Cops and domestic violence

Tacoma police chief kills self, shoots wife

The chief of the Tacoma, Washingon police department, David Brame, has attempted to murder his wife and killed himself. Crystal Brame was seeking a divorce.

GIG HARBOR – With their two young children nearby, Tacoma's police chief shot his wife and and then himself in the parking lot of a strip mall this afternoon - one day after the Post-Intelligencer reported allegations of abuse in the marriage.

David Brame died at St. Joseph's Hospital about 6 p.m. His wife Crystal was in critical condition at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle.

On Friday the P-I reported that Crystal Brame, 35, had obtained atemporary restraining order against her husband, accusing him ofpointing his service revolver at her and trying to choke her during twoseparate incidents in the past six months.

It appears that Brame tried to cover his tracks by falsing claiming to have been the victim of abuse by his wife. Considering his stature in comparison to hers, that may explain why the situation ended in tragedy. His superiors adamantly refused to investigate Crystal Brame's allegations of abuse, promoting her husband instead. Brame also had a troubled first marriage which they were aware of. A Tacoma Tribune article published hours before the shootings gives the details.

Tacoma city officials will not investigate allegations of abuse raised in Tacoma Police Chief David A. Brame's now public divorce.

Brame's wife, Crystal, made the accusations in a declaration filed as part of the divorce, which she started in February after more than 11 years of marriage.

. . .He [the former police chief] later promoted Brame twice, first to sergeant and then to lieutenant.

Anyone who has studied police officers knows domestic abuse is a major problem in the field. The same personality traits that lead a man to want to be an enforcer can lead him to be abusive. Many departments have domestic abuse counseling for their employees. The problem does not merely impact the homes of cops. For decades, domestic abuse victims were treated unsympathetically because the policemen called often empathized with the abusers. Domestic abuse is another issue we will be examining at Silver Rights.

"Weight": The song explained

Ben of The Wily Filipino, who you should be visiting regularly, answered the $60,000 question of what the lyrics to "Weight" mean. Turns out they mean different things to different people. The song was written by Robbie Robertson of The Band. However, other artists had much greater success on the charts covering it. Music historian Peter Viney has devoted a full entry to probing the history and the meanings of "Weight." Robertson's interpretation is interesting, but not the most intriguing of the possibilities.

I just wrote it. It's just one of those things. I thought of a couple of words that led to a couple more, and the next thing I knew I wrote the song. That song was the only song on Music From Big Pink that we never did rehearse. We just figured that it was a simple song, and when it came up we gave it a try and recorded it three or four times. We said that's fine, maybe we'll use it. We didn't even know if we were going to use it, and it turned out to be the album.

When I wrote 'The Weight', the first song for Music From Big Pink, it had a kind of American mythology I was reinventing using my connection to the universal language. The Nazareth in "Weight" was Nazareth, Pennsylvania. It was a little off-handed - 'I pulled into Nazareth'. Well I don't know if the Nazareth that Jesus came from is the kind of place you pull into, but I do know that you pull into Nazareth, Pennsylvania! I'm experimenting with North American mythology. I didn't mean to take sacred, precious things and turn them into humour.

Part of Viney's analysis is considering the meaning of the word "load" using The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary.

Load: A burden of affliction, sin, responsibility etc; a thing which weighs down, opresses or impedes a person.

Load: a material object or force which acts or is conceived as a weight, cog etc.

Load: = DOSE slang, 20th century (dose = an infection with venereal disease)

People seem to have used all those definitions in interpreting the song. But, as far as I know, my take is novel. I first heard the song as a child, so I suspect I took it literally. Being overweight can be a load, in keeping with the first definition. "Take a load off Fanny," could literally refer to the fanny. A man who only shakes a woman's hand might be discriminating against her because of her weight. You get the picture.

I find Viney's take on "Weight" really perspicacious. He sees Nazareth as a kind of Old West town with a microcosm of types peopling it. Carmen and the Devil? Ladies of the evening perhaps. This page is one of those finds that make being on the Web worthwhile. Read it.

The Weight: Revisited

Shadow of Fatshadow says I don't understand the fat liberation movement. Perhaps she is right. But, I am trying to. As is often the case, our disconnect on this topic turns on language. Shadow detests the words "over weight," preferring "fat." With most people it would be the other way around, so I did not anticipate she would feel differently.

It is true. I am  over the medically recommended weight. Of course it's been years since I gave a shit about anything the medical community (darn I keep making that mistake) industry said about my body. It's not entirely true. I do know some wonderful doctors. I usually look to alternative medicine. I LOVE my chiropractor and I LOVE my acupuncturist. And I love my herbs.

I had a reason for calling the original entry The Weight. It is the name of a song popularized by Aretha Franklin. From the lyrics, it is difficult to know if the weight described is physical or moral.

