Rewarding Incompetence
Lack of accountability is pervasive among public officials and agencies.
Lowry's observations apply as well to the FBI. (RICH LOWRY, "THE CIA'S HOLIDAY,"
New York Post, August 25, 2007) The US Court awarded $101 million to four men
framed by an FBI informant with the knowledge of supervising agents. FBI agents
in the troubled Boston office permitted a malicious prosecution for ethnic
reasons. Their motto is "Mess up, move up."
The award is taxpayer funds. The wrongdoers suffered no legal or
administrative penalties. The loud and clear message is that the taxpayer will
pay for misconduct of public officials. Among politicians it is worse. How much
malfeasance is inspired by elected officials who encourage abuses of power?
Roy Bercaw, Editor, ENOUGH ROOM
THE CIA'S HOLIDAY
New York Post
By RICH LOWRY
August 25, 2007 -- THE new report from the CIA's inspector general about the spy
agency's pre- 9/11 failings could be titled, "What We Did During Our Holiday
From History."
The stretch from the end of the Cold War to the 9/11 attacks was supposed to be
a shiny new era of globalized peace and prosperity, to which an intelligence
service was considered quaintly irrelevant. The CIA conformed to the zeitgeist
by remaining quaintly irrelevant.
George Tenet presided over the agency, failing his way to the second-longest
tenure of any director of central intelligence, a Presidential Medal of Freedom
and a $4 million book advance. He made the Peter Principle work for him not just
by advancing to his level of incompetence, but by benefiting from it handsomely.
[...]
More scandalous is how the CIA has escaped serious reform even today. Two CIA
directors in a row have resisted the IG report's recommendation for an
accountability board to evaluate CIA officials' pre-9/11 performance. That word
- not "board," but "accountability" - raises hackles at Langley, where everyone
is above-average at fighting al Qaeda. As many as 60 CIA employees knew that two
of the hijackers were in the U.S. before 9/11 and no one managed to get the word
to the FBI, yet CIA Director Michael Hayden thinks holding anyone accountable
for that or other failures would be "distracting."
And so the band plays on.
August 26, 2007
Promoting a Boondoggle
Promoting a Boondoggle
An insider said, Britney's "sick. [...] She needs help. It's sad because
what she's got - and we've heard it's like bipolar disorder - can easily be
treated with medication, but she won't do it." (Richard Johnson, "Britney
back-out stuns label," Page Six, New York Post, August 22, 2007, page 12)
The New York Post publishes rubbish -- psychiatric diagnoses made by
anyone. Who needs psychiatrists if everyone can make diagnoses?
Is Page Six in on the large joke called psychiatry which makes up illnesses
by consensus? When will the Post expose this great fraud, the harms by such
insiders, by police, by prosecutors and most of all by psychiatrists? When will
the boondoggle be stopped ending the theft of taxpayer funds for nonsensical
treatment?
Roy Bercaw, Editor, ENOUGH ROOM
Britney Back-out stuns label
Page Six
New York Post
Richard Johnson
August 22, 2007 -- Britney Spears backed out at the last minute from recording a
duet with her old flame, Justin Timberlake - and the inexplicable decision last
month has suits at her record label, Jive, very worried.
The duet, which was to be produced by hit-maker Timbaland at his studio in
Virginia Beach, could have started a big comeback for the troubled pop tart, who
peaked before she had two marriages and two kids.
A music industry source said Timberlake wrote the duet specifically for Spears.
Although they wouldn't be together in the studio, his voice would have been
mixed with hers later.
"Timbaland set aside a week out of his crazy schedule to do this - and then,
just before she was supposed to fly out, Britney abruptly canceled the session
and refused to do the song.
"It's crazy," the insider added. "She's looking for a comeback, and this would
have not only been a huge hit, but something she could have opened the MTV Video
Awards with and really blown everyone away."
Another insider said, "Listen, everyone is worried. In her mind, her album is
done and she's done enough work . . . She's an easy target right now, because
she's . . . sick. People like her are sick. It's like an anorexic who's sick in
the head and needs help. She needs help. It's sad because what she's got - and
we've heard it's like bipolar disorder - can easily be treated with medication,
but she won't do it."
[...]
An insider said, Britney's "sick. [...] She needs help. It's sad because
what she's got - and we've heard it's like bipolar disorder - can easily be
treated with medication, but she won't do it." (Richard Johnson, "Britney
back-out stuns label," Page Six, New York Post, August 22, 2007, page 12)
The New York Post publishes rubbish -- psychiatric diagnoses made by
anyone. Who needs psychiatrists if everyone can make diagnoses?
Is Page Six in on the large joke called psychiatry which makes up illnesses
by consensus? When will the Post expose this great fraud, the harms by such
insiders, by police, by prosecutors and most of all by psychiatrists? When will
the boondoggle be stopped ending the theft of taxpayer funds for nonsensical
treatment?
Roy Bercaw, Editor, ENOUGH ROOM
Britney Back-out stuns label
Page Six
New York Post
Richard Johnson
August 22, 2007 -- Britney Spears backed out at the last minute from recording a
duet with her old flame, Justin Timberlake - and the inexplicable decision last
month has suits at her record label, Jive, very worried.
The duet, which was to be produced by hit-maker Timbaland at his studio in
Virginia Beach, could have started a big comeback for the troubled pop tart, who
peaked before she had two marriages and two kids.
A music industry source said Timberlake wrote the duet specifically for Spears.
Although they wouldn't be together in the studio, his voice would have been
mixed with hers later.
"Timbaland set aside a week out of his crazy schedule to do this - and then,
just before she was supposed to fly out, Britney abruptly canceled the session
and refused to do the song.
"It's crazy," the insider added. "She's looking for a comeback, and this would
have not only been a huge hit, but something she could have opened the MTV Video
Awards with and really blown everyone away."
Another insider said, "Listen, everyone is worried. In her mind, her album is
done and she's done enough work . . . She's an easy target right now, because
she's . . . sick. People like her are sick. It's like an anorexic who's sick in
the head and needs help. She needs help. It's sad because what she's got - and
we've heard it's like bipolar disorder - can easily be treated with medication,
but she won't do it."
[...]
Breathing Together
Breathing Together
If you believe government prosecutors, only crime families form
conspiracies. But in reporting the widening scandal of abuses of power by the
Office of the New York Governor, Fredric Dicker refers to "the plot by top
Spitzer Aides," and "one of the plotters." (Fredric Dicker, "Eliot aide lawyers
up," New York Post, August 21, 2007, page 2) A group of men working together to
abuse the police power of the state contrary to law sounds like a conspiracy to
me. Is it possible for public officials to conduct a criminal conspiracy? Is the
Pope German?
Roy Bercaw, Editor, ENOUGH ROOM
If you believe government prosecutors, only crime families form
conspiracies. But in reporting the widening scandal of abuses of power by the
Office of the New York Governor, Fredric Dicker refers to "the plot by top
Spitzer Aides," and "one of the plotters." (Fredric Dicker, "Eliot aide lawyers
up," New York Post, August 21, 2007, page 2) A group of men working together to
abuse the police power of the state contrary to law sounds like a conspiracy to
me. Is it possible for public officials to conduct a criminal conspiracy? Is the
Pope German?
Roy Bercaw, Editor, ENOUGH ROOM
Animal Rights vs Human Rights
Animal Rights vs Human Rights
PETA and Peter Singer regard abuses of humans as a lower priority than
abuses of animals. (Star Parker, "PETA: Sicker Than Vick," Miami Herald,
August 24, 2007) This standard is institutionalized in state and US
laws. Animal Protection Act of 1966 has fines and jail time for violations of
animal research laws. There are no penalties for violations of the laws on
humans used for research (Title 45 CFR Section 46). Office of Human Research
Protection refers complaints about unlawful research using humans to the accused
institution for processing.
After 7 humans died in medical experiments at Harvard teaching hospitals in
Boston there were no criminal proceedings, unlike in the Vick case abusing dogs.
Roy Bercaw, Editor, ENOUGH ROOM
Posted on Fri, Aug. 24, 2007
STAR PARKER: Who is sicker, Vick or PETA?
MiamiHerald.com
The Michael Vick dogfighting scandal is morphing into a broader NFL dogfighting
scandal, as other NFL players also appear to be involved in this very weird
pastime.
But as animal-rights groups get more aggressive in their accusations and
demands, the whole scene is getting stranger and stranger. And the closer you
look, the more you see the deep conflicts in core values that fracture our
society.
PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) wants the NFL to "add cruelty
to animals - in all its forms - to its personal conduct policy." What, for PETA,
is "cruelty to animals - in all its forms"? According to its Web site, we should
not eat, wear, experiment on, use for entertainment or abuse animals in any way.
So PETA's problem is well beyond the sick and cruel murdering of these creatures
of which Vick and others are allegedly guilty. Dogfighting for entertainment, or
any other use of animals for entertainment, is itself, for PETA, cruelty.
If it's relevant to look for any kind of logic here, why would it be decent
entertainment to watch hulks of men ram the daylights out of each other as they
move a ball across a field, but cruel to watch dogs fight? Why would the NFL
sign on to such a thing?
More specifically, among PETA's prohibitions, is the use of animal skins. The
ball, as in football, is an inflated leather object endearingly called the
"pigskin."
Why does PETA oppose existing NFL conduct policy, and not football itself?
J.C. Watts, Chuck Colson and others have asked why abuse of dogs is outrageous
to so many who see no similar outrage in the 800,000-plus abortions that occur
in the United States each year. At the most intuitive level, there is something
unsettling about an attitude for which abuse of a dog is intolerable, but women
destroying their unborn children with impunity is not a problem.
[...]
PETA provides material on its Web site to explain the rationale of the
"animal-rights" concept that drives its worldview. "When it comes to pain, love,
joy, loneliness, and fear, a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy," says PETA founder
Ingrid Newkirk.
For more extensive exposition, the site refers to the writings of Princeton
philosopher Peter Singer, author of "Animal Liberation."
Now Singer has written on a great deal more than animal rights. He's the author
of "Practical Ethics," in which he offers his justifications for euthanasia,
abortion and infanticide.
According to Singer, parents should be permitted to kill a baby born with a
tragic illness or defect. In "Practical Ethics," he argues that "... the fact
that a being is a human being, in the sense of a member of the species Homo
sapiens, is not relevant to the wrongness of killing it; it is, rather,
characteristics like rationality, autonomy and self-consciousness that make a
difference. Infants lack these characteristics. Killing them, therefore, cannot
be equated with killing normal human beings, or any other self-conscious
beings."
Thus, through a long and twisted road of logic, beginning with one man's own
premises about existence, we are led to a conclusion that killing animals is an
outrage, but an infant, not.
[...]
* Star Parker is president of CURE, Coalition on Urban Renewal and Education
(www.urbancure.org) and author of three books. She can be reached at
parker@urbancure.org.
PETA and Peter Singer regard abuses of humans as a lower priority than
abuses of animals. (Star Parker, "PETA: Sicker Than Vick," Miami Herald,
August 24, 2007) This standard is institutionalized in state and US
laws. Animal Protection Act of 1966 has fines and jail time for violations of
animal research laws. There are no penalties for violations of the laws on
humans used for research (Title 45 CFR Section 46). Office of Human Research
Protection refers complaints about unlawful research using humans to the accused
institution for processing.
After 7 humans died in medical experiments at Harvard teaching hospitals in
Boston there were no criminal proceedings, unlike in the Vick case abusing dogs.
Roy Bercaw, Editor, ENOUGH ROOM
Posted on Fri, Aug. 24, 2007
STAR PARKER: Who is sicker, Vick or PETA?
MiamiHerald.com
The Michael Vick dogfighting scandal is morphing into a broader NFL dogfighting
scandal, as other NFL players also appear to be involved in this very weird
pastime.
But as animal-rights groups get more aggressive in their accusations and
demands, the whole scene is getting stranger and stranger. And the closer you
look, the more you see the deep conflicts in core values that fracture our
society.
PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) wants the NFL to "add cruelty
to animals - in all its forms - to its personal conduct policy." What, for PETA,
is "cruelty to animals - in all its forms"? According to its Web site, we should
not eat, wear, experiment on, use for entertainment or abuse animals in any way.
So PETA's problem is well beyond the sick and cruel murdering of these creatures
of which Vick and others are allegedly guilty. Dogfighting for entertainment, or
any other use of animals for entertainment, is itself, for PETA, cruelty.
If it's relevant to look for any kind of logic here, why would it be decent
entertainment to watch hulks of men ram the daylights out of each other as they
move a ball across a field, but cruel to watch dogs fight? Why would the NFL
sign on to such a thing?
More specifically, among PETA's prohibitions, is the use of animal skins. The
ball, as in football, is an inflated leather object endearingly called the
"pigskin."
Why does PETA oppose existing NFL conduct policy, and not football itself?
J.C. Watts, Chuck Colson and others have asked why abuse of dogs is outrageous
to so many who see no similar outrage in the 800,000-plus abortions that occur
in the United States each year. At the most intuitive level, there is something
unsettling about an attitude for which abuse of a dog is intolerable, but women
destroying their unborn children with impunity is not a problem.
[...]
PETA provides material on its Web site to explain the rationale of the
"animal-rights" concept that drives its worldview. "When it comes to pain, love,
joy, loneliness, and fear, a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy," says PETA founder
Ingrid Newkirk.
For more extensive exposition, the site refers to the writings of Princeton
philosopher Peter Singer, author of "Animal Liberation."
Now Singer has written on a great deal more than animal rights. He's the author
of "Practical Ethics," in which he offers his justifications for euthanasia,
abortion and infanticide.
According to Singer, parents should be permitted to kill a baby born with a
tragic illness or defect. In "Practical Ethics," he argues that "... the fact
that a being is a human being, in the sense of a member of the species Homo
sapiens, is not relevant to the wrongness of killing it; it is, rather,
characteristics like rationality, autonomy and self-consciousness that make a
difference. Infants lack these characteristics. Killing them, therefore, cannot
be equated with killing normal human beings, or any other self-conscious
beings."
Thus, through a long and twisted road of logic, beginning with one man's own
premises about existence, we are led to a conclusion that killing animals is an
outrage, but an infant, not.
[...]
* Star Parker is president of CURE, Coalition on Urban Renewal and Education
(www.urbancure.org) and author of three books. She can be reached at
parker@urbancure.org.
ADL Ignores Bias Toward Persons With Disabilities
ADL Ignores Bias Toward Persons With Disabilities
The reluctance of the National ADL to officially recognize the Armenian
genocide is not an anomaly. (Michael Levenson, "For longtime ADL leader, a rare
reversal of course," Boston Globe, August 22, 2007) For several years I asked
the ADL locally and nationally to address serious institutionalized
discrimination against persons with disabilities. The ADL ignores the abuses as
they did with the Armenian genocide.
The ADL acts as journalists and politicians do. They consider issues raised
by wealthy and politically connected persons. Instead of focusing on abuses of
vulnerable persons, journalists, politicians and the ADL help wealthy
individuals who are members of politically connected groups. Those who need the
help the least get special privileges due to their identity not according to
their need.
Roy Bercaw, Editor, ENOUGH ROOM
For longtime ADL leader, a rare reversal of course
By Michael Levenson,
Boston Globe Staff
August 22, 2007
He has stood up to Mel Gibson, Jimmy Carter, Louis Farrakhan, and the president
of Iran. But Abraham H. Foxman, the director of the Anti-Defamation League,
backed down yesterday after a standoff with Armenian-Americans in Watertown drew
the attention of some of the nation's most prominent Jewish leaders.
Foxman, a Holocaust survivor, reversed course and acknowledged that the
slaughter of 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman Turks was genocide. The change
stunned those who have followed Foxman's 42-year career at the ADL, where he has
rarely bowed to critics.
Jewish leaders said Foxman, who has made it his life's mission to fight
anti-Semitism and injustice, had little choice but to acknowledge the Armenian
genocide. Elie Wiesel, the famous Jewish author, had already endorsed the
position, and this week counseled Foxman to follow his lead.
"This issue resonated so deeply with the Jewish community that he simply could
not resist the pressures from below," said Harvard Law School Professor Alan M.
Dershowitz, a self-described Foxman fan. "He had to listen to the people, and
the people spoke in a loud and clear voice. The people said: 'Truth first.
Politics second.' "
Last week, Foxman fired Andrew H. Tarsy, the ADL's New England director, after
Tarsy defied the national group's policy and agreed to call the Armenian
massacre genocide. Foxman said he worried that using the term genocide could
alienate Turkey, a rare Muslim ally of Israel. In a letter, Foxman wrote, "No
organization can or should tolerate such an act of open defiance."
[...]
Michael Levenson can be reached at mlevenson@globe.com.
The reluctance of the National ADL to officially recognize the Armenian
genocide is not an anomaly. (Michael Levenson, "For longtime ADL leader, a rare
reversal of course," Boston Globe, August 22, 2007) For several years I asked
the ADL locally and nationally to address serious institutionalized
discrimination against persons with disabilities. The ADL ignores the abuses as
they did with the Armenian genocide.
The ADL acts as journalists and politicians do. They consider issues raised
by wealthy and politically connected persons. Instead of focusing on abuses of
vulnerable persons, journalists, politicians and the ADL help wealthy
individuals who are members of politically connected groups. Those who need the
help the least get special privileges due to their identity not according to
their need.
Roy Bercaw, Editor, ENOUGH ROOM
For longtime ADL leader, a rare reversal of course
By Michael Levenson,
Boston Globe Staff
August 22, 2007
He has stood up to Mel Gibson, Jimmy Carter, Louis Farrakhan, and the president
of Iran. But Abraham H. Foxman, the director of the Anti-Defamation League,
backed down yesterday after a standoff with Armenian-Americans in Watertown drew
the attention of some of the nation's most prominent Jewish leaders.
Foxman, a Holocaust survivor, reversed course and acknowledged that the
slaughter of 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman Turks was genocide. The change
stunned those who have followed Foxman's 42-year career at the ADL, where he has
rarely bowed to critics.
Jewish leaders said Foxman, who has made it his life's mission to fight
anti-Semitism and injustice, had little choice but to acknowledge the Armenian
genocide. Elie Wiesel, the famous Jewish author, had already endorsed the
position, and this week counseled Foxman to follow his lead.
"This issue resonated so deeply with the Jewish community that he simply could
not resist the pressures from below," said Harvard Law School Professor Alan M.
