The U.S. may appear to be a broken democracy to most but it is a functional constitutional republic. This was was the purposeful intent of the founders to safeguard the sovereign interests of the individual states.
that is a, frankly, insane contortion of logic that ignores an enormous amount of history in the south regarding housing, education, and racial equity.
These problems started years ago with forced segregation codified in law and have never been solved. To say that they are self-segregating because the law no longer compels them to is not the same as there being no barriers. What you are reading as self-segregation (and this is partially the writer's fault) is the paragraphs about 'both sides like it this way'. What is telling is the reasons both groups give. The white/Cleveland parents give reasons like "just leave us alone. Maybe that’s because I’m a sentimental fool, but I love Cleveland High School and I don’t want it to go away" while the black/East side parents give reasons like "[he] is likely to be East Side’s valedictorian this year, [and] wouldn’t have a shot at that distinction at Cleveland High 'no matter how good his grades are.'"
>white families who "don’t want to be in a small minority,"
>> white families who "don’t want to be in a small minority,"
> Oh really? why not?
Because race in America is (very, very unfortunately) a proxy for class, and people of one class do not like being a minority amongst another class. Particularly, people of a perceived-higher class do not want their children acculturated in a perceived-lower class.
And that doesn't justify the way the 99.9% black high school is being treated. Not enough textbooks, no lockers, until recently no ACT prep.
A desire to not brush elbows with those "others" here is specifically racially charged, and not class charged. Being class based would be bad enough. But the whites in this community are literally blocking improvements for the community as a whole for the sake of letting their precious snowflake children remain the majority in their school while they're the minority in the town.
you have the relationship backwards. Race is a proxy for class because class is largely forced upon race in active and passive ways. This is almost purely racial, and class is included because we have forced lower class status on minorities in ways that are increasingly designed to appear 'objectively race neutral'. The system is no longer racist in the way that people perceive, it is far more insidious because it effects the same outcome in the same way, but with cries of objectivity.
As examples of why this is about race and not class:
* High minority schools are more likely to have security apparatus (e.g., metal detectors) even after class is partialed out. Amazingly, the likelihood of security at a school is not significantly correlated to actual crime in the area or in the school. [1]
* Drug arrests are incredibly racially charged [2]. Despite more white teenagers both using and dealing drugs, black teenagers are more likely to get arrested for drug possession or use. When arrested, they are more likely to be charged and are sentenced to longer periods of time [3]. This occurs even in Colarado [4]. The follow-on effect of these arrests and guilty pleas is that black teenagers are then inelligible for many forms of government educational aid that is necessary for them to attend college.
* Are you familiar with the 'magical negro' trope in TV? [5] It is actually an empirically researched phenomenon that white people think black people have a higher pain tolerance, extrasensory perception, and superhuman strength [6]
* This occured in 1997: "Duane Buck was sentenced to die in Texas based on testimony of a psychologist who told the jury that Buck was more likely to be dangerous in the future because he is Black"[3] He is still on death row because that wasn't considered a large enough effect on the trial to influence the outcome.
(See Edit) Count me in the "me too" category. Pretty sketchy process. I've revoked their permission to my Facebook account and pray my cc info is not being sold on the Russian black market. Edit: Trevor at TinkerCoin cleared up the issue and the BTC are in my Coinbase wallet. So Kudos to them.
Completely understand your frustration. We have to keep a very high bar because of the possibility of credit card fraud, and sometimes we have false negatives. Sorry for the confusion!
Have you implemented Mastercard Securecode/Verified by Visa? These offer you protection against chargebacks for "cardholder unauthorized" chargebacks, which account for roughly 60% of all chargebacks in card-not-present transactions.
The actual lawsuit isn't against fracking itself. It is to prevent construction of a 160 water tower that would be used to fill trucks with water for fracking and other oil/gas exploration activities and this is in violation of the existing zoning ordinances in the ranching community in which he lives.
While it appears a subtle distinction to those looking for an example of glaring hypocrisy, would it be any different if he (and his other rancher neighbors) were protesting a construction of a 160ft water tower intended for some other purpose?
When you can afford the best lawyers, you can always find some way to be in the right. He would never directly fight against the right to frack. He needs to find something else that would prevent the fracking without affecting the right that he lobbied so hard to get.
I see that there appears to a link in the story that is dead now, which I suppose didn't used to be dead. Is there an authoritative text of the lawsuit pleadings we can all link to and look up, or is this a game of "telephone" ("Chinese whispers") in which each successive person who tells the story makes up more details about what the man is objecting to? Without the text of the lawsuit pleadings in view, I don't want to make up my own opinion about the balance of right and wrong or consistency and hypocrisy in this case.
