Showing posts with label Dave. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dave. Show all posts

The irrational path to death

Thursday, May 6, 2010 11:26 AM Chronicle
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Dave Balson

Opinion Editor 

I’m amazed how often I hear this laissez-faire defense of irrationality: “If people want to believe in fairy tales, what’s the harm?”

Sometimes, it is a fair argument. On Sunday, my horoscope read: “Your taste in art and appreciation in general are heightened. Perhaps this is a good time to select furnishings, colors, and so on--the finer things of life.”

It is irrational to believe such a statement could apply to one-twelfths of the world’s population, and quite offensive to those Aries living in abject poverty in the Third World. For some of them, a more accurate horoscope might read: “You will travel many miles in search of clean drinking water and hope your sister doesn’t die of cholera while you’re away.” But horoscopes don’t directly endanger lives.

Other irrational beliefs do have quantifiable, fatal consequences. In many cases, such as the Catholic Church’s insistence that god does not want people in AIDS-ridden nations to use condoms, the path to death is direct and easy to understand. Whenever the Vatican doles out such deadly decree, the civilized world is quick to condemn them.

For whatever reason, Americans seem less inclined to condemn irrational beliefs like medical quackery and climate-change denial, despite the lethal consequences those beliefs have on their communities.

Homeopathy is a perfect example of our irrational beliefs, why we hold them and the effect they have on our lives.

Millions of people and several first world governments spend billions of dollars annually on homeopathic medicine. Homeopathy is based on a premise its practitioners swear is not satire: The more you dilute a substance, the more potent it becomes. Therefore, the 2 ounce bottle of belladonna you bought at Whole Foods is potent precisely because it’s been diluted to 10 -60.

If you missed class the day your math teacher taught exponents, let me fill you in on how ridiculous a number that is. If you bought enough of the 10 -60 dilution to fill the world’s oceans, it would be extremely unlikely to contain a single molecule of the original belladonna.

The medical system established in modern first-world countries, while imperfect, works incredibly well. Modern medicine has given us longer, more comfortable, productive lives.

Homeopathy is an “alternative medicine,” which is medicine that has either not been proved to work, or been proved not to work. Otherwise we just call it “medicine.”

Unlike actual medicine, homeopathic remedies are not backed by scientific studies and are completely unregulated by the FDA, which is fair, since they’re only selling tiny bottles of water.

If it’s just water, it can’t hurt people. In fact, some people will enjoy the same benefits they would from a placebo. What’s the harm?

Homeopathy does affect the health of people who come to believe the fairy tale. The money they waste on this hyped-up H2O is money they could and should have spent on real medical advice and treatment from real doctors.

According to Reuters, Americans spend about $34 billion annually on homeopathic remedies. Some of that money comes from people with chronic illnesses.  This isn’t harmless, new-age nonsense. It’s a nefarious hustle.

People with terminal cancer are as susceptible mark as a con artist can hope for. Their doctor tells them they are going to die soon, but treatments could give them a bit more time with a bit less pain. Desperate, the patient looks for a third way—a cure.

The homeopath hustles the patient. The cancer worsens. The patient returns to the medically licensed doctor but can no longer afford the treatments that would have given him or her more time and less pain.

The patient’s motives are easy to understand, but the terminal patient’s irrational beliefs aren’t really the problem. The real problem lies in the other part of that $34 billion.

The people who reject medicine in favor of snake oil based on a conviction founded in neither fact nor reason legitimize quackery enough for it to appeal to vulnerable victims like our patient. Their motives truly do the damage.

Why would a person want to believe something that isn’t true, if that belief is bad for them?

It gives them a sense of control.

Science and medicine are confusing. Pills can regulate anything from your bowel movements to your dopamine levels. Surgeons can remove a tumor from your brain and put an artificial heart in your chest. It all seems so unnatural.

It is unnatural, of course. It is the nature of our bodies to fail and die. The whole idea of medicine is fend off that natural process.

But isn’t it nicer to believe that the whole medical industry is a scam? Life is simpler if I can go into my local Whole Foods and pick up a bottle of belladonna dilution, or ragweed or milk thistle, any time I get sick, rather than trusting arrogant doctors and scientists who think they know everything.

