TJ Schneider just got Episode 3 of the Snowboard Realms up, and you have a chance to win a brand new Capita Stairmaster just for checking it out. Head over to the Snowboard Realms website for more details.

Everyone knows the scenario.  Guy loves girl.  Girl loves guy.  Guy takes girl to an incredibly romantic spot.  Say a mountaintop or the restaurant where they had their first date (guys with foresight made it somewhere special).  There they have a wonderful evening with chocolate and wine (or sparkling grape juice), and then it happens.  The guy gets down on one knee, pulls out the ring that is way too expensive for him to afford, and then says the words every girl wants to her:  “Will you enter into a legally binding but stable relationship?”

“Yes!” the girl replies, “Yes, I want to take your last name and some tax breaks with it!”

Ok, that is not exactly how it goes, but it might as well.  Nowadays, “marriage” is little more than that.  Rarely in the United States are there marriages for property, and few people are really that desperately worried about their family name living on.  The best reason to get married, outside of tax breaks, seems to be to provide a stable environment for raising children.  But modern day couples are even challenging that reasoning, preferring to have kids before or without marriage.

This article is about gay marriage.  The Church is in an uproar about gay marriage.  A lot of people are not even that upset with gay people in general, but they just do not like gay people being married.  They can live together and act like they are married, but the word, “marriage,” is reserved for heterosexual couples.  That seems to be their only requirement.

I am tempted to give up the fight and support gay marriage.  Part of me wants to say, “Let them get married.  After all, if it acts like a duck, talks like a duck, gets tax breaks like a duck, we shouldn’t call it a goose.”  That reasoning is due, in most part, to the definition of marriage nowadays.

If people who only go to church on Easter and Christmas get married, no one cares.  If people who are clearly living in sexual sin get married, the Church still allows it.  If adamant atheists get married, nobody bats an eyelash.  Now, I am not saying we judge everyone to the point where we make decisions for them, but should not the Church have some responsibility in who gets married?  When we baptize people, we ask them questions, get their testimony, and make sure they are ready to get dunked. Why do we not do this with marriage?  The Church is ashamed of statistics that record how many baptized believers fall away, but it looks at the divorce rate as proof of the corruption of the world, not as something for which the Church is in any way responsible.  Guess what?  Most people get married in a church, and get married by an ordained preacher.  The Church approved most of these marriages that ended in divorce.

The Church is all in an uproar about the sanctity of marriage, and how the Bible defines marriage, yet how true is that?  I do not mean to say that the Bible does not say that a man and a woman should be the ones to get married, but the Church has not been the one defining marriage for quite some time.  The Church gave that responsibility to the State, and the State has defined it as has been culturally acceptable.  The majority of people in the United States are Christian, and it has been that way for some time, but that majority is shrinking.  It is now becoming more and more culturally acceptable to be homosexual*, and thus the State is considering changing the definition of marriage to fit the culture’s definition of marriage.  In this sense, the Bible only has influence as much as it can influence the culture.

The problem is that we gave the State the ability to define what we recognize in our religion.  Consider it like this:  the body of the Church is a group of baptized believers.  Once you believe, you can become baptized.  Without believing, you cannot become baptized.  Believing is a personal choice, but the Church evaluates your heart and decides if they want to be responsible for you, or if they feel that you are not ready.  Say getting baptized was a cultural phenomenon that everyone wanted to do because everyone did it.  Say if you did not do it and continued to live your life you would be looked down upon.  Then, say that in order to get baptized you needed a license from the State and had to meet requirements set by the State.  Then, say you got tax breaks for doing so.

