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Notes
Posted 1 week ago
Driving home from work on Mother’s Day. #rain #reflection #ttw #throughthewindow #sunset #latergram Zoom

Driving home from work on Mother’s Day. #rain #reflection #ttw #throughthewindow #sunset #latergram

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Posted 2 weeks ago
Tonight at work. Happy Drinko de Mayo. But these two…really, really amazing. Tim & Rebecca, The Nouveaux Honkies. It was a good night. Check ‘em out here: http://tnhband.com/ Zoom

Tonight at work. Happy Drinko de Mayo.
But these two…really, really amazing.
Tim & Rebecca, The Nouveaux Honkies.
It was a good night.

Check ‘em out here: http://tnhband.com/

Link 1728
Notes
Posted 2 weeks ago

"Five things everyone should know about U.S. incarceration"

1. The US incarcerates more people per capita than any other nation in the world: Approximately 1 in 100 adults or more than 2.2 million people are behind bars in the US, according to the Pew Center on the States. In addition, another 4.6 million (or a total of almost 7 million) people live under some form of correctional supervision. 

Although the US is widely recognised as a “land of liberty”, it could also be described as a nation of prisons. It incarcerates more people per capita than any other nation. Its imprisonment rate (per capita) is almost 50 percent higher than Russia’s and 320 percent higher than China’s. 

Within the western hemisphere, the US incarcerates five times as many people per capita as Canada and almost 2.5 times as many as Mexico. 

2. Mass incarceration is not a result of higher crime rates: The US has the highest incarceration rate in the world not because it has higher crime rates, but because it imprisons more types of criminal offenders, including non-violent and drug offenders, and keeps them in prison longer. 

With the exception of homicide, US crime rates are comparable to other European countries with much lower incarceration rates. 

High incarceration rates are the result of “truth in sentencing”, “mandatory minimum” and “three strikes” laws which have limited judicial discretion in sentencing and parole release. As a result, sentences are now mainly determined by what the prosecutor decides to charge. And prosecutors routinely over-charge defendants in order to encourage plea agreements. 

An egregious, but not unusual, recent example illustrates this point. In 2012, a Florida woman, who fired a “warning shot” in the direction of her physically abusive ex-husband (who was not hit by the bullet), was charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. 

The judge, as a result of mandatory sentencing legislation, was given no discretion in her sentencing. He sentenced her to 20 years in prison.

3. Mass incarceration disproportionately impacts US racial minorities: Mass incarceration has had a devastating effect on blacks and Hispanics in the US. African Americans are six times more likely to be incarcerated than a white person and non-white Latinos are almost three times more likely to be incarcerated, according to the Pew Center on the States. 

Incarceration hits hardest at young black and Latino men without high school education. An astounding 11 percent of black men, aged between 20 and 34, are behind bars. 

Much of the racial disparity is a result of the US’ war on drugs - started by President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s. By 1988, blacks were arrested on drug charges at five times the rate of whites. 

By 1996, the rate of drug admissions to state prison for black men was 13 times greater than the rate for white men. This is despite the fact that African Americans use drugs at roughly the same rate as white Americans. 

4. Mass incarceration is expensive: Imprisoning people is not cheap. The average cost of housing an inmate is approximately $20,000 to $30,000 per year. This price tag comes at the direct expense of public money that could be spent on public education, medical care and public assistance. And it is one reason why so many states face fiscal crises today. 

To put this in perspective, the state of California spends 2.5 times more money housing and feeding its inmates than it does educating students. California is not alone: five states “spend more on corrections than higher education”, a 2008 Pew Center study revealed. 

5. Mass incarceration disguises the US’ real unemployment rate and exacerbates inequality: The current unemployment rate in the US is high. And if we factored in all the people who are not looking for work because they are behind bars, it would be higher - especially among young black Americans and people without a high school diploma. 

A recent research by Becky Petit reveals: 

“Employment-population rates adjusted to include inmates suggest that only 26 percent of young black, male dropouts were employed in 2008, while over 37 percent were in prison or jail. Over half of the joblessness of young, black, and male dropouts is linked to incarceration.” 

Incarceration also negatively impacts former prisoner’s ability to earn a decent living. Several studies suggest that there are at least six million “ex-prisoners” living within society and when they look for a job, they are 50 percent less likely to be hired than job seekers without a criminal record. 

Former prisoners are paid less than those who have not been to prison. In addition, incarceration of a parent reduces a child’s prospects for economic mobility. 

‘Merica, y’all.

(Source: knowledgeequalsblackpower)

via wilwheaton
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Posted 2 weeks ago
gracious goes the ghost of you… on Flickr. Zoom

gracious goes the ghost of you… on Flickr.