I pulled into Nazareth, was feelin' bout a half past dead;

I just need some place where I can lay my head .

"Hey, mister, can you tell me where a [girl] might find a bed?"

He just grinned and shook my hand and "No," was all he said.

Take a load off Fanny, take a load for free;

Take a load off Fanny, And (and) (and) you can put the load right on me.

I believe this also applies to the issue of weight in our culture. Part of the rejection of fatness is because being over weight is perceived as being loose, not exercising enough control over one's physical appetites -- a moral judgment. I thought I had communicated that in the original entry.

Another area Shadow and I disagree on is medical research. Though some of that material may be biased against fat people, I don't believe all or most of it is. I come from a family with a history of diabetes. For me to ignore the link between weight gain and developing adult onset diabetes could lead to severe illness or death. In addition, I don't believe all medical research is against where Shadow is in her journey. Women over 35 tend to gain weight and have a harder time losing it. So, in that instance, medical research actually supports what she has likely discovered herself.

In what I think was just a misreading, Shadow believes I was criticizing Camryn Manheim when I wasn't. My point was most of our society still expects a fat woman to lose the weight no matter how well she is doing professionally.

Whenever one posts a blog entry one takes the risk of offending someone one didn't intend to. I will continue to read Shadow's blog and hope she will continue to read mine.

Update: Replaced lyrics with official version from The Band.

On the Web

•A people problem

Ninety dead big cats have been found on the property of a California animal "rescue" group.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Jon Weinhart saw himself as a big cat lover who for over 35 years provided a sanctuary in Southern California, under the name of Tiger Rescue, for retired animal actors whose performing days were over.

But California authorities on Thursday held a starkly different view of Weinhart's activities after discovering nearly 90 dead tigers and leopards at his home -- including 58 dead cubs stuffed into three freezers -- and piles of big cat pelts stacked in a storage barn.

An eight-year-old child was also discovered living among decomposing corpses of animals.

The veternarian for Tiger Rescue is among the defendants.

What does animal abuse have to do with civil rights? A lot. Most people who engage in this all to common form of depravity are mentally ill. In their sick minds, they are doing the animals a favor. The question of how to keep mentally ill people from doing harm while protecting their civil rights is one that has long haunted legal systems. I will be writing more on the topic. I also intend to explain a neurological condition that has symptoms that are similar to mental illness, especially in severe cases.

•George loves Rick

The appointed resident of the White House has praised a man who said sex acts between adult, non-related, consenting adults are like incest.

WASHINGTON - The White House said GOP Sen. Rick Santorum is doing a good job as party leader and is "an inclusive man," despite his controversial remarks on homosexuality.

"The president has confidence in the senator and believes he's doing a good job as senator" and in his No. 3 Senate GOP leadership post, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said Friday.

Some people thought the Trent Lott affair would result in a sea change in the Republican Party and the Bush administration. Though glad to see Lott get at least a knuckle rapping finally, I was skeptical. Subsequent events, including this one and the amicus brief the Bushites filed in the University of Michigan cases, convince me that not much as changed in regard to their attitude toward minorities.

•Jeanne honors Nina

At the risk of being accused of overwhelming people with remembrances of Nina Simone, I have one more you must read. Jeanne d'arc, the queen of expository writing in the blogosphere, has paid homage to a great artist and great lady.

It's not just the lyrics. There's something chilly and stern in Nina Simone's voice. Righteous. A call to justice without mercy. Put a face on it, and it would be a Byzantine Jesus, which, in many of her portraits, Nina Simone resembled. You hear that coldness most clearly in her more political songs, like "Mississippi Goddam," (where she prods an audience to embarrassed laughter, and then admonishes, "...and I mean every word of it") or in the cold fury of "Pirate Jenny." This is what real moral clarity sounds like. And in "Sinnerman," even more clearly than in her political songs, Miss Simone insists there's no exit. Evil has consequences. That's just the way it is, child, no point in glossing over it.

That was Nina Simone. Proud. Demanding. Uncompromising. One cannot read too much about her.

Winnie Mandela convicted of bank fraud

The BBC is reporting that a heroine of the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa has been convicted of taking money from an arm of the African National Congress.

A South African court is expected to consider a sentence for Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, former wife of Nelson Mandela, a day after her conviction of fraud and theft.

Madikizela-Mandela - found guilty of 43 charges of fraud and 25 of theft in connection with a bank loan scandal -- faces up to 15 years in prison.

Not enough is known about the case for extensive comment now. However, the sentencing scheme sounds severe for the amount of money allegedly diverted, $120,000.

