By Elvin Lim
Yesterday was Independence Day, we correctly note. But most Americans do not merely think of July 4 as a day for celebrating Independence. We are told, especially by the Tea Partying crowd, that we are celebrating the birth of a nation. Not quite.
Independence, the liberation of the 13 original colonies form British rule, did not create a nation any more than a teenager leaving home becomes an adult. Far from it, even the Declaration of Independence (which incidentally, was not signed on July 4, but in August), did not even refer to the “United States” as a proper noun, but instead, registered the “unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America.” And that was all we were in 1776 – a collection of states with no common mission, linked fate, or general government. This was the understanding of the the Franco-American treaties of 1778, which referred to the “United States of North America.”
America was not America until it was, well, constituted. The United States of America was born after the 9th State ratified the US Constitution, and Congress certified the same on September 13, 1788. So we should by all means celebrate the 4th, but confusing Independence with the birth of a nation has serious constitutional-interpretive implications. If the two are the same, then the Declaration’s commitment to negative liberty — freedom from government — gets conflated with the Constitution’s commitment to positive liberty — its charge to the federal government to “secure the Blessings of Liberty.” The fact of the matter is that government was a thing to be feared in 1776. Government, or so the revolutionaries argued, was tyrannical, distant, and brutish. But it was precisely a turnaround in sentiment in the years leading up to 1789 — the decade of confederal republican anarchy — that the States came around to the conclusion that government was not so much to be feared than it was needed. This fundamental reversal of opinion is conveniently elided in Tea-Party characterizations of the American founding.
It is no wonder that politicians can get American history so wrong if we ourselves — 84 percent, according to the National Constitution Center’s poll in 1997 — actually believe that the phrase “all men are created equal” are in the Constitution. Actually, quite the opposite. Those inspirational words in the Declaration of Independence have absolutely zero constitutional weight, and they cannot be adduced as legal arguments in any Court in the nation.
Nations are not built by collective fear. Jealousy is a fine republican sentiment, especially if it is directed against monarchy, but it is surely less of a virtue when directed against a government constituted by We the People unless jealousy against oneself is not a self-defeating thing. What remains a virtuous sentiment, in monarchies or in republics, however, is fellow-feeling, a collective identification with the “general Welfare.” America can move in the direction of “a more perfect Union” only if citizens can come to accept that the Declaration of Independence was the prelude to the major act, and not the culminating act in itself. At the very least, we could get an extra federal holiday in September.
Laura E. Williams, illustrated by Craig Orback,
The Can Man
Lee and Low Books, 2010.
Ages 5-10
In Laura E. Williams’ The Can Man, a young boy awakens to compassion. Tim’s bi-racial family remembers when Mr. Peters lived in their building, so they don’t respond to him as the homeless can collector he’s become since he lost his job. Plot tension develops quickly: Tim wants a skateboard for his birthday; his family, not well off themselves, can’t afford it, and Tim’s solution is morally dubious.
Craig Orback’s respectful, sensitive oil paintings depict life in a tree-lined neighborhood of neat three-story apartment buildings. One day Tim gets an idea, and while young readers will identify with his excitement as he begins to collect cans himself to earn money, they’ll also experience an unsettling prick of conscience, for Tim hasn’t realized, as they will have, that he’s taking the cans Mr. Peters relies on for income.
The neighborhood grocer and Tim’s mom both mention that Mr. Peters usually collects those cans, but Tim’s fixation on the skateboard has deafened his conscience. It’s only when he runs into Mr. Peters himself, clutching at his tattered coat on a winter Saturday, his shopping cart nearly empty, that Tim begins to consider the consequences of his greed.
Orback and Williams, who have each won numerous awards for their respective projects, make a fine team for The Can Man. Both Mr. Peters and Tim get what they need by the end of the story. Between the lines and through the images, an unspoken message is that young people develop moral sensitivity through the example of their elders. Tim has wise role models in his mother and the grocer as well as in Mr. Peters, whose humanity shines through despite potentially embittering circumstances. Tim is a fortunate boy, and young readers will likely take in many levels of meaning from this subtle, powerful story.
Charlotte Richardson
March 2011
Christopher David Ryan describes himself as a “a graphic artist, illustrator, daydreamer, pseudo-scientist, wanna-be astronaut and untrained intellectual.” Recently, he published the third installment to his As Overheard in the Back of My Mind series of books, which features a collection of thoughts and images from the depths of his psyche. Chock full of peppy people and inspirational adages, this book is a great addition to your bookshelf.
To purchase a copy of As Overheard in the Back of my Mind: Vol. 3, visit CD Ryan’s shop. To see more of his work, visit his website.