Do you see the problem here?  The State is supposed to treat everyone equally regardless of race, religion, gender, and (in many cases) sexuality.  What they offer one group of people they cannot deny the others.  Is this how it always works?  No, of course not, but this is the goal that the State tries to head toward.  This is the ideal that they are working for.  In the above example and in an ideal State, atheists would be able to get baptized with little resistance.  The State cannot discriminate, and it can only prevent social sins and does not concern itself with sins of the mind or heart. The State, in its inherent nature, has to ignore sins of the mind or heart that may have no consequence on Earth but will in Heaven.  This is a good thing, because the State is man-made and will only exist on Earth (The Kingdom of Heaven is unlike any government on Earth).

I digress.  The point is, we have given a heavenly and religious matter to a being that exists completely in the world and is supposed to treat all religious ideas the same.  As such, I do not see gay marriage as something we can fight against.  I see it as an inevitable outcome based on a mistake the Church made a long time ago.  The sanctity of marriage has already been breached.  It has been breached by hypocritical Christians.  It has been breached by apathetic Christians.  It has been breached by adamant atheists.  In a way, homosexuals are actually late to the party.

So this is a problem, then.  What do we do?  Practically, there are not many choices.  The problem with the word, “marriage,” is that there are so many people who have such a strong connection to it without any of the religious implications.  Rather, it is the cultural implications that drive them.  So, in order to restrict the word, “marriage,” back to the religious point-of-view, one would have to anger a lot of people.  Gay marriage is, after all, not about the tax benefits, but the titles.  The word, “marriage,” is what this whole debate is about, and it is a debate that the Church is losing.

There is the “abandon ship” method that so many Christians like.  We should just abandon the nomenclature and replace it with something else.  The connotations for that word are too strong to change, so we just make a new word that has better connotations.  Already, many Christians do this.

“I don’t believe in dating.  I believe in courtship,” because using an older word for “dating” completely changes the definition.

“It’s against my relationship to have a religion.”  That does not even make sense.  Look up the word, “religion.”  See if Jesus ever prohibited that.

The worst, in my opinion (and many will disagree with me), is when people refuse to call themselves Christian and instead say something like, “Jesus is my homeboy” (Muhammad also thought highly of Jesus).

So let’s go ahead and get on this bandwagon.  I suggest abandoning the word, “marriage,” as anything but tax breaks, and instead using words like “Holy Union,” or “Matchmaking done by Jesus.”  Or we could translate something from Greek.  Us Christians love to have stuff in Greek.  It sounds legit.

Some of these ideas came from the following article:

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1885190,00.html

*I wish to take a note and say that it is not bad that homosexual people are open about their sexual preferences.  I do think it is a sin, but homosexual people are sinners just like the rest of us.  I would rather them be honest and open than put up a façade (that is usually caused by fear of the response rather than shame of the sin).

I’ve never followed MLS – I’ve always been a Euro soccer guy, mostly following the top four English leagues. Since Philadelphia was awarded a franchise in ‘08, I decided now was time to immerse myself in the North American league of the beautiful game.

Our city’s club will be known as the Union and they have a very classic look, from it’s insignia to uniform to even the scarf. Managed by Polish great Piotr Nowak, the team’s expansion draft was held yesterday and here are the members of the very first Philadelphia Union team:

Brad Knighton (New England Revolution)
David Myrie (Chicago Fire)
Shavar Thomas (Chivas)
Jordan Harvey (Colorado Rapids)
Shea Salinas (San Jose Earthquakes)
Stefani Migliioranzi (Los Angeles Galaxy)
Andrew Jacobson (DC United)
Nick Zimmerman (New York Red Bulls)
Alejandro Moreno (Columbus Crew)
Sebastian Le Toux (Seattle Sounders)
Chris Seitz (free agent signing)

The team’s first game is March 25, 2010 in Seattle, and leading up to that event, I plan to profile some of these guys. A lot of passion and excellent planning went into the formation of the Union, so we can only hope they hit the ground running next year.

AIIMS | AIIMS Result – Click Here to View

<b>THE FREEDOM TO CREATE</b>

Freedom to Create (<a href=”http://www.freedomtocreate.com” target=”_blank”>www.freedomtocreate.com</a>) is an initiative that seeks to improve lives by addressing society’s ability to support and sustain creativity. The initiative focuses on those societies in greatest need.