Mandela has long been a controversial figure in South Africa. Though revered as the mother of the nation, she alienated some men who believed she possessed too much power for a woman and other people who considered her aloof and peremptory. She was accused and convicted of being responsible for a kidnapping and murder by the soccer team that acted as her body guards in 1991.

Giving evidence last month, Madikizela-Mandela said she had signed documents without checking them and was duped into taking part in fraud.

The Court did not find her testimony credible.

American writer Alice Walker has long been firmly in Winnie Mandela's corner. She belives Mandela's troubles result from her politics having been more radical than those of the men who have run South Africa. There is a superb essay on the topic in "Anything We Love Can Be Saved: A Writer's Activism."

Nelson and Winnie Mandela divorced in 1996.

She is the mother of his two youngest daughters.

The weight

The blogger at Fatshadow devotes much of her weblog to an issue we have not touched on at not quite a month public Silver Rights yet. She is a woman coming to terms with being over the medically recommended weight, or as she prefers to say, fat.

Twice in recent history I've had conversations with friends about how they wouldn't refer to me as that fat woman. For them it was about not wanting to focus on my physicality. But, ya know, if someone has a physical attribute that is distinguishable I think it's OK to use it as a descriptor. I don't think it would worry them to say I was really tall. I love it when thin and average sized people use the word fat as a simple descriptor.

Health experts estimate forty percent of Americans will qualify as obese by 2008.

Currently, about 31%, or about 59 million people, are obese, which is defined as roughly 30 or more pounds over a healthy weight. Almost 65% are either obese or overweight, 10 to 30 pounds over a healthy weight, which increases their chances of developing diabetes, heart disease, some types of cancer and a host of other health problems.

Paul, at Big Fat Blog, a fat acceptance weblog, takes exception to linking being overweight and health problems. Here, he says there is a lack of causal support for new research that finds fat people are more likely to die of cancer.

The study followed 900,053 people for 16 years. There were 404,576 men and 495,477 women, and 57,145 people of both genders died of cancer. That's a total of 6 percent of the total survey.

Yet the study is trumpeting that up to 20% of cancer-related deaths in women may be due to obesity; 15% of cancer-related deaths in men may be related to obesity.

This study leaves me with many questions, but the biggest one is this: if someone is overweight and dies of cancer, can one assume then that weight caused the cancer or helped it along? Is that something one can conjecture?

To me, the medical research seems pretty convincing.

I grew up with an older sister who was chronically fat. She had three sisters who were slim. I think her experiences may have shaped my tendency not to stay even zaftig for long. I will let some extra pounds creep on sometimes, but cut down on food intake as soon as my pants feel snug or my tummy claims my attention. I believe the body should be almost unnoticeable except for grooming. That may be because I've often been perceived as a body person instead of a brains person. (Remind me to write about that phenomenon later.)

I haven't decided whether I agree with Shadow's reclamation of the word "fat." My concern is that describing someone as fat, Chicana or the one in glasses seems to suggest that is the most important aspect of the person, at least briefly. Shadow may be fat, Sandra Cisneros may be a Chicana and I may wear glasses, but there is a lot more to each of us. Additionally, each of those descriptions focuses on something society considers not to be the ideal. I am wary of doing anything to encourage that kind of stereotyping. In my experience, men do make passes at girls who wear glasses. I suspect much of what people think about what it means to be fat or Chicana is equally false.

After sleeping on it, Shadow had second thoughts about her use of the adjective"fat."

The thing about the F word. It is very true that the word fat still holds so much negativity and, for many people, it is still hurtful to hear it said about themselves. I've made an effort to reclaim the word. The key word in that sentence is effort. It is not true that I have no problem hearing it. It is an effort to feel the word differently. Fat is a descriptive term. It aptly describes the body that I have.

I still have an expectation that fat women will try to lose the weight. After all, after going through periods of fat acceptance, Oprah, Roseanne and Delta Burke have. So, each time I watch The Practice, I am puzzled that Camryn Manheim hasn't followed suit. Manheim is a fine, Emmy Award winning actress as she is. She seems to be happy as the mother of a toddler and an actor who has no trouble finding work. Still, I, and I suspect, other people, expect her to conform. That is the kind of tension women who are overweight must live with everyday.

Off the web

•Inured. It just struck me, an hour later, I did not even mention the earthquake that hit while I was blogging the items below. I guess I have become too use to quakes. I just thought, 'That was an earthquake,' and kept on writing.

•A new blog? I estimate that I now have an additional 30 minutes to an hour three or four days a week I can devote to blogging. That makes an idea I've had in the back of my mind seem more feasible. I also write fiction. That means having a file cabinet full of manuscripts that I would not include in a new short story collection because they are dated or not my best work. However, these are not the ones I consider awful. They are good enough to allow people to see them. If I start a fiction blog, I could gradually publish them and any new stories of the same type to it. I could also invite other writers of fiction to link or publish their stories and poetry. And, there are my fiction-writing friends from offline. I'm sure they would contribute. Readers would get an opportunity to read something different in the blogosphere. For now, this is just an idea.