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By: Rebecca,
on 4/15/2010
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Donald A. Ritchie, historian of the U.S. Senate and author of the forthcoming The U.S. Congress: A Very Short History, as well as Our Constitution, and The Congress of the United States: A Student Companion, appeared on a panel about “The Uses and Abuses of New Deal History,” at the meeting of the Organization of American Historians in Washington, on April 8, 2010. Summarized here, his remarks dealt with common misperceptions about Roosevelt and Congress.
All presidents since the 1940s have been held to standards set by Franklin D. Roosevelt with regard to their relations with Congress. There is a common assumption that at least during Roosevelt’s first term, a compliant Congress gave him everything he wanted, and that the New Deal was exclusively an executive branch creation, with legislation written at the White House and promptly passed in Congress, sometimes without being read. This argument has been employed to promote the notion of presidential primacy in the federal government, from the “Imperial Presidency” to the “unitary executive.” While the image contains some truth, it is also clouded with inaccuracies.
The media has measured Presidents from Harry Truman to Barack Obama by what they accomplished in their first hundred days. This prospect was so troubling to John F. Kennedy that he added a disclaimer to his inaugural address that “All this will not be finished in the first 100 days.” Roosevelt’s First Hundred Days were unique. Republicans had lost 100 seats in the House (by comparison, the Democratic sweep in 1964 added 44 seats in the House; and the Republican victory in 1994 election brought a gain of 54). Those new members in 1933 looked to Roosevelt for leadership because the national economy had gone into free fall since the election, creating a sense of dire emergency that required extraordinary measures.
After Roosevelt called Congress into special session, he sent them a banking bill that the House passed that morning, the Senate that afternoon, and the president signed that night, the beginning of an unprecedented burst of legislative activity. But of all the bills Roosevelt signed during the Hundred Days, only two had fully originated with him: the Civilian Conservation Act and the Economy Act–which cut federal salaries and veterans’ pensions. Even the banking bill had been drafted by volunteers who stayed on from Hoover’s Treasury Department. Other ideas bubbled up from congressional sources. Commonly after there has been a change in party control of the White House, Congress will dust off measures that previous presidents vetoed. So Senator George Norris, a progressive Republican from Nebraska, revived the Tennessee Valley Authority, which Roosevelt now signed. Members of Congress also pressed on a skeptical Roosevelt the idea of federal deposit insurance, which today is counted as one of his smartest achievements. Other of Roosevelt’s proposals were designed to head off an activist
By: Rebecca,
on 4/12/2010
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John Mueller is the Woody Hayes Chair of National Security Studies and Professor of Political Science, Ohio State University. His new book, Atomic Obsession: Nuclear Alarmism From Hiroshima To Al-Qaeda, argues that nuclear weapons have had little impact on history. Alt
hough they have inspired overwrought policies and distorted spending priorities, things generally would have turned out much the same if they had never been invented. In the original post below Mueller looks at why formal nuclear arms reduction agreements are unnecessary.
The popular notion that the path to nuclear arms reduction requires formal agreements of the sort recently signed by the United States and Russia needs reexamination. Instead of fabricating elaborate agreements about reducing arms, they should just to do it.
The cold war arms buildup, after all, was not accomplished through written agreement; instead, there was a sort of free market in which each side, keeping a wary eye on the other, sought security by purchasing varying amounts of weapons and troops. As requirements and perspectives changed, so did the force structure of each side.
The same process can work in reverse: as tensions decline, so can the arms that are their consequence. Reductions are more difficult when accomplished by formal treaties requiring that an exquisitely nuanced agreement must be worked out for every abandoned nut and bolt. A negative arms race is likely to be as chaotic, halting, ambiguous, self interested, and potentially reversible as a positive one, but arms reduction will proceed most expeditiously if each side feels free to reverse any reduction it later comes to regret.
Although the signing of formal disarmament agreements can have a useful atmospheric effect, the process itself tends to delay and clutter the process. The current agreement, for example, was slowed by the Russian effort to tie it into efforts to have the United States abandon missile defenses. The Russians held on to weapons they were apparently quite willing to give up only because the weapons could be used as bargaining chips in arms reduction negotiations. That is, there were more weapons around because a formal arms control negotiating apparatus existed.
With the demise of fears of another major war, many of the arms that struck such deep fear for so long are quietly being allowed—as the bumper sticker would have it—to rust in peace. Let it happen.
School Visit Focuses on State Projects
A Celebration of States. Last week, right before Thanksgiving, I visited the El Dorado, AR school for a celebration of the states. The GT classes had been studying the US states: each student made a “suitcase” using a cardboard box the size of a boot box. They painted, collaged, and decorated it with images about and from their assigned state. Inside, they put pictures of famous people, flags, state bird, state flowers, selected items and puppets. In addition, each student had a short oral presentation on their state.