Dershowitz, a self-described Foxman fan. "He had to listen to the people, and
the people spoke in a loud and clear voice. The people said: 'Truth first.
Politics second.' "
Last week, Foxman fired Andrew H. Tarsy, the ADL's New England director, after
Tarsy defied the national group's policy and agreed to call the Armenian
massacre genocide. Foxman said he worried that using the term genocide could
alienate Turkey, a rare Muslim ally of Israel. In a letter, Foxman wrote, "No
organization can or should tolerate such an act of open defiance."
[...]
Michael Levenson can be reached at mlevenson@globe.com.
August 14, 2007
Skating in Lane
Skating in Lane
Is skating in traffic a safe way to get a medical professional around
Manhattan? (Ginger Adams Otis, "Dr. Wheel-good is on call," NYPost, August 5,
2007, page 9) If this form of transportation catches on how long before the
skater's lobby demands skating lanes?
Why not ban pedestrians so that there is more room for cars, bikes, and
skaters? This will permit eliminating sidewalks for more parking.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Is skating in traffic a safe way to get a medical professional around
Manhattan? (Ginger Adams Otis, "Dr. Wheel-good is on call," NYPost, August 5,
2007, page 9) If this form of transportation catches on how long before the
skater's lobby demands skating lanes?
Why not ban pedestrians so that there is more room for cars, bikes, and
skaters? This will permit eliminating sidewalks for more parking.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
In the Name of Right
In the Name of Right
Explaining the abuse of police power, New York Governor Eliot Spitzer said,
his administration "'allowed our passion to get the best of us,' They were
'fighting so hard for what we believed was right that we let down out guard.'"
(John Podhoretz, "The Humble Act," NYPost, August 10, 2007, page 31) Have these
small-minded politicians ever heard George Bernard Shaw's dictum, "The road to
hell is paved with good intentions?" Or Greek pre-Homeric Philosopher
Cleobulous's observation that "The chief source of evil among men is excessive
good?"
The lack of respect for New York Senator Joe Bruno and for the democratic
process indicates that these politicians are simply evil. The greatest harm
always appears in the name of good. Why are these superior men employed by "The
Steamroller" unable to simply follow the laws of the state and the US? Does
their superiority make them see what is more important than obeying the law and
their oaths of office?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Explaining the abuse of police power, New York Governor Eliot Spitzer said,
his administration "'allowed our passion to get the best of us,' They were
'fighting so hard for what we believed was right that we let down out guard.'"
(John Podhoretz, "The Humble Act," NYPost, August 10, 2007, page 31) Have these
small-minded politicians ever heard George Bernard Shaw's dictum, "The road to
hell is paved with good intentions?" Or Greek pre-Homeric Philosopher
Cleobulous's observation that "The chief source of evil among men is excessive
good?"
The lack of respect for New York Senator Joe Bruno and for the democratic
process indicates that these politicians are simply evil. The greatest harm
always appears in the name of good. Why are these superior men employed by "The
Steamroller" unable to simply follow the laws of the state and the US? Does
their superiority make them see what is more important than obeying the law and
their oaths of office?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Paying for Citizen Input
Paying for Citizen Input
[This letter was published in the Cambridge Chronicle on Tuesday August 14, 2007 online edition.]
Paying 150 students $7.50 per hour for about two hours each is a bargain at
any price. (Matt Dunning, "City to pay for kids" perspectives on violence,"
Cambridge Chronicle, Aug 10, 2007) Less than $2500 for 150 opinions is a great
investment. Usually the City pays hundreds of thousands of dollars for opinions
from experts with impeccable credentials who say little to help solve city
problems. They always write and print dazzling reports which impress the vacuous
politicians.
Are these students the young people who have negative encounters with the
police? Or will their opinions be second and third hand hearsay? Will these
students flatter the politicians telling them what they want to hear? Will these
students be able to tell the politicians and other public officials that it is
police role models and politician role models who teach young people that
obeying the law is for chumps?
What part of supporting and defending the Constitution and laws of the US
do these politicians not understand?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
City to pay for kids' perspectives on violence
By Matt Dunning/Chronicle Staff
Fri Aug 10, 2007, 04:48 PM EDT
Cambridge -
The city plans to pay kids to get their perspective on youth violence in a forum
Monday night in conjunction with the Citywide Crime Task Force.
Members of the task force announced the Office of Work Force Development would
be co-hosting a youth forum at the Rindge and Latin Monday (Aug. 13) afternoon.
During a discussion about the forum Thursday night, Mayor Ken Reeves said
officials were expecting about 150 teens to attend the forum, all of whom would
be paid $7.50 per hour. Members of the task force will be reviewing the input at
its next meeting in September.
"The reason we anticipate that is that Ellen [Semonoff and the Office of Work
Force Development] have been generous enough to pay the kids to come," Reeves
said. The purpose of the forum. He said, was to give the city's youth an
opportunity to tell city officials how they feel about their relationship with
police, as well as violence and tensions between neighborhoods.
According to Semonoff, the assistant city manager of human services, between 100
and 150 teens - out of more than 800 participating in the city's Summer Youth
Employment Program - have signed up for the forum. Semonoff said the teens would
be paid the program's regular rate of $7.50 per hour.
"It's not a big departure from anything we normally do," Semonoff said. "Every
summer, we offer the kids a number of opportunities to participate in
educational forums and special events, and we pay them if they want to
participate."
"This forum next week is a chance for them to offer their perceptions of safety
in the city, ways in which they think city officials can make Cambridge a safer
place to live, and what role youths in the city might play in that," she added.
"It seemed appropriate to offer the kids the opportunity."
In the past, Semonoff said her department has paid for teen workers to attend
financial literacy and educational forums. Each of the more than 800 Cambridge
teens participating in the summer employment program received an invitation to
Monday's forum.
The 2007 Cambridge Youth Forum is scheduled for 2 p.m., Aug. 13 in the CRLS Main
Cafeteria.
[This letter was published in the Cambridge Chronicle on Tuesday August 14, 2007 online edition.]
Paying 150 students $7.50 per hour for about two hours each is a bargain at
any price. (Matt Dunning, "City to pay for kids" perspectives on violence,"
Cambridge Chronicle, Aug 10, 2007) Less than $2500 for 150 opinions is a great
investment. Usually the City pays hundreds of thousands of dollars for opinions
from experts with impeccable credentials who say little to help solve city
problems. They always write and print dazzling reports which impress the vacuous
politicians.
Are these students the young people who have negative encounters with the
police? Or will their opinions be second and third hand hearsay? Will these
students flatter the politicians telling them what they want to hear? Will these
students be able to tell the politicians and other public officials that it is
police role models and politician role models who teach young people that
obeying the law is for chumps?
What part of supporting and defending the Constitution and laws of the US
do these politicians not understand?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
City to pay for kids' perspectives on violence
By Matt Dunning/Chronicle Staff
Fri Aug 10, 2007, 04:48 PM EDT
Cambridge -
The city plans to pay kids to get their perspective on youth violence in a forum
Monday night in conjunction with the Citywide Crime Task Force.
Members of the task force announced the Office of Work Force Development would
be co-hosting a youth forum at the Rindge and Latin Monday (Aug. 13) afternoon.
During a discussion about the forum Thursday night, Mayor Ken Reeves said
officials were expecting about 150 teens to attend the forum, all of whom would
be paid $7.50 per hour. Members of the task force will be reviewing the input at
its next meeting in September.
"The reason we anticipate that is that Ellen [Semonoff and the Office of Work
Force Development] have been generous enough to pay the kids to come," Reeves
said. The purpose of the forum. He said, was to give the city's youth an
opportunity to tell city officials how they feel about their relationship with
police, as well as violence and tensions between neighborhoods.
According to Semonoff, the assistant city manager of human services, between 100
and 150 teens - out of more than 800 participating in the city's Summer Youth
Employment Program - have signed up for the forum. Semonoff said the teens would
be paid the program's regular rate of $7.50 per hour.
"It's not a big departure from anything we normally do," Semonoff said. "Every
summer, we offer the kids a number of opportunities to participate in
educational forums and special events, and we pay them if they want to
participate."
"This forum next week is a chance for them to offer their perceptions of safety
in the city, ways in which they think city officials can make Cambridge a safer
place to live, and what role youths in the city might play in that," she added.
"It seemed appropriate to offer the kids the opportunity."
In the past, Semonoff said her department has paid for teen workers to attend
financial literacy and educational forums. Each of the more than 800 Cambridge
teens participating in the summer employment program received an invitation to
Monday's forum.
The 2007 Cambridge Youth Forum is scheduled for 2 p.m., Aug. 13 in the CRLS Main
Cafeteria.
Curious Priorities
Curious Priorities
Julia Vitullo-Martin recognizes that "living on the street inevitably
causes mental and physical deterioration." ("Homeless Hell," New York Post,
August 13, 2007, page 25) Nonetheless she does not see anything irrational about
delivering taxpayer funded medication to persons without homes, but not
providing funding to house them.
If being homeless causes dysfunction it is more profitable to continue
taxpayer funding to medicate those exhibiting the results of being homeless. If
they had a home they may not need medication. That would be bad for business. As
long as the taxpayer funds these irrational counterproductive programs they will
never end.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Julia Vitullo-Martin recognizes that "living on the street inevitably
causes mental and physical deterioration." ("Homeless Hell," New York Post,
August 13, 2007, page 25) Nonetheless she does not see anything irrational about
delivering taxpayer funded medication to persons without homes, but not
providing funding to house them.
If being homeless causes dysfunction it is more profitable to continue
taxpayer funding to medicate those exhibiting the results of being homeless. If
they had a home they may not need medication. That would be bad for business. As
long as the taxpayer funds these irrational counterproductive programs they will
never end.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Exploiting Vulnerable Persons
Exploiting Vulnerable Persons
It is better late than never to expose the exploitation of persons with
disabilities by able-bodied persons. (Andrea Estes, "Tough laws eyed against
handicap permit abuse," Boston Globe, August 14, 2007; "Many use handicap
permits illegally," August 13, 2007) When will the courts address the misuse of
discrimination laws by attorneys for millionaire thug athletes and drug addicts
to avoid criminal liability? When will the legislature stop writing laws for the
benefit of human services corporations, which permit further exploitation of
persons with disabilities?
The comment by the private attorney for disbility rights indicates how
accommodating these taxpayer funded alleged "advocates" for persons with
disabilities are. When the Inspector General of the state exhibits more outrage
than an attorney for the Disability Law Center you know there is
institutionalized exploitation. Where were all of these attorneys all of these
years?
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Tough laws eyed against handicap permit abuse
By Andrea Estes,
Boston Globe Staff
August 14, 2007
State and city officials vowed a crackdown on the illegal use of handicap
parking permits yesterday after a year-long state investigation revealed
widespread fraud by drivers using other people's placards to park all day at
meters or in specially designated spaces.
The Registry of Motor Vehicles, which conducted the investigation with the
Inspector General's office, said it would begin cross-checking permits with the
Social Security Administration to ensure that the placards are taken out of
circulation when the driver dies.
The Patrick administration said it will soon file legislation making it a
felony, punishable by up to five years in prison, to use a counterfeit or
altered placard.
State Representative Lewis Evangelidis filed a bill that would double the
existing fines for fraudulent use of a placard from $500 for the first offense
to $1,000. Under the bill, a violator's driver's license would be suspended for
a year, up from the current suspension of 30 days.
"I find it unconscionable that anyone would take advantage of a system that is
designed to help those in need," said Evangelidis, Republican of Holden. "You
are either deemed handicapped and in need of the plate, or you are committing
fraud by using it."
[...]
Andrea Estes can be reached at estes@globe.com.
Many use handicap permits illegally
Registry probe finds violations widespread
By Andrea Estes,
Boston Globe Staff
August 13, 2007
A yearlong investigation by the state inspector general and the Registry of
Motor Vehicles has turned up widespread abuse of the placards that allow people
with disabilities to park all day in designated spots and free of charge at
meters across the state.
Investigators focusing on three Boston commercial districts where parking is
particularly scarce -- North Station, Newbury Street, and the Financial District
-- found nearly a third of the roughly 1,000 placards they saw on vehicles were
being used by people who were not disabled and had been issued to someone else.
Forty-nine placards were used repeatedly even though the registered holder of
the permit had died -- in some cases several years ago. Nine placards had been
renewed since the person's death.
At a time when an aging population has an ever-increasing need for the permits,
the misuse of spots and placards for the disabled is "an unconscionable insult
and a fraud," said Inspector General Gregory Sullivan.
Registry officials, who will announce the findings at a news conference today,
said abuse of the placards is a rampant problem that is getting worse.
[...]
Andrea Estes can be reached at estes@globe.com.
It is better late than never to expose the exploitation of persons with
disabilities by able-bodied persons. (Andrea Estes, "Tough laws eyed against
handicap permit abuse," Boston Globe, August 14, 2007; "Many use handicap
permits illegally," August 13, 2007) When will the courts address the misuse of
discrimination laws by attorneys for millionaire thug athletes and drug addicts
to avoid criminal liability? When will the legislature stop writing laws for the
benefit of human services corporations, which permit further exploitation of
persons with disabilities?
The comment by the private attorney for disbility rights indicates how
accommodating these taxpayer funded alleged "advocates" for persons with
disabilities are. When the Inspector General of the state exhibits more outrage
than an attorney for the Disability Law Center you know there is
institutionalized exploitation. Where were all of these attorneys all of these
years?
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Tough laws eyed against handicap permit abuse
By Andrea Estes,
Boston Globe Staff
August 14, 2007
State and city officials vowed a crackdown on the illegal use of handicap
parking permits yesterday after a year-long state investigation revealed
widespread fraud by drivers using other people's placards to park all day at
meters or in specially designated spaces.
The Registry of Motor Vehicles, which conducted the investigation with the
Inspector General's office, said it would begin cross-checking permits with the
Social Security Administration to ensure that the placards are taken out of
circulation when the driver dies.
The Patrick administration said it will soon file legislation making it a
felony, punishable by up to five years in prison, to use a counterfeit or
altered placard.
State Representative Lewis Evangelidis filed a bill that would double the
existing fines for fraudulent use of a placard from $500 for the first offense
to $1,000. Under the bill, a violator's driver's license would be suspended for
a year, up from the current suspension of 30 days.
"I find it unconscionable that anyone would take advantage of a system that is
designed to help those in need," said Evangelidis, Republican of Holden. "You
are either deemed handicapped and in need of the plate, or you are committing
fraud by using it."
[...]
Andrea Estes can be reached at estes@globe.com.
Many use handicap permits illegally
Registry probe finds violations widespread
By Andrea Estes,
Boston Globe Staff
August 13, 2007
A yearlong investigation by the state inspector general and the Registry of
Motor Vehicles has turned up widespread abuse of the placards that allow people
with disabilities to park all day in designated spots and free of charge at
meters across the state.
Investigators focusing on three Boston commercial districts where parking is
particularly scarce -- North Station, Newbury Street, and the Financial District
-- found nearly a third of the roughly 1,000 placards they saw on vehicles were
being used by people who were not disabled and had been issued to someone else.
Forty-nine placards were used repeatedly even though the registered holder of
the permit had died -- in some cases several years ago. Nine placards had been
renewed since the person's death.
At a time when an aging population has an ever-increasing need for the permits,
the misuse of spots and placards for the disabled is "an unconscionable insult
and a fraud," said Inspector General Gregory Sullivan.
Registry officials, who will announce the findings at a news conference today,
said abuse of the placards is a rampant problem that is getting worse.
[...]
Andrea Estes can be reached at estes@globe.com.
August 9, 2007
$101 million in Taxpayer Money
$101 million in Taxpayer Money
[This letter was published in the Boston Herald on July 31, 2007]
The experts and Prof. Bloom miss the essential point of the $101 million
dollar award. (Dave Wedge and Mike Underwood, "Staggering judgment clear warning
to law enforcement," Boston Herald, July 27, 2007)
The $101 million award is taxpayer money. The criminal agents, police
and other officials who were negligent did not pay for attorneys fees either.
This judgment will not prevent further misadventures and permits police
and the FBI to cover up more abuses. There is no incentive to stop such
malfeasance
because there is no individual liability.
There was no penalty to Paul Rico or any supervising agents over 30 years.
This is not "a warning that no one is above the law." The "loud and clear
message" is that it costs nothing to abuse police powers. The taxpayer will pay
for your abuses.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Staggering judgment clear warning to law enforcement
Boston Herald
By Dave Wedge and Mike Underwood/ Analysis
Friday, July 27, 2007 - Updated: 07:10 AM EST
Stinging criticism of the FBI and the staggering sum awarded to four men wrongly
jailed for murder should flash a warning that no one is above the law, experts
believe.
U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner yesterday awarded $101.7 million after the
men were jailed for a 1965 murder they did not commit, spending three decades
behind bars because the FBI withheld crucial evidence of their innocence.
“I have concluded that the plaintiffs’ accusations that the United States
government violated the law are proved,” Gertner seethed as she fired a
broadside at the feds.
Peter Limone, 73, and Joseph Salvati, 75, and the families of the two other
men who died in prison had sued the federal government for malicious
prosecution.
They argued that Boston FBI agents H. Paul Rico and Dennis Condon knew mob
hit man Joseph “The Animal” Barboza lied when he named the men as killers in the
1965 death of Edward “Teddy” Deegan.
They said Barboza was protecting a fellow FBI informant, Vincent ‘Jimmy‘
Flemmi, who was involved.
The government’s argument that federal authorities could not be held
responsible for a state prosecution was branded “absurd” by Gertner.
“While Salvati and Limone languished in jail for thirty-odd years and Greco
and Tameleo died in prison, Barboza and his FBI handlers flourished,” the judge
blasted.
Experts say the settlement and Gertner’s fierce criticism should have a
ripple effect on the way law enforcement conducts business in future.
“The judgment has definitely sent a message and the message is law
enforcement needs to play the game fairly and if they don’t play it fairly
there’s going to be ramifications,” said Boston College law Professor Robert
Bloom.
“The fact that it’s $100 million, will be a loud and clear message.”
[...]
[This letter was published in the Boston Herald on July 31, 2007]
The experts and Prof. Bloom miss the essential point of the $101 million
dollar award. (Dave Wedge and Mike Underwood, "Staggering judgment clear warning
to law enforcement," Boston Herald, July 27, 2007)
The $101 million award is taxpayer money. The criminal agents, police
and other officials who were negligent did not pay for attorneys fees either.