Directly from their website:

<i><b>A celebration of courage and creativity</b>
Established in 2008, the Freedom to Create Prize is a celebration of the courage and creativity of artists around the world who use their talents to build the foundations for open societies and inspire the human spirit. It is open to artists in all creative fields.

<b>Support for frontline artists</b>
Each year, US$125,000 in prize money is awarded across three categories: Main, Youth and Imprisoned Artist.
The winners of this year’s Prize will be announced at our awards ceremony to be held at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, on 25 November 2009. Human rights activist Bianca Jagger, leading human rights lawyer Geoffrey Robertson QC and acclaimed documentary maker Nick Broomfield will present the awards.

<b>A growing presence</b>
The Prize has been embraced by artists on the frontlines, the global arts in development sector and the human rights community. This year there were more than 1,000 nominations from over 100 countries.</i>

Last year the Art Action Union promoted this prize in it’s fundamental year, to a very modest and new group of artists. We even ran our own <a href=”http://www.redbubble.com/groups/art-action-without-violence/challenges/134-activism-for-activism-and-freedom-to-create#all-entries%20challenge” target=”_blank”>challenge</a> in parallel with the ideals.

It was with honour and surprise that this year the Art Action Union was identified by this growing prestigious prize and invited to the awards ceremony at the V&amp;A Gallery in London.

<a href=”http://api.ning.com:80/files/sW2Jjkr5K1e7YuCSVh6jF6YgWM4INKX5O5lpHTt76rs_/freedomtocreateprizeinvitation.jpg” target=”_blank”><img src=”http://api.ning.com:80/files/sW2Jjkr5K1e7YuCSVh6jF6YgWM4INKX5O5lpHTt76rs_/freedomtocreateprizeinvitation.jpg?width=425″ alt=”" width=”425″ height=”600″ style=”float: left;”/></a> Unfortunately, I couldn’t go Because I don’t live anywhere near London … and after a frantic mail around couldn’t get anyone there either even though we were very lucky to have the invitation extended to our “colleagues in London” … ho hum! I’ll have to meet Bianca Jagger another day!

What is more important about the awards being in a state of “growing prestige”, is that not only are they attracting the likes of:
<i>HUMAN RIGHTS ADVOCATE BIANCA JAGGER,
AWARD-WINNING DOCUMENTARY MAKER NICK BROOMFIELD
AND HUMAN RIGHTS EXPERT, GEOFFREY ROBERTSON QC</i>
to present the winners, the growing number of entrants on the front line of human need regarding expression have embraced the awards. This year over 1000 entries from over 100 countries has marked <a href=”http://www.freedomtocreateprize.com/The-Prize.asp” target=”_blank”>The Freedom to Create Prize</a> as a special and magical celebration of voice, but contrasted against the dire need to raise community expectations and standards in educating our richest world communities about the sacrifices made by others in their struggle against oppression.

The stories of the finalists themselves are enough to inspire … <a href=”http://api.ning.com/files/YsV3QVgT9J6YZRThQryyahhSJLgGCCW0SZ3c7C0UByE_/2009FreedomtoCreatePrizeshortlistannouncement.pdf” target=”_blank”>please find the press release for the Awards</a> and read their biographies.

The winners will be announced tonight Wednesday the 25 November 2009 … alas without the real time cheers and tears of the Art Action Union’s physical presence, but we are there in spirit and will be advocating the change that these artists need to see in the world.

Congratulations to the America people.  You have successfully elected the one person that can, and will, completely destroy the Constitution.  Thanks to electing Obama, we are losing all our freedoms one by one.  The government now controls our energy usage thanks to Cap and Trade.  The government now controls our thoughts and the expression of those thoughts thanks to the Hate Crimes legislation.  The government will soon control our choice of doctors, medical procedures, and general lifestyles thanks to the health reform bill.