Homeopathy provides the delusion that life isn’t as fragile; that our bodies aren’t as complex, and sickness and death aren’t as random as they actually are.

It’s not just homeopathy. Some of our most harmful beliefs are based in the comforting delusion of control.

An ocean of evidence says climate change is real and caused by people. As that vast pool of evidence grows, it becomes ever more apparent that some of the dramatic effects of climate change—smaller ice caps, stronger storms, longer droughts, more acidic oceans—have arrived.

And yet, a large group of loud people believe climate change science is a hoax perpetrated by scientists and politicians who seek absolute control over the world economy. That irrational belief has spread throughout the American public, 67 percent of whom do not believe climate change is a “serious threat,” according to a March 12 Gallup poll.

I wish they were right. We can defend ourselves against the lies of powerful men and women much more easily than rising sea levels. If people really are causing climate change, then I have very little control. Even if I live a green, carbon-free life, I can’t make the guy next door trade in his Hummer for a SmartCar.

If we allow ourselves the delusion that there is no problem, we have an excuse not to address it. As any 12-stepper could tell you, the first step is admitting you have a problem.

Irrationality isn’t about stupidity or ignorance. It’s about refusing to face reality. Schools can teach critical thinking skills (CLC does a wonderful job at this). But at some point there is a larger lesson one must learn on one’s own.

Life can be complicated. Sickness and death can strike without reason. The ecosystem is buckling. But life is also full of wonder, in part because we work together to make it so.

When we refuse to accept how much of life we can’t control, we give up what control we do have. Humanity now faces unprecedented challenges. Unless we are willing to summon up the courage to see the world as it actually is, we cannot hope to make the future what we want it to be.

Tea partying with patriots in Gurnee

Saturday, April 17, 2010 2:55 PM Chronicle
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Dave Balson
Opinion Editor


      The Gurnee American Legion Hall is not easy to miss, being one of the few places in town with a M47 Patton Army Tank parked on its front lawn. Around 6 p.m. on April 1, people began to arrive at the hall for the Northern Illinois Patriot’s April Meetup. 

      It was the warmest April Fools Day on record. Next door, a little league baseball team enjoyed a carefree practice in the 82 degree weather. But the Patriots converged on the meeting hall to address a very serious concern: They had been “Taxed Enough Already.”

      The Northern Illinois Patriots consider themselves a part of the Tea Party movement, a loosely defined national protest movement that supports “constitutionally limited government.” The Tea Party movement emerged in opposition to the federal stimulus package passed in 2009 and has since organized against much of the legislation passed under the Obama administration.

      Fifty-nine percent of voters in Lake County, where Gurnee is located, voted for Barack Obama in the 2008 election, and the 100-some people who filled the upstairs meeting room of the American Legion hall were not thrilled with that result. Besides being all white and mostly middle-aged or older, the most common thread running through the crowd was a belief that the federal government had grown dangerously large and power hungry.

      The evening’s program began with an opening prayer, led by organizer Tony Raymond: “Dear heavenly father, we thank you for the freedoms we enjoy in the United States and we pray that you will serve alongside us as we seek to preserve and protect those freedoms. Father, I pray that tonight will be honoring to you. I pray this in Jesus’ name. Amen.”

      Next, a strapping, relatively young organizer named David Zumwalt went around the room with a microphone asking people what brought them to the meeting.

      Marsha said she loves her country, but, “we’re losing our freedoms—for speech, religion, if they have their way, our right to bear arms.”

      Stacy won’t be a victim to her government.

      Dotty doesn’t think “we should give our money to all of the illegals or the welfare bums.” Dotty got quite the applause.

      Joan said she is “disgusted with the direction the country is going in” and wants “to get back to the Constitution.”

      Jonathan said he is 67 years old and that the 2010 midterms will be “the most important election in my life.”

      Louise and Kevin Stolarik shared similar concerns in an interview.

      “Taxes are going up, and people have less freedom,” Kevin said. “And with the health care bill, I’m going to lose my insurance because the government is going to ration care.”

      Besides taxes, the Stolariks’ main concern is government interfering in their lives.

      “We have guns,” Louise said. “Illinois is the only state where you have to register your gun, and it’s just not right.” 