This judgment will not prevent further misadventures and permits police
and the FBI to cover up more abuses. There is no incentive to stop such
malfeasance
because there is no individual liability.
There was no penalty to Paul Rico or any supervising agents over 30 years.
This is not "a warning that no one is above the law." The "loud and clear
message" is that it costs nothing to abuse police powers. The taxpayer will pay
for your abuses.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Staggering judgment clear warning to law enforcement
Boston Herald
By Dave Wedge and Mike Underwood/ Analysis
Friday, July 27, 2007 - Updated: 07:10 AM EST
Stinging criticism of the FBI and the staggering sum awarded to four men wrongly
jailed for murder should flash a warning that no one is above the law, experts
believe.
U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner yesterday awarded $101.7 million after the
men were jailed for a 1965 murder they did not commit, spending three decades
behind bars because the FBI withheld crucial evidence of their innocence.
“I have concluded that the plaintiffs’ accusations that the United States
government violated the law are proved,” Gertner seethed as she fired a
broadside at the feds.
Peter Limone, 73, and Joseph Salvati, 75, and the families of the two other
men who died in prison had sued the federal government for malicious
prosecution.
They argued that Boston FBI agents H. Paul Rico and Dennis Condon knew mob
hit man Joseph “The Animal” Barboza lied when he named the men as killers in the
1965 death of Edward “Teddy” Deegan.
They said Barboza was protecting a fellow FBI informant, Vincent ‘Jimmy‘
Flemmi, who was involved.
The government’s argument that federal authorities could not be held
responsible for a state prosecution was branded “absurd” by Gertner.
“While Salvati and Limone languished in jail for thirty-odd years and Greco
and Tameleo died in prison, Barboza and his FBI handlers flourished,” the judge
blasted.
Experts say the settlement and Gertner’s fierce criticism should have a
ripple effect on the way law enforcement conducts business in future.
“The judgment has definitely sent a message and the message is law
enforcement needs to play the game fairly and if they don’t play it fairly
there’s going to be ramifications,” said Boston College law Professor Robert
Bloom.
“The fact that it’s $100 million, will be a loud and clear message.”
[...]
Egg-laying Hens Need Protection?
Egg-laying Hens Need Protection?
Passing resolutions to protect animals over abuses of humans shows the
curious priorities of the Cambridge City Council. (Donna Goodison, "Cambridge
squawks over cages," Boston Herald, August 1, 2007) There are criminal penalties
to protect animals used for research at the state and US levels. But there are
no penalties for violations of laws using human subjects in medical experiments.
Cambridge has a Laboratory Animal Commissioner but no person whose mission is to
protect humans used in research.
Why are there no standards to protect egg-laying hens from sexual abuses of
roosters? Are full rights under Roe vs. Wade extended to egg-laying hens? What
laws prohibit sexual harassment by roosters? The Cambridge resolution has no
teeth and needs penalties to make it real. This is one more example of pandering
to the voters.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Cambridge squawks over cages
By Donna Goodison
Boston Herald
Wednesday, August 1, 2007 - Updated: 09:57 AM EST
Cambridge became the sixth U.S. city to formally condemn factory farms’
confinement of egg-laying hens to small wire “battery” cages.
The Cambridge City Council on Monday unanimously passed a resolution
opposing the “inherent cruelty” of the cages and encouraging consumers not to
purchase eggs produced by caged hens.
“With no opportunity to engage in many of their natural behaviors -
including nesting, dust bathing, perching and walking - these birds endure lives
wrought with suffering,” the resolution, worded with help from the Humane
Society of the United States, states. The resolution was introduced by Councilor
Craig Kelley at the request of Cambridge resident Ryan Shapiro, a Ph.D. student
at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “I knew that other city councils
had passed resolutions condemning the cruelty inherent in the use of battery
cages,” Shapiro said. “And Cambridge being such a progressive city, I thought it
would be terrific for us to do something like that as well.”
Shapiro is the brother of Paul Shapiro, senior director of the Humane
Society’s factory farming campaign. [...]
Passing resolutions to protect animals over abuses of humans shows the
curious priorities of the Cambridge City Council. (Donna Goodison, "Cambridge
squawks over cages," Boston Herald, August 1, 2007) There are criminal penalties
to protect animals used for research at the state and US levels. But there are
no penalties for violations of laws using human subjects in medical experiments.
Cambridge has a Laboratory Animal Commissioner but no person whose mission is to
protect humans used in research.
Why are there no standards to protect egg-laying hens from sexual abuses of
roosters? Are full rights under Roe vs. Wade extended to egg-laying hens? What
laws prohibit sexual harassment by roosters? The Cambridge resolution has no
teeth and needs penalties to make it real. This is one more example of pandering
to the voters.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Cambridge squawks over cages
By Donna Goodison
Boston Herald
Wednesday, August 1, 2007 - Updated: 09:57 AM EST
Cambridge became the sixth U.S. city to formally condemn factory farms’
confinement of egg-laying hens to small wire “battery” cages.
The Cambridge City Council on Monday unanimously passed a resolution
opposing the “inherent cruelty” of the cages and encouraging consumers not to
purchase eggs produced by caged hens.
“With no opportunity to engage in many of their natural behaviors -
including nesting, dust bathing, perching and walking - these birds endure lives
wrought with suffering,” the resolution, worded with help from the Humane
Society of the United States, states. The resolution was introduced by Councilor
Craig Kelley at the request of Cambridge resident Ryan Shapiro, a Ph.D. student
at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “I knew that other city councils
had passed resolutions condemning the cruelty inherent in the use of battery
cages,” Shapiro said. “And Cambridge being such a progressive city, I thought it
would be terrific for us to do something like that as well.”
Shapiro is the brother of Paul Shapiro, senior director of the Humane
Society’s factory farming campaign. [...]
Eliot-gate Grows Larger
Eliot-gate Grows Larger
[This letter was published in the New York Post on July 10, 2007]
The youthful New York Governor did not learn from Watergate that the cover
up is always worse than the crime. ("Eliot's Stonewall," New York Post, Editorial,
July 30, 2007, page 26); (Fedric Dicker, "'Counsel' ploy silenced aides in AG's
probe," Page 5, "Empower Andy: GOP,"page 4) When will Eliot "I Am the the Greatest" 'fess up and face the consequences? The more he tries to avoid his fate the worse it will be for him.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
[This letter was published in the New York Post on July 10, 2007]
The youthful New York Governor did not learn from Watergate that the cover
up is always worse than the crime. ("Eliot's Stonewall," New York Post, Editorial,
July 30, 2007, page 26); (Fedric Dicker, "'Counsel' ploy silenced aides in AG's
probe," Page 5, "Empower Andy: GOP,"page 4) When will Eliot "I Am the the Greatest" 'fess up and face the consequences? The more he tries to avoid his fate the worse it will be for him.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Hear, See and Print No Evil
Hear, See and Print No Evil
Leave it to state legislators to make US politicians look good. (April
Simpson, "Legislators dump US mandates at 'Tea Party,'" Boston Globe, August 6,
2007) With a 14 percent approval rating among voters Congress is lower than the
president in opinon polls. But state officials go out of their way to waste time
and to make it look as if they do something. Their first priority is to keep the
campaign funds flowing into the bank.
Next is to create and maintain a positive image. Throwing empty boxes into
the harbor fits the bill, bringing the fawning media toadies. This boondoggle
costs the taxpayer $1.5 million.
Choosing Boston as the site for this self-serving taxpayer funded gathering
indicates that these state politicians know of the one-party unaccountable
government in Massachusetts. They may know how the Boston Globe looks away when
the government abuses its power. The Globe does not want to jeopardize any of
its sources. Ahem!
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Legislators dump US mandates at 'Tea Party'
By April Simpson,
Boston Globe Staff
August 6, 2007
Mimicking American colonists, four state senators from across the country staged
a modern-day Boston Tea Party yesterday, this time protesting an overreaching
government on the mainland.
"Instead of throwing tea in the harbor, we want to dump some of the unfunded
federal mandates that we've been saddled with by Congress over the years," said
Senator Richard T. Moore, who represents the Worcester and Norfolk districts in
the state Legislature. "It's easy if you live in Washington to vote for a
program, especially if you don't have to pay for it."
From the deck of a 137-foot schooner docked at Rowes Wharf, the four legislators
swung hollow crates marked with unfunded federal mandates above the murky waters
of Boston Harbor.
But it was just a ceremonial toss, imitating the 1773 protest against British
taxation without representation.
"We don't want to get arrested," Moore said while pretending to throw overboard
a crate marked $12 million to fund No Child Left Behind, a law that raises
standards for new teachers and has stringent requirements for public schools to
raise students' test scores.
[...]
Leave it to state legislators to make US politicians look good. (April
Simpson, "Legislators dump US mandates at 'Tea Party,'" Boston Globe, August 6,
2007) With a 14 percent approval rating among voters Congress is lower than the
president in opinon polls. But state officials go out of their way to waste time
and to make it look as if they do something. Their first priority is to keep the
campaign funds flowing into the bank.
Next is to create and maintain a positive image. Throwing empty boxes into
the harbor fits the bill, bringing the fawning media toadies. This boondoggle
costs the taxpayer $1.5 million.
Choosing Boston as the site for this self-serving taxpayer funded gathering
indicates that these state politicians know of the one-party unaccountable
government in Massachusetts. They may know how the Boston Globe looks away when
the government abuses its power. The Globe does not want to jeopardize any of
its sources. Ahem!
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Legislators dump US mandates at 'Tea Party'
By April Simpson,
Boston Globe Staff
August 6, 2007
Mimicking American colonists, four state senators from across the country staged
a modern-day Boston Tea Party yesterday, this time protesting an overreaching
government on the mainland.
"Instead of throwing tea in the harbor, we want to dump some of the unfunded
federal mandates that we've been saddled with by Congress over the years," said
Senator Richard T. Moore, who represents the Worcester and Norfolk districts in
the state Legislature. "It's easy if you live in Washington to vote for a
program, especially if you don't have to pay for it."
From the deck of a 137-foot schooner docked at Rowes Wharf, the four legislators
swung hollow crates marked with unfunded federal mandates above the murky waters
of Boston Harbor.
But it was just a ceremonial toss, imitating the 1773 protest against British
taxation without representation.
"We don't want to get arrested," Moore said while pretending to throw overboard
a crate marked $12 million to fund No Child Left Behind, a law that raises
standards for new teachers and has stringent requirements for public schools to
raise students' test scores.
[...]
Charities for Politicians?
Charities for Politicians?
According to this story (below) the New England Foundation for the Arts, a
tax exempt corporation, held a fund raiser for Deval Patrick saying they only
rented their facilities and did not endorse him. They planned to do it again for
a state senate candidate.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Ross fundraisers might not fly with Feds
By Matt Dunning/Chronicle Staff
Cambridge Chronicle
Tue Aug 07, 2007, 01:26 PM EDT
Cambridge -
Forget whether or not they’re well attended.
A pair of campaign fundraisers state Senate candidate Jeff Ross has scheduled at
the New England Foundation for the Arts may not even be legal.
On his Web site, as late as Monday afternoon, Ross has two fundraisers scheduled
at the foundation’s Boston office in the next eight days, one on Aug. 7 and
another on Aug. 13. Federal law prohibits non-profit organizations from
participating or intervening in any political campaign on behalf of any
candidate for public office. NEFA is a tax-exempt non-profit that operates with
funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New England state arts
agencies, and from corporations, foundations and individuals.
According to a spokesman for the state’s Office of Campaign and Political
Finance, the situation may be more damaging to the foundation than it would be
to Ross.
“There’s no problem with a non-profit hosting a fundraiser for a candidate as
far as we’re concerned,” said spokesman Dennis Kennedy. “It’s rare to see it
happen, because of the implication of their tax status.”
[...]
According to this story (below) the New England Foundation for the Arts, a
tax exempt corporation, held a fund raiser for Deval Patrick saying they only
rented their facilities and did not endorse him. They planned to do it again for
a state senate candidate.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Ross fundraisers might not fly with Feds
By Matt Dunning/Chronicle Staff
Cambridge Chronicle
Tue Aug 07, 2007, 01:26 PM EDT
Cambridge -
Forget whether or not they’re well attended.
A pair of campaign fundraisers state Senate candidate Jeff Ross has scheduled at
the New England Foundation for the Arts may not even be legal.
On his Web site, as late as Monday afternoon, Ross has two fundraisers scheduled
at the foundation’s Boston office in the next eight days, one on Aug. 7 and
another on Aug. 13. Federal law prohibits non-profit organizations from
participating or intervening in any political campaign on behalf of any
candidate for public office. NEFA is a tax-exempt non-profit that operates with
funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New England state arts
agencies, and from corporations, foundations and individuals.
According to a spokesman for the state’s Office of Campaign and Political
Finance, the situation may be more damaging to the foundation than it would be
to Ross.
“There’s no problem with a non-profit hosting a fundraiser for a candidate as
far as we’re concerned,” said spokesman Dennis Kennedy. “It’s rare to see it
happen, because of the implication of their tax status.”
[...]
Banning Speech
Banning Speech
Governments banning uncivilized speech is prohibited by the US
Constitution. But since there is such strong opposition to hateful and hurtful
speech why is it that only words that homosexuals, women and African Americans
find offensive banned? Why are police, prosecutors, politicians and journalists
permitted to utter hateful irrational speech about persons with disabilities
every day?
Saying there is "a history of mental illness" in courts repeated in the
media is a negative stereotyping that is accepted by the above-named three
groups. US Rep. William Delahunt (D-MA) when he was District Attorney of Norfolk
County, MA, said, "There is no history of mental illness." about a suspect
accused of homicide, as if that would explain the alleged crime.
Why are only words that some groups find offensive proposed for banning?
The dictionary defines this as bigotry.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
August 7, 2007
It’s a Female Dog, or Worse. Or Endearing. And Illegal?
By MICHAEL M. GRYNBAUM
The New York Times
The New York City Council, which drew national headlines when it passed a
symbolic citywide ban earlier this year on the use of the so-called n-word, has
turned its linguistic (and legislative) lance toward a different slur: bitch.
The term is hateful and deeply sexist, said Councilwoman Darlene Mealy of
Brooklyn, who has introduced a measure against the word, saying it creates “a
paradigm of shame and indignity” for all women.
But conversations over the last week indicate that the “b-word” (as it is
referred to in the legislation) enjoys a surprisingly strong currency — and even
some defenders — among many New Yorkers.
And Ms. Mealy admitted that the city’s political ruling class can be guilty of
its use. As she circulated her proposal, she said, “even council members are
saying that they use it to their wives.”
The measure, which 19 of the 51 council members have signed onto, was prompted
in part by the frequent use of the word in hip-hop music. Ten rappers were cited
in the legislation, along with an excerpt from an 1811 dictionary that defined
the word as “A she dog, or doggess; the most offensive appellation that can be
given to an English woman.”
While the bill also bans the slang word “ho,” the b-word appears to have
acquired more shades of meaning among various groups, ranging from a term of
camaraderie to, in a gerund form, an expression of emphatic approval. Ms. Mealy
acknowledged that the measure was unenforceable, but she argued that it would
carry symbolic power against the pejorative uses of the word. Even so, a number
of New Yorkers said they were taken aback by the idea of prohibiting a term that
they not only use, but do so with relish and affection.
[...]
Governments banning uncivilized speech is prohibited by the US
Constitution. But since there is such strong opposition to hateful and hurtful
speech why is it that only words that homosexuals, women and African Americans
find offensive banned? Why are police, prosecutors, politicians and journalists
permitted to utter hateful irrational speech about persons with disabilities
every day?
Saying there is "a history of mental illness" in courts repeated in the
media is a negative stereotyping that is accepted by the above-named three
groups. US Rep. William Delahunt (D-MA) when he was District Attorney of Norfolk
County, MA, said, "There is no history of mental illness." about a suspect
accused of homicide, as if that would explain the alleged crime.
Why are only words that some groups find offensive proposed for banning?
The dictionary defines this as bigotry.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
August 7, 2007
It’s a Female Dog, or Worse. Or Endearing. And Illegal?
By MICHAEL M. GRYNBAUM
The New York Times
The New York City Council, which drew national headlines when it passed a
symbolic citywide ban earlier this year on the use of the so-called n-word, has
turned its linguistic (and legislative) lance toward a different slur: bitch.
The term is hateful and deeply sexist, said Councilwoman Darlene Mealy of
Brooklyn, who has introduced a measure against the word, saying it creates “a
paradigm of shame and indignity” for all women.
But conversations over the last week indicate that the “b-word” (as it is
referred to in the legislation) enjoys a surprisingly strong currency — and even
some defenders — among many New Yorkers.
And Ms. Mealy admitted that the city’s political ruling class can be guilty of
its use. As she circulated her proposal, she said, “even council members are
saying that they use it to their wives.”
The measure, which 19 of the 51 council members have signed onto, was prompted
in part by the frequent use of the word in hip-hop music. Ten rappers were cited
in the legislation, along with an excerpt from an 1811 dictionary that defined
the word as “A she dog, or doggess; the most offensive appellation that can be
given to an English woman.”
While the bill also bans the slang word “ho,” the b-word appears to have
acquired more shades of meaning among various groups, ranging from a term of
camaraderie to, in a gerund form, an expression of emphatic approval. Ms. Mealy
acknowledged that the measure was unenforceable, but she argued that it would
carry symbolic power against the pejorative uses of the word. Even so, a number
of New Yorkers said they were taken aback by the idea of prohibiting a term that
they not only use, but do so with relish and affection.
[...]
Protect Big Business, Don't Kill the Job
Protect Big Business, Don't Kill the Job
"We don't have to study homelessness," state Representative Byron Rushing says [...] good research is already available." (Boston Globe Editorial, "A future without homelessness," August 8, 2007)
But Rushing does not explain what kind of research is available.
Does the research explain what will be done with the millions of taxpayer dollars appropriated for treatment by human services corporations and the caring professions? What will become of all of the not- for-profit employees who work at the many shelters?
Where will the suburban wives and their visiting college age children go to volunteer on Thanksgiving? Where will the politicians go for photo opportunities if there are no shelters?