You do know that there are no communities that have zoning ordinances allowing 160ft water towers, right?
So there's always a variance of some sort involved if fracking is done near any residential community, but I don't think that's stopped the guy or Dick before. I still think the hypocrite card can quite validly be played here.
Seriously? IANAL or a Texas attorney either but I can read...
Page 4...Section 211.003..."The governing body of a municipality may regulate...the height, number of stories, and size of buildings and other structures"
Sorry but infrastructural parts of fracking count as fracking. It's not like people are complaining solely about injection or leaking. Or the constant convoys of diesel vehicles, the expansive works they drive to and from.
In this case one tower is highlighted, but the process the tower is involved in is... Fracking.
Would it be different if it was a municipal water tower? Yes, since the man's job is to promote drilling and pumping hydrocarbons, not piping municipal water supplies. Of course it would be different.
That's some fairly tortured logic. Legally it has no bearing.
If the lawsuit was judged with your standards, a CEO of a water utility would be a hypocrite for opposing the same water tower being built "for municipal use" next to his ranch.
To dig deeper, do you question the motives of the other parties to the lawsuit - his ranching neighbors and other members of the community? Are they washed with your brush of perceived "hypocrisy" because they happen to live next to the CEO of Exxon?
Yes, the CEO of a water utility would be a hypocrite for opposing the development of a water tower next to eir ranch. Presumably the CEO of a water utility would understand that water towers are a useful part of municipal water distribution (though they have been largely replaced by pumps these days) and would have been involved in the selection of a location as part of his role in the utility.
On the other hand, a water utility CEO who didn't want that water tower near eir place for aesthetic reasons might ensure that there are multiple sites proposed, then start campaigning on environmental grounds to prevent the necessary roads being bulldozed to the site(s) where E doesn't want the tower: the NIMBY situation can be expressed in terms that everyone else with agree with ("there's a rare butterfly which only breeds in this area. Disrupting the environment would be awful!").
And that's what's happening here: "I don't want a fracking project messing up my backyard, so I'll protest against the stuff required to make that project viable."
The CEO is fully aware of the infrastructure requirements of the project, and if E wasn't concerned about the environmental impacts would otherwise have been proud to have a project nearby because it's a visible sign that the USA is taking responsibility for its own fuel supplies.
That is effectively what I was attempting to highlight. No minds read.
On the topic of tortured logic, I would love to know why you don't think the lawsuit[0] is about fracking when it involves water and the infrastructure that supplies it for those activities.
This lawsuit is about repeated assurances to the MANY plantiffs that the only plans for the property were for "low rise" (below the tree line) water tanks and the company later deciding to violate existing zoning regulations and seek to built the 160 ft water tank.
Your bias on this issue is only exceeded by your laziness.
And if you would direct your attention to the man's profession, you can see where people's idea of hypocrisy stems from. Thanks for calling me lazy, easy out that is.
You seem to be reaching to put the man on level ground with his peers. He is the CEO of a company that is partially responsible for many such installations sprouting up near other peoples regular homes. The man is complaining about his luxury mansion depreciating in value because of development.
He should listen to Exxon and other energy company lawyers and move away from progress if he doesn't like the smell or sight of it.
I am a lazy troll according to you. I earned this by referencing the free market principles that define the Exxon CEO's home as being in the path of progress. If he doesn't want his 'luxury' (according to court doc) home value to decline he wouldn't build it around natural resources the likes of which he aims to profit personally from to buy things like 'luxury' housing.
This is a situation many have to deal with yet are not news-worthy because they are not personally profiting of the types of ventures that they raise lawsuits over.
You can call me a troll for pointing that out as that is your right but you cannot accuse me of altering my comments to askew context, because that is rubbish.
I'm calling you a troll for re-writing your comments without even noting the "edit" -- 4 hours later in a lame attempt to refine your propaganda. This isn't Reddit.
What propaganda? You are the one that started this thread propagandizing your position that the man was not a hypocrite regardless of him being an energy company CEO and the case was not about fracking since it involves a company that just happens to provide services for fracking.
As others have pointed out, the CEO is a hypocrite for wanting to hinder the health of his local economy since he is in a position that directly profits off such ventures. That his luxury home wouldn't be if not for the eminent domain of infrastructural energy works next to residents across the globe. Residents who don't have the money or time to fight his and his company's legion of lawyers.
The heinous act of editing comments to be more grammatically correct or readable is worthy of this type of reaction from you? Of course this isn't Reddit, no one referenced it aside from you. Try to engage the topic instead of pounding sand about unsubstantial edits.
