I feel so bad for this woman and can completely understand her pain, and more than sympathize with her. The justice system can never really repair the damage these criminals have caused in their victims' lives, as well as their own families.
If there was any time better than now to take a deep dark look at what we are doing with our penal/judicial system, its now.
I realize she's just speaking out of pain, and I respect that (heaven knows that if I were in her shoes, I'd be saying a whole lot worse, and probably be plotting to kill the suspect myself), but I just wanted to point out that many local jails now do charge prisoners a daily fee - about $10 most places - for their food and lodging. Not that that at all helps the horrible situation this family is in - just being servicey.
@MIXED: The only Rhodes scholar I've ever met had an adorable burnout hippy boyfriend who was more interested in camping than studying. She detested Oxford and didn't finish her degree.
@eibhinn: It's got to be bittersweet winning an amazing, prestigious award and getting an incredible opportunity... all tied to a guy who was a bigot, colonialist zealot who thought white Brits should rule the world (and especially diamond-rich South Africa – Rhodes was co-founder of DeBeers).
I can't imagine having to reconcile Justice and justice for one you've lost. I don't care how much someone wants to wax poetic about the law/system and how government guarantees human treatment of all its citizens (which it doesn't really anyhow), that will be of little solace to someone in Lockhart-Davis' position.
@Penny: Yes. I once had this conversation with my dad. He said that if someone murdered me, he would want them to get the death penalty. I argued with him that he doesn't support the death penalty, doesn't believe the state should kill etc etc.
He just said: "There's a reason fathers of murdered children aren't allowed in sentencing hearings."
They recruited me; heavily recruited me. And I made the mistake of visiting the school. They harassed me for 3 months with constant calls/ letters--even after I told them I had accepted elsewhere. It took my dad getting on the phone and in his best commanding officer voice, telling them to fuck off before they stopped.
I'm sure some women have a fine experience there-- the women I talked to did not recommend it.
@curiousgeorgiana: A sister of a friend of mine went there and had a really awful time. Last I heard she was spending her sophomore year abroad at a military academy in France just to get away.
@daradoodle: I dealt with my share of sexist attitudes in NROTC. But those individuals were exceptions to the general rule. Not to mention guys would get slammed pretty hard by superior officers if they caught wind of comments etc. or witnessed any harassment.
It seems to be a culture at VMI, and I'm shocked that women survive it. Good for your friend for getting a break!
@curiousgeorgiana: Yeah, I read a bunch about the school for a class (we were focusing on military academies for a couple of weeks), and I have to say, I don't really understand why a woman would choose to go there, knowing what I found out. It seems as though the culture is almost a reaction (a very bitter, nasty one) to being forced to admit women, and its just scary.
@curiousgeorgiana: Many women from my university, Mary Baldwin College, are and were in the military program hosted on our campus, the Virginia Women's Institute for Leadership. VWIL is the only all-female cadet corps in the world, but we're a small school (around 900 students, with about 150 in VWIL at any time) and couldn't offer all of the officer training on campus. Upperclassmen would go down to VMI (about half an hour) and be part of their training; my friends who did so said it was horrible and sexist.
"They caused, allowed and permitted condoms to be distributed by school personnel to the students, many of which were opened during the school lunch period and thrown on the floor"
I'm sorry this lady fell and all, but I have a sneaky suspicion that she's just annoyed at students having had some real sex education at school.
@Ailatan: When I read that a teacher had "slipped on a condom", I thought maybe it had gotten a little too real. Hooray for linguistic ambiguity and its many amusements!
@Ailatan: That's what I first thought, and I hope I'm just a damnable cynic, but I honestly thought it was a ruse to ban sex ed and the condom handouts.
@Ailatan: How the F do you not see garbage on the floor? How do you slip on a used condom? It's not like those things need a decoder pen- they're not made invisible. Maybe her arms were full of promise keeper pamphlets.
@Ailatan: I'm afraid of the consequences this could have on the sex education of NYC students. Could the BofE then argue that they can't hand out condoms because they don't want this lawsuit to happen again?
When I'm Head Cheese of the World I'm going to abolish religion in government. I don't know how yet but I'll figure it out after I figure out how to become Head Cheese.
When you become head cheese, just create a constitution that says religion can't influence policy. And put it in your constitution that when a policymaker allows religion to influence policy, he is to be F-I-R-E-D.
Perhaps if the Bishops called out all Catholic politicians for any legislation that leads to murder it wouldn't be so bad. But do they call out the politicians who support the death penalty? How about the politicians that prevent changes to policy to reduce wrongful convictions? How about the politicians that support war? How about the politicians that don't provide adequate support for our troops who are facing death? Or don't support adequate medical care to those who return? How about the politicians that allow our veterans to go untreated for brain injury and PTSD so they put their own lives and the lives of their families at risk? How about the politicians that vote in favor of the tobacco industry? How about the politicians that are preventing health reform that would save and improve lives of so many Americans?
@bluebears: True. My teenaged son (I am more of a Unitarian myself) recently converted to Catholicism. After being in the church for about a year, he converted right back out! Good man!
@morninggloria: I find it sad that these incidences overshadow Catholicism's social justice work. Both in the media attention and, I fear, in the actual commitment by the church, bishops and priests. There are some Catholic churches that are safe havens to undocumented immigrants. There are some that stand next to community organizers and unions fighting for the poor.
@Lymed: unfortunately though, it's a top down organization and the upper management (if you will) seems way less interested in social justice then your kind hearted parish priest or kick ass nun (I have a fondness for nuns). So I don't think its surprising that the social justice work gets overshadowed.