Rep. Rushing ignores the potential for displaced money and people if persons without homes are housed. Homelessness is a big business, which has a big lobby at the legislatures. Forget that it costs less to house people than to arrest them and transport them to hospitals. Appropriating more taxpayer money is better for the human services corporations and the caring professions.
What are your priorities?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Globe Editorial
A future without homelessness
August 8, 2007
WE DON'T have to study homelessness," state Representative Byron Rushing says of a new state commission that he proposed to address the issue; good research is already available.
Instead, the commission has to answer two questions. What kind of housing do people need? And, what will it take to keep formerly homeless people housed?
If Massachusetts can find and pay for answers, it could end homelessness -- for families, adults living on the streets, people leaving prison, and those with mental illnesses or addictions.
"We're on the cusp of a new era," says Tina Brooks, the state's undersecretary of housing.
The commission should work to meet its self-imposed deadline and come up with a comprehensive plan by December.
[...]
"We don't have to study homelessness," state Representative Byron Rushing says [...] good research is already available." (Boston Globe Editorial, "A future without homelessness," August 8, 2007)
But Rushing does not explain what kind of research is available.
Does the research explain what will be done with the millions of taxpayer dollars appropriated for treatment by human services corporations and the caring professions? What will become of all of the not- for-profit employees who work at the many shelters?
Where will the suburban wives and their visiting college age children go to volunteer on Thanksgiving? Where will the politicians go for photo opportunities if there are no shelters?
Rep. Rushing ignores the potential for displaced money and people if persons without homes are housed. Homelessness is a big business, which has a big lobby at the legislatures. Forget that it costs less to house people than to arrest them and transport them to hospitals. Appropriating more taxpayer money is better for the human services corporations and the caring professions.
What are your priorities?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Globe Editorial
A future without homelessness
August 8, 2007
WE DON'T have to study homelessness," state Representative Byron Rushing says of a new state commission that he proposed to address the issue; good research is already available.
Instead, the commission has to answer two questions. What kind of housing do people need? And, what will it take to keep formerly homeless people housed?
If Massachusetts can find and pay for answers, it could end homelessness -- for families, adults living on the streets, people leaving prison, and those with mental illnesses or addictions.
"We're on the cusp of a new era," says Tina Brooks, the state's undersecretary of housing.
The commission should work to meet its self-imposed deadline and come up with a comprehensive plan by December.
[...]
August 3, 2007
Nobody Here But Us Chickens
Nobody Here But Us Chickens
Passing resolutions to protect animals over abuses of humans shows the
curious priorities of the Cambridge City Council. (Donna Goodison, "Cambridge
squawks over cages," Boston Herald, August 1, 2007) There are criminal penalties
to protect animals used for research at the state and US levels. But there are
no penalties for violations of laws using human subjects in medical experiments.
Cambridge has a Laboratory Animal Commissioner but no person whose mission is to
protect humans used in research.
Why are there no standards to protect egg-laying hens from sexual abuses of
roosters? Are full rights under Roe vs. Wade extended to egg-laying hens? What
laws prohibit sexual harassment by roosters? The Cambridge resolution has no
teeth and needs penalties to make it real. This is one more example of pandering
to the voters.
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor
ENOUGH ROOM
Cambridge squawks over cages
By Donna Goodison
Boston Herald
Wednesday, August 1, 2007 - Updated: 09:57 AM EST
Cambridge became the sixth U.S. city to formally condemn factory farms’
confinement of egg-laying hens to small wire “battery” cages.
The Cambridge City Council on Monday unanimously passed a resolution
opposing the “inherent cruelty” of the cages and encouraging consumers not to
purchase eggs produced by caged hens.
“With no opportunity to engage in many of their natural behaviors -
including nesting, dust bathing, perching and walking - these birds endure lives
wrought with suffering,” the resolution, worded with help from the Humane
Society of the United States, states. The resolution was introduced by Councilor
Craig Kelley at the request of Cambridge resident Ryan Shapiro, a Ph.D. student
at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. [...]
Passing resolutions to protect animals over abuses of humans shows the
curious priorities of the Cambridge City Council. (Donna Goodison, "Cambridge
squawks over cages," Boston Herald, August 1, 2007) There are criminal penalties
to protect animals used for research at the state and US levels. But there are
no penalties for violations of laws using human subjects in medical experiments.
Cambridge has a Laboratory Animal Commissioner but no person whose mission is to
protect humans used in research.
Why are there no standards to protect egg-laying hens from sexual abuses of
roosters? Are full rights under Roe vs. Wade extended to egg-laying hens? What
laws prohibit sexual harassment by roosters? The Cambridge resolution has no
teeth and needs penalties to make it real. This is one more example of pandering
to the voters.
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor
ENOUGH ROOM
Cambridge squawks over cages
By Donna Goodison
Boston Herald
Wednesday, August 1, 2007 - Updated: 09:57 AM EST
Cambridge became the sixth U.S. city to formally condemn factory farms’
confinement of egg-laying hens to small wire “battery” cages.
The Cambridge City Council on Monday unanimously passed a resolution
opposing the “inherent cruelty” of the cages and encouraging consumers not to
purchase eggs produced by caged hens.
“With no opportunity to engage in many of their natural behaviors -
including nesting, dust bathing, perching and walking - these birds endure lives
wrought with suffering,” the resolution, worded with help from the Humane
Society of the United States, states. The resolution was introduced by Councilor
Craig Kelley at the request of Cambridge resident Ryan Shapiro, a Ph.D. student
at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. [...]
Embattled NY Gov. Spitzer Ignores the Past
Embattled NY Gov. Spitzer Ignores the Past
[This letter was published in the New York Post on July 31, 2007]
The youthful New York Governor did not learn from Watergate that the cover up
is always worse than the crime. ("Eliot's Stonewall," New York Post, Editorial, July 30, 2007, page 26); (Fedric Dicker, "'Counsel' ploy silenced aides in AG's probe," Page 5, "Empower Andy: GOP,"page 4)
When will Eliot "I Am the the Greatest" 'fess up and face the consequences?
The more he tries to avoid his fate the worse it will be for him.
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor
ENOUGH ROOM
[This letter was published in the New York Post on July 31, 2007]
The youthful New York Governor did not learn from Watergate that the cover up
is always worse than the crime. ("Eliot's Stonewall," New York Post, Editorial, July 30, 2007, page 26); (Fedric Dicker, "'Counsel' ploy silenced aides in AG's probe," Page 5, "Empower Andy: GOP,"page 4)
When will Eliot "I Am the the Greatest" 'fess up and face the consequences?
The more he tries to avoid his fate the worse it will be for him.
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor
ENOUGH ROOM
July 18, 2007
Pervasive Abusive Silence
Pervasive Abusive Silence
Stephen Roberson says, "it would have been far better if [the surgeons
general] had shown the courage of their convictions while still in their posts
[...] the American people have a right to expect people in positions of
authority to speak the truth, even if these individuals have to risk
professional setbacks by doing so." ("The unhealthy silence of our surgeons
general," Letter, Boston Globe, July 13, 2007)
Why is this paradigm limited to surgeons general? Much of the cynicism
among voters derives from the failure of all public officials to reveal
wrongdoing by their colleagues for fear of losing their jobs. Fooling
journalists is the goal not keeping the public informed.
Six months after being elected the new Governor, the new Attorney General
and the Middlesex District Attorney remain silent about any wrongdoing by the
many local and state officials under their jurisdiction. Are they unaware of the
misconduct? If aware and keeping silent they have become part of the problem
that existed before they were elected. Business as usual is the dominant
paradigm in Massachusetts. Why is the Globe silent too?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
The unhealthy silence of our surgeons general
Letter
Boston Globe
July 13, 2007
WHILE IT is heartening to hear three former surgeons general -- Richard Carmona,
C. Everett Koop, and David Satcher -- finally speaking out about having been
censored by their respective administration officials, it would have been far
better if they had shown the courage of their convictions while still in their
posts (Ex-surgeon general accuses Bush officials of censorship," Page A2, July
11).
What would they have lost by speaking up when it mattered, over the president's
objections if necessary? Their jobs?
Whether we're listening to the secretary of state, the head of the CIA, or the
surgeon general, the American people have a right to expect people in positions
of authority to speak the truth, even if these individuals have to risk
professional setbacks by doing so. A private in the US Army risks more than that
every day; is it right that we expect so much less from our senior government
officials?
STEPHEN J. ROBERSON
Holliston
Stephen Roberson says, "it would have been far better if [the surgeons
general] had shown the courage of their convictions while still in their posts
[...] the American people have a right to expect people in positions of
authority to speak the truth, even if these individuals have to risk
professional setbacks by doing so." ("The unhealthy silence of our surgeons
general," Letter, Boston Globe, July 13, 2007)
Why is this paradigm limited to surgeons general? Much of the cynicism
among voters derives from the failure of all public officials to reveal
wrongdoing by their colleagues for fear of losing their jobs. Fooling
journalists is the goal not keeping the public informed.
Six months after being elected the new Governor, the new Attorney General
and the Middlesex District Attorney remain silent about any wrongdoing by the
many local and state officials under their jurisdiction. Are they unaware of the
misconduct? If aware and keeping silent they have become part of the problem
that existed before they were elected. Business as usual is the dominant
paradigm in Massachusetts. Why is the Globe silent too?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
The unhealthy silence of our surgeons general
Letter
Boston Globe
July 13, 2007
WHILE IT is heartening to hear three former surgeons general -- Richard Carmona,
C. Everett Koop, and David Satcher -- finally speaking out about having been
censored by their respective administration officials, it would have been far
better if they had shown the courage of their convictions while still in their
posts (Ex-surgeon general accuses Bush officials of censorship," Page A2, July
11).
What would they have lost by speaking up when it mattered, over the president's
objections if necessary? Their jobs?
Whether we're listening to the secretary of state, the head of the CIA, or the
surgeon general, the American people have a right to expect people in positions
of authority to speak the truth, even if these individuals have to risk
professional setbacks by doing so. A private in the US Army risks more than that
every day; is it right that we expect so much less from our senior government
officials?
STEPHEN J. ROBERSON
Holliston
Media and Medical Bias
Media and Medical Bias
Comments by hospital PR flacks suggest that persons accused of psychiatric
illness are the cause of ERs being overwhelmed. (Liz Kowalczyk, "Psychiatric
patients feel strain," Boston Globe, July 15, 2007) More importantly this report
lacks any reference to the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, the Americans with
Disabilities Act of 1990, and Mass General Law Chapter 151 B (the state anti
discrimination statute). Many cities also have anti discrimination laws.
Do these medical professionals, and the editors at the Boston Globe believe
that persons accused of psychiatric illness are excluded from enjoying the
rights enumerated in the US and MA Constitutions? Janice Sullivan a Quincy PR
flack said safety overrules Constitutional Rights. Huh?
Kowalczyk notes, "the challenge of caring for sometimes-aggressive
psychiatric patients." Why are persons accused of psychiatric illness treated
differently? Are all "normal" patients passive? It appears that the Boston
Globe, the DPH, the DMH, and hospitals believe that a person accused of
psychiatric illness is violent and dangerous. Police and prosecutors share this
misguided belief. It is institutionalized in MA state courts.
Why are the training plans for ER employees not meant for all of their
patients? That in itself is discriminatory and unlawful. What is the legal
rationale for allowing "some psychiatric patients to keep on their clothes and
instead be frisked and scanned with a hand-held metal detector?" Why is this
proposed policy only applied to persons accused of psychiatric illness? That is
an unlawful proposal.
In Cambridge until I complained for three years the Cambridge Health
Alliance boasted that they delivered mental health care coordinated with the
Cambridge police. That is an outrageous admission. The comments in this report
suggest it is not just a Cambridge problem. A new perspective is needed. The DMH
and taxpayer funded attorneys whose mission is protect persons with disabilities
and their rights failed by intentionally negligently allowing institutions to
express their unlawful bias and abuse a class of vulnerable persons.
Few psychiatrists know the laws regarding persons with disabilities. They
believe that their feelings and personal opinions trump law. That needs to stop
immediately.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Constance Surette, a Plymouth resident who has bipolar disorder, (left) and
Jill Judson participate in a discussion about patients' rights during an M-Power
meeting. (Globe Staff Photo / Evan richman)
The Boston Globe
Psychiatric patients feel strain
State investigates complaints at ERs
By Liz Kowalczyk,
Boston Globe Staff
July 15, 2007
The state investigated at least 21 complaints over the last 18 months that
emergency departments mistreated psychiatric patients, and officials cited
hospitals in half those cases for problems that included wrongly forcing
patients to undress, punching or hitting patients, and restraining others for
hours without proper monitoring.
One patient died while in restraints, and a patient's arm was broken as a nurse
forcibly removed his pants.
These cases are a sign of the growing strain on the state's overcrowded
emergency rooms, doctors, nurses, patients and state officials said, and also
reflect a shortage of services for the mentally ill, the challenge of caring for
sometimes-aggressive psychiatric patients, and inconsistent training of harried
ER staff.
Emergency rooms can be battlegrounds. They often are the last resort for
psychiatric patients in crisis -- some patients are so out of control and
aggressive that mental health facilities will not take them -- and ERs have
responded by creating "safe rooms" to handle such patients and on occasion
calling in police for help, according to inter views with 20 doctors, nurses,
patients, and hospital administrators.
ER staff give psychiatric medications but are not trained to provide
comprehensive psychiatric care, they said. And many of these patients stay in
ERs for days without proper treatment because of backlogs in psychiatric
facilities, creating potentially volatile situations for those patients, staff,
and other patients. Hospital officials said nurses, too, have been injured in
confrontations, and patients contend that they are humiliated by policies like
the one requiring them to undress.
Patients "will be in the ER from hours to days and they get absolutely no care,"
said Linda Condon, an emergency room nurse who has worked at four hospitals in
Southeastern Massachusetts. "You put a person with psychiatric problems in a
room with four walls and nothing to do, and there are going to be problems."
Documents from the Department of Public Health -- which conducts investigations
when patients or relatives complain or hospitals themselves report problems --
show that investigators cited 11 hospitals for a range of problems. Those cases
include:
A blind, disabled patient who went to Lawrence General Hospital in April because
he was suicidal. Hospital policy then required psychiatric patients to undress
so that staff could look for hidden drugs or weapons, but the patient wanted to
keep on his jeans. A male nurse "used excessive force" to remove them, the
health department found, breaking the patient's arm. The patient required
surgery and a three-week hospital stay.
In April 2006, a 49-year-old former nurse who arrived in the emergency room at
Melrose-Wakefield Hospital at 10:30 p.m., intoxicated and uncooperative. Staff
strapped down his arms and legs, gave him sedatives, and assigned a security
guard to watch him. After a nurse called the security guard away to help with
another violent patient, the first patient had a fatal cardiac arrest. The
hospital's internal investigation determined that the patient was not properly
monitored. Staff told state investigators that the ER was "very, very busy."
In June 2006, a male teen in the Merrimack Valley Hospital ER in Haverhill began
pulling medical equipment out of a wall, kicking furniture, and biting staff.
While he was biting a nurse, a staff member repeatedly punched him in the face.
State investigators said the hospital did not properly train staff on how to
restrain patients. Hospital staff said punching was a last resort because the
patient was severely injuring the nurse.
State documents released to the Globe omitted the names of patients and staff
for privacy reasons. When health officials find problems during investigations,
hospitals must implement plans to correct them.
The state public health and mental health departments have been so concerned
about the pattern of complaints that they sent a memo to hospital executives in
September, detailing 21 steps they should take to improve care of psychiatric
patients in ERs, including reducing waiting times, using trained mediators, and
further training staff in techniques to calm patients.
But patients and advocates for people with mental illness say problems remain
rampant. They are pushing legislators to increase the mental health department's
role in regulating ER care and to require the public health department to
develop "best practices" for treating psychiatric patients.
"When we get upset and don't want to take our clothes off, they think we're
going to flip out," said Constance Surette, 57, of Plymouth, who has bipolar
disorder and works with a group pushing for legislation. "But the way they treat
us, of course they're going to get that reaction. The ERs should use peer
mediators to talk to [psychiatric patients] because they are frightened of the
authority figures."
Surette filed a complaint with the health department last month, alleging that
city police officers at Quincy Medical Center sprayed one psychiatric patient
with mace and handcuffed another to a bench while she was in the ER. Hospital
spokeswoman Janice Sullivan said that she could not confirm Surette's account
but that the actions taken were appropriate "for the safety of everyone
involved."
Doctors and nurses say they have made improvements but are doing the best they
can in an impossible situation. They said the number of complaints statewide is
small considering the thousands of psychiatric patients who seek care in
Massachusetts ERs each year.
In 2005, ERs reported 168,000 visits by psychiatric patients, 10 percent more
than in 2003, according to the Massachusetts Health Data Consortium. And they
usually have to wait longer for care. The average ER stay for patients who are
eventually sent home or to another hospital is nearly three hours; it's nearly
six hours for psychiatric patients. And many of these patients wait two to three
days in the ER for an inpatient bed in a psychiatric facility to open.
"The emergency departments are overwhelmed," said Dr. Paul Bulat, medical
director of the emergency room at St. Luke's Hospital in New Bedford. "We are
seeing more violent patients and out-of-control patients. We're seeing mental
health problems much worse than we should be."
ER directors are reluctant to acknowledge that overcrowding hurts patient care.
But staff told the state health department that busyness was a factor in several
of the cases investigated, especially those that involved inadequate monitoring
of patients.
In the case of the former nurse who died at Melrose-Wakefield Hospital, not only
did the security guard leave the patient alone for about 20 minutes, but the
patient's condition was not checked every 15 minutes while he was restrained, as
required by hospital policy. Monitoring is especially crucial for intoxicated
patients who receive sedatives.
Hospital spokesman Richard Pozniak said he could not comment on the case because
of regulations requiring patient information to be kept confidential. State
investigators said in their report that 13 patients were in the ER when the man
arrived, and 20 other patients arrived before he died 4 1/2 hours later.
Public health investigators also found that lack of training is an issue,
including in cases where staff used excessive force. Better training in
techniques to calm patients is especially important as frustrated psychiatric
patients with no where else to go spend hours in the ER .
In the case of the patient whose arm was broken at Lawrence General Hospital,
investigators found a range of problems, including that the hospital's internal
investigation of the complaint did not include interviewing the patient.
