Sunday, February 25, 2018
Addiction:
Johann Hari: Does Stigmatizing Addiction Perpetuate It?
To stop illegal drug use, we typically punish, isolate and shame addicts. Journalist Johann Hari explains how these methods perpetuate addiction, and how human connection can be an effective antidote.
Johann Hari: Does Stigmatizing Addiction Perpetuate It?
To stop illegal drug use, we typically punish, isolate and shame addicts. Journalist Johann Hari explains how these methods perpetuate addiction, and how human connection can be an effective antidote.
Friday, February 23, 2018
War & Occupation:
Decades of continued occupation is Israel's permanent middle finger raised to international law, and the human rights of those they occupy.
Anne-Marie O'Connor: This Palestinian village had solar power — until Israeli soldiers took it away
"JUBBET ADH DHIB, West Bank — The residents of this dirt-poor Palestinian village waited decades for electricity. But in November, a Dutch-funded solar project finally gave them round-the-clock power to refrigerate food or do a load of laundry. That ended last week when Israeli military administrators in the West Bank sent soldiers with assault rifles and a team of workers to shut down the $400,000 project, ripping out its electrical components and driving away with 96 solar panels, some of them broken, villagers said. Israeli officials called the construction illegal, but the builders contested the charge, saying they are providing desperately needed humanitarian aid that is required under international law..."
Anne-Marie O'Connor: This Palestinian village had solar power — until Israeli soldiers took it away
"JUBBET ADH DHIB, West Bank — The residents of this dirt-poor Palestinian village waited decades for electricity. But in November, a Dutch-funded solar project finally gave them round-the-clock power to refrigerate food or do a load of laundry. That ended last week when Israeli military administrators in the West Bank sent soldiers with assault rifles and a team of workers to shut down the $400,000 project, ripping out its electrical components and driving away with 96 solar panels, some of them broken, villagers said. Israeli officials called the construction illegal, but the builders contested the charge, saying they are providing desperately needed humanitarian aid that is required under international law..."
Wednesday, February 21, 2018
The Temporary Success of Walls
Jack Anderson: THE WALL IS THE WALL: WHY FORTRESSES FAIL
"...Security advances throughout the centuries have been mostly technical adjustments in response to evolving weaponry. Fortification — the art and science of protecting a place by imposing a barrier between you and an enemy — is as ancient as humanity. From the standpoint of theory, however, there is very little about modern network or airport security that could not be learned from a 17th century artillery manual. That should trouble us more than it does...
...If a massive border wall seems like a bad idea and waste of money, there’s a more disturbing fact beneath it: Almost every current approach to security — from bag checks to passwords — already depends too much on walls. Border wall skeptics owe the same coldly rational criticisms to other, less politically charged walls. Over-reliance on walls has been a persistent security tendency throughout human history, and yet, their strategic effectiveness is checkered. The Maginot line is often remembered as a failure — a massive national investment in border security that the invading German army simply drove around. Hadrian’s wall was repeatedly breached and abandoned, arguably not worth its cost. Walls as tools of national security policy are largely a history of failed states. Security cannot depend on the hope that a fortification will not fail. Eventually, and always, walls fail us. This ought to make us humble about our fortification aspirations and reduce our expectations for them. Plato reckoned that walls encourage “a soft habit of soul in the inhabitants, by inviting them to seek refuge within it instead of repelling the enemy.” Aristotle retorted, that not building walls was “like desiring the country to be easy to invade.” It’s still an open argument."
Jack Anderson: THE WALL IS THE WALL: WHY FORTRESSES FAIL
"...Security advances throughout the centuries have been mostly technical adjustments in response to evolving weaponry. Fortification — the art and science of protecting a place by imposing a barrier between you and an enemy — is as ancient as humanity. From the standpoint of theory, however, there is very little about modern network or airport security that could not be learned from a 17th century artillery manual. That should trouble us more than it does...
...If a massive border wall seems like a bad idea and waste of money, there’s a more disturbing fact beneath it: Almost every current approach to security — from bag checks to passwords — already depends too much on walls. Border wall skeptics owe the same coldly rational criticisms to other, less politically charged walls. Over-reliance on walls has been a persistent security tendency throughout human history, and yet, their strategic effectiveness is checkered. The Maginot line is often remembered as a failure — a massive national investment in border security that the invading German army simply drove around. Hadrian’s wall was repeatedly breached and abandoned, arguably not worth its cost. Walls as tools of national security policy are largely a history of failed states. Security cannot depend on the hope that a fortification will not fail. Eventually, and always, walls fail us. This ought to make us humble about our fortification aspirations and reduce our expectations for them. Plato reckoned that walls encourage “a soft habit of soul in the inhabitants, by inviting them to seek refuge within it instead of repelling the enemy.” Aristotle retorted, that not building walls was “like desiring the country to be easy to invade.” It’s still an open argument."
Thursday, February 01, 2018
Police Corruption:
The Root: Baltimore Cops Kept Toy Guns to Plant Just in Case They Shot an Unarmed Person
"...And then there’s the revelation that the supervisor of the unit instructed officers to carry a toy gun just in case they found themselves “in a jam” and needed to plant one. When one of the officers, Marcus Tayor, was arrested, officials couldn’t figure out why he had a toy gun in his glove compartment..."
The Opioid Crisis:
New Yorker: The Family That Built an Empire of Pain
"...According to Forbes, the Sacklers are now one of America’s richest families, with a collective net worth of thirteen billion dollars—more than the Rockefellers or the Mellons. The bulk of the Sacklers’ fortune has been accumulated only in recent decades, yet the source of their wealth is to most people as obscure as that of the robber barons. While the Sacklers are interviewed regularly on the subject of their generosity, they almost never speak publicly about the family business, Purdue Pharma—a privately held company, based in Stamford, Connecticut, that developed the prescription painkiller OxyContin. Upon its release, in 1995, OxyContin was hailed as a medical breakthrough, a long-lasting narcotic that could help patients suffering from moderate to severe pain. The drug became a blockbuster, and has reportedly generated some thirty-five billion dollars in revenue for Purdue..."
The Root: Baltimore Cops Kept Toy Guns to Plant Just in Case They Shot an Unarmed Person
"...And then there’s the revelation that the supervisor of the unit instructed officers to carry a toy gun just in case they found themselves “in a jam” and needed to plant one. When one of the officers, Marcus Tayor, was arrested, officials couldn’t figure out why he had a toy gun in his glove compartment..."
The Opioid Crisis:
New Yorker: The Family That Built an Empire of Pain
"...According to Forbes, the Sacklers are now one of America’s richest families, with a collective net worth of thirteen billion dollars—more than the Rockefellers or the Mellons. The bulk of the Sacklers’ fortune has been accumulated only in recent decades, yet the source of their wealth is to most people as obscure as that of the robber barons. While the Sacklers are interviewed regularly on the subject of their generosity, they almost never speak publicly about the family business, Purdue Pharma—a privately held company, based in Stamford, Connecticut, that developed the prescription painkiller OxyContin. Upon its release, in 1995, OxyContin was hailed as a medical breakthrough, a long-lasting narcotic that could help patients suffering from moderate to severe pain. The drug became a blockbuster, and has reportedly generated some thirty-five billion dollars in revenue for Purdue..."