To support their hard work, I was there to talk about The Journey of Oliver K. Woodman, my story about a wooden man who crossed the US to connect a family. It was great fun to talk to these students because they knew the US map so intimately.
Congratulations to all the students who worked so hard on their state boxes!
Related posts:
- 3 Keys to a Successful School Visit
- Value of school visits
- Oliver K. Woodman Needs Your Help
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Perhaps you are thinking that I am writing this ode because of the election of the first black president. I assure you that has nothing to do with it.
I am protestant and I survived the first Catholic president back in 1960. I don’t always agree with Obama but both he and Kennedy are and were pretty nice guys all things considered. No, I just can’t continue to try and understand and/or compete with current mores and capabilities.
I can’t wear my pants without a belt. No matter how tight the pants are if I don’t wear a belt they fall down. Today, however, I see teenage boys wearing their pants so low that their underwear shows but their pants stay up without a belt. It defies gravity. I’m obviously getting too old.
I don’t know how to communicate with others at work without being called a racist or sexist or homophobe.
I’m an old white guy so I’m innately bad the world says.
Playboy used to be reserved for a model who was trying to become discovered and then they only revealed a little more than a bikini. Today top stars battle each other to get in the magazine and it’s not sexy because it is more like watching a doctor give a gynecological exam.
People go to the Elizabeth Taylor School of Marriage.
It used to be the domain of old white guys to have a tattoo of their military unit or their girlfriend or their mother.
Now women have multiple tattoos in multiple places along with their “partners.”
People don’t have spouses any longer they have “partners.”
Men and women both wear jewelry of all types not only in their ears but tongues, eyes and any other place you can think of or wish you wouldn’t have to think of.
If you see a movie more often than not the bad guy will be the good guy. However, I don’t go to movies any longer because even PG movies are shocking with respect to violence and sex.
Men’s fashion either makes me look like a criminal or a girl.
When I watch television instead of finding sports when I flip channels I am just as likely going to learn how to cook or dance.
However, when I do find sports the teams don’t battle to win they sit down and have group therapy in an attempt to work out their differences.
People don’t seem happy.
Despite great wealth our country seems to be full of people who simply want more.
The new cars I have driven take a doctorate in engineering to understand.
Anyway I thought you would want to know why this old white guy is going to drop out of sight.
What am I going to do?
I think I am going to go on a mountain and take an old black and white television. I am going to limit myself to three channels.
I’m going to fish. (I’ll practice throwing the fish back of course)
I think I’ll lie on my back and remember the days when I wore a suit to church; I’ll remember the days when girls wore clothes that left a little to the imagination. I’ll think of my high school days when my best friend was a black guy. I respected him and would never have even thought of calling him something derogatory, not because a law prevented me from doing so but because of my love for him. As a matter of fact we didn’t know there was anything different about us.
Well I’ve rambled enough. I hope things work out for the world.
During the mid 1800s’, Canada was a wild frontier. A continuous stream of settlers and miners flowed into Canada following “Free Land” Promises, and the numerous gold strikes in the Yukon. Constant Struggles with the Native Americans were an everyday occurrence, as well as the rowdy miners causing a ruckus in their tiny mining communities. Law and order in Canada were mere words to its citizens. Something had to be done; however, with no real standing army, and without the means to make one, Canada went down a different path.
According to the Centennial Anniversary Book, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in its earliest years were a group of 200 men given the difficult task of bringing law and order to the whole of Canada. Not only this, but they were also given the duty of keeping good relations with the dozens of Canada’s native tribes, according to the song, “The RCMP Always Chasing After Me” by Rick Stoneback. In many parts of Canada, especially the Yukon, the RCMP officer was the highest authority. Over time, the force grew and so did their reputation. What was once a small group of men trying to bring justice to the wilds, soon became a force to be reckoned with. One that stood for duty, justice and loyalty.
Tales of their exploits soon reached mythical level. Stories of “Mounties” saving entire towns soon gained them the reputation of being “Do Rights”. Popular radio shows such as “The Yukon” and the movie, “Dudley DoRight” reinforced this. Although their reputation is only over-powered by their dedication to service, and their ability to do their jobs better than many others. The RCMP are able to place themselves higher on a pedestal than other police forces because of their lack of jurisdiction restrictions, their superior training, and the tradition of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
Most local and national police forces such as the NYPD or the CIA do have some jurisdiction on some specific cases in the United States, whereas the RCMP have automatic authority over any crime scene in Canada or dealing with a Canadian citizen cited from Parliament of Canada Law 81A section 22-3. The Mounted Police, on a couple of occasions, have ventured into the United States to solve cases that happen in Canada and the Criminals try to flee Canada in hopes that the Mounties will not be able to follow. Once specific case from the Niagara Gazette reported a murder in 1982 and the RCMP joining forces with the U.S. Coast Guard from the article, “Mounties Team Up With Coast Guard to Nab Murderer.” Another example is during the 1920’ druing Prohibition in the United States, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police on a few occasions raided sites just across the boarder that had been distributing illegal Canadian whiskey. Dozens of times the RCMP joined forces with the United States State Department to bring down criminal rings illegally smuggling Canadian whiskey into the United States according to the book, “20th century Mounties”. While the RCMP and the United States have not teamed up recently, the RCMP, because of its status as a national police force, is able to in certain cases have international jurisdiction. The RCMP would not be able to conduct these raids however if it were not for long, unique, and special training periods.