Investigators also found no evidence that staff and security had been trained in
patient's rights. And they said the nurse should have explored the patient's
reasons for wanting to keep on his jeans before resorting to force.
Hospital spokeswoman Ellen Murphy Meehan said the hospital "expressed deep
regret to the patient" for what it considers an accident. She said Lawrence
General has since changed its policy to allow some psychiatric patients to keep
on their clothes and instead be frisked and scanned with a hand-held metal
detector.
Paul Dreyer, director of the state Division of Health Care Quality, said "a
culture change" is needed; he is organizing an educational summit for ER staff
in the fall, hoping hospitals will improve on their own, making legislation
unnecessary. Legislators expect to hold hearings this summer or in the fall.
We want "people to realize they don't have to call in security the first time
someone looks at them cross-eyed," Dreyer said. "The ERs are in a production
mode. Their aim is to process the patients as quickly as possible to get on to
the next patient. These patients may not take well to being treated that way.
They may act out."
A number of hospitals said they have improved care after serious encounters.
UMass Memorial Medical Center -- where campus police beat a psychiatric patient
with a baton in 2004, injuring him, and, several months later, threw a patient
against a wall and called her a "bitch," according to state reports -- said it
has made significant changes. These include creating a secured, quiet area for
psychiatric patients and training police to use calming techniques. Dr. Patrick
Smallwood, medical director for emergency mental health services, also joined
the hiring panel for campus police officers last year.
Dr. Bruce Auerbach, chief for emergency and ambulatory services at Sturdy
Memorial Hospital in Attleboro, said hospitals need more resources, not more
regulation. "When a patient who is having a behavioral health crisis is in my ER
for four days not getting the intervention he needs -- it's a travesty in our
healthcare system," he said.
Liz Kowalczyk can be reached at kowalczyk@globe.com.
Comments by hospital PR flacks suggest that persons accused of psychiatric
illness are the cause of ERs being overwhelmed. (Liz Kowalczyk, "Psychiatric
patients feel strain," Boston Globe, July 15, 2007) More importantly this report
lacks any reference to the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, the Americans with
Disabilities Act of 1990, and Mass General Law Chapter 151 B (the state anti
discrimination statute). Many cities also have anti discrimination laws.
Do these medical professionals, and the editors at the Boston Globe believe
that persons accused of psychiatric illness are excluded from enjoying the
rights enumerated in the US and MA Constitutions? Janice Sullivan a Quincy PR
flack said safety overrules Constitutional Rights. Huh?
Kowalczyk notes, "the challenge of caring for sometimes-aggressive
psychiatric patients." Why are persons accused of psychiatric illness treated
differently? Are all "normal" patients passive? It appears that the Boston
Globe, the DPH, the DMH, and hospitals believe that a person accused of
psychiatric illness is violent and dangerous. Police and prosecutors share this
misguided belief. It is institutionalized in MA state courts.
Why are the training plans for ER employees not meant for all of their
patients? That in itself is discriminatory and unlawful. What is the legal
rationale for allowing "some psychiatric patients to keep on their clothes and
instead be frisked and scanned with a hand-held metal detector?" Why is this
proposed policy only applied to persons accused of psychiatric illness? That is
an unlawful proposal.
In Cambridge until I complained for three years the Cambridge Health
Alliance boasted that they delivered mental health care coordinated with the
Cambridge police. That is an outrageous admission. The comments in this report
suggest it is not just a Cambridge problem. A new perspective is needed. The DMH
and taxpayer funded attorneys whose mission is protect persons with disabilities
and their rights failed by intentionally negligently allowing institutions to
express their unlawful bias and abuse a class of vulnerable persons.
Few psychiatrists know the laws regarding persons with disabilities. They
believe that their feelings and personal opinions trump law. That needs to stop
immediately.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Constance Surette, a Plymouth resident who has bipolar disorder, (left) and
Jill Judson participate in a discussion about patients' rights during an M-Power
meeting. (Globe Staff Photo / Evan richman)
The Boston Globe
Psychiatric patients feel strain
State investigates complaints at ERs
By Liz Kowalczyk,
Boston Globe Staff
July 15, 2007
The state investigated at least 21 complaints over the last 18 months that
emergency departments mistreated psychiatric patients, and officials cited
hospitals in half those cases for problems that included wrongly forcing
patients to undress, punching or hitting patients, and restraining others for
hours without proper monitoring.
One patient died while in restraints, and a patient's arm was broken as a nurse
forcibly removed his pants.
These cases are a sign of the growing strain on the state's overcrowded
emergency rooms, doctors, nurses, patients and state officials said, and also
reflect a shortage of services for the mentally ill, the challenge of caring for
sometimes-aggressive psychiatric patients, and inconsistent training of harried
ER staff.
Emergency rooms can be battlegrounds. They often are the last resort for
psychiatric patients in crisis -- some patients are so out of control and
aggressive that mental health facilities will not take them -- and ERs have
responded by creating "safe rooms" to handle such patients and on occasion
calling in police for help, according to inter views with 20 doctors, nurses,
patients, and hospital administrators.
ER staff give psychiatric medications but are not trained to provide
comprehensive psychiatric care, they said. And many of these patients stay in
ERs for days without proper treatment because of backlogs in psychiatric
facilities, creating potentially volatile situations for those patients, staff,
and other patients. Hospital officials said nurses, too, have been injured in
confrontations, and patients contend that they are humiliated by policies like
the one requiring them to undress.
Patients "will be in the ER from hours to days and they get absolutely no care,"
said Linda Condon, an emergency room nurse who has worked at four hospitals in
Southeastern Massachusetts. "You put a person with psychiatric problems in a
room with four walls and nothing to do, and there are going to be problems."
Documents from the Department of Public Health -- which conducts investigations
when patients or relatives complain or hospitals themselves report problems --
show that investigators cited 11 hospitals for a range of problems. Those cases
include:
A blind, disabled patient who went to Lawrence General Hospital in April because
he was suicidal. Hospital policy then required psychiatric patients to undress
so that staff could look for hidden drugs or weapons, but the patient wanted to
keep on his jeans. A male nurse "used excessive force" to remove them, the
health department found, breaking the patient's arm. The patient required
surgery and a three-week hospital stay.
In April 2006, a 49-year-old former nurse who arrived in the emergency room at
Melrose-Wakefield Hospital at 10:30 p.m., intoxicated and uncooperative. Staff
strapped down his arms and legs, gave him sedatives, and assigned a security
guard to watch him. After a nurse called the security guard away to help with
another violent patient, the first patient had a fatal cardiac arrest. The
hospital's internal investigation determined that the patient was not properly
monitored. Staff told state investigators that the ER was "very, very busy."
In June 2006, a male teen in the Merrimack Valley Hospital ER in Haverhill began
pulling medical equipment out of a wall, kicking furniture, and biting staff.
While he was biting a nurse, a staff member repeatedly punched him in the face.
State investigators said the hospital did not properly train staff on how to
restrain patients. Hospital staff said punching was a last resort because the
patient was severely injuring the nurse.
State documents released to the Globe omitted the names of patients and staff
for privacy reasons. When health officials find problems during investigations,
hospitals must implement plans to correct them.
The state public health and mental health departments have been so concerned
about the pattern of complaints that they sent a memo to hospital executives in
September, detailing 21 steps they should take to improve care of psychiatric
patients in ERs, including reducing waiting times, using trained mediators, and
further training staff in techniques to calm patients.
But patients and advocates for people with mental illness say problems remain
rampant. They are pushing legislators to increase the mental health department's
role in regulating ER care and to require the public health department to
develop "best practices" for treating psychiatric patients.
"When we get upset and don't want to take our clothes off, they think we're
going to flip out," said Constance Surette, 57, of Plymouth, who has bipolar
disorder and works with a group pushing for legislation. "But the way they treat
us, of course they're going to get that reaction. The ERs should use peer
mediators to talk to [psychiatric patients] because they are frightened of the
authority figures."
Surette filed a complaint with the health department last month, alleging that
city police officers at Quincy Medical Center sprayed one psychiatric patient
with mace and handcuffed another to a bench while she was in the ER. Hospital
spokeswoman Janice Sullivan said that she could not confirm Surette's account
but that the actions taken were appropriate "for the safety of everyone
involved."
Doctors and nurses say they have made improvements but are doing the best they
can in an impossible situation. They said the number of complaints statewide is
small considering the thousands of psychiatric patients who seek care in
Massachusetts ERs each year.
In 2005, ERs reported 168,000 visits by psychiatric patients, 10 percent more
than in 2003, according to the Massachusetts Health Data Consortium. And they
usually have to wait longer for care. The average ER stay for patients who are
eventually sent home or to another hospital is nearly three hours; it's nearly
six hours for psychiatric patients. And many of these patients wait two to three
days in the ER for an inpatient bed in a psychiatric facility to open.
"The emergency departments are overwhelmed," said Dr. Paul Bulat, medical
director of the emergency room at St. Luke's Hospital in New Bedford. "We are
seeing more violent patients and out-of-control patients. We're seeing mental
health problems much worse than we should be."
ER directors are reluctant to acknowledge that overcrowding hurts patient care.
But staff told the state health department that busyness was a factor in several
of the cases investigated, especially those that involved inadequate monitoring
of patients.
In the case of the former nurse who died at Melrose-Wakefield Hospital, not only
did the security guard leave the patient alone for about 20 minutes, but the
patient's condition was not checked every 15 minutes while he was restrained, as
required by hospital policy. Monitoring is especially crucial for intoxicated
patients who receive sedatives.
Hospital spokesman Richard Pozniak said he could not comment on the case because
of regulations requiring patient information to be kept confidential. State
investigators said in their report that 13 patients were in the ER when the man
arrived, and 20 other patients arrived before he died 4 1/2 hours later.
Public health investigators also found that lack of training is an issue,
including in cases where staff used excessive force. Better training in
techniques to calm patients is especially important as frustrated psychiatric
patients with no where else to go spend hours in the ER .
In the case of the patient whose arm was broken at Lawrence General Hospital,
investigators found a range of problems, including that the hospital's internal
investigation of the complaint did not include interviewing the patient.
Investigators also found no evidence that staff and security had been trained in
patient's rights. And they said the nurse should have explored the patient's
reasons for wanting to keep on his jeans before resorting to force.
Hospital spokeswoman Ellen Murphy Meehan said the hospital "expressed deep
regret to the patient" for what it considers an accident. She said Lawrence
General has since changed its policy to allow some psychiatric patients to keep
on their clothes and instead be frisked and scanned with a hand-held metal
detector.
Paul Dreyer, director of the state Division of Health Care Quality, said "a
culture change" is needed; he is organizing an educational summit for ER staff
in the fall, hoping hospitals will improve on their own, making legislation
unnecessary. Legislators expect to hold hearings this summer or in the fall.
We want "people to realize they don't have to call in security the first time
someone looks at them cross-eyed," Dreyer said. "The ERs are in a production
mode. Their aim is to process the patients as quickly as possible to get on to
the next patient. These patients may not take well to being treated that way.
They may act out."
A number of hospitals said they have improved care after serious encounters.
UMass Memorial Medical Center -- where campus police beat a psychiatric patient
with a baton in 2004, injuring him, and, several months later, threw a patient
against a wall and called her a "bitch," according to state reports -- said it
has made significant changes. These include creating a secured, quiet area for
psychiatric patients and training police to use calming techniques. Dr. Patrick
Smallwood, medical director for emergency mental health services, also joined
the hiring panel for campus police officers last year.
Dr. Bruce Auerbach, chief for emergency and ambulatory services at Sturdy
Memorial Hospital in Attleboro, said hospitals need more resources, not more
regulation. "When a patient who is having a behavioral health crisis is in my ER
for four days not getting the intervention he needs -- it's a travesty in our
healthcare system," he said.
Liz Kowalczyk can be reached at kowalczyk@globe.com.
Only Black Women Have Feelings?
Only Black Women Have Feelings?
This essay raises serious credibility questions. (Madeline Drexler, "How
racism hurts -- literally," Boston Sunday Globe, July 15, 2007) Are black women
different from white men when it comes to reacting to stress? Are black women
different from white men in reacting to discrimination? Are black women's
reaction to racism different from white men's reaction to discrimination based
upon sexual preference? Or disability? Were any studies done on the effects of
discrimination against white men who are accused of psychiatric illness? I don't
think so.
Why does the Globe continue to prioritize one form of discrimination
over others when many kinds of bias are equally unlawful and offensive? The
Globe discriminates in its focus on discrimination. See, e.g., how differently
the Globe reported on outrageous unlawful discrimination in access to health
care for persons with disabilities in Liz Kowalczyk, "Psychiatric patients feel
strain,"
Boston Globe, July 15, 2007.
This essay cherry picks ignoring the income and class of black people. Do
multi millionaire athletes and celebrities get worse medical care than poor
white men? I don't think so.
Most importantly psychiatrists say that you cannot control what another
person thinks or says about you. But you can control how you react to what they
say or do. These anecdotes suggest that black people are incapable of ignoring
what others say and do. Do black people have no control over their emotions and
thoughts?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
How racism hurts -- literally
Boston Sunday Globe
By Madeline Drexler
July 15, 2007
FOUR YEARS AGO, researchers identified a surprising price for being a black
woman in America. The study of 334 midlife women, published in the journal
Health Psychology, examined links between different kinds of stress and risk
factors for heart disease and stroke. Black women who pointed to racism as a
source of stress in their lives, the researchers found, developed more plaque in
their carotid arteries -- an early sign of heart disease -- than black women who
didn't. The difference was small but important -- making the report the first to
link hardening of the arteries to racial discrimination.
The study was just one in a fast-growing field of research documenting how
racism literally hurts the body. More than 100 studies -- most published since
2000 -- now document the effects of racial discrimination on physical health.
Some link blood pressure to recollected encounters with bigotry. Others record
the cardiovascular reactions of volunteers subjected to racist imagery in a lab.
Forthcoming research will even peek into the workings of the brain during
exposure to racist provocations.
Scientists caution that the research is preliminary, and some of it is quite
controversial, but they say the findings could profoundly change the way we look
at both racism and health. It could unmask racism as a bona fide public health
problem -- just as reframing child abuse and marital violence as public health
concerns transformed the way we thought about these ubiquitous but often secret
sources of suffering. Viewing racial discrimination as a health risk could open
the door to understanding how other climates of chronic mistreatment or fear
seep into the body -- why, for instance, pregnant women in California with
Arabic names were suddenly more likely than any other group to deliver low
birth-weight babies in the six months after 9/11.
Most striking, researchers note, is how consistent the findings have been across
a wide range of studies. The task now, they say, is to discover why.
"We don't know all the internal processes," said James Jackson, director of the
Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan. "But we can observe
an effect, and we need to find out what's going on."
The burgeoning research comes at a time when lawmakers and government officials
are increasingly focused on the problem of racial disparities in health.
African-Americans today, despite a half century of economic and social progress
since the civil rights movement, face a higher risk than any other racial group
of dying from heart disease, diabetes, stroke, and hypertension. In the United
States, affluent blacks suffer, on average, more health problems than the
poorest whites. Spurred by statistics like these, dozens of states and cities
have been passing legislation intended to eliminate racial and ethnic
disparities in health.
Boston's Disparities Project, launched in 2005 by Mayor Menino's office and the
Boston Public Health Commission, is one of the most progressive blueprints for
change. It includes partnerships with medical institutions, detailed public
reports tracking progress, and community grants to tackle such entrenched
problems as street violence and lack of access to fresh produce. In May,
lawmakers on Beacon Hill held a hearing on proposed legislation that would
reverse the root causes of health inequities. The bill would establish a state
office of health equity, among other measures.
Critics of the new research tying racism directly to disease have charged that
it is flawed because one cannot objectively measure "racial discrimination." But
the science has grown more sophisticated, allowing investigators to measure
people's experiences with prejudice more precisely. And its proponents argue
that the sheer breadth of the work suggests the conclusions are important. Most
of the investigations have been done in the United States, but a growing body of
literature originates elsewhere -- from Finland and Ireland to South Africa and
New Zealand. These studies have found connections between racism and physical
health in populations ranging from Brazil's African-descended citizens to black
women in the Netherlands who had immigrated from the former Dutch colony of
Suriname.
"Across multiple societies, you're finding similar kinds of relationships," said
David Williams, a sociologist at the Harvard School of Public Health. "There is
a phenomenon here that is quite robust."
For decades, experts have agreed that racial disparities in health spring from
pervasive social and institutional forces. The scientific literature has linked
higher rates of death and disease in American blacks to such "social
determinants" as residential segregation, environmental waste, joblessness,
unsafe housing, targeted marketing of alcohol and cigarettes, and other
inequities.
But the new work draws on a different vein of research. In the early 1980s, Duke
University social psychologist Sherman James, introduced his now-classic "John
Henryism" hypothesis. The name comes from the legendary 19th-century
"steel-driving" railroad worker who competed against a mechanical steam drill
and won -- only to drop dead from what today would probably be diagnosed as a
massive stroke or heart attack. In James's work, people who churn out prodigious
physical and mental effort to cope with chronic life stresses are said to score
high on John Henryism. James showed that blacks with high John Henryism but low
socioeconomic position pay a physical price, with higher rates of blood pressure
and hypertension.
Racism, other research suggests, acts as a classic chronic stressor, setting off
the same physiological train wreck as job strain or marital conflict: higher
blood pressure, elevated heart rate, increases in the stress hormone cortisol,
suppressed immunity. Chronic stress is also known to encourage unhealthy
behaviors, such as smoking and eating too much, that themselves raise the risk
of disease.
In the 1990s, Harvard School of Public Health social epidemiologist Nancy
Krieger pushed the hypothesis further. She confirmed that experiences of
race-based discrimination were associated with higher blood pressure, and that
an internalized response -- not talking to others about the experience or not
taking action against the inequity -- raised blood pressure even more. A
controversial finding at the time, it has since been replicated by other
investigators: The suppressed inner turmoil after a racist encounter can set off
a cascade of ill effects.
Jules Harrell, a Howard University professor of psychology, said he was moved
this spring by a photo of the Rutgers University women's college basketball
team, sitting together with dignified expressions, after radio talk show host
Don Imus had labeled them with a racist epithet.
