MICHAEL POLLAN: AMERICANS' UNHEALTHY RELATIONSHIP WITH FOOD

MICHAEL POLLAN: AMERICANS' UNHEALTHY RELATIONSHIP WITH FOOD
By Tom Philpott
Grist Magazine and AlterNet

An interview with food writer Michael Pollan about food, food politics and his latest book.



In his 1996 book Tasting Food, Tasting Freedom, the great food anthropologist Sidney Mintz concluded that the United States had no cuisine.

Interestingly, Mintz's definition of cuisine came down to conversation. For Mintz, Americans just didn't engage in passionate talk about food. Unlike the southwest French and their cassoulet, most Americans don't obsess and quarrel about what comprises, say, an authentic veggie burger.

But if cuisine comes down to talk, things are looking up a decade after Mintz cast his judgment. Now, more and more people are buzzing about food: not only about what's good to eat, but also -- appropriately for the land that invented McDonald's and Cheetos -- about what's in our food, where it came from, how it was grown.

No writer has galvanized this new national conversation on food more than Michael Pollan, from his muckraking articles on the meat industry for The New York Times Magazine earlier this decade to the publication last year of The Omnivore's Dilemma.

On a recent day when he was reviewing the galleys of his latest book, due out in January, I rang up Pollan at his Berkeley, Calif., home to talk ... about food.

To Read the Interview

Democracy Now: FEMA Admits It Held Fake Press Conference about California Wildfires; FEMA Staffers Posed as Journalists

FEMA Admits It Held Fake Press Conference about California Wildfires; FEMA Staffers Posed as Journalists
Democracy Now

On Tuesday, FEMA staged a fake press conference with agency staffers posing as news reporters. One FEMA staffer who pretended to be a journalist has since been promoted to become head of public affairs at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

To Listen/Watch/Read

NPR Live Concert Series: The New Pornographers

(I tuned in to hear The New Pornographers, but I was also very impressed by the Scottish singer Emma Pollock)

NPR Live Concert Series
The New Pornographers in Concert
Benjy Ferree, Emma Pollock Open Show from Washington, D.C.



With stunning vocals from Neko Case and playfully cerebral narratives from songwriters Dan Bejar and A.C. Newman, the Canadian band New Pornographers is virtually peerless in the world of power-pop and indie-rock. The New Pornographers gave a full concert on NPR.org Oct. 27, webcast live from Washington, D.C.'s 9:30 Club. Hear the performance online, with opening sets by Benjy Ferree and Emma Pollock.

The band is on tour in support of Challengers, its fourth full-length release. The disc is a melodic, hook-drenched collection of songs Newman says were inspired by his recent move to New York, finding love and the universal search for meaning. Though as passionate as the band's earlier work, Challengers feels slightly more wistful and melancholic.

On the album's title track, Newman sings about finding new love out of nowhere and trying to play it cool. "When I wrote the lyrics I thought of the Camus quote from the liner notes to a Scott Walker album," he says. "'A man's work is nothing, but this slow trek to discover through the detours of art, those two or three great and simple images in whose presence his heart first opened.'"

The New Pornographers is a collective of sorts, with members from several other popular Canadian bands. Newman is from the group Zumpano, while bassist John Collins is from Thee Evaporators and guitarist Dan Bejar moonlights in Destroyer. Keyboardist Blaine Thurier is a well-known cartoonist and filmmaker. Singer Neko Case has an established career as a solo artist. The New Pornographers also features Kurt Dahle on percussion, Todd Fancey on guitar and Kathryn Calder on vocals and piano.

Benjy Ferree is an artful singer-songwriter based in Washington, D.C. His 2006 album, Leaving the Nest, is loosely based in American roots music.

Emma Pollock is a former member of the Scottish pop group The Delgados who just released her solo debut, Watch the Fireworks.

Listen to the Concert

John Cowper Powys: "Ecstasy of the Unbounded"

How magically sagacious is childhood in its power of arriving at boundless effects through insignificant means ... how often the whole course of one's subsequent history becomes an attempt to regain this sorcery. ... It is a criminal blunder of our maturer years that we so tamely, without frantic and habitual struggles to retain it, allow the ecstasy of the unbounded to slip out of our lives.

--John Cowper Powys. Autobiography. London: Pan Books, 1982: 1-2.