•Better off dead. I got away from that second hour of The Practice this week. The plot I was following most was resolved in the first hour. A serial killer who had escaped conviction for years did Lindsay the 'favor' of killing another serial killer who had been harassing her friend, Helen. Lindsay violated the Code of Professional Responsibility by turning him in. The judge kicked the case out. Lindsay's friend the serial killer committed suicide. It was one of those situations in which a kind of bittersweet justice occurs. The serial killer, who would not seek treatment and was too wily to get caught and convicted, is better off dead. Yet, one does not feel comfortable saying that.

•Back to the gym. One of my writing teachers, Kristin Hunter, once said to give any character over the age of 30 some kind of physical difficulty. I've understood why for the last few years. I've decided to do less biking and spend more time at the gym. Riding a bike means the occasional quick stop or spill. Both are hard on the knees. Rather than risk more anterior cruciate ligament problems in my right knee, I'm going to ease up. The gym is boring in comparison to riding, but it is also safer.

The best of tributes to Nina Simone

I learned from Julia at Sisyphus Shrugged that Laura has her tributes to Nina Simone up. Both are wonderful. Not only do they pay almost holy homage to Simone, they explain much about African-American religious and musical traditions. From "She's gone back home:"

I recognized her incorporation of parts and pieces of our shared spiritual/institutional history, of the African Methodist Episcopals, from which my parents drifted, much like many middle class African-Americans at the time. As church musicians in this tradition, we got the absolute finest of musical training: solid music theory coupled with blues/Gospel innovations on the standard European Cathedral, classical and American popular methods. And a song I'd listened to countless times became my theme: "I'm Going Back Home". Me, the perpetual student, the perpetually motherless, the perpetual orphan, I made the decision to "go home". Or so I thought at the time.

The piece also highlights Laura's skills as a songwriter.

She is equally informative and impassioned in "Gospel Meme 2 - Goin' Back Home." In addition, the entry emphasizes the mixture of influences from all over the world that so much of American culture is.

My own musical training made sense to me through a quadrangulation of what most would consider a sweet and tragic novelty of some Black suburban preacher's-kid: Rick Wakeman (of Yes), Keith Emerson (of Emerson Lake and Palmer), Nina Simone, and Bach. All those well-tempered fuges, through Marshall amps, and whatnot.

As a fellow musician, Laura brings informative insights to the Simone experience. For example, she believes Simone's greatest talent was as an arranger. Laura also alludes to the corporate chicanery and bad marriage that prevented Nina Simone's music from reaching the much wider audience it deserves.

Go to Interesting Monstah and read these entries in their entirety. Because I said so.

Thinking about death

South Know Bubba lives in Tennessee , which is about to execute a man. He is thinking about capital punishment.

Governor Phil [Bredesen] is faced with the prospect of signing his first death warrant and taking the life of another human on behalf of the people of our state.

The Governor is on record as supporting the death penalty. And if anyone ever deserved to die, it is this Paul Reid, who killed seven fast food employees in a vicious crime spree. He is scheduled to die on April 29th.

Presumably, though, the Governor also has the power to commute Reid's sentence to life in prison without the possibility of parole. This would be the right thing to do.

My position on the death penalty is not fully liberal. I am generally opposed because of the disproportionality and racial discrimination so obviously present in the way the penalty is applied. However, I can think of egregious situations in which I would not oppose the death penalty. For example, I shed no tears over the execution of Timothy McVeigh. Nor am I feeling sympathetic toward John Muhammad, assuming he is guilty of the crimes with which he is charged. I favor sparing his alleged accomplice, Lee Boyd Malvo, because of his age. Perhaps in my golden years I will mellow and come to oppose the death penalty altogether.

Prior to the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976, Tennessee's death penalty history was typical of a Southern state's.

Tennessee first used the electric chair in 1916 on Julius Morgan, who had been convicted of rape. Of the 125 executions performed in Tennessee eighty-five were black and 40 were white. All were men. Thirty-six had been convicted of rape, the rest of murder. One person was convicted of both crimes.

After reinstatement, executions became uncommon. One person has been executed since 1976.

Texas holds the record for executions in the United States, having killed 45 people in 2002-2003 alone. Post-reinstatement, the number stands at 301 . . .for now.

Part of my repulsion in regard to the death penalty is there is no way to opt out of it. The states kill convicts in the names of their citizenry. We are complicit whether we want to be or not.

