Camden plans to lay off half of its police officers and a third of its firefighters this fiscal year. What is to happen to this city that had the highest crime rate in the country in 2008? Although 2009 saw a little improvement, the city is still the second most dangerous place in the US. It has a population of about 78,000 and these alarming crime statistics:
And what of the police officers, firefighters and other city workers who will be laid off? How will they support their families and their mortgages? Camden depends considerably on state aid; it has no tax base to raise revenue or cover its deficit. From 2002 to 2010, the city was forbidden to raise property taxes. PILOTs or payments in lieu of taxes, were approved by state appointees so that large corporations in the city did not pay much taxes. The New Jersey state budget cuts have further crippled the city. Since the state takeover in 2002, not much effort has been put into luring investors here; the city has now been dropped like a hot potato. Whoever comes here these days, visits the aquarium or the Rutgers University (never after dark); the glory days of Campbell Soup, Lockheed Martin and RCA have long since been erased from its memory. All we can look forward to are days of lawlessness. Gangs will get a firmer foothold, and people who want a better life will just move.
Camden--Near Drop
I think the government should now think in terms of planned demolition of the city. Urban planning to bring about urban renewal. Maybe that will provide more jobs? Companies could be persuaded to build around the Rutgers University campus providing employment to new graduates thereby extending the safety zone in the city. Schools hours could be extended, so children's activities could be supervised. They would have no time for gangs and would learn a little civic sense. Salaries are a small price to pay for the overall mental and economic health of the community. Society needs growth--maybe this is the way to help it grow.
Thanksgiving is fun for everyone except the turkeys.
Each year, the President of the United States "pardons" two turkeys on Death Row. Here is the story of the first official turkey pardon.
The National Turkey Foundation and the Poultry and Egg National Board, since 1947, have presented the President with a turkey each year at a White House ceremony. And the Presidents have always eaten it.
JFK was an exception; he said, "Let's just keep him". In 1989, the senior Bush started the practice of pardoning turkeys--two a year. Till 2004, the pardoned turkeys were sent to Kidwell Farm (also ironically called Frying Pan Park), a petting zoo in Virginia. But now they go to Disneyland as the honorary grand marshals of the Thanksgiving Day parade. They are even given names. This year's chosen ones are Apple and Cider.
I don't see what difference it makes to pardon two turkeys a year when, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, more than 45 million turkeys are cooked and eaten in the U.S. at Thanksgiving!!
One of the funniest things that I ever saw is this video on Youtube on how to cheat in an exam. It involved a scanner, a coke bottle and some glue. Mystified? Well, here it is
First of all, it bothers me that the author of the above video gives it a serial number. There are many more of these. And then, I think the students could better utilize their time simply memorizing what would fit on the teeny Coke bottle label.
Yet another student teaches to cheat by writing notes on a stretched rubber band. What? Are they going to write on the heads of pins next?
Professor Quinn of the University of Central Florida in Orlando, caught 200 of his 600 business-course students cheating in a midterm exam.
He offered the students an ultimatum: Come clean and take a four-hour ethics course, and your records would be wiped clean. If they chose not to come forward, they'd run a risk.
The risk of expulsion, that is. The move to make these students attend a class on ethics was a stroke of genius.
Also, all 600 students had to redo their midterms.
Student Konstantin Ravvin accused the university of "making a witch hunt out of absolutely nothing, as if they want to teach us some kind of moral lesson." (Mind you, a moral lesson!! Who needs that?)
"This is college. Everyone cheats, everyone cheats in life in general," Ravvin said. "I think you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone in this testing lab who hasn't cheated on an exam."
Really, the Professor has nothing to worry about. Those that do not learn the "moral lesson" his way, will learn it the hard way. And then maybe they will learn that they are, in fact, only cheating themselves. As Kiki Kho, a producer of similar "cheating" videos said, the viewers don't really have to follow the videos. If they do, it is all their own fault.
Usually, Google acknowledges the birthday of a great soul by including an art banner about him on its home page. I am disappointed that there was no art for Mahatma Gandhi. The two 'O's in "Google" would have done nicely for Gandhi's glasses and the 'g's for his ears.
Gandhi's favorite hymn was "Vaishnava Janato"--that carried a message of equality of all men and their obligations towards one another. Let us listen because we have yet to learn how to live with others in harmony.
Tyler Clementi's suicide confirms two things: that man is essentially a hostile being and that education does nothing for him. Education does not seem to teach tolerance but breeds arrogance instead. It was not enough that Tyler was minding his own business--he neglected to be watchful of others minding it for him. Not content with a giggle or a snicker, the voyeur had to publicly humiliate Tyler. What are schools teaching children? What are parents teaching their children? Why is their energy so misdirected? Thanks to social networking sites like Facebook and Myspace, private lives are on public display, cyber bullying is rampant. No one takes the responsibility of controlling the content on these sites. No one even cares until something extreme like this happens.
My elementary school would set aside an hour every day for "Moral Science", a period dedicated to teaching children decent, moral behavior and social etiquette. It wasn't my favorite part of the day, but I think that is what is missing in children's lives today. Decency has to be taught and cultivated. And their energy should be properly channeled. Children do not play out on the streets nowadays; tag and hide-and-seek are lame games. No one uses a punching bag to vent his/her frustrations on. Even Playstation and Xbox are getting obsolete now that there is more fun in being mean on the internet. Let us wind-up the toys and watch them run pell-mell!! Let the mind games begin.
Stephen Hawking in his book "The Grand Design" says God did not create the Universe and that the Big Bang was inevitable according to the laws of physics.
But how does he account for this? Even he would agree that this grand design is not wholly the work of "Head and Shoulders" shampoo. Troy Polamalu, the star of the Steelers football team, had his 36" long curly Samoan hair insured for one million dollars.
Awesome.
