutional destabilization. What most scarred our collective psyche that day was not, perhaps, the gravity of the physical loss we endured but the psychological loss of security.We found it troubling — and still do — that the attacks were disturbingly unsophisticated in their shrewdness. Suddenly it seemed the systems we had built to protect ourselves were not adequate. More importantly, we realized there were no quick, easy or painless solutions to the problems posed by this new threat.A commonality with the attacks that day and seemingly unrelated current events is that those acting could not have done so in a different time or with different resources.The Arab Spring could not have happened without Twitter and mobile phones, nor could 9/11 have happened without credit card networks, mobile phones or rapid communication. Certainly the advent of the Internet has not made it harder to recruit jihadists. As we democratize information, we must be ready to deal with the unintended consequences. For a while, we might experience more turbulence in this era of change. I believe, however, that eventually those who seek to disrupt, destroy or cause harm will be disadvantaged by democratized technology.Anonymity is far less a guarantee in the digital realm than most assume. Information is a potent thing. Those who use the Internet cannot be contained to propaganda. Eventually truth wins out.Truth, I believe, is a positive force, for it is a reflection of our human nature.We should not fear dark days ahead, because collectively our human nature is good, and collectively we shun disruption, destruction and hate.— cdbabcoc@indiana.edu
(08/28/11 11:39pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>If Joseph Stalin were still alive today, he would be proud of the progress the United States has made in the Department of Socialist Ploys. Being a far-left extremist, I am a frequent visitor to the National Public Library of Socialism located beneath the DC Metro lines. I’ve become familiar with nearly all of the past, present and future socialist conspiracies that have been, are or will be underway in the United States. According to a Wikipedia page I just created and some redacted papers I found in the library, the “Abortions, Propaganda and High Gas Prices for All Act” passed the NATO super-congress in 1998. It is our most vast (and my favorite) left-wing conspiracy, and it has made a profoundly liberal impact on the country. The conspiracy attacks the very soul of our soon-to-be secular nation by re-routing the hard-earned money of the rich away from oil company subsidies. Instead, this money is funneled into the two cornerstones of the secret, transnational leftist government: Planned Parenthood and National Public Radio. All liberals know that in order to crush the capitalist spirit of a nation, one must attack the petroleum industry relentlessly (as well as the rich, of course). This can be achieved any number of ways, but one of the more subtle and effective methods is to starve the beast by denying it the God-given right to billions of dollars of government subsidies. The Act kills two birds with one stone. Rather than simply wasting the subsidy money in another sector of government, it wastes taxpayer money effectively through the creation of propaganda and by providing free abortions. U.S. Senator Jon Kyl, R-Ariz. said abortions account for 90 percent of what Planned Parenthood does. I’d hazard a guess that all 90 percent of those abortions are paid for by the government (but don’t quote me on that one). I like those statistics. Item numero uno (that’s “number one” for our conservative readers) on the left-wing agenda is to limit population growth in order to slow global warming. The Act was decided upon as the best method for capping population growth, as we were all scared conservatives might realize “Cap and Trade” really refers to newborn babies rather than carbon credits. Our efforts seem to be succeeding. A recent USA Today article cites statistics showing that white children younger than three are the minority in many states, and my gut tells me that’s related to our plan (but again … don’t quote me on that). While I am a big liberal socialist, I am still open-minded. For instance, Stephen Colbert, a well-respected conservative thinker, taught me how to listen to my gut. And you should take note. Those squirmy noises your gut makes after you eat Penn Station aren’t simply a slow breakdown of grease and carbohydrates. They’re a new socialist plot brewing. — cbabcoc@idsnews.com
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This is a radish article. It should be taken as satire and not actual opinion