      Louise also doesn’t like the student loan reform President Obama signed into law in March.

      “I can’t afford to put my own kids through college,” she said. “Why should I be paying for everybody else’s kids? The government is taking over all the loans. They say who gets one and who doesn’t.”

      “There will be a quota system, like everything else,” Kevin added.

      Next, organizer Greg Clements spoke about the group’s five core principles. He said the group is pro-family, stands for limited government, supports a free-market economy, believes in national defense and wants more choice in education.

      “Many of you who have kids in school know that what they are receiving is not education,” Clements said. “It’s indoctrination.”

      Marilyn Rickert, the Midwest irector for the Fair Tax Movement in Illinois, also spoke at the event. Rickert said that when the “founding fathers decided to start America, they didn’t want a federal government that does very much.” 

      She said that after writing the Constitution, the founders wrote the Federalist Papers to “explain it to the people.”

      Rickert had produced packets for people to pick up on their way in. The first page was an excerpt from the Federalist Papers. The second page was from the “10 point program of Communism” from Karl Marx’s “Manifesto of the Communist Party.” One point was circled, “A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.”

      “Does that sound a wee-bit familiar to anyone?” Rickert asked. The crowd responded that it did sound familiar.

      “If you want to know where your taxes come from, it wasn’t the founding fathers,” Rickert said. “It was Karl Marx.”

      Rickert is pushing for a “fair tax,” which she describes as an indirect consumption tax. 

      “You should decide when you are going to pay taxes, how much you will pay, and if you should pay any at all that particular day,” Rickert said. “It’s entirely up to you.

      “With the fair tax, you will be able to pay your necessities of life tax free, as long as you are an American citizen or a legal resident. Sorry, but illegals are foreign visitors They’ll have to pay the full share.” 

      The crowd erupted into applause.

      Rickert also said the fair tax would finally force criminals to pay taxes.

      “I don’t know about your neighborhood, but I’m pretty sure the drug dealer in my neighborhood is not sending in his tax form,” she said. The crowd laughed. 

      “What is the point of having all this money, your fellow drug dealer or your drug dealer or whoever, if you’re not going to spend it?” Rickert said. “For the first time in their lives, criminals are going to be paying taxes. Will they be paying 100 percent? No, I’m sure they will steal some stuff. They are criminals, after all. But they can’t steal everything, and they’ll be paying more than they are now.”

      Rickert was also upset that her First Amendment rights were being violated. Rickert’s organization is tax-exempt, a designation awarded to some non-profit groups and religious organizations. An organization that engages in partisan political activity can lose its tax exemptions.

      “Every day my freedom of speech is violated, and it really ticks me off,” Rickert said. “Did you know that the pastor of your church, or your priest, are also regulated by the federal tax code? Things have gotten so bad, it’s not what your priest or pastor actually says, it’s what the IRS agent listening in the audience thinks he says.”

      Among the speakers were two potential candidates for the 2010 midterm elections. The first, Michael Niecestro, is running as an Independent for the Senate seat previously held by Barack Obama.

      Niecestro, a 29-year veteran of the mortgage banking industry, opposes the Sixteenth Amendment. Passed in 1913, the Sixteen Amendment set in stone the federal government’s right to tax income. 

      Niecestro said the Sixteenth Amendment had made his life miserable.

      “(The income tax) is our money being redistributed downward,” he said. “I would eliminate the income tax, the dividend tax, the capital gains tax and the estate tax.”

      In a later interview, Niecestro said he would vote to repeal the new health care law and start over with new reform legislation.

      “The health care bill will not work for the people,” he said. “The end result is that insurance companies are going to end up folding.”

      After repealing the law, Niecestro would like to replace it with other legislation.

      “Open up the interstate borders,” he said. “Let people go anywhere they want. I believe in tort reform. There are a lot of frivolous lawsuits out there. Just like the frivolous auto accidents where people go out and have a fake accident and they put in falsified claims. We all pay for that. That’s the same thing with the insurance industry.”

      In his Senate race, Niecestro will face Republican Mark Kirk and Democrat Alexi Giannoulias. Niecestro is running as a more conservative alternative to Kirk. 

