HARLEM CHARTER SCHOOLS

Some 5,000 people attended April 17th's Harlem Success Academy Charter School lottery, the largest ever held for charter schools in the history of New York State. About 3,600 applied for 600 available places, and 900 applied for the 11 open slots in the second grade. The desperation of these parents is hardly surprising:

• In one Harlem school district, not one public elementary school has more than 55 percent of its pupils reading at the level expected for their grade.
• And 75 percent of 14-year-olds are unable to read at their grade level.

So parents are beginning to leave the public school system in crowds, says the Economist:

• Harlem now has the most charter schools per square mile in the United States, yet demand still exceeds supply.
• Harlem Success is opening three new schools this summer.
• About 40 percent of all eligible children in central Harlem applied for kindergarten at Harlem Success schools.

The reason is obvious:

• At the beginning of the 2006-07 school year at Harlem Success only 11 percent of six-year-olds were at their grade level in mathematic, by the end of the year, 86 percent were.
• This may have something to do with grouping children by ability rather than by age, and with involving parents, who have to read six books a week to their children.

Unfortunately, many local politicians oppose charter schools. They have tried to cap their numbers, or refused to let them share buildings with public schools. The legislature in Albany has mandated that if a charter school has more than 250 students before its third year of existence, the teachers must unionize. That spoils everything, says the Economist.

READ MORE

Military Police Donate Smiles in Afghanistan

Army Sgt. Heather Slater, deployed from 367th Military Police Company, in Horsham, Pa., helps an Afghan boy Feb. 25, 2008, at the Egyptian hospital at Bagram Air Base, Afghanistan. Slater and several other servicemembers from the 724th MP Battalion visit patients at the hospital every Sunday. Slater, who’s been deployed to Afghanistan for eight months, is a student at Castleton State College in Vermont.

READ MORE

Commander Says al-Qaida ‘Virtually Destroyed’ in Kirkuk

Army Col. David Paschal, commander of 1st Brigade, 10th Mountain Division, said that as security improves in Iraq’s Kirkuk province and that coalition and Iraqi forces have “virtually destroyed” al-Qaida in Iraq in the region [snip]

The Sons of Iraq program has been a cornerstone to security in the region, he said, noting that 400 men who were part of the Sons of Iraq program from the brigade’s Arab areas are graduating from two months of police training this week [snip]

“The information and actionable intelligence that they provide has grown exponentially,” he said. “That actionable intelligence is in the form of the turning of caches, location of [roadside bombs] and, in many cases, instances of insurgent or terrorist leaders throughout the province,”

[it's all about intelligence: with it, we win - without it... And FISA?]

READ MORE

General Cites Iranian Links to ‘Special Groups’ Terrorists in Iraq

So-called “special groups” terrorists operating in Iraq apparently are receiving training, arms and funding from Iranian sources, a senior U.S. military official posted in Iraq said today.

“Over the course of the last several months, we have publicly discussed numerous times, and shown numerous times, the evidence on four separate occasions on what we have found and continue to find: Iranian-made weapons in the hands of criminals in Iraq,” [snip]

“I think it has awakened them to the reality of the magnitude of Iranian meddling in Iraq,” Gates said. “And, so, we are being very aggressive in going after the networks in Iraq and the individuals who are interfering and are supplying weapons from Iran.”

[how many Americans does Iran have to kill before we employ the Bolton option?]

READ MORE

John Bolton: US should bomb Iranian camps

John Bolton, America’s ex-ambassador to the United Nations, has called for US air strikes on Iranian camps where insurgents are trained for war in Iraq. Mr Bolton said that striking Iran would represent a major step towards victory in Iraq. While he acknowledged that the risk of a hostile Iranian response harming American’s overseas interests existed, he said the damage inflicted by Tehran would be “far higher” if Washington took no action...

READ MORE

Barney Frank Will Move to Defund War

House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) told Cybercast News Service on Tuesday he will move to end the Iraq War with an immediate termination of funding if a Democrat becomes president next year. ''I will move to cut funding immediately,'' said Frank. ''I have already done that. I voted against the war and voted to cut the funding. I would hope a Democratic president would put in place a plan that would begin a total withdrawal.''