Free Press: Consolidation Devastates Radio Diversity

Consolidation Devastates Radio Diversity
Free Press

In testimony before the Senate Commerce Committee on Wednesday, Free Press Research Director S. Derek Turner will call on lawmakers to address media consolidation’s devastating impact on diverse and local radio ownership.

“Congress must send a message to the FCC to stop its rush toward more consolidation,” Turner said. “Ownership rules exist for a reason: to increase diversity and localism, which in turn produces more diverse speech, more choice for listeners, and more owners who are responsive to their local communities.”

Turner will testify at a hearing on the “Future of Radio” on behalf of Free Press, Consumers Union and Consumer Federation of America. Others scheduled to testify include musician Mac McCaughan of Merge Records; Tim Westergren, founder of the Internet radio service Pandora; Carol Pierson, president of the National Federation of Community Broadcasters; and Dana Davis Rehm of NPR.

A live webcast of the hearing will be available at this site

Following the hearing, Sens. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) and Trent Lott (R-Miss.) will hold a press conference at noon in the Senate Radio & TV Gallery to discuss FCC Chairman Kevin Martin’s reported plans to push for a vote to relax media ownership rules before the end of the year.

In extensive comments filed this week with the FCC, the three consumer groups detailed how the FCC has not accurately counted the number of minority and female broadcast owners or given any consideration to the impact of broader media ownership policy on ownership diversity or localism.

“Our research conclusively demonstrates that more consolidation means less female and minority ownership,” Turner said. “The Commission needs to first adequately study the issue of minority ownership before moving forward with any rule changes. It may be hard to believe, but they’ve never even conducted an accurate count of who owns the nation’s radio outlets. How can the FCC conduct any meaningful analysis regarding the effects of its policies if it can’t conduct a basic count of who owns what?”

A summary of Turner’s testimony

The full written testimony

Link for this Post

Fresh Air: Comedian and Actor George Carlin

Comedian and Actor George Carlin
Fresh Air from WHYY, November 1, 2004
National Public Radio

Carlin's seven dirty words routine was the center of a famous obscenity case in the 1970s. He has a new book When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops? His other books include Napalm & Silly Putty, and Brain Droppings.

To Listen

You Tube has a great selection of Carlin's classic bits (he will be coming to Louisville in November):

Listen to more

Philosophy Talk: Bush's Doctrine of Preemptive Self-Defense

Bush's Doctrine of Preemptive Self-Defense
Philosophy Talk
Guest: Professor George Lucas, US Naval Acadamey

What is it? What is the difference between mere aggression and preemptive self defense? Can you really permissibly "defend" yourself against an attack that hasn't even begun? How does preemptive self defense differ from preventive war, from humanitarian intervention?

President Bush, in a speech at West Point in 2002.

"We cannot defend America and our friends by hoping for the best. We cannot put our faith in the word of tyrants, who solemnly sign non-proliferation treaties, and then systemically break them. If we wait for threats to fully materialize, we will have waited too long."

Since then the Bush doctrine of preemption has been put into effect in Iraq.

The doctrine raises interesting moral and philosophical issues. Why couldn't Marshall Dillon draw first, if the bad guy was clearly going to try to shoot him? Etiquette? Morals? Stupidity? Are nations in a "state of nature?" Or governed by law?

John and Ken distinguish between wars of aggression and of self-defense. Wars of aggression are bad. There are also preemptive wars, attacking before a known aggressor attacks, and wars of humanitarian intervention, attacking to help someone else. How sure does an attack have to be in order to morally justify preemptive self-defense? Ken introduces George Lucas, professor at the U.S. Naval Academy. Lucas says that the doctrine of preemptive self-defense is troubling in the modern political scheme. Lucas says that preemptive self-defense is warranted when the threat is imminent. Lucas says that the United Nations is ill equipped to address preemptive self-defense.

Where is the line between preemption and aggression drawn? Lucas says that preemption usually is a matter of hours or days. What gives the United States the right to attack Iraq when Al-Qaeda was the group that attacked? Lucas says that it is an interpretation of moral philosophy and lack of security provided by international laws that justify it. Must we always exhaust all alternatives before engaging in preemption? Is self-defense always morally right?

Michael Walzer proposed several criteria to determine if preemptive action is acceptable. Is preemption a self-defeating doctrine? If we attack others because we are worried that they will attack us, then won't other nations consider attacking us out of fear that we'll attack them too? Lucas says that the lack of an international police force creates problems for peaceful dealings with rogue nations. The United Nations was created during the Cold War, so it is inadequate to deal with many modern international problems. Do you have to know that an aggressor will attack or is it enough to fear it?