      “He’s for partial-birth abortion,” he said. “I don’t believe in abortion, period. I’m pro-life. A child at conception is the most important thing. The sanctity of a marriage is between a man and a woman. To me, Mr. Kirk is just another liberal candidate.”

      The second candidate to take the stage was Michael White. He is the Constitution Party’s choice for governor. White said the Constitution Party is “a conservative group who take the right to life, liberty and the freedom of happiness literally.”

      White said the federal government shouldn’t be allowed to mandate health insurance. 

      “I would sue the government for state sovereignty,” he said. “Growing the size of government programs takes away from our humanity, our charity, our concern for our neighbors. America is not about community responsibility. It is about individual responsibility to our community.”

      The theme of the tea party and the mood of the Patriots was clear: The size of the federal government, the taxes being levied on its citizens and the government’s ability to regulate firearms are a clear and present danger to the future of America.

      The Patriots want to take that future back.


____________




Mr. Balson's analysis of the Tea Party here.

Analysis: Mr. Balson takes his tea

2:49 PM Chronicle
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Dave Balson
Opinion Editor


      The strangest thing about the Northern Illinois Patriot’s April Meetup was that its attendees were sincerely upset and angry over things that just aren’t true. 

      In every speech and nearly every interview, people expressed deep concerns that the Obama administration had imposed debilitating tax increases. 

      In fact, the very stimulus bill tea partiers revile contained tax cuts for 95 percent of working families. Most people said that as middle-class workers, they couldn’t afford more taxes. Yet 70 percent of those tax cuts went to the middle 60 percent of American workers.

      The three most common words emblazoned on shirts, stickers and fliers at tea parties across the country are, “Taxed Enough Already.” It is the motto and mantra of the movement. If taxes are a central grievance of the Tea Party, why did the movement flourish after the vast majority of its members received tax cuts?

      Another big concern at the tea party was that the Obama administration was eagerly working to deprive Americans of their right to keep and bear arms. This is a widely held belief among tea partiers and conservatives throughout the nation. The gun and ammunition industry is still enjoying the boom in sales sparked by Obama’s election.

      In fact, the president has shown no desire to fight for stricter gun control. The only gun-related laws passed in his presidency have been pro-gun rights. 

      Thanks to two laws signed by the president, gun-toting tea partiers can now tote their guns into national parks and onto Amtrak trains. Meanwhile, the gun control advocacy group, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence gave Obama an “F” on each of its issues.

      Why were so many of the people at the meeting convinced that the president is coming to take their guns?

      Some of the objections shared by the tea partiers are familiar conservative sentiments, particularly anger toward illegal immigrants and welfare recipients. But those are mostly philosophical or cultural positions, not directly related to actual events or policies occurring in the last 15 months.

        The people at the meeting were outraged over things they believed were absolute fact. Public education is government indoctrination. The government is going to ration health care via death panels. Taxation is un-American. Barack Obama is a foreign-born socialist. The list goes on.

      The tea partiers were not uninformed—surely they pay more attention to politics than the majority of Americans. They were well-misinformed.

      The conspiracies, even the words and phrases used to describe them, sounded familiar. I asked each person I interviewed where they had heard about, say, the future of death panels or the impending communist takeover of Washington. Each one said Fox News, Glenn Beck in particular. I also asked where they went for news and information on current events. Again, Fox News, Glenn Beck in particular.

      Beck is the hero of the Tea Party. The Northern Illinois Patriots say on their Web site, “We stand for the principles and values espoused by the National 9/12 Project.” The 9/12 Project is Beck’s ultra-right vision for America. Through his conspiracy-laden, terror-inducing TV show, Beck has created his own pernicious brand of entertainment.

      These were good people. They believe their country is in trouble, that America is hurtling toward self-destruction, and they believe it is their duty to fight for their country’s future. They were, in some sense, incredibly patriotic.

      Night after night, most of the tea partiers turn on Fox News believing that makes them well-informed citizens. But they aren’t getting news, or facts, or analysis from a journalist. They are getting a compelling story from a talented storyteller.

      The couple I talked to, Louise and Kevin Stolarik, love Beck’s TV show because they believe he gives the facts to them straight.