(04/19/11 10:29pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Even as thousands of young environmentalists descended on Washington, D.C., from around the United States this weekend, a case is heading to the U.S. Supreme Court that could have enormous consequences. It could at best allow groups and states to sue power companies in order to force them to reduce their carbon emissions. At the very worst, it could strike a blow to the legitimacy of the argument for climate change protection and set a dangerous precedent. Unsurprisingly, the Obama administration has taken the conservative position against the environmental groups who are suing. The administration’s argument is that the federal courts are not the place to make a type of regulatory decision that should be left to Congress or the Environmental Protection Agency. Environmentalists agree to an extent but say the case is their last hope now that the prospect of no substantive legislation or regulation has become a reality after the 2010 elections.I’m inclined to agree with the environmental groups. Congressional Republicans have made it a priority to stop the EPA from regulating carbon dioxide, and there’s certainly no way any type of real legislation could get through the lower house. President Obama does have the option of directing the EPA to regulate carbon dioxide without the approval of Congress, but that isn’t his leadership style. If the president directed the agency to act on its own, it is a quite probable scenario that Congress would react by barring the agency from doing so with the help of the remaining conservative Democrats.If that happened, the next recourse would be the courts. This case has high rewards to match its high stakes. As much as I would like the 2012 elections to sweep Congress back into the hands of the Democrats, redistricting across states could easily thwart that plan. With the House in the hands of the Republicans for the foreseeable future, environmentalists need to confront Obama on the legislative, executive and judicial fronts in order to make headway on climate change.They’re doing a good job so far. Thousands of young people participated this weekend in Power Shift, a massive conference designed to train them in the art of environmental activism and arm them with the skills to hold the government and corporations accountable.These are the young people who will continue the fight regardless of the outcome of the Supreme Court case. They’ll be a thorn in Obama’s side in 2012 if he doesn’t make a commitment and show an effort to take on Republicans and work to address climate change.Activism by young people is sorely needed. It hasn’t been very long since we were fighting so workers could have the right to unionize and demand a living wage and decent rights. And only recently in history have women been able to legally obtain birth control and abortions.These rights, just like the rights to clean air, water and a stable climate, are rights we often take for granted. These rights were hard fought for; many activists have died to give them to us. Yet all of them (and more) are under assault from conservatives in state houses and the federal government.I applaud the Hoosier students who attended Power Shift, and I ask that other progressive groups on campus reach out to them to hear what they learned. As individual interest groups we’re weak, but we’re strong as a unified voice for change. Let’s work together to hold the Obama administration and Republicans across the nation accountable.— cdbabcoc@indiana.edu
(04/12/11 8:34pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>I call myself a progressive. To me, being a progressive means that I value the positive role government plays in our lives. This isn’t to say I believe government is perfect or that I believe it has all the answers. Rather, it is a glass half empty, glass half full perspective. I believe we formed our various governments in the United States not begrudgingly and only as a necessary evil, but rather, as a realization that reaching our true potential as a society takes our collective action, organization and cooperation. I believe we have formed our governments to lay the ground rules and to level the playing field for everyone regardless of wealth, disability, gender, sexual orientation, race, religion or lack thereof. We live in a world that is constantly changing, and as such, I believe that while our forefathers were brilliant in their creation, they could not have foreseen every present day challenge to our society. This means we must not accept our government or society as is, but rather strive to make our government the most effective and functional it can be and make our society as just and equitable as possible. When my friends ask me what I think the purpose of government should be, I always tell them the same thing. I say I believe the most government should do is level the playing field for everyone, make sure that my rights do not intrude on yours and do the things only a government (and not an individual or business) can do best. They nearly always agree and tell me my position is a very moderate and reasonable one. Beyond this starting place however, we may disagree to a very large extent as to whether our government is acting within or beyond the definition I set. To me, the size of government is a nonissue. The issue in my mind is whether the government is fulfilling its duties to the people effectively and fairly. If fulfilling these duties necessitates a large