 Is this the change that you wanted America?  For all the faults that George Bush had, he wasn’t intentionally trying to destroy the foundation of this nation.  Obama is doing this on purpose.  Having grown up surrounded by communists he was doomed to at least lean in that direction.  So it is no surprise that with every situation that comes up, he looks to his communistic philosophies for the answer.  In every case, he is wrong.  Communism does not work.  Just look at the fall of the Soviet Union and the horrible conditions in Cuba as examples of how bad communism can turn out.  Even China has started to implement more capitalistic solutions to problems because the old communistic approach doesn’t work.

 I read an article this past week about a “Constitutional Congress” meeting in Illinois.  This meeting had a lot of people with a large range of differing philosophies, but one major goal.  They want to preserve the original intent of our founding fathers.  They want to resurrect the Constitution.  They drafted a document that restricts the federal government from stealing our freedoms.  Especially our freedom of speech, religion, and gun ownership.  The document also calls the Patriot Act unconstitutional along with all these energy initiatives and the health care reform.  I agree with most of what they came up with but I don’t understand how it can make a difference.  Unless the American people start demanding that their representatives actually represent them in Washington, congress will just keep doing what they have been doing this past year.  How can we actually implement and ratify the document that was produced?

 The only solutions to our issues are voting out the current representatives or impeaching them.  I think we need to start impeachment proceedings.  Maybe if one or two get impeached, the rest will finally start to pay attention.  I would prefer to vote them out of office, but that would mean putting up with a lot of them for another couple of years. 

 The only other possibility is the Supreme Court.  If our current justices would actually do their job, none of these pieces of legislation would make it into law.  Since every single one of these bills undermines something in the constitution, the Supreme Court needs to strike them down and declare them unconstitutional.  But they have made it abundantly clear that they do not want to hear anymore cases related to our first amendment rights.  They recently chose not to hear a case concerning a valedictorian’s right to mention God in their commencement speech.  By refusing this case, they allowed a blatant violation of an individual’s right to free speech.  This is inexcusable.

 Our country is in a world of hurt right now and unless we act soon to take our country back from these communists, we will lose our country for good.  Come on people wake up and fight for this country and the constitution.

David Farr is the CEO of Emerson Electric, a $1.7-billion-dollar company heavily involved in manufacturing. What does he think about the job that the Democrats are doing in Washington?

In this Bloomberg article, he explains:

Emerson Electric Co. Chief Executive Officer David Farr said the U.S. government is hurting manufacturers with regulation and taxes and his company will continue to focus on growth overseas.

“Washington is doing everything in their manpower, capability, to destroy U.S. manufacturing,” Farr said today in Chicago at a Baird Industrial Outlook conference. “Cap and trade, medical reform, labor rules.”

Emerson, the maker of electrical equipment and InSinkErator garbage disposals with $20.9 billion in sales for the year ended September, will keep expanding in emerging markets, which represented 32 percent of revenue in 2009. About 36 percent of manufacturing is now in “best-cost countries” up from 21 percent in 2003, according to slides accompanying his speech.

Companies will create jobs in India and China, “places where people want the products and where the governments welcome you to actually do something,” Farr said.

The unemployment rate in the U.S. jumped to 10.2 percent in October, the highest level since 1983. Emerson, which Farr said employs about 125,000 people worldwide, has eliminated more than 20,000 jobs since the end of 2008 to lower expenses.

“What do you think I am going to do?” Farr asked. “I’m not going to hire anybody in the United States. I’m moving. They are doing everything possible to destroy jobs.”

[...]Mature markets such as the U.S., Western Europe and Japan continue to decline in importance and the company will keep investing in emerging markets, Farr said during the presentation.

“We as a company today are putting our best people, our best technology and our best investment in these marketplaces to grow,” he said. “My job is to grow that top line, grow my earnings, grow my cash flow and grow my returns to the shareholders. My job is not to shrink and roll over for the U.S. government.”