      “He digs into everything and it’s just amazing, the facts that he comes up with,” Louise said. She meant it as a compliment.

      After explaining that communism was “taking root” in America, Kevin said he gets most of his news from Beck.

      “Hopefully I’m getting well-informed,” he said.

      Of course, Beck isn’t the only one misinforming the masses. Many pundits and politicians live to tell lies to lots of people. Sarah Palin brought the “death panel” myth to the national stage. Palin was also very popular with the tea partiers.

      Beck makes a lot of money for Fox News and takes home a hefty paycheck. ABC News reported April 13 that Palin has made around $12 million since she quit being governor of Alaska.

      There is a word for those who make money by deceiving people, by appealing to their emotions to convince them of things that aren’t true and aren’t in their best interest. We call them conmen.

Israel settlements undermine peace efforts

Friday, March 26, 2010 9:42 PM Chronicle
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Dave Balson
Opinion Editor

      Two generations have come of age in a world where war in the Middle East seemed as familiar and normal as television reruns and people hating Monday. In the U.S., presidential and congressional candidates routinely promise to solve the stalemate, and succeeding administrations have seen their efforts stymied by the enduring deadlock. The Obama Administration has faced a familiar, inauspicious first year in mediating the conflict.

      On March 9, during a visit to the country Vice President Joe Biden gave a speech vowing the administration’s support for Israel. The Israeli Interior Ministry announced plans to extend Israeli settlements in East Jerusalem by building 1,600 new homes.

      Last spring President Obama, in an effort to bring regional leaders to the negotiating table, tried to convince Israel to freeze new settlement in contested parts of the country. Israel initially rejected this, but eventually accepted a 10-month freeze on settlements in the West Bank. While East Jerusalem was not included in the freeze, announcing the planned expansion during the vice presidential visit insulted the administration and was a step backward in the peace process, since Palestinians believe East Jerusalem is rightfully and historically theirs.

      The president, vice president, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton all expressed their outrage to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu offered his apology for the poor timing of the announcement, but indicated that he would be moving forward his plans, regardless.

      Over the years of the Middle East conflict, lasting peace between Israel and Palestine was mostly considered a foreign interest of the U.S. We liked Israel, thought a free democracy in the Middle East was a fine idea, and had its back if anything went down. But things have changed. Now the stakes are higher, and the consequences hit closer to home.

      The “Israeli occupation of Palestine” has proved a great recruiter and fundraiser for Islamic extremist groups and gains sympathy from moderate Muslims around the globe. Because the U.S. is by far Israel’s strongest ally, the hatred toward Israel is easily extended to America. A core demand of al-Qaida is that America withdraw its support for Israel.

      I, along with most of the planet and much of the Middle East, take great pleasure in reminding al-Qaida where they can stick their demands. But American soldiers are fighting and dying in two separate wars in the region, and with would-be terrorists stuffing explosives into their tighty-whities to attack the U.S. homeland, solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is an urgent necessity.

      The good news is a generally agreed upon solution exists. The bad news is that it has been generally agreed upon, but not acted upon, for many years.
 
      Since Israel’s founding, the “two-state solution”—dividing the country into two sovereign nations, Palestine and Israel—has been continually proposed, discussed, endorsed and opposed. Even today, polls show the majority of Israelis and Palestinians favor this plan over any other.

      Reasonable minds on both sides know that the two-state solution is what should, and eventually must, happen. But talks break down over small, contested regions, especially Jerusalem. In the 1990s, President Bill Clinton mediated a peace plan to near completion, but neither side would cede or share the Temple Mount.

      I’m not opposed to intellectual endeavors, but when two groups of people refuse to end a whole lot of death and murder because each group is committed to an inflexible interpretation of their holy book, I get very offended.

      Having a free democracy in a region of the world that generally and consistently gets low marks for both freedom and democracy is a good thing. But Palestinians also have a fair argument. In the messy years that marked the end of the British Mandate of Palestine and the founding of the state of Israel, the Palestinians got the shaft. And the walled, impoverished Gaza strip looks a lot like apartheid.