Oregonians have experienced two family murders in which the husband and father took his wife and childrens' lives, but spared his own, during the last two years. (In at least one other case, the man also killed himself.) Christian Longo was convicted of murdering his wife and three small children and sentenced to death this month. Edward Morris is yet to be tried. The rate of family murders here is surprisingly high.

The rate of slayings of multiple family members in Oregon is 2.5 per 100,000 households, which far exceeds the national average of 1.4, according to The Oregonian's analysis of FBI crime reports from 1990 to 1999. During that time, Oregon recorded 11 crimes in which someone killed a family member under the age of 18 and another child or intimate partner, The Oregonian found.

Experts have laid out the common threads of familicide: It's a crime committed mostly by white men in their 30s and 40s who then usually take their own lives.

I have not decided whether I support the death penalty for either man.

Some news from down South

•A liberal in South Carolina

The Wyeth Wire provides some insight into what is like to be a Democrat in a state politically hijacked by Republicans and/or neo-Confederates. Here's a recent entry:

4.21.2003  

SC DEM DONORS - GEPHARDT: Only one person in the entire state, Algie Grubbs of Hilton Head, gave money to Dick Gephardt. ($2000). Algie Grubbs was recently written up in the Hilton Head Island Packet for being named one of the Top 100 Re/Max real estate agents in the Carolinas.

One person ponied up a significant contribution to a Southern presidential candidate who is a Democrat. Telling, regardless of whether one supports Gephardt or not.

I have been looking for more Southern blogs to add to the blogroll. Unfortunately, the ones I come across are far Right and often openly hostile to people of color. If you know of a liberal, progressive or moderate blog in the South, please bring it to my attention.

•South Carolina NAACP chief to step down

Also in South Carolina, the leader of the state's NAACP is resigning after six years in office. James Gallman, 60, is credited with forcing the state to remove the Confederate flag from atop the state capitol.

Gallman, 60, said Friday he has led the group as far as he possibly could.

Gallman brought unity to the state National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, working to pull down the Confederate flag from atop the Statehouse in 2000 and to eradicate the "Confederate mind-set," said the Rev. H.H. Singleton, Gallman's opponent for the post in 1997.

. . .Gallman said he is proud of his efforts to bring down the flag, but he is most proud of his role in restoring some of credibility to the organization lost in the 1990s when his predecessor, William F. Gibson, resigned amid accusations of misspending.

•Flag controversy is not flagging

Meanwhile, in Georgia, legislators have encountered a new difficulty with their proposed replacement flag.

Republican senators and lawyers for the governor worked throughout the day Monday, looking for a way around a faulty bit of legalese in the bill that would result in a new flag that, proportionately, would be the longest in the nation. A standard flag has dimensions of 3-by-5 feet. The new flag, a variation of the Confederate Stars and Bars, would be 3-by-6 feet.

The governor's legislation, which includes a possible statewide vote on the Confederate battle emblem if voters reject the new flag in March, arrives on the floor of the Republican-controlled state Senate today for what could be a final battle.

Most, if not all, African-American legislators are opposing the bill because it contains a backdoor provision that could restore the old Confederate battle flag to the state's emblem. I am inclined to agree with them since I perceive Gov. Sonny Perdue, who rode into office on neo-Confederate votes. as one hell of a sneak.

A farewell to a fine woman: Nina Simone

I just learned Nina Simone died today. Anyone who knows me also knows I loved Nina Simone, both the woman and her music. Yes, I know it is considered naive to say I 'loved' someone I didn't know. But, to the extent that it is possible, I loved Nina Simone. A classically trained musical prodigy, my fellow North Carolinian could have taken that route to stardom instead of the jazz singing career she chose or that chose her. Not only was she a superb pianist, her voice was special and powerful. Whether she was reinterpreting Billie or Ella, or singing a song she penned herself, Simone's rendition was invariably unique and perfect in its own way.

I loved the woman because she was brave and determined. Simone could have been a 'nice Negro' and accepted second-class citizenship despite being a famous artist. She never did, even when it meant bumping heads with the powers that be. You can be assured there were few venues willing to book her in the South for a long time after she wrote "Mississippi Goddam." At times she chose to live outside of America, including Liberia and France.

Though forced to confront racism, Simone remained someone who treated people as people. From her first marriage, interracial during a time when such relationships were illegal in most states, to her belief the French were her people, too, she was truly a humanist.

Yahoo News reports:

Simone, born Eunice Kathleen Waymon in Tryon, N.C., was a classically trained pianist whose songs ranged from blues to spirtuals to classical fare. But she gained fame in 1959 with her recording of "I Loves You Porgy," from the musical "Porgy & Bess."

She later became a voice of the civil rights movement, with her song "Mississippi Goddam," and later, "To Be Young, Gifted and Black."