@bluebears: But the Catholic Church used to be known as a social justice organization in America. It is the change that saddens me...as a non-Catholic social justice activist.
I was pretty into being Catholic for a long time because I loved that part of the faith was service. I went to a Catholic university and did service work all through college (I also sang in the liturgical choir) and due to my Catholic faith, I joined Americorps after I graduated.
I realized one day, though, that you can believe in serving others and social justice without the icky parts of the Church clinging to you. You can be pro-social justice and also pro-women's rights. You can be a moral person without the institution telling you that your body isn't really yours.
But...Wasserman Schultz was politicizing breast cancer. I mean, obviously the GOP is throwing this out primarily as a hurdle. But I watched that yesterday, and the point was that the council had a great deal of regulatory power over Medicare or the public option or whatever. Stephanopolis read the line in the bill, and the congresswoman said no, it's just a suggestion. She was ignoring the issue.
I don't really know who's technically correct, but this whole affair begs the question: when the government is responsible for more health spending, it will be responsible for budgeting. Maybe that will require hard choices. Maybe in order to pay for one thing that will save or better a large group of people, a minority of others might be shorted for treatment funds. Or maybe in order to save a diminishing margin of people for one disease you would need to spend money on an expensive screening process that could be used more efficiently to save a larger group of people for something else. Health care is utilitarian in that respect.
Under a private system, squawking over rationing won't due any good because you're nobody's boss. Public officials are (in thoery) our minions, though. The Democrats' jumpy reaction to the reports this week makes me worry that in the future lawmakers will quixotically pursue 100% treatment under the threat of interest groups. If we have to make Medicare cuts and reduce fee-for-service and the like in order for this thing to work on a cost basis, we're in deep shit.
It's time for everyone to stand up, including myself. I'm trying to draft a letter I can send to all the members of the Senate, imploring them to consider carefully the implications of killing health care reform. I don't expect the Republicans to listen, but at least I will have had my say.
"Don't ask me to make everybody live by it because they are not members of the church," Cuomo said. "If that were the operative rule, how could you get any Catholic politician in office? And would that be better for the Catholic church?"
Exactly. The Catholic church is great at the holier-than-thou stuff, but all they ever end up doing is shooting themselves in the foot. They have a lot of nerve whining about abortion funding, while their church is having to fight off lawsuit after lawsuit because their celibate male priests can't keep their hands of young boys.
@NefariousNewt: Remember history. Weren't many folks afraid that President JFK was going to take his orders from the Pope. Shit like this makes what was once thought of as an irrational fear as quite legit. Well, this and Judge Scallia, who probably does make all of his decisions based on Catholic doctrine.
12:02 PM
If there was any time better than now to take a deep dark look at what we are doing with our penal/judicial system, its now.
09:32 AM
11/23/09
//congrats to both of them, what an achievement!
11/23/09
Awesome for them. Hooray!!!
11/23/09
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11/23/09
11/23/09
#tips
11/23/09
#tips
11/23/09
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11/23/09
He just said: "There's a reason fathers of murdered children aren't allowed in sentencing hearings."
11/23/09
They recruited me; heavily recruited me. And I made the mistake of visiting the school. They harassed me for 3 months with constant calls/ letters--even after I told them I had accepted elsewhere. It took my dad getting on the phone and in his best commanding officer voice, telling them to fuck off before they stopped.
I'm sure some women have a fine experience there-- the women I talked to did not recommend it.
11/23/09
11/23/09
It seems to be a culture at VMI, and I'm shocked that women survive it. Good for your friend for getting a break!
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
I'm sorry this lady fell and all, but I have a sneaky suspicion that she's just annoyed at students having had some real sex education at school.
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
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11/23/09
I blame the system!
11/23/09
Won't someone think of the children??!! [that these children won't be having because they're being given condoms in school]
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
10:01 AM
11/23/09
11/23/09
Never mind kids having unprotected sex, because we have to worry about the real menace: SLIPPAGE.
11/23/09
11/23/09
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11/23/09
When you become head cheese, just create a constitution that says religion can't influence policy. And put it in your constitution that when a policymaker allows religion to influence policy, he is to be F-I-R-E-D.
11/23/09
#tips
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
#tips
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
I was pretty into being Catholic for a long time because I loved that part of the faith was service. I went to a Catholic university and did service work all through college (I also sang in the liturgical choir) and due to my Catholic faith, I joined Americorps after I graduated.
I realized one day, though, that you can believe in serving others and social justice without the icky parts of the Church clinging to you. You can be pro-social justice and also pro-women's rights. You can be a moral person without the institution telling you that your body isn't really yours.
11/23/09
I don't really know who's technically correct, but this whole affair begs the question: when the government is responsible for more health spending, it will be responsible for budgeting. Maybe that will require hard choices. Maybe in order to pay for one thing that will save or better a large group of people, a minority of others might be shorted for treatment funds. Or maybe in order to save a diminishing margin of people for one disease you would need to spend money on an expensive screening process that could be used more efficiently to save a larger group of people for something else. Health care is utilitarian in that respect.
Under a private system, squawking over rationing won't due any good because you're nobody's boss. Public officials are (in thoery) our minions, though. The Democrats' jumpy reaction to the reports this week makes me worry that in the future lawmakers will quixotically pursue 100% treatment under the threat of interest groups. If we have to make Medicare cuts and reduce fee-for-service and the like in order for this thing to work on a cost basis, we're in deep shit.
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
Exactly. The Catholic church is great at the holier-than-thou stuff, but all they ever end up doing is shooting themselves in the foot. They have a lot of nerve whining about abortion funding, while their church is having to fight off lawsuit after lawsuit because their celibate male priests can't keep their hands of young boys.
11/23/09