I'm former Navy (Electronics Technician - Radio/Radar), but was in Army JROTC in High School.
First step is to take the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB). There is no obligation to take that test (despite the pressure from the Navy or Air Force recruiter that you need to "lock up" your spot right away). Your score on this test will essentially open or shut doors to the variety of jobs/ratings you can ask for.
Generally, if you score high enough, you can guarantee a slot in a school of your choice, post-boot camp graduation. Like anything, if you fail in boot camp (generally sent home) or fail in the the "A-school" -- you can be put into any classification as the military sees fit.
Ignore all "promises" from recruiters that are not explicitly made in writing. Verbal assurances are meaningless -- no matter how sincere the recruiter appears.
You will be best served, if you feel the military is not going to be a career, to select jobs/classifications that have immediate transferability to civilian applications.
Once in, take advantage of all the training schools or other educational outlets that the military offers (and the GI Bill when you exit).
P.S., Some boot camp tips (applies to Air Force probably)
1. Consider when your boot camp located and join in "good weather" months. Great Lakes is hot & humid in July/Aug and bitter cold in Dec-Feb.
2. Show up being able to at least run a mile with little effort and do 20 "real pushups". They'll train you up from there, but those first 2 weeks will be brutal if you can't do either on day 1.
3. It's all about paying attention to (mostly meaningless) details. This is to prepare you to not being lazy and learn your most innocent mistakes can get someone killed. So it appears "stupid" early, but you'll see it's importance later.
The public also voted in a Republican House majority and flipped Ted Kennedy's seat to prevent a filibuster proof Senate majority to essentially prevent Obamacare being implemented without amendments.
Yet, it was "deem and passed" and here we are. Power to the people?
Who was Mr. Romenycare, and prior to the election was notorious for being willing to say anything to get elected?
Coming from the "extreme right wing" side of the political spectrum, I assure you that few of us considered any "severely conservative" promise from Hairpiece Q. Motherf----- credible. The eGOP managed to hand us the single worst possible candidate in every way to run against Obamacare.
The website's easily among the best this government, or any government, has ever created. It hasn't had a single minute of downtime (the Healthcare.gov servers have handled the load without a hiccup), it looks great, it's easy to use, it's mostly open source (on GitHub no less), and during off-peak hours I had no problem making an account. All that in a few months with a small team and no headline-making budget over-run. The only "non-functioning" aspect is likely that the legacy systems it talks to can't handle that many millions of people a day. Even in the face of those failures, the site doesn't crash or unhelpfully throw you some cryptic error code, it puts you in a queue and eventually tells you it's too busy and asks you to use the call center in the meantime.
Sure, it's not accomplishing its goal for everyone yet (over 2.4 million have been able to sign up for new plans, or so I heard on NPR today). But, from the perspective of "I could've built a better website alone in my bedroom", no he couldn't, as what this team built is working great despite doing a lot more behind-the-scenes than one might expect.
I hate to pile on, but this just came across my Twitter feed.
"The federal government will take down a critical part of HealthCare.gov, the Obamacare web portal, for a portion of the coming weekend as programmers feverishly work to fix major glitches that are impeding enrollment and marring the debut of the centerpiece of President Barack Obama's health care reform law."
We've all acknowledged that the site isn't working right now. That's not evidence that you could've built a better one, or that it's simple as "querying a database". I think you've lost track of the conversation, and this entire story's been flagged off the front page, so let's leave it at that.
I think you missed the rather insightful point he was making entirely.
The DEA's use of NSA intercepts "sounds" a whole lot more sensible (catching 'drug dealers') than what may be potentially 1000s of other horrific uses the government is also using this data for.
It absolutely does not sound more sensible for the USG to be focusing the tools of foreign intelligence on its own citizens for drug enforcement. I didn't miss his point; his point is wrong. Using foreign intelligence for criminal justice does the opposite of legitimizing foreign intelligence programs.
He said that on March 30, 2012, NOM became aware that the Human Rights Campaign, the pro-gay rights group, obtained confidential information of its donors and posted the information without redacting the names. That information later appeared on websites like the Huffington Post.
NOM discovered another document with redactions that had been posted. A computer analysis, after removing the document's redaction layer, discovered the document had "originated from within the IRS itself." He said the group found the header of each page read: “THIS IS A COPY OF A LIVE RETURN FROM SMIPS. OFFICIAL USE ONLY." And that was proof that the leak originated from the IRS.
The testimony states only that documents originated within the IRS. There isn't any indication of the means in which they were released. What would be the political sense in releasing the names of donors? A rogue leaker seems more likely to me.