[...]In renewable and alternative-energy markets, Emerson had 2009 sales of $50 million and plans to increase that to more than $800 million in five years.

“But you are not going to see Emerson going out there with fancy commercials or sitting at the right hand of some president, talking about this,” Farr said. “We do it.”

When it comes to manufacturing jobs, the only person whose opinion counts is the CEO of the manufacturing company, because he makes the hiring decisions.

Why Obamanomics will not improve the economy

I noticed the Bloomberg article because it was linked to this American Thinker article, which was linked at Marshall Art’s blog.

The American Thinker article analyzes why Obamanomics will not improve the economy.

Excerpt:

The reason that Obamanomics will not and cannot work is because an economy cannot be managed from the top. Economics is a bottom-up process that depends upon individual incentives. Critical incentives have been diminished or destroyed by recent economic policies. Fear, uncertainty, threats, tax increases, penalties, and violations of the rule of law are but some of the conditions anathema to entrepreneurs, small business, and large business. Businesses will not hire, invest, or expand in a climate of disincentives. No commands from on high can force economic activity. That was a lesson that should have been learned from Eastern Europe and the former USSR.

If these disincentives are left in place, our economy will continue to shrink and our standard of living will continue to diminish. Capital has no nationality, and it will start to flee our shores. Talent will follow. We will not recover from this economic downturn until businesses and individuals have a more favorable incentive structure.

You can’t argue with the 10.2% unemployment rate, and it’s only going to get worse. Everything that Obama has done has been bad for business, and has contributed to raising unemployment. Democrats, (and the people who voted Democrat), know less about economics than my keyboard.

We know that our blog has had a lot of posts about the BC Paramedics lately, but we’re very interested in seeing how this all turns out.

Paramedics are asking colleagues from around the country not to come to work during the Olympics until the labour disputes are settled between the government CUPE:

BC paramedics warn ongoing labour dispute could impact service during Olympics

Ambulance workers in British Columbia are asking their colleagues across North America not to come work at the Olympics until their labour dispute with the province is resolved, a request the union says could jeopardize service levels at the big event.

“People obviously need to be worried about whether or not an ambulance is going to be there,” John Strohmaier, president of the Ambulance Paramedics of B.C., said Monday.

“It’s not our intention to put patients in the middle of this dispute … We are certainly going to try, to the best of our ability, to be there for patients when they need us. We are asking those same people to be there for us.”

The province’s 3,500 paramedics were forced back to work through legislation earlier this month, ending a seven-month-old job action. Paramedics worked at reduced levels during the strike, since ambulance services are designated an essential service in the province.

Despite the legislation, paramedics continue to pressure the government for a better deal.

On Monday, about 200 paramedics and supporters showed up to protest outside a speech by Health Minister Kevin Falcon and earlier this month more than 80 called in sick over two days, idling dozens of ambulances.

And Strohmaier said union members are reluctant to volunteer to work overtime as a result of the legislation, and are requesting other paramedics stay away in support.

“As long as this labour dispute exists in British Columbia they shouldn’t be thinking about coming to B.C. and volunteering during the Olympics either,” he said.

Strohmaier said the union is not only unhappy with the back-to-work legislation, but by the province’s appointment last week of a former deputy minister, Chris Trumpy, as head of a commission set up to try to resolve the labour dispute.

“It’s a pretty simple fix. Appoint an independent third party to conduct the review and this dispute is over,” Strohmaier said in an interview.

As head of the commission, Trumpy is charged with reviewing issues such as salary, staffing levels, workload and health and safety. The commission is expected to report back to government Jan. 15.

Labour minister Murray Coell said Trumpy has worked under both NDP and Liberal governments and is “very independent.”

Coell also said he thinks “cooler heads will prevail” and the labour dispute will be resolved before the Games.