"The expressions on their faces," said Harrell. "All I could think was, 'Good
God, I'd hate to see their cortisol levels.' "
Collectively, these studies of the racism-health link have tied experiences of
discrimination to poorer self-reported health, smoking, low-birth-weight
deliveries, depressive symptoms, and especially to cardiovascular effects. In
the mid-1980s scientists began to take advantage of the controlled conditions of
the laboratory. When African-American volunteers are hooked up to blood-pressure
monitors, for example, and then exposed to a racially provocative vignette on
tape or TV -- such as a white store clerk calling a black customer a racist
epithet -- the volunteers' blood pressures rise, their heart rates jump, and
they take longer than normal to recover from both reactions. Perhaps, scientists
reasoned, the effort of a lifetime of bracing for such threats prolongs the
effect.
More recently, the lab has moved out into the real world. Several investigations
have linked blood pressure to real-time experiences of stress and discrimination
as recorded in electronic diaries. In one yet-to-be-published study, Elizabeth
Brondolo, a psychologist at St. John's University, found that daytime
experiences of racism led to elevated nighttime blood pressure, suggesting that
the body couldn't turn off its stress response.
Despite these suggestive findings, the field remains beset by unknowns. One of
the biggest problems is that researchers don't share a concrete, agreed-upon
definition of racial discrimination -- partly because such prejudice takes
myriad forms. They also don't know if more exposure to racism produces more
disease or if, instead, disease sets in only after a threshold has been passed.
They don't know if exposures during certain periods of life are more risky than
others. And they don't know why some victims cope better than others.
Skeptics distrust people's own accounts of racial discrimination, because the
experiences can't be objectively documented and because the victim can't always
know the motives of the perpetrator.
"You have to read these studies very carefully and see how they define
'discrimination.' What exactly are they measuring?" said Dr. Sally Satel, a
resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative
think-tank. "Typically, it comes down to an individual's perception of how he
was regarded by another person or by a system -- which is not the same thing as
being unfavorably dealt with on the basis of race."
The field's proponents counter that perception is precisely the issue. Studies
of depression, anger, and post-traumatic stress disorder also rely on the
patient's perceptions of events in their lives, they say -- not on objectively
verified facts. Why should research on discrimination be held to a different
standard?
Researchers have also refined the questionnaires and interview methods they use,
allowing them to tease out the effects of depression or hostility -- mood states
that can encourage a person to see discrimination where it's not. The questions
posed have also grown more subtle and indirect, enabling study participants to
talk openly about experiences they might otherwise deny or minimize.
Methods gauging changes in the body have likewise become more accurate. Stress
researchers have gone beyond such straightforward approaches as taking
blood-pressure readings or asking individuals to rate their own health. Now,
with noninvasive diagnostic equipment, they can look directly at coronary
blockages, levels of stress hormone, and the functioning of the immune system.
These measurements help scientists zero in on the mechanisms by which racial
discrimination may ultimately cause damage.
At the University of California, Los Angeles, psychologist Vickie Mays, director
of the Center on Minority Health Disparities, is taking a futuristic angle on
racism's bodily toll: peering into the brain itself. In a forthcoming study,
Mays will record what happens in the brain's circuits and structures during
laboratory conditions of discrimination and whether people vary in their brain
responses based on their lifelong exposure to racial prejudice.
"We know about [racism's] outcome -- but in many ways we don't know what makes
up the experience of racism," she said. "Is it processing in the part of the
brain responsible for emotions? Or in the part of the brain responsible for
fear?"
Racism remains challenging to explore scientifically, researchers say, partly
because it is difficult to get funding and partly because of institutional
reluctance to take on a potentially polarizing issue. In 2006, Harvard's David
Williams and a colleague submitted a grant proposal to the National Institutes
of Health to study whether perceived ethnic discrimination, coupled with
inequities in medical care, delayed stroke recovery in Latinos. As one reviewer
wrote back, "It is not a good investment of NIH dollars to study racism, because
even if we fund something, there is nothing we can do about it."
It's the kind of remark many scientists in the field have heard. These comments
are frustrating, they say, because they see the research as a crucial first step
toward a more clinical, less charged, discussion of the place of racism in
American society.
"The first step is validating that these effects could be real," said Tené
Lewis, a health psychologist at the Yale School of Public Health. "Once we have
a body of literature, we can say: 'OK, can we please talk about this?' "
Boston-based journalist and author Madeline Drexler, a former Globe Magazine
medical columnist, holds a visiting appointment at the Harvard School of Public
Health.
This essay raises serious credibility questions. (Madeline Drexler, "How
racism hurts -- literally," Boston Sunday Globe, July 15, 2007) Are black women
different from white men when it comes to reacting to stress? Are black women
different from white men in reacting to discrimination? Are black women's
reaction to racism different from white men's reaction to discrimination based
upon sexual preference? Or disability? Were any studies done on the effects of
discrimination against white men who are accused of psychiatric illness? I don't
think so.
Why does the Globe continue to prioritize one form of discrimination
over others when many kinds of bias are equally unlawful and offensive? The
Globe discriminates in its focus on discrimination. See, e.g., how differently
the Globe reported on outrageous unlawful discrimination in access to health
care for persons with disabilities in Liz Kowalczyk, "Psychiatric patients feel
strain,"
Boston Globe, July 15, 2007.
This essay cherry picks ignoring the income and class of black people. Do
multi millionaire athletes and celebrities get worse medical care than poor
white men? I don't think so.
Most importantly psychiatrists say that you cannot control what another
person thinks or says about you. But you can control how you react to what they
say or do. These anecdotes suggest that black people are incapable of ignoring
what others say and do. Do black people have no control over their emotions and
thoughts?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
How racism hurts -- literally
Boston Sunday Globe
By Madeline Drexler
July 15, 2007
FOUR YEARS AGO, researchers identified a surprising price for being a black
woman in America. The study of 334 midlife women, published in the journal
Health Psychology, examined links between different kinds of stress and risk
factors for heart disease and stroke. Black women who pointed to racism as a
source of stress in their lives, the researchers found, developed more plaque in
their carotid arteries -- an early sign of heart disease -- than black women who
didn't. The difference was small but important -- making the report the first to
link hardening of the arteries to racial discrimination.
The study was just one in a fast-growing field of research documenting how
racism literally hurts the body. More than 100 studies -- most published since
2000 -- now document the effects of racial discrimination on physical health.
Some link blood pressure to recollected encounters with bigotry. Others record
the cardiovascular reactions of volunteers subjected to racist imagery in a lab.
Forthcoming research will even peek into the workings of the brain during
exposure to racist provocations.
Scientists caution that the research is preliminary, and some of it is quite
controversial, but they say the findings could profoundly change the way we look
at both racism and health. It could unmask racism as a bona fide public health
problem -- just as reframing child abuse and marital violence as public health
concerns transformed the way we thought about these ubiquitous but often secret
sources of suffering. Viewing racial discrimination as a health risk could open
the door to understanding how other climates of chronic mistreatment or fear
seep into the body -- why, for instance, pregnant women in California with
Arabic names were suddenly more likely than any other group to deliver low
birth-weight babies in the six months after 9/11.
Most striking, researchers note, is how consistent the findings have been across
a wide range of studies. The task now, they say, is to discover why.
"We don't know all the internal processes," said James Jackson, director of the
Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan. "But we can observe
an effect, and we need to find out what's going on."
The burgeoning research comes at a time when lawmakers and government officials
are increasingly focused on the problem of racial disparities in health.
African-Americans today, despite a half century of economic and social progress
since the civil rights movement, face a higher risk than any other racial group
of dying from heart disease, diabetes, stroke, and hypertension. In the United
States, affluent blacks suffer, on average, more health problems than the
poorest whites. Spurred by statistics like these, dozens of states and cities
have been passing legislation intended to eliminate racial and ethnic
disparities in health.
Boston's Disparities Project, launched in 2005 by Mayor Menino's office and the
Boston Public Health Commission, is one of the most progressive blueprints for
change. It includes partnerships with medical institutions, detailed public
reports tracking progress, and community grants to tackle such entrenched
problems as street violence and lack of access to fresh produce. In May,
lawmakers on Beacon Hill held a hearing on proposed legislation that would
reverse the root causes of health inequities. The bill would establish a state
office of health equity, among other measures.
Critics of the new research tying racism directly to disease have charged that
it is flawed because one cannot objectively measure "racial discrimination." But
the science has grown more sophisticated, allowing investigators to measure
people's experiences with prejudice more precisely. And its proponents argue
that the sheer breadth of the work suggests the conclusions are important. Most
of the investigations have been done in the United States, but a growing body of
literature originates elsewhere -- from Finland and Ireland to South Africa and
New Zealand. These studies have found connections between racism and physical
health in populations ranging from Brazil's African-descended citizens to black
women in the Netherlands who had immigrated from the former Dutch colony of
Suriname.
"Across multiple societies, you're finding similar kinds of relationships," said
David Williams, a sociologist at the Harvard School of Public Health. "There is
a phenomenon here that is quite robust."
For decades, experts have agreed that racial disparities in health spring from
pervasive social and institutional forces. The scientific literature has linked
higher rates of death and disease in American blacks to such "social
determinants" as residential segregation, environmental waste, joblessness,
unsafe housing, targeted marketing of alcohol and cigarettes, and other
inequities.
But the new work draws on a different vein of research. In the early 1980s, Duke
University social psychologist Sherman James, introduced his now-classic "John
Henryism" hypothesis. The name comes from the legendary 19th-century
"steel-driving" railroad worker who competed against a mechanical steam drill
and won -- only to drop dead from what today would probably be diagnosed as a
massive stroke or heart attack. In James's work, people who churn out prodigious
physical and mental effort to cope with chronic life stresses are said to score
high on John Henryism. James showed that blacks with high John Henryism but low
socioeconomic position pay a physical price, with higher rates of blood pressure
and hypertension.
Racism, other research suggests, acts as a classic chronic stressor, setting off
the same physiological train wreck as job strain or marital conflict: higher
blood pressure, elevated heart rate, increases in the stress hormone cortisol,
suppressed immunity. Chronic stress is also known to encourage unhealthy
behaviors, such as smoking and eating too much, that themselves raise the risk
of disease.
In the 1990s, Harvard School of Public Health social epidemiologist Nancy
Krieger pushed the hypothesis further. She confirmed that experiences of
race-based discrimination were associated with higher blood pressure, and that
an internalized response -- not talking to others about the experience or not
taking action against the inequity -- raised blood pressure even more. A
controversial finding at the time, it has since been replicated by other
investigators: The suppressed inner turmoil after a racist encounter can set off
a cascade of ill effects.
Jules Harrell, a Howard University professor of psychology, said he was moved
this spring by a photo of the Rutgers University women's college basketball
team, sitting together with dignified expressions, after radio talk show host
Don Imus had labeled them with a racist epithet.
"The expressions on their faces," said Harrell. "All I could think was, 'Good
God, I'd hate to see their cortisol levels.' "
Collectively, these studies of the racism-health link have tied experiences of
discrimination to poorer self-reported health, smoking, low-birth-weight
deliveries, depressive symptoms, and especially to cardiovascular effects. In
the mid-1980s scientists began to take advantage of the controlled conditions of
the laboratory. When African-American volunteers are hooked up to blood-pressure
monitors, for example, and then exposed to a racially provocative vignette on
tape or TV -- such as a white store clerk calling a black customer a racist
epithet -- the volunteers' blood pressures rise, their heart rates jump, and
they take longer than normal to recover from both reactions. Perhaps, scientists
reasoned, the effort of a lifetime of bracing for such threats prolongs the
effect.
More recently, the lab has moved out into the real world. Several investigations
have linked blood pressure to real-time experiences of stress and discrimination
as recorded in electronic diaries. In one yet-to-be-published study, Elizabeth
Brondolo, a psychologist at St. John's University, found that daytime
experiences of racism led to elevated nighttime blood pressure, suggesting that
the body couldn't turn off its stress response.
Despite these suggestive findings, the field remains beset by unknowns. One of
the biggest problems is that researchers don't share a concrete, agreed-upon
definition of racial discrimination -- partly because such prejudice takes
myriad forms. They also don't know if more exposure to racism produces more
disease or if, instead, disease sets in only after a threshold has been passed.
They don't know if exposures during certain periods of life are more risky than
others. And they don't know why some victims cope better than others.
Skeptics distrust people's own accounts of racial discrimination, because the
experiences can't be objectively documented and because the victim can't always
know the motives of the perpetrator.
"You have to read these studies very carefully and see how they define
'discrimination.' What exactly are they measuring?" said Dr. Sally Satel, a
resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative
think-tank. "Typically, it comes down to an individual's perception of how he
was regarded by another person or by a system -- which is not the same thing as
being unfavorably dealt with on the basis of race."
The field's proponents counter that perception is precisely the issue. Studies
of depression, anger, and post-traumatic stress disorder also rely on the
patient's perceptions of events in their lives, they say -- not on objectively
verified facts. Why should research on discrimination be held to a different
standard?
Researchers have also refined the questionnaires and interview methods they use,
allowing them to tease out the effects of depression or hostility -- mood states
that can encourage a person to see discrimination where it's not. The questions
posed have also grown more subtle and indirect, enabling study participants to
talk openly about experiences they might otherwise deny or minimize.
Methods gauging changes in the body have likewise become more accurate. Stress
researchers have gone beyond such straightforward approaches as taking
blood-pressure readings or asking individuals to rate their own health. Now,
with noninvasive diagnostic equipment, they can look directly at coronary
blockages, levels of stress hormone, and the functioning of the immune system.
These measurements help scientists zero in on the mechanisms by which racial
discrimination may ultimately cause damage.
At the University of California, Los Angeles, psychologist Vickie Mays, director
of the Center on Minority Health Disparities, is taking a futuristic angle on
racism's bodily toll: peering into the brain itself. In a forthcoming study,
Mays will record what happens in the brain's circuits and structures during
laboratory conditions of discrimination and whether people vary in their brain
responses based on their lifelong exposure to racial prejudice.
"We know about [racism's] outcome -- but in many ways we don't know what makes
up the experience of racism," she said. "Is it processing in the part of the
brain responsible for emotions? Or in the part of the brain responsible for
fear?"
Racism remains challenging to explore scientifically, researchers say, partly
because it is difficult to get funding and partly because of institutional
reluctance to take on a potentially polarizing issue. In 2006, Harvard's David
Williams and a colleague submitted a grant proposal to the National Institutes
of Health to study whether perceived ethnic discrimination, coupled with
inequities in medical care, delayed stroke recovery in Latinos. As one reviewer
wrote back, "It is not a good investment of NIH dollars to study racism, because
even if we fund something, there is nothing we can do about it."
It's the kind of remark many scientists in the field have heard. These comments
are frustrating, they say, because they see the research as a crucial first step
toward a more clinical, less charged, discussion of the place of racism in
American society.
"The first step is validating that these effects could be real," said Tené
Lewis, a health psychologist at the Yale School of Public Health. "Once we have
a body of literature, we can say: 'OK, can we please talk about this?' "
Boston-based journalist and author Madeline Drexler, a former Globe Magazine
medical columnist, holds a visiting appointment at the Harvard School of Public
Health.
July 10, 2007
Biker Abuses
Biker Abuses
My favorite biker abuse is when they come up on pedestrians on sidewalks
and yell, "On your right," or "On your left." (From the Editor, Weekly Dig, July
4, 2007, page 3) Is this a carry-over from car-on-car traffic? Do car drivers
approach cars from behind and yell "On your left," and expect the car in front to make way for the yelling driver? What are these morons thinking?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
My favorite biker abuse is when they come up on pedestrians on sidewalks
and yell, "On your right," or "On your left." (From the Editor, Weekly Dig, July
4, 2007, page 3) Is this a carry-over from car-on-car traffic? Do car drivers
approach cars from behind and yell "On your left," and expect the car in front to make way for the yelling driver? What are these morons thinking?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Only In New York?
Only In New York?
[This letter was published in The New York Post on Tuesday July 10, 2007]
Are the abuses of police powers by Governor Spitzer unique to New York?
("Abuse of Power?" Editorial, New York Post, July 5, 2007, page 26) At least in
Albany there are some powerful Republicans like Joe Bruno to fight back. In some
places e.g., Massachusetts there is one-party rule. Similar police abuses
are customary with no Republican Party to oppose them.
As in Albany, the new Massachusetts Governor promised change and he is
doing business as usual. Is this something that is common to all politicians? Or
is it something in the New York water?
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
AN ABUSE OF POWER?
New York Post
Editorial
July 5, 2007 -- So now comes word that the New York State Police, at the direction of Gov. Spitzer's office, undertook a detailed surveillance of Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno.
The surveillance appears to have culminated in a selectively leaked story published in an upstate newspaper meant clearly to undermine Bruno in his on-going battles with Spitzer.
Which it clearly has done.
Post State Editor Fredric U. Dicker reports this morning that detailed State Police records have been kept of Bruno's travels around the city. It was those records that apparently served as the basis for the newspaper story - which appeared last Sunday in the Albany Times-Union.
No such records have been kept on the travels of Spitzer and Lt. Gov. David Paterson.
It hardly needs to be said that the application of police powers to serve political ends is antithetical to American traditions, values and law.
If, in fact, Spitzer sicced troopers on Bruno, the governor's effectiveness will be significantly constrained. As it is, the boorishness that has characterized his administration almost from the beginning has all but hamstrung state government, rendering the governor's ambitious reform agenda moot.
In May, at the height of the governor's battles with Bruno, troopers began keeping records of the majority leader's use of a state helicopter and ground transportation for a number of trips he made - but not that of any other state officials. The cops say they have no separate documentation of any trips by Paterson or Spitzer himself - although Spitzer acknowledges having used state aircraft and vehicles.
Yesterday, gubernatorial spokesman Darren Dopp said Bruno got special attention after Conservative Party Chairman Michael Long - often at ideological loggerheads with Bruno - said that the lawmaker was bringing armed troopers to fund-raising events.
Long flatly denied that.
Obviously, somebody is not telling the truth.
Where the story goes from here is anybody's guess. To term the entire matter bizarre would be to understate the case.
What seems clear, however, is that Spitzer & Co. ordered the police to track Bruno's travel methods and compile records - and then suggested that the Times-Union request those records, which it did under the Freedom of Information Law - resulting in the paper's story Sunday.