To Listen to the Show and More Info

Democracy Now: Body Shop Founder & Environmental Campaigner Anita Roddick 1942-2007

(I was saddened to learn about Roddick's death. I was fortunate to meet her when I was a grad student at Illinois State University--she was brilliant, generous, passionate and an inspiration for all who met her.)

Body Shop Founder & Environmental Campaigner Anita Roddick 1942-2007
Democracy Now

A memorial will be held in London on Tuesday to remember the life of Dame Anita Roddick, the environmental campaigner and pioneer in cruelty-free beauty projects. We air a 2001 interview she did with Canadian filmmaker Mark Achbar during production of the documentary "The Corporation." Also, imprisoned Black Panther activist Herman Wallace remembers Anita Roddick's work to help free the Angola 3.

To Watch/Listen/Read

Peace Rally in Jonesborough, TN/Clinton Bucks Trend, Rakes in Cash From Weapons Industry

(Message from Claire Glasscock)

Oct.27 UFPJ Mobilization
Jonesborough, TN
SOLIDARITY
With our SOLDIERS in DU-CONTAMINATED battlefields – TROOPS HOME NOW
With military FAMILIES who suffer DU-CAUSED health effects – MEDICAL CARE NOW
With all VICTIMS of URANIUM WEAPONS worldwide – REPARATIONS NOW

Major Doug Rokke, PhD
Viet Nam & Gulf War Veteran
Pentagon DU Expert, US Army-Retired

Chris Lugo
Nashville Peace Coalition

Leila al-Imad, PhD
Professor, Middle East History-ETSU
Former director of MidEast Issues-AFSC

Staff Sgt Herbert Reed
Iraq War Veteran, US Army-Retired
Victim of Depleted Uranium Poisoning

Russell Kincaid, PhD
Professor, Mathematics-Wilmington College, Ohio

Caren Neile, MFA, PhD
Director-South Florida Storytelling Project, Florida Atlantic University
Performing excerpts from the 410 BC comedy, Aristophanes’ “Lysistrata”

Father John Rausch
Director - Catholic Committee of Appalachia
Pax Christi’s 2007 Teacher of Peace

Retha Ferrell
Celtic Musician
George Friday – Rally MC
United for Peace & Justice-Administrative Committee & past Co-Chair

Noon-3pm: RALLY -- Mill Spring Park, Spring Street
3pm: March/Caravan to Aerojet Ordnance
Hosted by First Tennessee Progressives

Go to next Saturday’s peace rally (and protest of depleted uranium munitions manufacture) in Jonesborough, Tennessee.

Clinton Bucks Trend, Rakes in Cash From Weapons Industry
By Leonard Doyle
The Independent UK
Friday 19 October 2007
The US arms industry is backing Hillary Clinton for President and has all but abandoned its traditional allies in the Republican party. Mrs Clinton has also emerged as Wall Street's favourite. Investment bankers have opened their wallets in unprecedented numbers for the New York senator over the past three months and, in the process, dumped their earlier favourite, Barack Obama.

Mrs Clinton's wooing of the defence industry is all the more remarkable given the frosty relations between Bill Clinton and the military during his presidency. An analysis of campaign contributions shows senior defence industry employees are pouring money into her war chest in the belief that their generosity will be repaid many times over with future defence contracts.

Employees of the top five US arms manufacturers - Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop-Grumman, General Dynamics and Raytheon - gave Democratic presidential candidates $103,900, with only $86,800 going to the Republicans. "The contributions clearly suggest the arms industry has reached the conclusion that Democratic prospects for 2008 are very good indeed," said Thomas Edsall, an academic at Columbia University in New York.

Republican administrations are by tradition much stronger supporters of US armaments programmes and Pentagon spending plans than Democratic governments. Relations between the arms industry and Bill Clinton soured when he slimmed down the military after the end of the Cold War. His wife, however, has been careful not to make the same mistake.

After her election to the Senate, she became the first New York senator on the armed services committee, where she revealed her hawkish tendencies by supporting the invasion of Iraq. Although she now favours a withdrawal of US troops, her position on Iran is among the most warlike of all the candidates - Democrat or Republican.

This week, she said that, if elected president, she would not rule out military strikes to destroy Tehran's nuclear weapons facilities. While on the armed services committee, Mrs Clinton has befriended key generals and has won the endorsement of General Wesley Clarke, who ran Nato's war in Kosovo. A former presidential candidate himself, he is spoken of as a potential vice-presidential running mate.