government, so be it. If fulfilling all of the duties means we’ll have a small government, that is fine too. The problem with conservatism today is that it has not defined its mission as improving people’s lives first or by making government more efficient or effective. Conservatives have defined their mission as one to simply reduce the size of government. To me, that’s like saying I don’t want to write an editorial about anything in particular, I just want to write an editorial that is less than 100 words. If I set out with only that goal in mind, I could probably write 100 words very quickly. Whether those words are coherent or worth saying doesn’t matter. I’m likely to meet my goal, but I’m just as likely to write a terrible article. What we’ve seen with the modern conservatives is they’re willing to get rid of nearly anything and everything, regardless of the merit or effectiveness or popularity of the program. For what noble goal are they destroying these effective programs? Small government. We need far less talk of small government on the right and far more talk about making government work. After all, both parties at least acknowledge the basic need for government. Let’s start there, at our common ground, and find ways to improve government, not destroy, cripple or disable it.— cdbabcoc@indiana.edu
(04/05/11 10:10pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>The average Americans don’t seem to realize that while they may feel materially wealthy, their earnings are a pittance compared to how well the best of us are doing. They do not realize how much money (substitute power) a very select number of people in this country really have and on the flip side, do not realize how many people have so little. The problem with not knowing much about income equity is that you have no idea how well you’re doing in relation to anyone else. Sure, you may have an outstanding quality of life compared to someone living in another country, but how well are you doing in comparison to your neighbors?Most Americans have absolutely no idea, and they are more likely to support backward economic policies because they misunderstand the true economic situation of the United States. Anyone remember the argument during the health care debate that we have the best health care in the world? Times that by 100 and you’ll get the argument that the rich need more tax breaks.Economists measure how poorly a country distributes its resources to the citizens by using what is called the Gini index. The closer a country’s Gini index is to zero, the more equal a society; a Gini index of 100 means that a single person holds all the wealth in a country.According to the CIA World Factbook, the country with the most equal distribution of wealth is Sweden, which has a Gini index of 23, and the country with the most unequal wealth distribution is Namibia, with a 70.7 score. The United States has a score of 45, which places us on the bottom half of the 136 countries ranked by the CIA World Factbook. Ivory Coast, where an ongoing civil war to remove the embattled strongman Laurent Gbagbo has killed more than 800 people, actually ranks two places higher and has a more equally distributed society than the United States. Iran, a country we don’t often think of as having an equal society, also has a far more equal distribution of wealth than the United States.A study done by Harvard business professor Michael Norton and behavioral economist Dan Ariely of Duke University last year asked Americans how equitable they believed the wealth distribution in America actually was.Participants were asked to assign a percentage of total wealth to each income bracket and were then asked to show what they believed would be the fairest distribution.Participants missed the mark by a wide margin, assuming that the top 20 percent own about half of the country’s wealth. Their ideal distribution would have given the top 20 percent of Americans roughly a third of the country’s wealth, a distribution that looks more like Sweden than Côte d’Ivoire.In reality, the top 20 percent of income earners in the United States control approximately 85 percent of the country’s wealth, markedly more so than people assumed in the study. So is income inequality a problem? Isn’t the wealthy having a lot of money the perfect way to allow it to trickle back down through the economy?The mere fact that income and wealth inequality has risen during decades of conservative economic policies seems to dispel this myth.We need to start taxing the rich again and quickly. We already economically resemble a banana republic; let’s hope we fix inequality before we start acting like one.— cdbabcoc@indiana.edu