      Though I tend to have more sympathy for those who wish to extend civil rights (Israel), rather than curb them (Palestine), both sides can argue injustices for a literal lifetime. The best we can hope for is that both sides pause their retaliations long enough to make a solid agreement. Announcing new Israeli settlements in territory that Palestinians hope will be returned to them through negotiations hinders that peace effort.

      This is a shame, considering the unique opportunity Israel currently has.

      Iran has become so politically and militarily ambitious that the entire region considers it a threat. Facing the possibility of a nuclear Iran, nations that have been historically hostile to Israel—Jordan and Saudi Arabia, for example—would probably work with Israel to ensure regional stability. Strong, lasting alliances can be built by nations who seek a common defense.

      If and when a two-state solution is reached, hatred toward Israel in the Middle East will turn to reluctant acceptance. But diplomatic engagement is thwarted whenever Israel is publicly seen as unwilling to make the compromises needed to work out the solution.

      Israel is justified in refusing to negotiate with Hamas, the militant group which runs the Gaza strip and continually lobs missiles into Israel. But the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, under Mahmoud Abbas, has shown a strong desire for a two-state solution and a willingness to suspend hostilities while negotiations take place.

      The U.S. lends its enormous influence to Israel, partly because it’s a democracy and partly because American Jews hold great political and cultural clout, but also because without our support, Israel/Palestine would become very bloody very quickly.

      Israel is consistently one of the top recipients of U.S. foreign aid, adding to our deficit spending during a financial crisis. Our alliance engenders hatred in Iraq and Afghanistan, putting American troops further at risk. The one thing Israel can do to lessen those burdens on the American people is to make the concessions necessary to achieve a two-state solution. When Israeli leaders refuse to make those concessions, they make our alliance—their lifeline—much harder to justify.

Congress passes historic student loan bill

9:39 PM Chronicle
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Dave Balson
Opinion Editor

      President Obama signed into law the most extensive overhaul of student aid in 40 years on Thursday, March 25. The program is expected to save the government $61 billion over 10 years. The savings will be used to boost Pell Grants, lower interest rates and approve more loans, according to the Associated Press.

      The legislation removes banks from the federal student loan program. Since 1965, banks used federal subsidies to make student loans, making the profits while the government assumed most of the risk. Now all loans will come directly from the U.S. Department of Education. 

      Of the $61 billion savings, $36 billion will provide more students will be awarded larger Pell Grants. Starting 2014, monthly payment caps on low-income graduates will be reduced from 15 percent to 10 percent of their incomes and any remaining debt will be forgiven after 20 years, costing the government $1.5 billion, according to the Washington Post.

      The bill will also be used to fund education programs, providing $2 billion to community colleges for job training. 

      A CNN/Opinion Research poll released March 25 shows 64 percent of respondents supported the education overhaul, while 34 percent opposed it.

      The program was part of, and overshadowed by, the health care reconciliation bill. The bill passed the Senate 56-43, then passed the House 220-207 before being sent to the president. No Republicans voted for the bill.

Prevention, intervention key to campus safety

9:12 PM Chronicle
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Dave Balson
Opinion Editor


      Prevention and intervention are keys to keeping CLC’s campuses safe and open to all students, the CLC Police Department says. The CLC Police Department reported that the college’s campuses have had eight incidents of violent crime.

      The statistics, which the department is required by law to produce, show the frequency of certain crimes committed on campus 2006 through 2008. Throughout those years, the statistics show no murders, one sexual assault, two aggravated assaults (both in ’06), and five cases of battery.

      “Our statistics are not fudged,” CLC Police Sergeant Theodore Waters said. “These are honest statistics and not all schools can say that.” 

      In his 19 years at CLC, Sergeant Waters said he hasn’t seen violent crime rates trend in either direction. Fights make up the majority of violent crime the department deals with. But college campuses across the country now confront the challenge of trying to prevent the next major school shooting.

      “CLC has always been a very safe place,” Waters said. “But we have to be prepared and have those plans in place to keep it safe, because violence is trying to make its way in.”

        “You try to intervene and prevent,” CLC Chief of Police Kevin Lowry said. “On a national level, that’s what the FBI and Secret Service do for our country. They try to intervene, prevent, before that bomber does what he’s trying to do. On our level, we’re trying to do the same thing. Campus wide, a department of 20 can’t do that all by ourselves, so what we try to do is train individuals to help with that.”