The back-to-work legislation was passed weeks after the Olympics organizing committee, known as VANOC, wrote a letter to the government asking for a guarantee of paramedic services.

“Without full emergency services on site at the competition venues, the Vancouver 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games may not proceed,” the committee’s medical services director, Dr. Mike Wilkinson, wrote in a memo dated Sept. 14.

Wilkinson has said they’ve lined up volunteer medical staff in case of a shortage during the event, but will rely on the expertise of the province’s ambulance system and its staff.

As part of its bid for the Games, the Vancouver organizing committee promised that every venue will have paramedics and ambulances on site at all times.

Strohmaier said there aren’t enough staff to handle the ambulance needs in B.C. on a regular day, let alone during the Games.

He said the province will need “several hundred” more paramedics and ambulances to handle the thousands of visitors coming during the Olympics. But Strohmaier said he isn’t aware of any plans to add staff during the Games.

Despite criticism from the paramedics’ union, B.C. Premier Gordon Campbell said the back-to-work legislation was not passed because of the pending Olympics.

“I know lots of paramedics, and I think the paramedics are professionals, they care about people, they want to provide the public with service,” Campbell told reporters after an Olympic event Monday.

“It was unfortunate for all of us that we had to legislate people back to work, but it was about the H1N1, it was the pressure that was on the system, we spent literally millions of dollars trying to find a resolution to this. Unfortunately, it wasn’t possible.”

The ambulance workers, who are members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees local 873, say they went on strike seeking better staffing levels that would result in faster ambulance response times, wage parity with other emergency responders and a multi-year contract.

They argue they’re being stretched to the limit by the ambulance service’s dependence on part-time workers, unpaid travel time and chronic overtime.

Comment about this post

By: Various authors and journalists

The bank that coined the phrase, “we listen, we understand, we make it work” seemed to forget that public relations slogan during the large CAW labor protest at 500 Woodward Avenue, in Detroit, MI.  As you recall, Canadian workers of Adraco and Aramco a division of Catalina Precision, have been denied their severance, termination, and vacation pay by the Catalina’s creditors Comerica Bank.  Numerous coalitions were there to demand justice for workers who just want to be paid what they are owed and Comerica controls the purse strings.  They feel that workers being paid is more important that Comerica executive bonuses.  Participants signed a letter to the company’s executives asking Comerica to live up to the so called “code of ethics” that is posted on Comerica’s website.  The code of ethics seems like a great public relations spin tool but the workers with children to feed were more interested in Comerica showing action; not just empty public relations gimmicks.  As one of the participants read from Comerica’s code of ethics, looks of disgust and frustration fell over participants faces.  There appeared to be a huge disconnect between corporate marketing propaganda and the daily reality that the workers were facing.
At one point a protester challenged the CEO, Ralph Babb and the Michigan President Tom Ogden to respond to the workers concerns.   Comerica executives were challenged to answer the following questions:

• Do they think it was fair that Comerica was rewarded $2.25 billion in TARP money approximately 30 days after the Michigan attorney general Mike Cox forced Comerica Securities to pay fines and restitution of over $1.5 billion to shareholders?
• Is it fair that the banking industry has received $23.7 million in subsidies, bailouts and backdoor corporate welfare while homeowner forclosure rates are at 15% and property values have collapsed?
• Is it fair that the citizens labor under disasterous debt burdens while the banking industry has been given subsidies that could have paid off personal mortgage debt three times over?
• Workers have alleged fraud by the company owners.  Should law enforcement launch an investigation into what Comerica knew and when they knew it?  Are there possible fraudulent conveyance issues regarding the collateral?
• Is if fair that US banks are speculating with the TARP money, including foreign exchange trading that is driving the US dollar lower?
• Is if fair that Comerica CEO Ralph Babb got a raise in 2008?
• Is it fair that Comerica stock holders have lost money over the past 5 years while Comerica executives have gotten extremely wealthy?
• Is it fair that Comerica Bank has so much taxpayer TARP money and at the same time ranks in the top ten banks for loans to company insiders?
• Is it fair that these loans to corporate insiders are not fully transparent?
• Is it fair that Comerica has refused to give an account of exactly where the $2.25 billiion in TARP money went and why?
• Is if fair that Comerica executives seem to hide in their plush offices and refuse to answer the public’s questions?  Perhaps the next protest should be at the home of a Comerica executive like Michigan President, Tom Ogden in Grosse Pointe?   Perhaps neighbors should have a chance to see exactly what serous issues Comerica executives are dodging?