Because of Canada’s unique location, it experiences both extremely hot summers as well as frigid cold winers. Because Mounted Police officers can be stationed anywhere, their training period is broken down into two nine week blocks. One block trains in southern Canada where it is warmer during the spring and summer, and one in the Yukon where it is always cold. This is according to the RCMP website home page at rcmp.com. The RCMP is also required to meet physical requirements that match that of the French Foreign Legion which is one of the hardest in the world as described by the auto biography of RCMP officer Murphy Rhodes. All officers are to be outstanding students as well. All officers must have a college degree with a minor in Native American studies and are required to be fluent in French as well as English also according to the RCMP website. In comparison to most police forces who have easily obtainable physical requirements, shorter training periods, and lower academic standards.
The RCMP’s rigorous training also includes rifle and pistol training. Long known for their excellent marksmen, the RCMP tries to uphold their traditions by being proficient in both contemporary weapons as well as old-fashioned weapons such as the 1870 Winchester lever-action rifle and Colt 1868 .45 caliber single action revolver. This information was taken from the RCMP field guide.
The officers are also highly trained in hand-to-hand combat. Compared to other armies and police forces, the RCMP are among the best according to USA Today’s Article “Top 20 I Would Not Want To Fight” by Philip Morgan.
What makes the RCMP the Royal Canadian Mounted Police is the traditions that they uphold even today. The RCMP has always been about selfless service to Canada and all who inhabit it. Trying to build a better life for all of Canada. The values that the “Do Rights” stand for today are the same as the ones that they stood for over a hundred years ago. As previously stated, the RCMP try to uphold their weaponry traditions by being crack shots with the weapons used at their founding. Apart from that is the wearing of their uniform. Unlike most police forces who have many times updated their uniforms, for the most part, the Mounted Police have stayed true to their roots. Like at their founding, the Mounted Police still wear the red uniform of their predecessors. While their uniform has had to be slightly modified for safety reasons, according to the Ottawa Times, modern day “Mounties” are among the few who stay traditional.
There are thousands of police forces from around the world. All with unique abilities that they bring to the table. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, while just one of the thousands, stands out from the rest of the pack. In an age of corruption and endless police violence, the RCMP holds to the values of those who came before them. Being physically, and weaponry superior aside, the RCMP have been able to last throughout the ages, partially because of their mythical status. However, the majority of this comes from their ability to do their jobs, and to do it well. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police are one of the better police forces in the world because of their lack of jurisdiction restrictions, their superior training, and the tradition of the Mounted Police.
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I feel pretty certain that the answer is the Mississippi River but apparently it is not as simple as that, as some very reliable sources disagree and say it is the Missouri River.
According to Encyclopædia Britannica I am correct and it is the Mississippi (see here & here), but…
…the US Geological Survey (USGS) say I am wrong and hand it to the Missouri by a clear 200 miles! I feel you have to believe the USGS but Britannica is also a very reputable and normally reliable source.
The figures quoted are as follows:
Encyclopædia Britannica list the Mississippi at 2350 miles whereas the USGS says 2340 miles and Britannica has the Missouri at 2315 miles while the USGS say 2540 miles.
So, bearing in mind the simplicity of the question - i.e. “What is the longest river in the U.S.A.?” - what is the definitive answer?
Image via Wikipedia
I feel pretty certain that the answer is the Mississippi River but apparently it is not as simple as that, as some very reliable sources disagree and say it is the Missouri River.
According to Encyclopædia Britannica I am correct and it is the Mississippi (see here & here), but…
…the US Geological Survey (USGS) say I am wrong and hand it to the Missouri by a clear 200 miles! I feel you have to believe the USGS but Britannica is also a very reputable and normally reliable source.
The figures quoted are as follows:
Encyclopædia Britannica list the Mississippi at 2350 miles whereas the USGS says 2340 miles and Britannica has the Missouri at 2315 miles while the USGS say 2540 miles.
So, bearing in mind the simplicity of the question - i.e. “What is the longest river in the U.S.A.?” - what is the definitive answer?
Posted on 7/18/2009
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Brooms have a long history and are often connected with witchcraft and also believed to be having some association with witches.