(03/29/11 9:55pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>As I watched New York’s Congressman Anthony Weiner dig into the congressional Republicans for deciding to hold a vote on defunding National Public Radio, his sarcasm and snark temporarily turning C-SPAN into a made-for-broadcast segment of the Daily Show, I began to wonder: What do Republicans really stand for these days?I know Weiner ripped Republicans for voting to defund NPR a couple weeks ago. I was planning on writing a column about it then, but I thought instead I’ll wait for some snippy response to Weiner from someone on the right.I waited, and I waited.But I got so bored watching Paul Ryan, R-Wis., try to figure out how many nickels it would take to close the budget deficit that I realized Republicans are sort of like that substitute teacher you had in high school. The one who got called in at the last minute, and the normal teacher didn’t even have the courtesy to leave a lesson plan.On the floor of the House, Weiner declared Americans aren’t really worried about the economy. Instead he said, “They’re staring at their radio station saying, ‘Get rid of Click and Clack.’” “Kudos to you my friends,” he said to the Republicans, as finally, they had acted to remove that dangerous demagoguery from the airwaves. At first glance, someone could argue that while spending time on defunding NPR may seem a little childish, both sides have their pet issues. So what’s different about this?Republicans weren’t just going about their normal congressional business. They had called an emergency congressional session just so that they could defund NPR.An emergency session? They didn’t even call an emergency session when we started bombing Libya. Directionless, congressional Republicans are, as I predicted two months ago, already beginning to splinter. The Republican Party was lacking cohesion and leadership far before the Tea Party wave of 2010, and their new populist base has only further fractured the lost party. If the best the Republican Party can come up with is pulling the cord on one of the nation’s best news services at a time when good news services are few and far between, they’re going to have a harder and harder time convincing Americans that they have the ideas we need to dodge our longer-term problems.As much as they’d like to, Republicans cannot defund climate change. And while cutting services for the poor and taxes for the rich may benefit the people holding fundraisers for them, Republicans will soon be unable to avoid the other elephant in the room: income inequality.They may have ridden a Tea Party wave to victory in 2010, but their momentum has already fizzled out. The Republican Party has no master plan for the United States other than cut, cut, cut programs and taxes. The Grand Old Party used to care about doing things; now all they care about is obstructing things.That’s one way to ensure temporary victories, but the Right will discover very quickly that years of tearing down minority groups and institutions does not build effective coalitions.Let’s hope that they discover it soon.Because call me a communist, but I love National Public Radio.— cdbabcoc@indiana.edu
(03/08/11 11:22pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>I’m elated, but so disappointed.On March 3, Indiana Secretary of State Charlie White was indicted on seven felony charges involving voter fraud. I was elated to hear the news because I’ve known about the nature of the charges since the controversy began to brew in September. But I’m so very disappointed it took this long for there to be some decent media coverage.Back in October, Greg Purvis, an attorney in Fishers, Ind., called for a special prosecutor and grand jury to investigate White, who was previously a member of the Fishers Town Council. White had moved outside the district for the seat he held on the council. Rather than forfeiting the seat and the salary with it, White has been accused of keeping both by neglecting to update his voter registration to match his new address. Well, he hasn’t simply been accused. He’s actually admitted to doing this. In September, White resigned from his position on the council, citing the fact that he had technically been disqualified from holding the seat since moving outside the district in February. It either took White seven months to realize he had moved, or he had decided to hang on to the seat for just a little while longer. Regardless of his motive, White was committing the felonious act of voter fraud, not to mention the theft of more than $7,000 given to him for those seven months of serving on the council. Unfortunately, our secretary of state’s criminal actions did not stop there.Purvis accused White of changing his voter registration not to reflect his new residency outside the district, but rather to his ex-wife’s house inside the district. This too is illegal, as it is a felony to list incorrect information on your voter registration. I should mention that once again, White does not disagree with the accusations. Instead, White takes offense to the idea that he had illegally registered himself as living at his ex-wife’s house for the purpose of retaining his seat on the town council. He simply said, “I made a couple silly mistakes. I’ll learn from it.” He must have been learning at a breakneck speed since September because in January he was inaugurated as secretary of state and is now the chief Indiana official overseeing Indiana’s voting laws and elections. It really is a