      The individuals Chief Lowry is helping to train make up the school’s Crisis Prevention and Intervention Team. Most of the staff on the team are heads of departments who have direct contact with students.

      “We have the key players in place who might get information about students in crisis,” said Julie DeGraw, dean of the Counseling, Advising and Transfer Center at CLC. DeGraw is also the team’s chairwoman.

      College campuses across the country are implementing similar prevention teams. The teams are largely a response to the Virginia Tech massacre in 2007, when student Seung-Hui Cho killed 32 people before turning the gun on himself. 

      “What they found from Virginia Tech was that Cho had had encounters with campus police, counseling, health center and numerous faculty members,” said Lowry, also a member of the team. “All that information from the faculty was held within their divisions.”

      “As a result of that,” DeGraw said, “there was a lot written about how we should create avenues for (information sharing) to happen, especially in extreme situations where we’re worried about the safety and health of the student or the campus.”

      The team’s main functions are to train and educate staff and faculty on how best to identify and work with students who may be in crisis. Then, they meet and share information to identify students who have the potential for violence.

      If a student seems to be in crisis, his or her name is brought up to the group. 

      “If others say, ‘yes, that name is familiar to me,’ then we share the info as it’s appropriate.” DeGraw said. “If people say no, that’s the end of it.”

      “Anything that is said in that group is confidential,” she added, “it can’t be taken out of that group. I don’t want people to think that if they come in to talk to me or the police that we’re going to share that information outside of our office. It’s really only when we think it may be harmful to other places on campus.”

      The team is also responsible for helping plan the campus-wide emergency response.
      “I’ve been really impressed since I’ve been here,” DeGraw said. “We know what we’re doing. Everybody has a plan and has walked through that plan.

      “We don’t want to just be responding, we want to be preventing things before they happen.”

      Waters and DeGraw both stressed the importance of keeping the college open to the community.

      “Community colleges have people who are fresh out of prison for violent crimes,” Waters said. “But they are here to get an education, to become a productive member of society. This is where you want them to be.

      “They’re coming here to learn how to not be violent and live a better life, and that’s a good thing. CLC is lucky, and CLC is a good place. People are here to improve their lives, and they don’t want to mess that up.”

      In fact, countless studies have shown that prisoners who get an education are far less likely to go back to prison. A 2009 report released by the U.S. Department of Education, “Partnerships Between Community Colleges and Prisons,” found that community colleges make their community safer by turning potential re-offenders into productive citizens.

      “You want colleges to be open and public and available to all people,” DeGraw said. “We’re all about access and trying to be a resource to the community. Do we want to be about locking our doors and making everybody swipe a card to get in? I don’t think we do.

      “There’s a strong connection between education and being able to move forward. So why wouldn’t we want that to be available to everyone?”

      Sergeant Waters also said the general attitudes and expectations of people on campus play a very large role in keeping the campus safe.

      “We, the students, staff, everybody, create a culture that is not accepting of the precursor elements of violence,” Waters said. “Valuing diversity and making sure that everyone feels included and is included, treating people with respect, that’s what we do. I think that’s why CLC is a safer place.”

Fear merchants selling out American values

Thursday, March 18, 2010 12:33 PM Chronicle
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Dave Balson
Opinion Editor 
 
      “Let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself,” Franklin D. Roosevelt said in his first inaugural address.


      I find it nearly impossible to read those words without dreamily drifting off to dwell on their profundity. Beyond its sharp-yet-zen phrasing, the line embodies the highest ideals of the American Century. It’s easy to see why the people who first heard it would make FDR the only president elected to a third and fourth term.


      But few on that day could have predicted how prescient his words would prove. In the 1950s, well after FDR’s passing, Sen. Joe McCarthy used the fear of communism to bring political rhetoric to a dangerous extreme. After the Sept. 11 attacks, the Bush administration used fear of terrorism to expand its power, justify torture and make the case for war in Iraq. And in 2010, some conservatives are combining both of those fears for political gain.