Witchcraft and brooms have been often also found in movies, television shows as well as cartoons.
Even though brooms are most of the time associated with females, a male witch named Edeline in 1453 made a claim of having used broomstick to fly in air. Not only this but even history shows some records of people claiming of having seen witches flying using brooms and such objects.
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It is also believed that witches used brooms so that they can hide their magic wands from others in the form of broomsticks.
In many witchcraft guides and magic guides there are some rituals where brooms are included and these rituals are called besom.
In witchcraft brooms are looked upon as a tool to be used to clean the negative energies and call upon spirits.
Traditions and culture:
- In old times during the slavery period in United States, African Americans were not allowed to marry in church and their weddings involved the use of brooms where, brooms were kept at the door of the house and they step on the broom to start their new life. This custom was known as “jumping the broom”.
- In Bible, broom has been noted as a sign of the work of women.
Posted on 7/18/2009
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Brooms have a long history and are often connected with witchcraft and also believed to be having some association with witches.
Witchcraft and brooms have been often also found in movies, television shows as well as cartoons.
Even though brooms are most of the time associated with females, a male witch named Edeline in 1453 made a claim of having used broomstick to fly in air. Not only this but even history shows some records of people claiming of having seen witches flying using brooms and such objects.
Image via Wikipedia
It is also believed that witches used brooms so that they can hide their magic wands from others in the form of broomsticks.
In many witchcraft guides and magic guides there are some rituals where brooms are included and these rituals are called besom.
In witchcraft brooms are looked upon as a tool to be used to clean the negative energies and call upon spirits.
Traditions and culture:
- In old times during the slavery period in United States, African Americans were not allowed to marry in church and their weddings involved the use of brooms where, brooms were kept at the door of the house and they step on the broom to start their new life. This custom was known as “jumping the broom”.
- In Bible, broom has been noted as a sign of the work of women.
The online Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines the concept of law as: “a binding custom or practice of a community: a rule of conduct or action prescribed or formally recognized as binding or enforced by a controlling authority”. The best and most agreed-upon laws are those that are designed to protect the rights and well-being of the citizens in the country or place where they are enforced. However, some laws are just plain dumb.
Here are the Top Ten Dumbest Laws (via dumblaws.com):
10. Donkeys cannot be kept in the bathtub in states such as Georgia and Arizona.
What I have to ask is: why would this even need to be a law? I understand that a single state might have a quirky official who thinks it’s amusing or necessary…but more than one state having this law is just ludicrous.
9. Lollipops are illegal in the great state of Washington.
What can be so bad about a simple, innocent lollipop? Are lollipops really all that bad? Apparently an official in Washington thinks/thought so.
8. It is illegal for more than five women to live in the same house in Ohio.
This law was obviously designed to help cut down on brothels. However, what happens if parents have five or more daughters living at home? Do they have to have a special permit or something? Or do they have to evict one of the elder ones if a new baby comes along and happens to be a girl?
7. It is illegal to wear a mask of any kind in public in Alabama.
Image via Wikipedia
Mask is such a board term, it could really be construed to me costume masks and health masks. As we all know, the attention surrounding Swine Flu caused everyone and their mom to go out and buy health masks and wear them around town.
Furthermore, I live in Alabama. I can honestly say this law isn’t really enforced. Little kids where masks on Halloween every year. In fact, Halloween isn’t the only exclusion. People go to masked balls all the time and I’ve never heard of a raid at such parties.
6. Anyone who flirts in the state of New York can be charged a $25 fine.
It’s a sad day when flirting is a crime. But at some point, some lawmaker in New York certainly thought so.
5. It is illegal to walk around town with an ice cream cone in your back pocket in states such as Alabama and Georgia.
Image via Wikipedia
This is, perhaps, one of the most ridiculous laws in the country. The real crime is how wide-spread it is. Several states have a law regarding the prohibition of walking around with an ice cream cone in your back pocket. And all I have to ask is: why was this ever an issue in the first place? I know I wouldn’t want my butt to be sticky and cold.
4. Every man must carry a rifle to church on Sunday in Massachusetts.
This is one of the more hilarious church laws out there and I have to wonder where it came from. Was it perhaps to keep away the Quakers and witches? (Being a Friend or a witch is still illegal in the state of Massachusetts.)
3. It is illegal for a woman to do her own hair in Oklahoma, unless she has a beauty license from the state.
I know women from Oklahoma and surely this law isn’t enforced. If it were, every woman in Oklahoma would be walking around with a rat’s nest in her greasy hair (assuming that “doing hair” also entails washing).
2. Montana declares that it’s a felony for a wife to open her husband’s mail.
Yet it is not a felony for a husband to open his wife’s mail. This is merely one of many US state laws that throw sexual equality out the window.