shame, because unless a lawsuit by the Indiana Democratic party holds up, Gov. Mitch Daniels will appoint White’s successor. The Indiana Democratic party has sued, claiming that Mr. White was ineligible to run because his residency was incorrectly listed. They would like to see him disqualified from the election and removed from office. Had voters truly understood the gravity and nature of the controversy surrounding White, that lawsuit could have been avoided and White’s opponent Vop Osili could be secretary of state right now.Then perhaps Indiana would not look so foolish having elected a felon to office with roughly 57 percent of the vote. Osili barely mentioned the voter fraud issue at all during the campaign. If he was afraid to go too negative, I say to all politicians: Negativity isn’t wrong if what you’re saying is true.Or perhaps because the charges involved a felony, Osili was afraid to be sued for defamation.We all know that guilt hasn’t stopped some people from threatening lawsuits. A third possible reason is that Osili may have been waiting for the media to pick up the slack and do the reporting for him.After all, the free press is supposed to be there to defend truth and justice when people attempt to cover up or mislead the public.Unfortunately, this far too often is not the case.The only thing worse than misreporting is not reporting, especially within a democracy. When the victims of ignorance are voters, we all become victims of their votes.As we’ve seen with the charges against White, complacency and silly mistakes are not excuses for breaking the law.We should not let the press’s complacency prevent us from informing ourselves of what goes on in the world or from electing those candidates who have our best interests in mind.E-mail: cdbabcoc@indiana.edu
(02/22/11 11:11pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>I usually don’t go a day on campus without being unpleasantly surprised by an example of how IU fails to live up to its potential to be a frontrunner in sustainability. From the lack of recycling bins outdoors, the reliance on corporate food vendors for dorm dining halls or that giant gray smokestack tucked away behind the Kelley School of Business, I’m always wondering what more we could be doing.I have the feeling that our administrators are not wondering the same thing because IU lacks clear direction on sustainability. IU’s leadership has failed to guide us and outline a plan as to how we’re going to compete with other universities in the 21st century with regards to sustainability.Not only are universities leaving us behind on the global scale, universities in Indiana have begun to best us by taking giant leaps and bounds forward.Purdue University was planning for the past year to install a new coal-powered boiler. Just when you thought Indiana couldn’t have any more coal plants, Purdue University wanted to build another one. But after the heavy lobbying of student groups, Purdue canceled its plans to build the coal plant.That’s not all; Purdue has approved plans to build a 60-turbine wind farm for research and clean energy generation.Those 60 turbines will create enough energy to power 25,000 homes and will be a significant addition to northern Indiana’s renewable energy options.Ball State University is replacing four of its coal-fired boilers with a geothermal system that will save the university $2 million a year and cut the total carbon emissions of the university in half.There are no similar plans for clean energy generation at IU.While clean energy is a very complicated issue, IU fails to address even the smaller, more easily addressed issues of sustainability on campus.As the Indiana Daily Student recently said in an article about RecycleMania, a recycling competition among universities, “If the Old Oaken Bucket were a recycling bin, it would not be in IU’s possession.”What I find so fascinating is not so much Purdue’s mediocre performance in the RecycleMania competition, but rather IU’s extremely terrible score.Our most recent RecycleMania score is nearly 20 percent; Purdue University’s most recent score is nearly 40 percent. Not only is our score currently half the level of Purdue’s, it is nearly 10 whole percentage points below the national average. When a relatively liberal campus is 10 percentage points below the national average for recycling, this should be a huge red flag.IU’s low score is not so much a cultural or awareness problem, it is a structural problem.As I mentioned, there are no outdoor recycling bins on campus. Students hear rumors that not all of the material tossed in the recycling bins on campus is even recycled. And while the dining halls have separate bins for waste, the process is lackadaisically enforced and minimally encouraged.The only thing worse than not being able to recycle at all is for recycling to be the most difficult choice to make.Our administrators should be making recycling a lot easier for students, and our student groups should be holding their feet to the fire.In not being aggressive in making recycling easier for students, the IU administrators are holding IU back.To be ranked 154th in any contest or metric is not something to be proud of, and it certainly isn’t something you’d tell prospective freshmen. Yet there we are, ranked 154th in RecycleMania’s recycling contest.IU’s leadership seems content to let IU become the most unsustainable university in the country.I haven’t heard anyone seriously argue that we’re striving to become the most sustainable.By endorsing the status quo, IU’s leadership is failing students by allowing the University to be left behind. IU needs a comprehensive, University-wide sustainability plan.IU needs to get serious and take up the cause of sustainability; our competitiveness and the environment depend on it.E-mail: cdbabcoc@indiana.edu
