In the news

[magid]

Goodbye, Alistair Cooke. You will always be the voice of Masterpiece Theater for me.

Yesterday the MA legislature voted (barely) against gay marriage and for civil unions that will have the same rights as marriage. While I know that many people want gay marriage legal, it's something to consider how far the fallback position has come; now it's civil unions with all the rights of marriage. Which is a pretty amazing change in and of itself.
Tangentially related: this week's story Strange Horizons, The Grammarian's Five Daughters (Eleanor Arnason) (thanks to Queue for the pointer).

I hadn't realized that Congress passed a law that people who have been convicted on drug charges would not be eligible for student aid. Apparently the intent was for current students, but it wasn't written clearly, and schools have been conservative, and applying it to students with prior records. In either case, I don't understand why drug convictions are so horrible that they were singled out for this law. Isn't any felony a horrible-enough thing that committing one would lose you financial aid? And is being busted for owning a bag of pot so vile that the government should withdraw any financial help? It doesn't make sense to me.

Comments

[bitty.livejournal.com]

Well, it's not like Amherst every bothered to bust anyone for drugs, so that financial aid is intact.

[magid.livejournal.com]

*grin*

It's also people who got a record before college, and are now trying to change paths... which is considerably harder without funding. NPR had a story about a girl who'd ended up earning a GED while without family and homeless. She's made it into a decent school, but since she has a prior drug conviction, she can't currently get loans, which would mean not going to school.
Theoretically, aren't the Republicans in favor of people pulling themselves up by their bootstraps? All that's on offer here is loans, after all.

[bitty.livejournal.com]

Oh, I understood the political ramifications perfectly, I was just grumbling about the 1600-SAT scorers at Amherst who still couldn't figure out how to smoke pot w/o setting off the smoke detectors several times a week, even by junior year.

Morons. I never touched the stuff, and even I knew enough to not trip the smoke detectors.

[magid.livejournal.com]

Test-taking ability doesn't always correlate to intelligence.
(However one defines that outside the test-taking context.)

[spwebdesign.livejournal.com]

Are you sure? I seem to remember 2-3 people getting ousted for drugs.

[bitty.livejournal.com]

nah, that was d*** the psychopath who claims that dean lieber was out to get him, and used drugs as the excuse. he'd already graduated by that point.

[spwebdesign.livejournal.com]

What about Matt what's-his-face? And the other guy? And there might have been another. Of course, these might have happened while I was working for Campus Police after we graduated. I don't remember.

[queue.livejournal.com]

But it's helping us fight the War On Drugs! I think we've got it just about won. Go us!

[magid.livejournal.com]

So we can focus on the War on Terror, now?

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

But whatever happened to the War on Poverty?

[queue.livejournal.com]

Didn't you hear? We won!!!

Great news!

[pinkfish.livejournal.com]

Next time I see a poor person, I will tell them to report to the nearest POW camp.

Re: Great news!

[fj.livejournal.com]

We're supposed to call them Salvation Army Homeless Shelters now.

war on poverty

[bitty.livejournal.com]

it ran out of money.

Re: war on poverty

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

*rotfl* You win.

Re: war on poverty

[bitty.livejournal.com]

Wow! Someone won!

Now what war was I fighting again?

Re: war on poverty

[queue.livejournal.com]

The War on Carbs?

Re: war on poverty

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

The War on Drugs used by Terrorists to fight Poverty. Or maybe the War on Terror caused by Poverty-striken Druggists. Sadly, not the War on Stupidity.

Re: war on stupidity

[magid.livejournal.com]

Definite lack of vision on the politician's part... or is that an inability to start a war on oneself?

Re: war on stupidity

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

Ha!

But now that I think about it, maybe the No Child Left Behind thingy was supposed to be a War on Stupidity . . . but now that I think about _that_, I seem to recall They've totally fucked up that one, too. Oh well.

Re: war on stupidity

[magid.livejournal.com]

Love those unfunded mandates.

There are a number of places that have already opted out of NCLB; they couldn't get the numbers to work so all students would actually get a good education, rather than having to pay a lot to get a few kids up to par, and the rest given less because there wasn't enough funding for anything more.

The basic idea is a nice one, but when it comes down to nuts and bolts, as written, it's not a good law.

Re: war on stupidity

[bitty.livejournal.com]

It was written by nuts, basically.

Re: war on stupidity

[bitty.livejournal.com]

er, nuts who bolted, i meant to say.

Re: war on stupidity

[arfur]

you mean, the Stupidity on Children?

Re: war on poverty

[spwebdesign.livejournal.com]

Not during this administration.

Re: war on poverty

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

But aren't they waging a War on the Poor? Isn't that the same thing? I mean, no poor people means no poverty, right?

Re: war on poverty

[spwebdesign.livejournal.com]

I was referring to the War on Stupidity. I didn't realize the subject heading had reverted back to "Poverty." Although, I suppose one can make the case that those who are stupid are mentally impoverished.

Re: war on poverty

[bitty.livejournal.com]

The Administration is busy waging war on everyone else; why not on itself next?

Re: war on poverty

[spwebdesign.livejournal.com]

Good point. And they just might be stupid enough to do it!