In 1998, she blamed racism in the United States for her decision to live abroad, saying that as a black person she has "paid a heavy price for fighting the establishment." She did not elaborate but said racial inequality in the United States was now "worse than ever."

I deeply regret Nina Simone was not able to die feeling more positive about race relations in her native country.

Bill Gates does the right thing

James, of Outside the Beltway, congratulates Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates on his philanthropy, but with an interesting reservation.

GATES MONEY

Bill Gates has vowed to spend billions to boost minority education. Even for someone of his enormous wealth, this is a noble gesture. Frankly, he will continue to get rich regardless of whether he engages or philanthropy. That said, I can't help but wonder why "minority" education? Why not just help out poor districts irrespective of their racial profiles?

The answer seems obvious to me: Gates has targeted the money to where it is most needed. More than 35 percent of American youths are minorites. Continuing economic discrimination means minority group members are more likely to be low-income. Continuing residential segregation means that minority students are often confined to the worst schools with the worst teachers. The result is an achievement gap that is not closing with the dispatch it should. Largely, the mainly minority districts the Gates Foundation has targeted will be the same poor districts James says he is in favor of helping out.

To ask James' question a person needs to be oblivious to the disproportionate impact of poverty on minorities in the United States. An analysis of the most recent Census Bureau data reveals:

Poverty rates fell for African-Americans of all ages and most family types, narrowing the gap between their poverty rates and poverty rates among whites. Poverty rates for African-Americans, however, remain well above white poverty rates. At 22.1 percent in 2000, the poverty rate for African-Americans was nearly three times the non-Hispanic white poverty rate of 7.5 percent. The story among Hispanics is similar — poverty rates declined in 2000 but remain comparatively high. Some 21.2 percent of Hispanics were poor last year.

Facts like those above seem totally lost on many conservatives. A commenter at Beltway blunders more than James.

For the same reason MSFT signed on to the Michigan side of the affirmative action case before the Supremes -- the current tone in the US brands anybody who doesn't explicitly go out of their way for a minorities as racist. In other word, political correctness. There's a bit more to it, but that is a lot of it.

It is not a matter of going out of the way for minorities. Attempting to include minorities in the fruits of society the white middle-class takes for granted is simply being inclusive. Not to do so is to help perpetuate the status quo, which is rife with inequities because of centuries of discrimination. Do nothing, as people like the commenter would endorse, and those minority children will mainly repeat the cycle of poor achievement. Richard Nixon had a name for the practice, which he supported in regard to African-Americans, whom he considered inherently inferior, "benign neglect."

Gates has donated $53 million for the program, not billions. That misstatement seems to have come from a story in the biased and neo-Confederate run Washington Times.

The proposed approach, which will combine high school and college under one roof, is very ambitious.

The schools will target students who are not succeeding in traditional high schools -- especially black and Latino students -- and help them get a jump on their college careers, California Community College Chancellor Thomas Nussbaum said in a news conference announcing the program.

"We're going to pick up our students at a much earlier place, before they get lost in the shuffle, and help them get going on their career goal," Nussbaum said.

Note that white students who are poor are not excluded, but the emphasis is on minority students.

The Gates Foundation has analyzed the problem correctly and is responding pro-actively. It should be commended.

Read more about the plan here.

For someone who gave her all

MB of Wampum Blog has written to inform me the planned memorial fund to help Pfc. Piestewa's heirs is now a fate accompli.

Memorial fund created for Piestewa children

TUESDAY, APRIL 8, 2003

A memorial fund has been created for the two children of Lori Ann Piestewa.

Donations can be made to the "LORI PIESTEWA MEMORIAL FUND" at any Wells Fargo Bank. The account number is 0464633783.

The account was set up by the Hopi Tribe of Arizona.

Inequality and interracial relationships

I have been meaning to post about interracial relationships and marriages for some time. Part of the impetus is to clarify data from the Census Bureau that was falsely reported in some quarters. Another is to discuss my own experiences with interracial relationships, including a marriage. The more recent reason I am writing about the topic is that I've been reminded of a trend I don't like. That trend involves very conservative white men dating or marrying women of color. They then turn around and use the women as supposed trump cards when they are busted for being racists.

Yes. you heard me right. A person in an interracial marriage can be a racist. The mere fact a man is involved with a woman of color does not mean he considers people of color his equal. American and world history are replete with white men who formed relationships with African, Indian and Asian women who bore them children. However, those relationships did not mean the men had any intention of treating people of color as equals. They saw nothing wrong with killing the brothers of their Indian concubines, abusing Asian men or selling their children by black women into slavery.