No Comerica executives were willing to address these questions.  To the contrary, a goon from Comerica’s security staff came outside to harrass the protesters and interfere with the protest.  A Comerica security goon constantly interfered with the groups right to free speech and free assembly.  At the same time various Comerica employees watched the protesters from the lobby of the building.  Many protesters commented on the arrogant smirks from the “Comericasuits” that watched the workers appeal for fairness.  After letter to Comerica management had been signed by all the attendees the CAW made an attempt to deliver it to someone in the lobby.  To our surprise, Comerica had locked the doors and therefore could not receive the signed letter.  Even Comerica customers and employees were unable to get into the front door after Comerica locked them out at approximately 12:45 pm.  Participants thought this as an act of wholesale cowardice and arrogance.   The signed letter had to be left at Comerica’s front door while the various journalists continued to take notes.  This is what $2.25 billion of your tax dollars now sit.  What will Comerica plan as an encore at future protests?

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Views and opinions of varous authors and journalists are not necessarily those of www.bankingwhistleblower.wordpress.com or Circle Point LLC. No warranties expressed or implied. Feel free to express your comments, suggested revisions, corrections and/or dissagreements to the editors.  All reader input will be viewed objectively.

OK, folks…it took almost a week, but we finally have a statement from President Cevallos about the administration’s intentions regarding the Chancellor’s remarks regarding College of Business accreditation.  As you’ll recall, the Chancellor made it clear that any move forward toward accreditation needed to be part of a shared governance process.  Here’s what Cevallos wrote to faculty late yesterday afternoon:

From: “Cevallos, F. Javier” <cevallos@kutztown.edu>
Date: November 24, 2009 3:10:22 PM EST
To: COB-Dept <cob-dept@kutztown.edu>
Subject: COB meeting re: AACSB/December 3 at 11:00 a.m.

To the Faculty in the College of Business;

There has been quite a bit of conversation since the Chancellor’s November 18 visit to our campus regarding the College of Business and the pursuit of AACSB accreditation.  Although in the past there have been several conversations regarding this particular subject, and we have made significant investments in the College for this purpose, these decisions were made under a PASSHE mandate to accredit academic programs.  The Chancellor has suggested that we should have additional conversations on the campus regarding this issue in light of his new policy regarding accreditation, and I concur.  Given the importance of this issue, and the tight time line we face, I would like to invite the faculty in the College  (as well as APSCUF and University Senate representatives) to a meeting to discuss the matter, on Thursday, December 3, 2009  from 11 to 12:00 p.m. at DeFran 100.  I look forward to a productive discussion that will help us move forward in the best way for the College and the University.

Let’s hope that President Cevallos does not intend for a one hour meeting in the second to last week of the semester count for “shared governance.” At the very least, I hope that a timeline for future discussions will be established.  We’ll see.

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[Submitted by Mike Berneathy]

A few years ago we started having one day of night conferences during conference week. In exchange for staying til eight at night, we are allowed to leave with the students on one (ONE) of the other early dismissal days. We can choose whatever day we want, and don’t need approval from the principal. What didn’t change is that we have to stay til the end of our regular workday on the other days. (Also, you have to stay til the end of night conferences whether you have any scheduled or not. So you may as well schedule them and get it over with.) So, conscientious teachers like me and Popular Science Guy and SpeechTeach are working in the copy room at 3 p.m. while most everyone else is long gone, even though they took their early day on Friday, and we all know they’ll leave early tomorrow. It’s infuriating, and there’s nothing we can do.