1. Minnesota actually has a law banning a person from crossing the state lines with a duck on top of their head.
Personally, I find this law to be the most hilariously astounding. First of all, how would you even get a duck to stay still long enough on your head to cross the state line? Secondly, why would you want to?
These are all real laws that are (hopefully) written for real reasons. And however moronic they sound, remember: thousands (if not millions) of tax dollars went into creating them.
Some states have repealed laws that they realized were either stupid, unconstitutional, or no longer applied. Oklahoma, for instance, finally legalized tattoos in 2006. To this day, tattoos remain illegal in certain other states. So, the real question is: will more tax dollars have to be sent repealing laws that are, for lack of better word, dumb?
The online Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines the concept of law as: “a binding custom or practice of a community: a rule of conduct or action prescribed or formally recognized as binding or enforced by a controlling authority”. The best and most agreed-upon laws are those that are designed to protect the rights and well-being of the citizens in the country or place where they are enforced. However, some laws are just plain dumb.
Here are the Top Ten Dumbest Laws (via dumblaws.com):
10. Donkeys cannot be kept in the bathtub in states such as Georgia and Arizona.
What I have to ask is: why would this even need to be a law? I understand that a single state might have a quirky official who thinks it’s amusing or necessary…but more than one state having this law is just ludicrous.
9. Lollipops are illegal in the great state of Washington.
What can be so bad about a simple, innocent lollipop? Are lollipops really all that bad? Apparently an official in Washington thinks/thought so.
8. It is illegal for more than five women to live in the same house in Ohio.
This law was obviously designed to help cut down on brothels. However, what happens if parents have five or more daughters living at home? Do they have to have a special permit or something? Or do they have to evict one of the elder ones if a new baby comes along and happens to be a girl?
7. It is illegal to wear a mask of any kind in public in Alabama.
Image via Wikipedia
Mask is such a board term, it could really be construed to me costume masks and health masks. As we all know, the attention surrounding Swine Flu caused everyone and their mom to go out and buy health masks and wear them around town.
Furthermore, I live in Alabama. I can honestly say this law isn’t really enforced. Little kids where masks on Halloween every year. In fact, Halloween isn’t the only exclusion. People go to masked balls all the time and I’ve never heard of a raid at such parties.
6. Anyone who flirts in the state of New York can be charged a $25 fine.
It’s a sad day when flirting is a crime. But at some point, some lawmaker in New York certainly thought so.
5. It is illegal to walk around town with an ice cream cone in your back pocket in states such as Alabama and Georgia.
Image via Wikipedia
This is, perhaps, one of the most ridiculous laws in the country. The real crime is how wide-spread it is. Several states have a law regarding the prohibition of walking around with an ice cream cone in your back pocket. And all I have to ask is: why was this ever an issue in the first place? I know I wouldn’t want my butt to be sticky and cold.
4. Every man must carry a rifle to church on Sunday in Massachusetts.
This is one of the more hilarious church laws out there and I have to wonder where it came from. Was it perhaps to keep away the Quakers and witches? (Being a Friend or a witch is still illegal in the state of Massachusetts.)
3. It is illegal for a woman to do her own hair in Oklahoma, unless she has a beauty license from the state.
I know women from Oklahoma and surely this law isn’t enforced. If it were, every woman in Oklahoma would be walking around with a rat’s nest in her greasy hair (assuming that “doing hair” also entails washing).
2. Montana declares that it’s a felony for a wife to open her husband’s mail.
Yet it is not a felony for a husband to open his wife’s mail. This is merely one of many US state laws that throw sexual equality out the window.
1. Minnesota actually has a law banning a person from crossing the state lines with a duck on top of their head.
Personally, I find this law to be the most hilariously astounding. First of all, how would you even get a duck to stay still long enough on your head to cross the state line? Secondly, why would you want to?
These are all real laws that are (hopefully) written for real reasons. And however moronic they sound, remember: thousands (if not millions) of tax dollars went into creating them.
Some states have repealed laws that they realized were either stupid, unconstitutional, or no longer applied. Oklahoma, for instance, finally legalized tattoos in 2006. To this day, tattoos remain illegal in certain other states. So, the real question is: will more tax dollars have to be sent repealing laws that are, for lack of better word, dumb?
By: Rebecca,
on 3/18/2009
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Dr. David Kilcullen is one of the world’s leading experts on guerrilla warfare. He has served in every theater of the “War on Terrorism” since 9/11 as Special Advisor for Counterinsurgency to the Secretary of State 
Condoleezza Rice, Senior Counterinsurgency Advisor to General David Petraeus in Iraq, and chief counterterrorism strategist for the U.S. State Department. In his new book, The Accidental Guerrilla: Fighting Small Wars In The Midst of a Big One, Kilcullen takes us on the ground to uncover the face of modern warfare, illuminating both the global challenges and small wars across the world. In the excerpt below we learn why the Afghanistan is so very difficult and so very important in this struggle.