Mrs Clinton has been a regular visitor to Iraq and Afghanistan and is careful to focus her criticisms of the Iraq war on President Bush, rather than the military. The arms industry has duly taken note.

So far, Mrs Clinton has received $52,600 in contributions from individual arms industry employees. That is more than half the sum given to all Democrats and 60 per cent of the total going to Republican candidates. Election fundraising laws ban individuals from donating more than $4,600 but contributions are often "bundled" to obtain influence over a candidate.

The arms industry has even deserted the biggest supporter of the Iraq war, Senator John McCain, who is also a member of the armed services committee and a decorated Vietnam War veteran. He has been given only $19,200. Weapons-makers are equally unimpressed by the former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani. Despite a campaign built largely around the need for an aggressive US military and a determination to stay the course in Iraq, he is behind Mrs Clinton in the affections of arms executives. Mr Giuliani may be suffering because of his strong association with the failed policies of President Bush and the fact he is he is known as a social liberal.

Mrs Clinton's closest competitor in raising cash from the arms industry is the former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, who raised just $32,000.

"Arms industry profits are so heavily dependent on government contracts that companies in this field want to be sure they do not have hostile relations with the White House," added Mr Edsall.

The industry's strong support for Mrs Clinton indicates that she is their firm favourite to win the Democratic nomination in the spring and the presidential election in November 2008. In the last presidential race, George Bush raised more than $800,000 - twice the sum collected by his Democratic rival John Kerry.

Mr Edsall's analysis of the figures reveals that, over the past 10 years, the defence industry has favoured Republicans over Democrats by a 3-2 margin, making Mrs Clinton's position even more remarkable.

May 1968 Paris Uprising

Check out the links on the right of the video for more

American Blackout

(Courtesy of Adbusters

American Blackout chronicles the recurring patterns of disenfranchisement witnessed from 2000 to 2004 while following the story of Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, who not only took an active role in investigating these election debacles but also found herself in the middle of one after publicly questioning the Bush Administration about the 9-11 terrorist attacks. Some call Cynthia McKinney a civil rights leader among the ranks of Shirley Chisholm and Malcolm X. Others call her a conspiracy theorist and a 'looney.' American Blackout gains unprecedented access to one of the most controversial and dangerous politicians in America and examines the contemporary tactics used to control our democratic process and silence political dissent.

The Onion: Reaganomics Finally Trickles Down To Area Man

Reaganomics Finally Trickles Down To Area Man
The Onion

HAZELWOOD, MO—Twenty-six years after Ronald Reagan first set his controversial fiscal policies into motion, the deceased president's massive tax cuts for the ultrarich at last trickled all the way down to deliver their bounty, in the form of a $10 bonus, to Hazelwood, MO car-wash attendant Frank Kellener.

The late President Ronald Reagan clearly had people like present-day car wash attendant Frank Kellener in mind when articulating his "trickle-down" economic theory in the early 1980s.

"Back when Reagan was in charge, I didn't think much of him," Kellener, 57, said, holding up two five-dollar bills nearly three decades in the making. "But who would have thought that in 2007 I'd have this extra $10 in my pocket? He may not have lived to see it, but I'm sure President Reagan is up in heaven smiling down on me right now."

Leading economists say Kellener's unexpected windfall provides the first irrefutable proof of the effectiveness of Reagan's so-called supply-side economics, and shows that the former president had "incredible, far-reaching foresight."

"When the tax burden on the upper income brackets is lifted, the rich and not-rich alike all benefit," said Arthur Laffer, who was a former member of Reagan's Economic Policy Advisory Board. "Eventually."