The best known of these stories is that of Thomas Jefferson and his slave, Sally Hemings. Though Jefferson was an admirable man in many ways, he was a complete failure in regard to race relations. If he had acted on his better impulses, the entire history of American race relations would be quite different. Instead, Jefferson helped maintain slavery. In his personal life, he was equally despicable, never freeing any of his slaves, including his paramour and children. There was a tiny minority of situations in which a white lover behaved honorably, but Jefferson's actions were the norm.

Recently, two people accosted me about an incident in which I alluded to inequality in interracial relationships. I was asked about a remark I made months ago as a commenter in regard to an attack on people of color by Stefan Sharkansky. Long story, middling short version. Sharkansky attacked Oliver Willis for mentioning the lack of diversity among bloggers at a conference. It was a typical Right Wing white person's assault: 'How dare Willis bring up the issue of race? Doesn't he know people of color are not allowed to discuss race unless they are praising white people? And furthermore, blacks and Hispanics shouldn't receive affirmative action. Yada. Yada. Yada.' My response was Willis had raised a valid concern. He had said:

I guess the main complaint here is that blogging is open to everyone, and there is no racial inequity in it. That's patently false - but I think I understand the hostility racing over here to Boston.

Sharkansky continued with his attack on affirmative action in the U.S., and people of color in general at Willis' blog and his own. (He particularly hates Arabs and Muslims. His entire blog is pretty much devoted to that. See for yourself.) I continued pointing out that his claim to know what is best for people of color smacked of paternalism and that his simultaneous deriding of them was overt bigotry. After painting himself into a corner, Sharkansky produced what he thought was his trump card -- 'My wife is Asian, so I can't be a racist.'

I laughed out loud. Whether someone is a racist turns on their entire response to the people they might be bigoted against and issues which impact those people. Who one is married to is not remotely probative. As I said above, marriage does not even necessarily mean the white spouse sees the colored one as an equal. Furthermore, to 'produce' a woman for that purpose is to treat her as a commodity. Sharkansky and others like him are saying 'I have this thing that I pull out whenever someone notices I don't consider all people equals.' My response was to ask where he ordered his commodity from. Of course I knew the woman might not be a mail-order bride, but he introduced her into the conversation as an object, a commodity. I followed his lead hoping to reveal the nature of what he was doing. Both persons I've heard from regarding this missed the point, one rather purposely, I suspect.

I reiterate that these situations involving reactionary white men and women of color smack of the old arrangement to me. That impression is further supported when someone commodifies the woman he supposedly considers his equal.

I don't mean to leave the impression I am opposed to interracial relationships. Most of the relationships I have been in have been interracial. However, I have quickly weeded out anyone who I thought harbored racist attitudes. A person should not trade his or her self-respect to be in a relationship, including interracial relationships that involve inequality.

People are saying

Doing Pinochet's time

The former dictator has remained unprosecuted despite efforts to get him a day in court, both at home and abroad. However, Randy Paul at Beautiful Horizons believes a comrade, Manuel Contreras, the head of Pinochet's secret police, is doing time in his stead.

I, for one, am hoping that Contreras is finally fed up enough to see Pinochet slip off into a quiet dottage while he (Contreras) does time again that he finally decides to roll on Pinochet, tell what Pinochet was really behind and drag him down into the pit of ignominy with him. One can only hope!

Some people reap what they sow . . . and the crop from the seeds their friends planted.

Pax Americana, indeed

Laura has some thoughts on trigger-happy American troops at Interesting Monstah. She says something I have been thinking: Why do Americans believe they belong everywhere in a 'police' capacity? Sometimes, it seems the imperial British have been reborn in Milwaukee, Nashville and Seattle.

Rummy gets around

My young libertarian friend Julian Sanchez is intrigued about how the same names involved in 'rebuilding' Iraq were lucratively hanging around the Middle East 20, even 40-something years ago. He isn't sounding very philosophical at Notes from the Lounge.

A Dem who has made up her mind?

Julia may have decided who she will support for President. Go to Sisyphus Shrugged to see her spill the beans. Me? I haven't a clue, except for knowing some of the candidates I won't back.

Grass rubs it in

Richard Einhorn at Tristero is quoting Gunter Grass about national pride:

We Germans often are asked if we are proud of our country. To answer this question has always been a burden. There were reasons for our doubts. But now I can say that the rejection of this preemptive war on the part of a majority in my country has made me proud of Germany. After having been largely responsible for two world wars and their criminal consequences, we seem to have made a difficult step. We seem to have learned from history.

Take that, Americans. And, truth be told, Grass is right.

Nathan Newman goes for the gold

Nathan Newman proves once again that when he's well, he's swell. His blog currently features at least a half-dozen items of interest to anyone who cares about what is going on in the world. Among them:

•The New York Times editorial board is not playing doormat for George W. Bush despite a war-fueled rise in opinion polls for the appointed president.

•A tiny tax on stock transactions would raise billions for cash-strapped New York.