(02/09/11 12:22am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>A well-regarded conservative figure and governor of a traditionally Republican state has proposed some broad reforms that are strikingly similar to a plan by the president, a Democrat.Something odd is occurring. In this ultra-partisan environment, where anything left of David Frum is a socialist plot to destroy America by instating Sharia Law, seizing all private companies, and simultaneously capitulating to Iran, China, North Korea, Venezuela and ...I’ll just come out and say it.The education reform plans put forth by President Obama and Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels are nearly identical in terms of stated goals. One might think if these two leaders were not distanced by the 10th Amendment and our separation of powers, they might actually work together to enact positive change for our country.But alas, Daniels is not speaker of the house.If he were, I think that at the federal level we’d finally see a break in the partisan gridlock, if only temporarily, to pass education reform.While it seems bipartisanship will be likely, I do not underestimate the ability of the Republicans in Congress to force their ideas into a bill before ultimately voting against it.We saw this play out in the health care bill. Democrats accepted numerous Republican amendments into the final bill, but in the end Republican support was non-existent. Several of the most important components of the health care bill were originally conservative ideas, and many key components that liberals had pushed for were eventually left out. There are many differences, of course, between the education debate and health care debate. Republicans now control one chamber of Congress, and public support is more heavily in favor of education reform than it was for the health care reforms. Unlike the absurd debate about the quality of our health care (we really are ranked 37th in the world for health care quality), there is actually a consensus in America that our schools are failing. It is the president and Democrats, not Republicans, who have moved toward the center on the issue of education. Public opinion and alarming statistics have forced them to. Republicans have moderately modified their stance on the issue, but Democrats are drastically modifying theirs.They’ve begun to re-examine their close ties to teachers’ unions and dislike of charter and private school subsidies. Of course Democrats do not wish to abandon public schools in favor of charter and private schools, but their icy stance toward waivers and subsidies is melting. On the other side of the aisle, Republicans aren’t willing to increase funding for education and most propose cuts. Therein lies the true difference between Obama’s approach and the approach of Daniels and Republicans.Obama’s “Race to the Top” program rewarded a total of $4.35 billion to schools who could demonstrate progress in achievement or reform. Daniels, on the other hand, is slashing higher education spending in Indiana by $37 million per year, on top of a $150 million reduction to higher education that has already occurred under his administration.Obama and Daniels both have shown they believe that more needs to be done to strengthen school and teacher accountability, that tenure should be reviewed and that we should increase access to private and charter schools for people of all income levels, not just the wealthy. Accomplishing these reforms looks to be fairly straightforward for Daniels, since in Indiana, Republicans control a sizable majority of the House and Senate. For Obama, Republicans in the House anxious to control the deficit may deride any meaningful overhauls to the system.House Republicans may not accept increased funding for education, and Obama will certainly not accept a bill that decreases education funding.We’ll have to wait and see whether or not Daniels and Obama are able to pull off their education reforms. We won’t, however, have to speculate too much about what these changes will look like.With such broad bipartisan support for the issue from the public, our legislators will be compelled to work from the standpoint of moderation.This could result in good legislation.The ideas proposed by Daniels and Obama are good ones, and they shouldn’t be lost in a battle over budgets.E-mail: cdbabcoc@indiana.edu