If Bruno did nothing wrong - and from what's on the record now, it appears that he did not - then the dust-up over the trips pales before the larger question:
Did Eliot Spitzer, or someone acting at his direction, in fact order state troopers to undertake a surveillance of Joe Bruno in an effort to gain political advantage?
Parallels with other abuses of police power by politicians spring to mind. If Spitzer wants to avoid spending the coming months - if not years - attempting to govern under such a cloud, he would do well to commission an independent investigation of the facts already on the record, and of those which might come later.
This is an extraordinarily serious matter. It must be attended to forthwith.
[This letter was published in The New York Post on Tuesday July 10, 2007]
Are the abuses of police powers by Governor Spitzer unique to New York?
("Abuse of Power?" Editorial, New York Post, July 5, 2007, page 26) At least in
Albany there are some powerful Republicans like Joe Bruno to fight back. In some
places e.g., Massachusetts there is one-party rule. Similar police abuses
are customary with no Republican Party to oppose them.
As in Albany, the new Massachusetts Governor promised change and he is
doing business as usual. Is this something that is common to all politicians? Or
is it something in the New York water?
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
AN ABUSE OF POWER?
New York Post
Editorial
July 5, 2007 -- So now comes word that the New York State Police, at the direction of Gov. Spitzer's office, undertook a detailed surveillance of Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno.
The surveillance appears to have culminated in a selectively leaked story published in an upstate newspaper meant clearly to undermine Bruno in his on-going battles with Spitzer.
Which it clearly has done.
Post State Editor Fredric U. Dicker reports this morning that detailed State Police records have been kept of Bruno's travels around the city. It was those records that apparently served as the basis for the newspaper story - which appeared last Sunday in the Albany Times-Union.
No such records have been kept on the travels of Spitzer and Lt. Gov. David Paterson.
It hardly needs to be said that the application of police powers to serve political ends is antithetical to American traditions, values and law.
If, in fact, Spitzer sicced troopers on Bruno, the governor's effectiveness will be significantly constrained. As it is, the boorishness that has characterized his administration almost from the beginning has all but hamstrung state government, rendering the governor's ambitious reform agenda moot.
In May, at the height of the governor's battles with Bruno, troopers began keeping records of the majority leader's use of a state helicopter and ground transportation for a number of trips he made - but not that of any other state officials. The cops say they have no separate documentation of any trips by Paterson or Spitzer himself - although Spitzer acknowledges having used state aircraft and vehicles.
Yesterday, gubernatorial spokesman Darren Dopp said Bruno got special attention after Conservative Party Chairman Michael Long - often at ideological loggerheads with Bruno - said that the lawmaker was bringing armed troopers to fund-raising events.
Long flatly denied that.
Obviously, somebody is not telling the truth.
Where the story goes from here is anybody's guess. To term the entire matter bizarre would be to understate the case.
What seems clear, however, is that Spitzer & Co. ordered the police to track Bruno's travel methods and compile records - and then suggested that the Times-Union request those records, which it did under the Freedom of Information Law - resulting in the paper's story Sunday.
If Bruno did nothing wrong - and from what's on the record now, it appears that he did not - then the dust-up over the trips pales before the larger question:
Did Eliot Spitzer, or someone acting at his direction, in fact order state troopers to undertake a surveillance of Joe Bruno in an effort to gain political advantage?
Parallels with other abuses of police power by politicians spring to mind. If Spitzer wants to avoid spending the coming months - if not years - attempting to govern under such a cloud, he would do well to commission an independent investigation of the facts already on the record, and of those which might come later.
This is an extraordinarily serious matter. It must be attended to forthwith.
June 25, 2007
Page Six as Lobbyist?
Page Six as Lobbyist?
Are the editors of Page Six doing PR for the drug companies and the
psychiatric industry? (Paula Froelich, "SECRET HELL OF OLYMPICS QUEEN," Page
Six, New York Post, June 23, 2007, page 10) On what evidence is the statement
"It turned out to be a chemical imbalance in her brain that caused her to
'become extremely lethargic
[...]'" based?
There is no such thing as a "chemical imbalance in the brain."
Psychiatrists do not do a chemical analysis of brain matter. They take
photographs. But even if they did scoop out brain matter and test it chemically
there is no standard for a chemical balance. This is a fantasy created by the
psychiatric industry and their mentors the drug companies to promote the false
notion that psychiatry is science based. It sounds good. It fools a lot of people.
But there is no science behind this nullity.
See also the efforts of civil rights activists from MindFreedom who
conducted a hunger strike to challenge the American Psychiatric Association to
provide evidence of their claim of a chemical imbalance. The APA could not
provide any. It is time to scrutinize these baseless claims of the boondoggle
called psychiatry, before everyone who has emotions and thoughts are medicated
into submission.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
SECRET HELL OF OLYMPICS QUEEN
New York Post
Page Six
Paula Froelich
page 10
June 23, 2007 -- OLYMPICS skating legend Dorothy Hamill still has nightmares
about the tragic death of her ex-husband Dean Paul Martin - because, she reveals
for the first time, he crashed his plane minutes after learning she had secretly
married another man he'd warned her about.
"The wedding had been so impulsive that I hadn't had a chance to tell him
beforehand . . . I wanted to tell him in person - he deserved to hear it
straight from me. The fact that he had to hear it from somebody else, and
immediately before he was to command an F-4 in the air, haunts me to this day,"
Hamill says in her upcoming autobiography, "A Skating Life," due out this
October from Hyperion.
While there has never been any evidence that Martin crashed on purpose, Hamill
raises the possibility he was under extreme duress in his last moments. She says
she was told that as Martin waited for weather clearance on March 21, 1987, he
was asked by an acquaintance about her recent marriage to sports doctor Ken
Forsythe.
"He'd turned to her, his face in shock, and reacted incredulously, 'She did?' "
Hamill writes. Also haunting the athletic pixie was the warning Martin first
gave her after she started dating Forsythe. " 'He's no good Dorothy. Watch out
for this guy,"' she quotes Martin as telling her. She and Forsythe later
divorced, had a custody battle for their daughter, Alexandra, and were forced to
declare bankruptcy after some business ventures went bad.
"I was in the depth of a depression. I had hit rock bottom," Hamill writes. "I
kept up with [the antidepressant] Paxil, but I was supplementing it with glasses
of white wine. Not a good idea . . . To add to my misery, I started smoking." It
turned out to be a chemical imbalance in her brain that caused her to "become
extremely lethargic . . . sometimes so paralyzed I [didn't] want to get off the
couch."
[...]
Are the editors of Page Six doing PR for the drug companies and the
psychiatric industry? (Paula Froelich, "SECRET HELL OF OLYMPICS QUEEN," Page
Six, New York Post, June 23, 2007, page 10) On what evidence is the statement
"It turned out to be a chemical imbalance in her brain that caused her to
'become extremely lethargic
[...]'" based?
There is no such thing as a "chemical imbalance in the brain."
Psychiatrists do not do a chemical analysis of brain matter. They take
photographs. But even if they did scoop out brain matter and test it chemically
there is no standard for a chemical balance. This is a fantasy created by the
psychiatric industry and their mentors the drug companies to promote the false
notion that psychiatry is science based. It sounds good. It fools a lot of people.
But there is no science behind this nullity.
See also the efforts of civil rights activists from MindFreedom who
conducted a hunger strike to challenge the American Psychiatric Association to
provide evidence of their claim of a chemical imbalance. The APA could not
provide any. It is time to scrutinize these baseless claims of the boondoggle
called psychiatry, before everyone who has emotions and thoughts are medicated
into submission.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
SECRET HELL OF OLYMPICS QUEEN
New York Post
Page Six
Paula Froelich
page 10
June 23, 2007 -- OLYMPICS skating legend Dorothy Hamill still has nightmares
about the tragic death of her ex-husband Dean Paul Martin - because, she reveals
for the first time, he crashed his plane minutes after learning she had secretly
married another man he'd warned her about.
"The wedding had been so impulsive that I hadn't had a chance to tell him
beforehand . . . I wanted to tell him in person - he deserved to hear it
straight from me. The fact that he had to hear it from somebody else, and
immediately before he was to command an F-4 in the air, haunts me to this day,"
Hamill says in her upcoming autobiography, "A Skating Life," due out this
October from Hyperion.
While there has never been any evidence that Martin crashed on purpose, Hamill
raises the possibility he was under extreme duress in his last moments. She says
she was told that as Martin waited for weather clearance on March 21, 1987, he
was asked by an acquaintance about her recent marriage to sports doctor Ken
Forsythe.
"He'd turned to her, his face in shock, and reacted incredulously, 'She did?' "
Hamill writes. Also haunting the athletic pixie was the warning Martin first
gave her after she started dating Forsythe. " 'He's no good Dorothy. Watch out
for this guy,"' she quotes Martin as telling her. She and Forsythe later
divorced, had a custody battle for their daughter, Alexandra, and were forced to
declare bankruptcy after some business ventures went bad.
"I was in the depth of a depression. I had hit rock bottom," Hamill writes. "I
kept up with [the antidepressant] Paxil, but I was supplementing it with glasses
of white wine. Not a good idea . . . To add to my misery, I started smoking." It
turned out to be a chemical imbalance in her brain that caused her to "become
extremely lethargic . . . sometimes so paralyzed I [didn't] want to get off the
couch."
[...]
One-sided Argument for Same Sex Marriage
One-sided Argument for Same Sex Marriage
The Dig reports the usual pabulum on same sex marriage. (Julia Reischel +
Paul McMorrow, "Gay Marriage Scorecard," June 20, 2007) We know "members of the
legislature [...] are not opposed to gay marriage." The only thing politicians
oppose is losing their job, having "shifted gayward [...] to protect their
seats."
The authors quote a political reporter and two politicians and declare that
"Beacon Hill doesn't care." The Due Process Rights of 100,000 citizens, none of
whom were quoted by these authors remain voided. US Rep. Barney Frank shares
the elitist view that legislators should speak for the voter. Does the Dig
think journalists should speak for the voter too? Are voters incapable of
knowing how to vote? If they stupid what does that say about their votes
for the legislators?
Gay activists protect a flawed Court decision. The SJC does not have
jurisdiction on marriage issues according to the state constitution. [Chapter
III.
JUDICIARY POWER.
Article V. All causes of marriage, divorce, and alimony, and all appeals from
the judges of probate shall be heard and determined by the governor and council,
until the legislature shall, by law, make other provision.]
Until same sex marriage is codified the court case will remain vulnerable.
This battle may be a Pyrrhic victory. Gay elitists believe that they know better
than voters and laws.
[PART THE FIRST
A Declaration of the Rights of the Inhabitants
of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
Article V. All power residing originally in the people, and being derived from
them, the several magistrates and officers of government, vested with authority,
whether legislative, executive, or judicial, are their substitutes and agents,
and are at all times accountable to them.]
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Gay Marriage Scorecard
The ConCon changes everything
by Julia Reischel + Paul McMorrow
Issue 9.25
Wed, June 20, 2007
Unless you missed the enormous rainbow mushroom cloud blooming over the State
House dome last week, you know that on Thursday, to the surprise of pretty much
everyone, Massachusetts’s state legislators convened a Constitutional
Convention, killed the Protection of Marriage Amendment and enshrined gay
marriage until at least 2012.
Just six months ago, the legislature voted the opposite way by a
comfortable margin, giving the amendment a decent shot of landing on the 2008
ballot. Somehow, leadership on Beacon Hill engineered a semi-miraculous
turnaround in six months, cobbling together a pro-gay marriage coalition out of
thin air. And while the bloviators in the House and Senate say last week’s vote
is all about courage and rights, those aren’t the main reasons the gays
prevailed.
“Unlike a generation ago, and unlike most other states, most of the
members of the legislature, gay or straight, male or female, liberal or
conservative, are not opposed to gay marriage,” says Larry DiCara, a longtime
observer of local politics.
That’s been the case ever since 2004, when Carl Sciortino, an openly
gay representative from Somerville, beat out Vincent Ciampa, an entrenched and
virulently anti-gay incumbent. Sciortino’s long-shot victory, engineered by gay
rights advocates, sent tremors throughout the State House. Since then,
incumbents who’ve been faced with upstart progressive candidates (or the threat
thereof) have shifted gayward in election years in order to protect their seats
from opposition. And the ones who haven’t shifted have consistently lost
elections.
The change reflects Massachusetts’s population overall. “The
changing demographics of the state are significant,” says DiCara. “We think of
[state Rep.] Brian Wallace of South Boston, for example, of having a district
full of a bunch of Irish guys who wear scally caps and drink beer. Guess what? I
bet there are 3,000 or 4,000 gay people in Brian Wallace’s district.”
By showing up at the State House in person to lobby their
legislators in the weeks before the ConCon, many of those gay citizens tipped
the balance even more in their favor.
“I’m willing to suspend my cynicism and acknowledge that that did
work,” says Jon Keller, WBZ-TV’s chief political analyst. “Come on—with the
presence of your absolutely most respectable, solid-citizen constituents sitting
there in front of you, you’d have to be a real hater to not get it.”
Marriage-protection activists have been pushing constitutional
amendments since 2001, and legislators have ducked and dodged them as much as
possible, avoiding conclusive votes for years. Then Senate President Robert
Travaglini—with more than a gentle nudge from Mitt Romney and the Supreme
Judicial Court—forced the issue in early January, and the legislature had no
place left to hide.
“I think there was just a major-league ConCon fatigue,” Keller says.
[...]
The Dig reports the usual pabulum on same sex marriage. (Julia Reischel +
Paul McMorrow, "Gay Marriage Scorecard," June 20, 2007) We know "members of the
legislature [...] are not opposed to gay marriage." The only thing politicians
oppose is losing their job, having "shifted gayward [...] to protect their
seats."
The authors quote a political reporter and two politicians and declare that
"Beacon Hill doesn't care." The Due Process Rights of 100,000 citizens, none of
whom were quoted by these authors remain voided. US Rep. Barney Frank shares
the elitist view that legislators should speak for the voter. Does the Dig
think journalists should speak for the voter too? Are voters incapable of
knowing how to vote? If they stupid what does that say about their votes
for the legislators?
Gay activists protect a flawed Court decision. The SJC does not have
jurisdiction on marriage issues according to the state constitution. [Chapter
III.
JUDICIARY POWER.
Article V. All causes of marriage, divorce, and alimony, and all appeals from
the judges of probate shall be heard and determined by the governor and council,
until the legislature shall, by law, make other provision.]
Until same sex marriage is codified the court case will remain vulnerable.
This battle may be a Pyrrhic victory. Gay elitists believe that they know better
than voters and laws.
[PART THE FIRST
A Declaration of the Rights of the Inhabitants
of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
Article V. All power residing originally in the people, and being derived from
them, the several magistrates and officers of government, vested with authority,
whether legislative, executive, or judicial, are their substitutes and agents,
and are at all times accountable to them.]
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Gay Marriage Scorecard
The ConCon changes everything
by Julia Reischel + Paul McMorrow
Issue 9.25
Wed, June 20, 2007
Unless you missed the enormous rainbow mushroom cloud blooming over the State
House dome last week, you know that on Thursday, to the surprise of pretty much
everyone, Massachusetts’s state legislators convened a Constitutional
Convention, killed the Protection of Marriage Amendment and enshrined gay
marriage until at least 2012.
Just six months ago, the legislature voted the opposite way by a
comfortable margin, giving the amendment a decent shot of landing on the 2008
ballot. Somehow, leadership on Beacon Hill engineered a semi-miraculous
turnaround in six months, cobbling together a pro-gay marriage coalition out of
thin air. And while the bloviators in the House and Senate say last week’s vote
is all about courage and rights, those aren’t the main reasons the gays
prevailed.
“Unlike a generation ago, and unlike most other states, most of the
members of the legislature, gay or straight, male or female, liberal or
conservative, are not opposed to gay marriage,” says Larry DiCara, a longtime
observer of local politics.
That’s been the case ever since 2004, when Carl Sciortino, an openly
gay representative from Somerville, beat out Vincent Ciampa, an entrenched and
virulently anti-gay incumbent. Sciortino’s long-shot victory, engineered by gay
rights advocates, sent tremors throughout the State House. Since then,
incumbents who’ve been faced with upstart progressive candidates (or the threat
thereof) have shifted gayward in election years in order to protect their seats
from opposition. And the ones who haven’t shifted have consistently lost
elections.
The change reflects Massachusetts’s population overall. “The
changing demographics of the state are significant,” says DiCara. “We think of
[state Rep.] Brian Wallace of South Boston, for example, of having a district
full of a bunch of Irish guys who wear scally caps and drink beer. Guess what? I
bet there are 3,000 or 4,000 gay people in Brian Wallace’s district.”
By showing up at the State House in person to lobby their
legislators in the weeks before the ConCon, many of those gay citizens tipped
the balance even more in their favor.
“I’m willing to suspend my cynicism and acknowledge that that did
work,” says Jon Keller, WBZ-TV’s chief political analyst. “Come on—with the
presence of your absolutely most respectable, solid-citizen constituents sitting
there in front of you, you’d have to be a real hater to not get it.”
Marriage-protection activists have been pushing constitutional
amendments since 2001, and legislators have ducked and dodged them as much as
possible, avoiding conclusive votes for years. Then Senate President Robert
Travaglini—with more than a gentle nudge from Mitt Romney and the Supreme
Judicial Court—forced the issue in early January, and the legislature had no
place left to hide.
“I think there was just a major-league ConCon fatigue,” Keller says.
[...]
June 11, 2007
Talking the Talk
Talking the Talk
L.A. City Attorney said, "If law enforcement officials are to enjoy the
respect
of those we are charged with protecting, we cannot tolerate a two-tiered jail
system where the rich and powerful receive special treatment." (Lorena Mongelli,
"Poor Li'l Rich Paris is Free," New York Post, June 8, 2007, page 6)
Oh? Hello? Earth to City Attorney! Does he believe we were all born
yesterday? In which city, county, state of this country is there not a
two-tiered system of justice? Do any attorneys treat poor persons the same as
they treat wealthy and powerful clients? For what office is he running using
rhetoric like that?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
L.A. City Attorney said, "If law enforcement officials are to enjoy the
respect
of those we are charged with protecting, we cannot tolerate a two-tiered jail
system where the rich and powerful receive special treatment." (Lorena Mongelli,
"Poor Li'l Rich Paris is Free," New York Post, June 8, 2007, page 6)
Oh? Hello? Earth to City Attorney! Does he believe we were all born
yesterday? In which city, county, state of this country is there not a
two-tiered system of justice? Do any attorneys treat poor persons the same as
they treat wealthy and powerful clients? For what office is he running using
rhetoric like that?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Enabling Court Corruption
Enabling Court Corruption
The defense lawyer said the defendant "was not criminally responsible for
the slaying because he had a mental illness and alcohol abuse problems at the
time." (Associated Press, "Lawyer details his client's ills," Boston Globe, June
9, 2007) Illness as a defense to crime is nothing new. Flip Wilson blamed the
devil for his misdeeds. If Twinkies, mental illness and alcoholism caused crime
why not simply lock up all alcoholics and mental patients?