      At a recent private meeting in Florida, the Republican National Committee presented their 2010 strategy to their core fundraisers. In a paper copy of a PowerPoint presentation accidentally left at the hotel, later obtained by politico.com and reported March 3, the RNC suggested to fundraisers that they should appeal to the “fear” of small donors and the “ego” of big donors.  Some of the more cynical slides encouraged the conference attendees to sell the fear of socialism and use an image of the president’s face painted like the Joker from the “The Dark Night.”


      The Obama-as-the-Joker poster, with “SOCIALISM” printed across the bottom, became an instant hit at Tea Party rallies. Racially charged and factually conflicted, it fits the Tea Party movement perfectly. If painting the face of the first black president is not motivated by racism, then the poster’s message is that the president is like the Joker: unpredictable, psychotic, chaotic and ruthless.


      The Joker was all of those things. Politically, we would call him an anarchist, the very farthest thing from socialism on the political spectrum. I know times are tough and that dictionaries cost more than a whole box of tea bags, but it would really help the discussion if people could start looking up words before they start using them.


      It is one thing to have your opponents call you on fear-mongering and quite another to let slip that it is an integral part of your marketing plan. But fear has been a political currency for generations and the presentation, while embarrassing, is hardly surprising.


      More worrisome are the accusations that the Obama administration is too weak on, or even sympathetic to, terrorism. The worst of these have come from Keep America Safe, an ultra-conservative organization run by Liz Cheney, daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, and Bill Kristol, a neo-con author and activist and a stalwart promoter of the war in Iraq.


      Cheney’s group has launched an ad campaign against certain lawyers working in the Justice Department for having previously represented detainees from Guantanamo Bay. A video released by Keep America Safe portrays Attorney General Eric Holder as seeking out these terrorist sympathizers to staff the Justice Department. The video refers to the seven appointees as “The Al-Qaeda 7” and asks, “Whose values do they share?”


      I’m glad you asked, Liz. It would be my great honor to offer the answer.


      They share the very deepest and noblest of American values, from our founding to present. They share the values of John Adams, who represented British soldiers in the Boston Massacre trial. Adams, the nation’s first vice president and its second president, later said the experience was, “one of the most gallant, generous, manly and disinterested actions of my whole life, and one of the best pieces of service I ever rendered my country.”


      His founding brothers no doubt shared these values. The document they drafted to specifically define American values, the Bill of Rights, is chocked full of the stuff. In fact, it’s some of the most important, cherished parts of the Constitution.


      Providing legal representation to a defendant is the only way to ensure a fair trial. A fair trial allows the disinterested hand of justice to decide the case. Regardless of the charge, a person must have the means and the right to be heard and to plead their case.


      The arguments being made by some conservatives—that suspected terrorists shouldn’t receive a fair trial, that they can and should be subjected to cruel and unusual punishment, that they shouldn’t be tried where the crime was committed and imprisoned on American soil—are arguments against the fundamental principles of the Constitution.


      As un-American as it is to argue that these defendants are so guilty that they don’t deserve a fair trial, it is worse still to implicate their defense attorneys. By calling the “Al-Qaeda 7” terrorist sympathizers, we imply that lawyers are necessarily sympathetic to the crimes their clients are accused of committing. If that’s the case, this country is crawling with public defenders who are sympathetic to rape, murder and child molestation.


      And what about the judges who hear the case? The juries? The elderly court reporter, sympathetically clicking away on her little machine? Just look at her, an older woman, quietly writing her incantations in heathen shorthand, I know she’s a witch, I just know it!


      American justice derives all of its legal and moral credibility from a design that prevents prosecution from becoming persecution. One of the things that makes America great is the belief that right makes might, and you are innocent until proven guilty. Lawyers who defend those accused of terrorism are keeping America’s greatest values and virtues safe. The efforts of Liz Cheney and the actions of her father do better than any lawyer, indeed any terrorist, in undermining that safety.


      Terrorism, by its very definition, uses violence and intimidation to force a society to change its political ideology.


      Those who would allow terrorists to coerce us into disregarding our deepest principles are the ones who aid and abet the terrorists. It is they who are letting the terrorists win.


      Franklin Roosevelt’s “fear itself” quote usually ends halfway through his sentence. I think it both worthy and just that we let the man complete his thought:
      “So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.”

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