People often speak of “the Iraq War” and the “the war in Afghanistan” as if they were separate conflicts. But was we have seen, Afghanistan is one theater in a larger confrontation with the transnational takfiri terrorism, not a discrete war in itself. Because of commitments elsewhere-principally Iraq-the United States and its allies have chosen to run this campaign as an “economy of force” operation, with a fraction of the effort applied elsewhere. Most of what has happened in Afghanistan results from this, as much as from local factors. Compared to other theaters where I have worked, the war in Afghanistan is being run on a shoestring. The country is about one and a half times the size of Iraq and has a somewhat larger population (32 million, of whom about 6 million are Pashtun males of military age), but to date the United States has resourced it at about 27 percent of the funding given to Iraq, and allocated about 20 percent of the troops deployed in Iraq (29 percent counting allies). In funding terms, counting fiscal year 2008 supplemental budget requests, by 2008 operations in Iraq had cost the United States approximately $608.3 billion over five years, whereas the war in Afghanistan had cost about $162.6 billion over seven years: in terms of overall spending, about 26.7 percent of the cost of Iraq, or a monthly spending rate of about 19.03 percent that of Iraq. In addition to lack of troops and money, certain key resources, including battlefield helicopters, construction and engineering resources, and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) assets, have been critically short.
Resource allocation in itself is not a sign of success-arguably in Iraq we have spent more than we can afford for limited results-but expenditure is a good indicator of government attention. Thus the international community’s failure to allocate adequate resources for Afghanistan bespeaks an episodic strategic inattention, a tendency to focus on Iraq and think about Afghanistan only when it impinges on public opinion in Western countries, NATO alliance politics, global terrorism, or the situation in Pakistan or Iran, while taking ultimate victory in Afghanistan for granted. Two examples spring to mind: the first was when Admiral Michael G. Mullen, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, remarked in congressional testimony in December 2007 that “in Afghanistan, we do what we can. In Iraq, we do what we must,” implying that Afghan issues by definition play second fiddle to Iraq, receiving resources and attention only as spare capacity allows. The reason for Admiral Mullen’s remark emerges from the second, larger illustration of this syndrome: by invading Iraq in 2003, the United States and its allies opened a second front before finishing the first, and without sufficient resources to prosecute both campaigns effectively. Western leaders committed this strategic error primarily because of overconfidence and a tendency to underestimate the enemy: they appear to have take for granted that the demise of the Taliban, scattered and displaced but not defeated in 2001, was only a matter of time.
These leaders would have done well to remember the words of Sir Olaf Caroe, a famous old hand of the North-West Frontier of British India, ethnographer of the Pashtuns, and last administrator of the frontier province before independence, who wrote in 1958 that “unlike other wars, Afghan wars become serious only when they are over; in British times at least they were apt to produce an after-crop of tribal unrest [and]…constant intrigue among the border tribes.” Entering Afghanistan and capturing its cities is relatively easy; holding the country and securing the population is much, much harder: as the Soviets (with “assistance,” and a degree of post-Vietnam schadenfreude, from Washington) discovered to their cost, like the British, Sikhs, Mughals, Persians, Mongols, and Macedonians before them. In Afghanistan in 2001, as in Iraq in 2003, the invading Western powers confused entry with victory, a point the Russian General Staff lost no time in pointing out. The Taliban movement’s phenomenal resurgence from its nadir of early 2002 underlines this point: the insurgents’ successes seem due as much to inattention and inadequate resourcing on our part as to talent on theirs.
Afghanistan is also a very different campaign from Iraq, though the two conflicts are linked through shared Western political objectives and cooperation between enemy forces. The Iraq campaign is urban, sectarian, primarily internal, and heavily centered on Baghdad. The Afghan campaign is overwhelmingly rural, centered on the Pashtun South and East, with a major external sanctuary in Pakistan and, as of 2008, increasing support for the effort in Afghanistan than for Iraq (though rhetoric often does not translate into action). Afghanistan is seen as a war of necessity, “the good war,” the “real war on terrorism.” This gives the international community greater freedom of action than in Iraq.
Perhaps counterintuitively, events in Afghanistan also have greater proportional impact than those in Iraq, effort there has greater effect than equal effort in Iraq-a brigade (3,000 people) in Afghanistan is worth a division or more (10,000-12,000) in Iraq, in terms of its proportionate effect on the ground. Regardless of the outcome in Iraq, Afghanistan still presents an opportunity for a positive long-term legacy for Western intervention, if it results in an Afghan state capable of effectively responding to its people’s wishes and meeting their needs.