The $10 began its long journey into Kellener's wallet in 1983, when a beefed-up national defense budget of $210 billion enabled the military to purchase advanced warhead-delivery systems from aerospace manufacturer Lockheed. Buoyed by a multimillion-dollar bonus, then-CEO Martin Lawler bought a house on a 5,000-acre plot in Montana. When a forest fire destroyed his home in 1986, Lawler took the federal relief check and invested it in a savings and loan run by a Virginia man named Michael Webber. After Webber's firm collapsed in 1989, and he was indicted on fraud and conspiracy charges, he retained the services of high- powered law firm Rabin & Levy for his defense. After six years and $7 million in legal fees, Webber received only a $250,000 fine, and the defense team went out to celebrate at a Washington, D.C.-area restaurant called Di Forenza. During dinner, lawyer Peter Smith overheard several investment bankers at an adjoining table discussing a hot Internet start-up that was about to go public. Smith took a portion of his earnings from the Webber case and bought several hundred shares in Gadgets.com, quadrupling his investment before selling them four months later. Gadgets.com's two founders used the sudden influx of investment capital to outfit their office with modern Danish furniture, in a sale brokered by the New York gallery Modern Now! in 1998. After the ensuing dot-com bust, Modern Now! was forced out of business, and Sotheby's auction house was put in charge of liquidating its inventory. The commission from that auction enabled auctioneer Mary Schafer to retire to the Ozark region of Missouri in 2006. Last month, while passing through Hazelwood, she took her Audi to Marlin Car Wash, where Kellener was one of the employees who tended to her car. She was so satisfied with the job that she left a $50 tip, which the manager divided among the people working that day.

"This money didn't just affect one life," Laffer said. "It affected five."

Prior to joining Marlin Car Wash in 2005, Kellener worked for nearly two decades at a local Ford assembly plant that is now defunct. Before that, he was employed by the FAA as an air traffic controller until his union went on strike and Reagan fired him, along with nearly 13,000 others. This is the largest tip he has received in his professional life.

"I thought Reaganomics was nothing more than a mirage that allowed President Reagan to reward his wealthy support base," Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA) said. "But two generations later I am seeing Reaganomics in action, and I like what I see. It just took a little longer than I thought it was supposed to."

The tip has not gone unnoticed by the economic team in the current administration.

"Had Mr. Kellener received that money in 1981, like the Democrats wanted, it would only be worth $4.24 today because of inflation," Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson, Jr. said during an official announcement of the economic policy's success at a press conference Monday. "Instead, Kellener has a solid $10 to spend right here and now. The system works, and our current president intends to keep making it work."

Kellener, who has cared for his schizophrenic sister ever since her federally funded mental institution was closed in 1984, said that he plans to donate the full $10 to the Republican presidential candidate who best embodies Reagan's legacy.

Link

Mother Jones

(I usually avoid repeating ads, but this one is for one of my favorite magazines)

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Cahal Milmo: Fury at DNA pioneer's racist theory

(Courtesy of Mark Ouellette)

Fury at DNA pioneer's theory: Africans are less intelligent than Westerners
Celebrated scientist attacked for race comments: "All our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours - whereas all the testing says not really"
By Cahal Milmo
The Independent (UK)

One of the world's most eminent scientists was embroiled in an extraordinary row last night after he claimed that black people were less intelligent than white people and the idea that "equal powers of reason" were shared across racial groups was a delusion.

James Watson, a Nobel Prize winner for his part in the unravelling of DNA who now runs one of America's leading scientific research institutions, drew widespread condemnation for comments he made ahead of his arrival in Britain today for a speaking tour at venues including the Science Museum in London.

The 79-year-old geneticist reopened the explosive debate about race and science in a newspaper interview in which he said Western policies towards African countries were wrongly based on an assumption that black people were as clever as their white counterparts when "testing" suggested the contrary. He claimed genes responsible for creating differences in human intelligence could be found within a decade.

The newly formed Equality and Human Rights Commission, successor to the Commission for Racial Equality, said it was studying Dr Watson's remarks " in full". Dr Watson told The Sunday Times that he was "inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa" because "all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours – whereas all the testing says not really". He said there was a natural desire that all human beings should be equal but "people who have to deal with black employees find this not true".

His views are also reflected in a book published next week, in which he writes: "There is no firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved identically. Our wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so."

To Read the Rest of the Article

2007 Nobel Peace Prize: Al Gore

Al Gore continues to learn and develop after his loss in the 2000 presidential race--a truly remarkable transformation and rebirth:

Green Cine archive of Reports

Webster's Dictionary Word of the Day: langue

Merriam-Webster Word of the Day

langue \LAHNG (the vowel is pronounced in a nasal manner)\ noun

: language viewed abstractly as a system of forms and conventions used for communication in a community; also : the knowledge that enables a person to speak and understand a language

Example sentence:

Langue makes communication possible; without it we could not process and understand each other’s utterances.

Did you know?

In lectures delivered at the University of Geneva from 1907 to 1913, Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure set forth his groundbreaking distinction between "langue" -- the systematic, structured language existing at a given time within a given society -- and "parole," the individual use of that language by a person. In French, "langue" literally means "language." It was adopted into Middle English with that same general meaning but fell into disuse. "Parole" is also a French word; it means "speech" and is related to Late Latin "parabola," the base of our English word "parable."