A few people have said things to me as a Union rep, but the Union will not address issues that are “member against member”. Theoretically I understand this, but I agree with Science Guy that they should also want us to be the best teachers we can be. I want to say something to Pretty because each time it gets worse. Take Fashionista as an example: she took last Friday as her early day, left today at 1:30 after her one conference today, and will undoubtedly leave at 1 tomorrow because she has no conferences scheduled. (She also left before eight on our night conferences.) It’s just not right.

We were all kvetching that even if we say something to Pretty, nothing will change, just like Dr. Glinda gets to come in late every day, not show up for her small groups, and leave early without ever getting in trouble. We can’t take it anymore.

Interesante post.

http://angeloliverospuertogelves.blogspot.com/2009/11/cuanto-dinero-de-sus-impuestos-para-la.html

Lea esto si quiere saber cuánto dinero de sus impuestos ha ido a manos de la banca privada

¿Cuánto dinero de los ciudadanos-contribuyentes, sufridores de la crisis, ha ido a parar a manos de la banca privada, creadora de la crisis?.

Seguir…

[A long trail of students protesting on a rainy night along the road outside my apartment. For a moment, I thought I was hearing drum rolls in my head, until I opened my windows and realised it was from them.]

I’m doing an add-on to my flight back to Singapore by swinging by HK too. It’s 14 days away but I already know what I’m eating when I touch down.

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I’m sort of surprised the same sex marriage conversations are not evolving more quickly.  The long and short of it (to me) is this:

1. We still (sort of) live in a free country.  Government should not be denying anyone rights; we all agree on that.
2. Marriage is a sticky word – lots of religious folks want to protect it’s definition.

To me, the solution is so obvious I’m surprised we’re still talking about it.  I would love for someone to give me some real reasons with my solution explained in detail here (link) does not work for both sides.

In summary, here’s the solution: Privitise Marriage.  Get the government out of the conversation all together (State and Federal).  This would restore freedom to marriage.  This can be done a number of ways; here are two suggestions.

• Re-write the current government marriage documents and exclude the word marriage.  Write them so that they can be used in any combination.
• Remove the current marriage documents and don’t replace them with anything – get the government away from marriage.  We really should not need the government’s permission to get married.  I understand marriage is related to property but there are other, smarter ways around that.

IT WOULD WORK, RIGHT?

For the folks in favor of same sex marriage:

• Equality is achieved.
• Federal and State documents ether don’t exist, or are identical regardless if the union is same sex, or opposite sex.  The word “marriage” does not exist in government documents.
• Religious organizations have the freedom (regardless of what state they are in) to perform same sex marriages, or not perform same sex marriages thus respecting their religious freedom.
• Same sex couples can choose to get married at the places that choose to perform the ceremony.  It can be called anything in the world.  Party, marriage, celebration, union, lemon, whatever.

For the folks who do not support same sex marriage:

• Marriage is protected, and can be defined by your specific religious organization.
• Marriage is no longer a government word, and it’s name or definition will not be changed by the government.
• Religious organizations exist that do not allow same sex marriages which are an option for membership.

BUT WHAT WOULD SCHOOLS TEACH?

Because marraige would no longer be a federal or state issue, marriage would not come up in the classroom at all.  The only thing they could really teach would be the legal documents that replace the old marriage documents (if they even need to exist) but I don’t think schools would waste valuable time teaching that.  What would they teach… where to fill in the names?  As there is no lesson on W-10’s or other government forms I’m sure the new union documents would be left out of the classroom.

OK folks, so let me have it.  How does this not resolve the issue…?

-dm

Slovenians celebrating vivtory over Russia and promotion to Republic of South Africa football championships