Conversely, although the American population and the international community are inured to negative media reporting about Iraq, they are less used to downbeat reporting about Afghanistan. Most people polled in successive opinion surveys have tended to assume that the Afghan campaign is going reasonably well, hence Taliban successes or sensational attacks in Afghanistan may actually carry greater political weight than equivalent events in Iraq, a campaign that is so unpopular and about which opinion is so polarized that people tent to assume it is going less well than is actually the case.
We've had more than the usual amount of United States presidential campaign activity near OCLC's headquarters in Dublin, Ohio. Ohio is one of the key battleground states for the election of the next U.S. president so no doubt there will be many more visits by the candidates, but probably not many so close to home with both the major candidates and their running mates appearing together.
On Friday, 29 August, Republican candidate John McCain held a rally (12-15,000 people) in nearby Dayton, Ohio, and announced his choice for running mate, Governor Sarah Palin.
WorldCat Identities for the Republican ticket:
McCain, John 1936-
Palin, Sarah 1964-
On Saturday 30 August, Democratic candidate Barack Obama and his running mate, Joe Biden held an outdoor rally (18-20,000 people) at Dublin Coffman High School, within walking distance of OCLC Headquarters.
WorldCat Identities for the Democratic ticket:
Obama, Barack
Biden, Joseph R.
I was not able to attend John McCain's campaign event, but I was able to attend Barack Obama's (see the scan of the ticket stub above). The message Obama and other speakers at the rally presented was very much an echo of the speeches at the Democratic National Convention. Obama followed his presentation by moving through part of the crowd, shaking hands, talking with those gathered. I and Heather managed to position ourselves close enough to see Obama up close. His interaction with the crowd seemed very genuine as he shook hands and responded to comments. Aides gathered copies of his books that people wanted signed, and he apparently signed them before boarding his bus and departing.
While it's very easy to be cynical about the pronouncements of the U.S. presidential candidates and their lieutenants and supporters, one has to acknowledge that the excitement I witnessed at the Obama rally was very real. Presumably McCain's event garnered a similar level of excitement from his gathered supporters. We can only hope that both of the tickets are composed of worthy people, and that the U.S. electorate will choose wisely.
At libraries (especially public libraries) throughout the U.S. , citizens are being offered the opportunity to register to vote, and access to materials by and about the candidates. So, gentle IAG readers, what great things will your library be doing this election season to help your users be informed on the candidates and the issues and exercise their right to vote?
***
Musical note:
This song has been used by both the Republicans (during George W. Bush's 2004 campaign) and now by the Democrats (for Obama's 2008 campaign).
"Only in America" composed by Kix Brooks/Don Cook/Ron Rogers ; popularized by Brooks & Dunn (AMG entry, Wikipedia entry, Brooks & Dunn Web site).
Excerpt:
"Only in America
Dreaming in red, white and blue
Only in America
Where we dream as big as we want to
We all get a chance
Everybody gets to dance
Only in America"
Right now for our bedtime reading, my daughter and I are revisiting an old classic — The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster (illustrated by Jules Feiffer), Yearling Books, 1961. I encountered this novel when I was in grade five; it was recommended to me by a friend. I remembered reading it and loving it. It’s a witty and clever book by halves, and I don’t think I ‘got’ everything in it at the time I read it, but following the adventures of this idle and bored schoolboy protagonist Milo “who didn’t know what to do with himself — not just sometimes, but always” was compelling. In reading it now with my daughter, I am enjoying the story again with so much more gusto — this time getting, of course, all the many puns and double entendres throughout the book. My daughter is less enthusiastic. As she puts it herself, “I like listening to it because it puts me to sleep.” (Mind you, this fact alone makes it a worthy bedtime read for the parent!) But while she dozes off, I often continue reading aloud for the sheer pleasure of the story which speaks to the book’s attractive charm and longevity.
I’ve just bought my first e-book. I realise that might fill some people with horror at how long it’s taken me to jump on the bandwagon, but it was always going to have to be something special that would propel me into action. Perhaps if I spent more time on public transport, I might have succumbed to an e-reader by now, but as it is… Anyway, I’ve just downloaded the free Kindle for PC and have taken the leap, tempted as I was by 
With 
On Wednesday, Older Brother, Little Brother and I had the thrill of hearing this year’s 
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A related question from a Brit. The creationism vs evolution issue in schools isn't as controversial here (though ironically I live in the one small part of the UK where matters religious are a controversial issue).
With Sarah Palin as the GOP VP pick, some of the media has focused on this issue and how it affects teaching in the US (religion, science). Is this something that mainly affects the education sector, or does it affect the US library sector as well? In other words, are there "controversies" with public libraries stocking books of either theory, and how they are classified (religion, science, other sections)?