Robert Redford's Lions for Lambs

(Courtesy of Green Cine)

Partially about "student apathy" in regards to ongoing American geopolitics, Redford has taken his film to preview at universities to see how students react:

As reported by Michael Guiellen at the Evening Class

Official Website and Trailer

Tagline for the film: "If you don't STAND for something, you might FALL for anything." (Courtesy of IMDB

Inside Higher Ed: Desmond Tutu, Persona Non Grata

(Courtesy of Rebecca Glasscock)

Desmond Tutu, Persona Non Grata
Inside Higher Ed

Last week’s visit by Iran’s president to Columbia University symbolized to many the openness of American higher education to hearing controversial ideas and individuals. An incident coming to light at the University of St. Thomas, in Minnesota, illustrates that some speakers are denied campus platforms. In this case, the would-be speaker isn’t a Holocaust denier. Nor does he run a government that routinely denies basic civil rights to scholars, journalists or gay people.

The speaker barred at St. Thomas won the Nobel Peace Prize.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who won the prize for his nonviolent opposition to South Africa’s apartheid regime, was deemed unworthy of appearing at St. Thomas because of comments he made criticizing Israel — comments the university says were “hurtful” to some Jewish people. Further, the university demoted the director of the program that invited Tutu after she wrote a letter to him and others complaining about the revocation of the invitation. (She retains a tenured faculty job.)

While the incident happened several months ago, it has only just become public, when it was reported by City Pages, the alt-weekly in Minneapolis-St. Paul. The revoked invitation has some faculty members at the university seething.

“There isn’t any academic freedom here when this happens,” said Marv Davidov, an adjunct faculty member who has taught courses about nonviolence for 15 years at the university. “This is cowardice.”

Tutu was invited to the university through a program called PeaceJam International, which organizes conferences for high school students on issues related to peace. While the program is not officially a part of St. Thomas, many faculty members —- especially in the Justice and Peace Studies Program — are involved in it, and major speakers sometimes appear on the campus, reaching those at the university in addition to the high schoolers in the program. Tutu, invited through the Justice and Peace Studies Program, was to talk at St. Thomas about issues of peace and nonviolence and there was no expectation that his talk would focus on the Middle East.

Doug Hennes, vice president for university and government relations at St. Thomas, said that when administrators were informed of the invitation, they did some research about Tutu, and found that some of his comments had been controversial. Then, the university consulted with some Jewish leaders, and concluded that Tutu had made remarks that had been “hurtful” to Jewish leaders.

“We had heard some criticism of him in the past that he had said things some people judged to be anti-Semitic. We talked to the Jewish Community Relations Council. We know a number of other people in the Jewish community, and they said that some of the things he said had been hurtful and there was a feeling — and this isn’t among all Jews — that he had said things that were hurtful to them,” Hennes said.

“We never made a judgment that he is anti-Semitic. We have not made that judgment. We have only been told by members of the Jewish community that his words have been hurtful,” Hennes said. He stressed that the university sought out the views of Jewish leaders, and that the revocation of the invitation was a university decision, and not one that was sought by anyone outside St. Thomas.

“We make decisions every day on a regular basis on whether to invite people to campus,” Hennes said. Asked if disqualifying people from speaking for being “hurtful” might block many speakers, he said, “That’s not the case at all. We have speakers on a wide variety of issues and interests, including sensitive issues within the Catholic church.” (St. Thomas is a Roman Catholic university.)

To Read the Rest of the Report

The Courage of San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders

Comment posted at YouTube:

"Grab a hanky," writes Joan Walsh today on San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders' painful eleventh-hour decision to fight for gay marriage. "This is the way necessary social change happens. It starts out unthinkable, and then one day it's inevitable."

In a moving speech, choking back tears, Mayor Jerry Sanders explains why he changed his mind moments before he was to veto the San Diego City Council Resolution:

"The concept of a 'separate but equal' institution is not something I can support."

He reveals that his own daughter Lisa as well as members of his staff are gay: "In the end, I could not look any of them in the face and tell them that their relationships -- their very lives -- were any less meaningful than the marriage that I share with my wife, Rana."

CNN Report on the Announcement:

Dove Campaign for Real Beauty: No Wonder Our Perception of Beauty is Distorted

(Courtesy of Apophenia)