The fallacy is that most alcoholics and most mental patients do not commit
crimes. They are often the victims of crime. That does not stop journalists and
lawyers from demonizing persons accused of mental illness.
During trials lawyers are permitted to exaggerate when arguing. It is
called "puffing." Fantasy is allowed in a courtroom.
Journalists report what lawyers and police say in court, the deceptions
used to win cases, as if they are facts. Readers depend on journalists for their
vision of reality. Does this help keep Americans misinformed?
The mental illness defense follows from American legal theory. If a person
does not know that his act is wrong he cannot be held liable for criminal acts.
Being accused of having a mental illness does not mitigate criminal
liability. It is the absence of knowing right from wrong. But the psychiatric
industry and its co-conspirator the drug industry promote irrational ideas as
part of their marketing campaigns. Corporate interests corrupt the legal system
as well as the social system in this country. The Boston Globe editors enable
these
abuses by with headlines and reporting.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Lawyer details his client's ills
Cites alcoholism and mental illness in Nantucket case
Boston Globe
By Associated Press
June 9, 2007
NANTUCKET -- A former New York bank executive charged in the fatal stabbing of
his former girlfriend was mentally ill, struggling with alcohol addiction and
suffering from "the ultimate rejection" of a spurned marriage proposal when she
was killed, his lawyer told a jury yesterday.
But prosecutor Brian Glenny said the relationship between Thomas Toolan III and
Elizabeth Lochtefeld "came to a violent end at the hands of Mr. Toolan."
[...]
The defense lawyer said the defendant "was not criminally responsible for
the slaying because he had a mental illness and alcohol abuse problems at the
time." (Associated Press, "Lawyer details his client's ills," Boston Globe, June
9, 2007) Illness as a defense to crime is nothing new. Flip Wilson blamed the
devil for his misdeeds. If Twinkies, mental illness and alcoholism caused crime
why not simply lock up all alcoholics and mental patients?
The fallacy is that most alcoholics and most mental patients do not commit
crimes. They are often the victims of crime. That does not stop journalists and
lawyers from demonizing persons accused of mental illness.
During trials lawyers are permitted to exaggerate when arguing. It is
called "puffing." Fantasy is allowed in a courtroom.
Journalists report what lawyers and police say in court, the deceptions
used to win cases, as if they are facts. Readers depend on journalists for their
vision of reality. Does this help keep Americans misinformed?
The mental illness defense follows from American legal theory. If a person
does not know that his act is wrong he cannot be held liable for criminal acts.
Being accused of having a mental illness does not mitigate criminal
liability. It is the absence of knowing right from wrong. But the psychiatric
industry and its co-conspirator the drug industry promote irrational ideas as
part of their marketing campaigns. Corporate interests corrupt the legal system
as well as the social system in this country. The Boston Globe editors enable
these
abuses by with headlines and reporting.
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Lawyer details his client's ills
Cites alcoholism and mental illness in Nantucket case
Boston Globe
By Associated Press
June 9, 2007
NANTUCKET -- A former New York bank executive charged in the fatal stabbing of
his former girlfriend was mentally ill, struggling with alcohol addiction and
suffering from "the ultimate rejection" of a spurned marriage proposal when she
was killed, his lawyer told a jury yesterday.
But prosecutor Brian Glenny said the relationship between Thomas Toolan III and
Elizabeth Lochtefeld "came to a violent end at the hands of Mr. Toolan."
[...]
T Fares Fund Roads?
T Fares Fund Roads?
Retiring Senator Jarrett "Barrios said that much of that [MBTA] debt
actually resulted from the Big Dig." Huh? (Marie Szaniszlo, "Barrios, Wolf urge
state to cover debt, thwart more T fare hikes," Boston Herald, June 08, 2007)
This is rational transportation policy? Two Democrats lament
counterproductive policy mandated under the one-party system in Massachusetts.
Rather than promoting mass transit for energy savings, and for saving the
environment, the one-party government in Massachusetts places the financial
burden of funding the $15 billion boondoggle road project on the users of mass
transit. That makes sense if you want to encourage vehicle usage and to
discourage mass transit usage.
Underlying the irrational Democratic policies is that there is more money
to
be made by pouring taxpayer funds into the MBTA pit. Using government agencies
to make money for criminal organizations is the new pattern of government in
this country. This is like using appropriations for gambling addiction to build
casinos.
Is this a surprise for Barrios and Wolf? Did they just learn about
the abuses? Where have they been all of these years? Why is the rest of the
legislature silent on these abuses?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Barrios,Wolf urge state to cover debt, thwart more T fare hikes
By Marie Szaniszlo/Boston Herald
Boston Herald
Fri Jun 08, 2007, 06:21 PM EDT
Boston -
Some of the MBTA’s harshest critics yesterday urged state lawmakers to support
two bills that would relieve the T of most of its massive debt, one reason why
the transit agency has doubled fares over the last seven years.
Senate bill 2029 and House bill 3694 call for the state to pay $2.9 billion
- or about $280 million a year - of the T’s $5.1 billion in debt, which
according to T officials would otherwise cost the agency $8 billion to pay off
over 30 years. In return, the bills, filed by state Sen. Jarrett T. Barrios and
Rep. Alice K. Wolf, both Cambridge Democrats, would limit future fare increases
to the rate of inflation.
“Without doing this, the cycle of fare increases will continue,” Lee H.
Matsueda, a community organizer at The T Riders Union, said at a press
conference before a hearing on the bills. “And that injustice needs to end.”
[...]
Retiring Senator Jarrett "Barrios said that much of that [MBTA] debt
actually resulted from the Big Dig." Huh? (Marie Szaniszlo, "Barrios, Wolf urge
state to cover debt, thwart more T fare hikes," Boston Herald, June 08, 2007)
This is rational transportation policy? Two Democrats lament
counterproductive policy mandated under the one-party system in Massachusetts.
Rather than promoting mass transit for energy savings, and for saving the
environment, the one-party government in Massachusetts places the financial
burden of funding the $15 billion boondoggle road project on the users of mass
transit. That makes sense if you want to encourage vehicle usage and to
discourage mass transit usage.
Underlying the irrational Democratic policies is that there is more money
to
be made by pouring taxpayer funds into the MBTA pit. Using government agencies
to make money for criminal organizations is the new pattern of government in
this country. This is like using appropriations for gambling addiction to build
casinos.
Is this a surprise for Barrios and Wolf? Did they just learn about
the abuses? Where have they been all of these years? Why is the rest of the
legislature silent on these abuses?
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
Barrios,Wolf urge state to cover debt, thwart more T fare hikes
By Marie Szaniszlo/Boston Herald
Boston Herald
Fri Jun 08, 2007, 06:21 PM EDT
Boston -
Some of the MBTA’s harshest critics yesterday urged state lawmakers to support
two bills that would relieve the T of most of its massive debt, one reason why
the transit agency has doubled fares over the last seven years.
Senate bill 2029 and House bill 3694 call for the state to pay $2.9 billion
- or about $280 million a year - of the T’s $5.1 billion in debt, which
according to T officials would otherwise cost the agency $8 billion to pay off
over 30 years. In return, the bills, filed by state Sen. Jarrett T. Barrios and
Rep. Alice K. Wolf, both Cambridge Democrats, would limit future fare increases
to the rate of inflation.
“Without doing this, the cycle of fare increases will continue,” Lee H.
Matsueda, a community organizer at The T Riders Union, said at a press
conference before a hearing on the bills. “And that injustice needs to end.”
[...]
June 6, 2007
Library Lights Go Off
Library Lights Go Off
Derrick Jackson argues rationally to encourage library use. (Derrick Z.
Jackson, "As TVs go on, library lights go off," Boston Globe, May 30, 2007)
Unfortunately the decisions regarding library funding are made by politicians or
politicians masquerading as City Managers.
Reading is dangerous from the perspective of deceptive politicians. People
who read books seldom give money to politicians. Few politicians read.
There is no tangible return from keeping libraries open. They are used as a
refuge by persons without homes. They encourage critics who learn that the
politicians may be misleading the public.
A way to overrule the interests of the self serving politicians is lacking.
That is why libraries are one of the first budget items receiving the axe.
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
As TVs go on, library lights go off
By Derrick Z. Jackson,
Boston Globe Columnist
May 30, 2007
PLOP 'M DOWN. Kill the libraries. Fry the kids.
In a study in this month's Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine,
researchers found that 40 percent of children regularly watched television by 3
months old. By age 2, 90 percent watch an average of 1 1/2 hours of TV a day.
So much for doctor's orders. The American Academy of Pediatrics says children
should watch no television before age 2, as studies show that too much TV leads
to poor grades, attention deficit, obesity, and bullying. Denting the myth that
exhausted parents use TV merely as a cheap babysitter, two-thirds of parents
have convinced themselves the boob tube is a major educational and social
resource.
A combined 66.5 percent of parents say they let their infants and toddlers watch
television because the shows and videos are "good" for their brains, help them
relax, socialize with siblings, and get along well with others, and because they
"enjoy" them.
[...]
Derrick Z. Jackson's e-mail address is jackson@globe.com.
Derrick Jackson argues rationally to encourage library use. (Derrick Z.
Jackson, "As TVs go on, library lights go off," Boston Globe, May 30, 2007)
Unfortunately the decisions regarding library funding are made by politicians or
politicians masquerading as City Managers.
Reading is dangerous from the perspective of deceptive politicians. People
who read books seldom give money to politicians. Few politicians read.
There is no tangible return from keeping libraries open. They are used as a
refuge by persons without homes. They encourage critics who learn that the
politicians may be misleading the public.
A way to overrule the interests of the self serving politicians is lacking.
That is why libraries are one of the first budget items receiving the axe.
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
As TVs go on, library lights go off
By Derrick Z. Jackson,
Boston Globe Columnist
May 30, 2007
PLOP 'M DOWN. Kill the libraries. Fry the kids.
In a study in this month's Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine,
researchers found that 40 percent of children regularly watched television by 3
months old. By age 2, 90 percent watch an average of 1 1/2 hours of TV a day.
So much for doctor's orders. The American Academy of Pediatrics says children
should watch no television before age 2, as studies show that too much TV leads
to poor grades, attention deficit, obesity, and bullying. Denting the myth that
exhausted parents use TV merely as a cheap babysitter, two-thirds of parents
have convinced themselves the boob tube is a major educational and social
resource.
A combined 66.5 percent of parents say they let their infants and toddlers watch
television because the shows and videos are "good" for their brains, help them
relax, socialize with siblings, and get along well with others, and because they
"enjoy" them.
[...]
Derrick Z. Jackson's e-mail address is jackson@globe.com.
World Class City Only for Residents?
World Class City Only for Residents?
The "Cambridge Water Department [...] wants to ban nonresident pooches from
roaming off leash." (Janice O'Leary, "Unleashed frustration," Boston Globe, May
30, 2007) Pete "Wilkins, of Belmont, wondered whether a park that receives
federal and state funding has the right to restrict access for people and
canines from out of town."
"If we make a decision, we need to have it be a reasonable one,"
[Councilor] Kelley said. Concurrrently the Council says it wants to make
Cambridge a World Class City. Taxes and reason aside, here is another example of
the Cambridge City Council promoting contradictory goals at one time. It
indicates how irrational City government is. How can a city be a World Class
City and prohibit dogs from nearby cities from using their parks? Will this
encourage visitors to Cambridge? Well, duh!
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
The proposed rules would require dog owners like Jeff Ginsberg of Somerville to
keep their pooches leashed at Fresh Pond Reservation. (Evan Richman/ Globe
Staff) The Boston Globe Unleashed frustration Out-of-town dog owners howl over Cambridge plan By Janice O'Leary, Globe Correspondent May 30, 2007
CAMBRIDGE -- If some Cambridge officials have their way, dogs like Babe, a
frisky yellow lab mix, will be sidelined at Fresh Pond Reservation.
What's wrong with Babe? She's from Belmont.
Fresh Pond is one of the few parks in the area where dogs are allowed to run
free. But the Cambridge Water Department, which oversees the park, wants to ban
nonresident pooches from roaming off leash and plans to outfit Cambridge canines
with bright red medallions, so the rangers who patrol the park can see which
dogs belong and which do not.
The Water Department says all those roaming out-of-town dogs are leading to the
degradation of the soil and water quality in the park.
[...]
The "Cambridge Water Department [...] wants to ban nonresident pooches from
roaming off leash." (Janice O'Leary, "Unleashed frustration," Boston Globe, May
30, 2007) Pete "Wilkins, of Belmont, wondered whether a park that receives
federal and state funding has the right to restrict access for people and
canines from out of town."
"If we make a decision, we need to have it be a reasonable one,"
[Councilor] Kelley said. Concurrrently the Council says it wants to make
Cambridge a World Class City. Taxes and reason aside, here is another example of
the Cambridge City Council promoting contradictory goals at one time. It
indicates how irrational City government is. How can a city be a World Class
City and prohibit dogs from nearby cities from using their parks? Will this
encourage visitors to Cambridge? Well, duh!
--
Roy Bercaw, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
The proposed rules would require dog owners like Jeff Ginsberg of Somerville to
keep their pooches leashed at Fresh Pond Reservation. (Evan Richman/ Globe
Staff) The Boston Globe Unleashed frustration Out-of-town dog owners howl over Cambridge plan By Janice O'Leary, Globe Correspondent May 30, 2007
CAMBRIDGE -- If some Cambridge officials have their way, dogs like Babe, a
frisky yellow lab mix, will be sidelined at Fresh Pond Reservation.
What's wrong with Babe? She's from Belmont.
Fresh Pond is one of the few parks in the area where dogs are allowed to run
free. But the Cambridge Water Department, which oversees the park, wants to ban
nonresident pooches from roaming off leash and plans to outfit Cambridge canines
with bright red medallions, so the rangers who patrol the park can see which
dogs belong and which do not.
The Water Department says all those roaming out-of-town dogs are leading to the
degradation of the soil and water quality in the park.
[...]
Doctor’s Bias Undeniable
Doctor’s Bias Undeniable
[Published in print edition June 7, 2007, online June 5, 2007]
Cambridge Chronicle
Tue Jun 05, 2007, 05:05 PM EDT
http://www.townonline.com/cambridge/opinions/x1121275257
Cambridge -
Byron Diggs’ denial is not unique among medical professionals who seldom admit
their negative bias toward persons with disabilities. Who would believe that
doctors are prejudiced? Ahem! (Byron R. Diggs, “Psychiatric care needs medical
care,” letter, Cambridge Chronicle, May 31). This doctor celebrates and boasts
of his bias.
Diggs declares that statements with which he disagrees are inaccurate and
distorted, showing his intolerance. Diggs denies that he suggested that all
persons with disabilities are violent by citing two extreme cases of criminal
acts. But that is what journalists, police and prosecutors do all of the time.
Diggs is part of the clueless majority hateful population who fear and demonize
persons with disabilities.
Medical professionals are a major barrier to persons with disabilities being
treated the same as ordinary persons. Diggs is unaware that saying his “answer
contended that such patients are potentially dangerous,” shows his prejudice.
How are persons with disabilities more potentially dangerous than the rest of
the population? They are only so in Diggs’ biased mind.
Diggs shows intolerance by stereotyping all persons who arrive at the ER in an
unconventional manner. If a person with muscular dystrophy who uses a wheelchair
arrived at the ER, would Diggs forcibly drug him because he was unable to walk
and acted funny? Diggs is unable to perceive that being upset may be a person’s
disability. He equates being upset to violence and crime. He recognizes that
there may be other reasons than psychiatric causes. But he asserts, “Such
patients are suffering greatly and out of control.” Oh?
Diggs would never generalize about women, homosexuals or blacks as he does about
persons with disabilities. That is evidence of his prejudice. He needs some
sensitivity training. Shame on this clueless, prejudiced doctor.
ROY BERCAW, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
[Published in print edition June 7, 2007, online June 5, 2007]
Cambridge Chronicle
Tue Jun 05, 2007, 05:05 PM EDT
http://www.townonline.com/cambridge/opinions/x1121275257
Cambridge -
Byron Diggs’ denial is not unique among medical professionals who seldom admit
their negative bias toward persons with disabilities. Who would believe that
doctors are prejudiced? Ahem! (Byron R. Diggs, “Psychiatric care needs medical
care,” letter, Cambridge Chronicle, May 31). This doctor celebrates and boasts
of his bias.
Diggs declares that statements with which he disagrees are inaccurate and
distorted, showing his intolerance. Diggs denies that he suggested that all
persons with disabilities are violent by citing two extreme cases of criminal
acts. But that is what journalists, police and prosecutors do all of the time.
Diggs is part of the clueless majority hateful population who fear and demonize
persons with disabilities.
Medical professionals are a major barrier to persons with disabilities being
treated the same as ordinary persons. Diggs is unaware that saying his “answer
contended that such patients are potentially dangerous,” shows his prejudice.
How are persons with disabilities more potentially dangerous than the rest of
the population? They are only so in Diggs’ biased mind.
Diggs shows intolerance by stereotyping all persons who arrive at the ER in an
unconventional manner. If a person with muscular dystrophy who uses a wheelchair
arrived at the ER, would Diggs forcibly drug him because he was unable to walk
and acted funny? Diggs is unable to perceive that being upset may be a person’s
disability. He equates being upset to violence and crime. He recognizes that
there may be other reasons than psychiatric causes. But he asserts, “Such
patients are suffering greatly and out of control.” Oh?
Diggs would never generalize about women, homosexuals or blacks as he does about
persons with disabilities. That is evidence of his prejudice. He needs some
sensitivity training. Shame on this clueless, prejudiced doctor.
ROY BERCAW, Editor ENOUGH ROOM
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