Photo 396
Notes
Posted 3 weeks ago
newyorker: Postscript E.L. Konigsburg: “Konigsburg taught, in her famous novel, that “happiness is excitement that has found a settling down place, but there is always a little corner that keeps flapping around.” She may be gone, but her books still teach that lesson.” http://nyr.kr/ZH0v2q

newyorker:

Postscript E.L. Konigsburg: “Konigsburg taught, in her famous novel, that “happiness is excitement that has found a settling down place, but there is always a little corner that keeps flapping around.” She may be gone, but her books still teach that lesson.” http://nyr.kr/ZH0v2q

via newyorker
Link 62
Notes
Posted 4 weeks ago

ShortFormBlog: Three media platforms targeted by a lot of second-guessing after the whole Boston thing

shortformblog:

  • CNN Already facing a bit of a tough run of it, the media outlet screwed up a major story on Wednesday—falsely reporting the arrest of suspects in the Boston bombing. The network’s John King reported the news, which appears to have been a problem of poor sourcing that befell other media outlets…

I was just making the same point earlier….let’s learn the lesson, folks.

via shortformblog
Link 37
Notes
Posted 4 weeks ago

The problem with one-night stands in locked-down Boston

usatoday:

Well, there’s a new and awkward angle. 

Indeed.

via usatoday
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Posted 4 weeks ago
shortformblog: nbcnews: First person: West, my home town, is gone (Photo: Erin Trieb for NBC News) I learned the news about the explosion in West, Texas, the way you seem to learn everything these days - on Twitter, and then Facebook. I was actually in the middle of telling someone about West. It’s where I grew up and lived until I was 20. Read more from NBC News Contributing Writer Zac Crain. A stirring and emotional first-person reflection on the explosion that rocked West, Texas last week, overshadowed somewhat as it was by the Boston bombing and subsequent manhunt. It’s difficult to imagine finding out about something like this happening to your town and your neighbors on Twitter. Hard to fathom. Zoom

shortformblog:

nbcnews:

First person: West, my home town, is gone

(Photo: Erin Trieb for NBC News)

I learned the news about the explosion in West, Texas, the way you seem to learn everything these days - on Twitter, and then Facebook. I was actually in the middle of telling someone about West. It’s where I grew up and lived until I was 20.

Read more from NBC News Contributing Writer Zac Crain.

A stirring and emotional first-person reflection on the explosion that rocked West, Texas last week, overshadowed somewhat as it was by the Boston bombing and subsequent manhunt. It’s difficult to imagine finding out about something like this happening to your town and your neighbors on Twitter. Hard to fathom.

via shortformblog
Quote 31025
Notes
Posted 1 month ago

Let me tell you a story. The day after Columbine, I was interviewed for the Tom Brokaw news program. The reporter had been assigned a theory and was seeking soundbites to support it. “Wouldn’t you say,” she asked, ‘that killings like this are influenced by violent movies?” No, I said, I wouldn’t say that. “But what about ‘The Basketball Diaries’?” she asked. “Doesn’t that have a scene of a boy walking into a school with a machinegun?”

The obscure 1995 Leonardo DiCaprio movie did indeed have a brief fantasy scene of that nature, I said, but the movie failed at the box office and it’s unlikely the Columbine killers saw it.

The reporter looked disappointed, so I offered her my theory. “Events like this,” I said, “if they are influenced by anything, are influenced by news programs like your own. When an unbalanced kid walks into a school and starts shooting, it becomes a major media event. Cable news drops ordinary programming and goes around the clock with it. The story is assigned a logo and a theme song; these two kids were packaged as the Trench Coat Mafia. The message is clear to other disturbed kids: If I shoot up my school, I can be famous. The TV will talk about nothing else but me. Experts will try to figure out what I was thinking. Kids and teachers at school will see they shouldn’t have messed with me. I’ll go out in a blaze of glory.”

In short, I said, events like Columbine are influenced far less by violent movies than by CNN, “The NBC Nightly News” and other news media, who glorify the killers in the guise of “explaining” them.

The reporter thanked me and turned off the camera. Of course the interview was never used. They found plenty of talking heads to condemn violent movies, and everybody was happy.

Roger Ebert (via sharpless)

The blame game…

(Source: yeezytaughtme)

via sharpless
Photo 391
Notes
Posted 1 month ago
cheatsheet: The rucks were filled with Camelbacks of water, extra uniforms, Gatorade, changes of socks—and first-aid and trauma kits. It was all just supposed to be symbolic. Mother Jones has the story of a group of soldiers who ran the Boston Marathon wearing 40-pound packs, then saved lives.  [Photo: Military Friends Foundation] The helpers…. Zoom

cheatsheet:

The rucks were filled with Camelbacks of water, extra uniforms, Gatorade, changes of socks—and first-aid and trauma kits. It was all just supposed to be symbolic.

Mother Jones has the story of a group of soldiers who ran the Boston Marathon wearing 40-pound packs, then saved lives. 

[Photo: Military Friends Foundation]

The helpers….

via motherjones