•Newman reminds us what McCarthyism is.

The danger of McCarthyism was not that popular individuals might lose income because fans or customers didn't like their views-- it was that the government would use public power to punish those views irregardless of the public.

And offers an example of what could be real McCarthyism occurring right now.

DARPA, the arm of the U.S. Department of Defense that funds research and development and is best known for funding what became the Internet, gave a grant to Berkeley researchers in 2001 in order to strengthen security features in OpenBSD, a key open source operating system.

But all of a sudden DARPA pulled the remainder of the grant. . . .

•The destruction of Iraqi artifacts, including the burning of Qurans, some of them centuries old, in a fire at the Ministry for Religious Affairs in Baghdad, reveals how clueless the Bushites are about world history.

•Why does the economy continue to decline? "Here's the bottom line -- manufacturing is operating more than 27 per cent below its potential -- the lowest level since 1983."

Read Nathan's reportage. When you're finished with it, read his movie reviews.

Pew's new study

A topic that was the talk of the Web a few years ago is back on my mind and in the news. New research reveals the digital divide is still with us.

A total of 80 million American adults -- 42 percent of the adult population -- say they don't use the Internet, the study found.

About 27 percent of Americans are completely removed from the online world, according to the study. They've never tried going online and aren't surrounded by anyone else who uses the Internet.

Members of minority groups, which are disproportionately low-income, are much less likely to be online than whites.

Internet use also continues to vary by race, income and education level, according to the Pew report. While only 40 percent of white Americans are nonusers, 55 percent of African Americans and 46 percent of English-speaking Hispanics are offline as well.

Not the usual suspects

However, the poor and people of color are not the only groups who are more apt to be non-users. Members of other demographics, including some who have access to computers, are also often non-users. Among them are the disabled and people over 50.

Fellow Oregon blogger Cowboy Kahlil of the ReachM High Cowboy Network Noose has some interesting observations regarding the new revelations. He believes age, from both directions, may be key to why some people are not on the Internet.

* Over 50, the professional motivation is not there to learn and the older generations tend to be thriftier.  Communication? Long distance phone calls are cheaper and don't crash. Also, typing was not an essential to many in this group, so computer use requires lots of new skills to be developed.  Entertainment?  The TV doesn't crash either.

* For my teens, the computer offers music and games, mostly. They'll use a computer when it's there but moving out on their own they could care less about having one. A Walkman and cable access to MTV ranks higher in Maslow's needs.

Cowboy, who used to live in a rural area, also has some thoughts about why city-dwellers are more likely to be on online.

The dropouts are among us

Another blogger thinking about the digital divide is Tristan Louis of TNL.net. Like Cowboy and your host, he is curious about Internet dropouts. Wired tells us who they are.

"People don't actually have a progression from a nonuser to new user and then onto broadband user," said Amanda Lenhart, a research specialist at the Pew project who wrote the new report. "That's the case with some people, but with others there are more fits and starts. They try it, then they don't like it, or they get knocked off and spend a year trying to come back online."

Tristan has some suggestions for how business and government, both of which have vested interests in getting people to use the internet, can do so, including winning dropouts back.

According to the Wired article, some of the reasons have to do with complexities related to going online. In order to resolve those issues, the industry needs to play closer attention to user experience and start figuring out how to make things easier. Return on investments in technology will increase if more people use a system. More people will use a system if it's easier to use. However, few companies pay close attention to those kinds of details.

There are proposals to use the newest connectivity technology to help the poor, disabled and elderly get online. I will explore the topic in an upcoming entry.

If you have checked out Silver Rights, especially at odd hours, lately, you've noticed some peculiarities. Archives that went AWOL. Disappearing links and sometimes the entire blogroll. Colors that come and go. All of this was repair work, made necessary by the landlord, Blogger. After less than a month residing under their auspices, I have learned not to expect much. The lessor is the equivalent of the tenement owner who offers you a cheap flat, along with water that comes and goes, lead paint on the walls and roaches.

I was apparently able to repair my archives yesterday and last night. I did so by using my imagination, not the Blogger FAQ. They had gotten so bad this blog could no longer be reliably linked to. When I tried to repair them using Blogger's advice, the archives went from unreliable to almost not there. Even the cache files at Google, which are supposed to maintain the status quo of the time they are built, were impacted. I had become wary of suggesting links to Silver Rights. The problem of bloggered links is system wide, but it still bothered me.

Some bloggers solve the Blogger blues by moving. Both Laura and Kevin Drum are now with Movable Types. Their MT addresses are:

•http://www.interestingmonstah.com/blog/

•http://www.calpundit.com/

Silver Rights should now be in the best condition it has ever been. I welcome linkers and being added to more blogrolls.