READ MORE

Amerabia

Even Americans knowledgeable about Europe's growing accommodation to the totalitarian ideology known alternatively as Islamism, jihadism or Islamofascism tend smugly to believe the same thing can't happen here. Think again. Every day, new evidence appears of similar acts of submission — the Islamists call it "dhimmitude" — on the part of the U.S. government, judges, the press and leading corporations. Eurabia, meet the United States of Amerabia. [snip]

On May 4, an ominous alarm was sounded in a Pajamas Media column by Youssef Ibrahim, a former New York Times reporter. Mr. Ibrahim is an astute critic of the Islamists' steady, tireless and increasingly effective efforts to impose — on Muslims and non-Muslims alike — the repressive theo-political-legal agenda they call Shariah law. He warned that "In the very real war on terror, a noisy squabble over 'fighting them there so we don't have to fight them here' clouds a simple truth: namely, that 'they' are here already. Indeed, Islamists are busy constructing a wing of jihad in America's backyard."[snip]

Unfortunately, in the last 17 years, the Ikhwan has succeeded beyond its wildest dreams. Groups like CAIR, ISNA and MPAC made great strides in what Mr. Ibrahim calls "the common task [of] instill[ing] the notion among Arab-Americans or European immigrant communities of Muslim countries that they are not part of secular multicultural societies." Brotherhood fronts have also penetrated and exercised enormous influence over the very U.S. government agencies responsible for understanding and countering the Islamist threat...

[can't say if fun, but it is important: Recommended > ]

READ MORE

La. furniture salesman guilty of spying for China

McLean, Va. -- A New Orleans furniture salesman pleaded guilty Tuesday to spying for the Chinese government and providing Beijing with secret information on military relations between the U.S. and Taiwan. Tai Shen Kuo, a naturalized U.S. citizen with prominent family connections in Taiwan, provided gambling money and promises of a job to a Defense Department analyst who gave him classified information in 2007. Taiwanese military officials have said the disclosures caused some damage but did not compromise key technology.

READ MORE

J'lem worried by Iranian owned anti-ship missile

The recent delivery of an advanced Russian anti-ship missile to Iran has defense officials concerned it will be transferred to Syria and Hizbullah and used against the Israel Navy in a future conflict.

READ MORE

Brussels warns France and Italy on spending plans

The European Commission has sent a warning to France, Italy, Romania and Slovakia over their spending plans for the coming years, with an extra heap of criticism for Paris and Rome for their reluctance to sign up to an EU-wide goal of fully slashing public deficit by 2010.

Presenting the regular reports on the four countries, EU economy commissioner Joaquin Almunia recommended cuts in budgetary expenditure and further structural reforms as key goals for all of them, suggesting they should be "more ambitious" in their planning.

Although the country managed to cut its budget deficit "well bellow 3% in 2007" - which is the EU's allowed ceiling – Brussels doubts the likelihood of Rome eliminating its deficit by 2011. It also warned about its public debt, currently at 106.8 percent of GDP.

READ MORE

Is It Ethical to Travel on Airplanes?

Travelers troubled by rising airfares, canceled flights, and overcrowded tarmacs are hearing yet another reason to reconsider air travel. Some say it's unethical to fly. Earlier this month, neighborhood and environmental activists staged events across Britain to dramatize concerns about commercial aviation. (Snip) The nub: The planet should not have to suffer the consequences of a fast-growing (if now troubled) air-travel industry. Hence, the argument goes, an ethical consumer should think twice before buying plane tickets...

[all activity will be subject to this religion/scam if successful]

READ MORE

GREEN POLICIES WILL CAUSE MORE DEATHS

Green self-fulfilling prophecies are upon us. Unless we expose them today, we will suffer at the hands of more dangerous policies in the future, says TCS Daily.

For example, policies driven by the pursuit of a pesticide free will cause an increase in insect-borne disease. Members of the European Parliament recently agreed to numerous measures that will make it harder to use pesticides in future, pushed by lobbying from environmental groups;

• With laughable specificity given the paucity of data of any harm from such exposure, Pesticide Action Network Europe claims children are 164 times more at risk from up to 13 organophosphate pesticides than adults.
• However, the only people who die from pesticides are those who use them recklessly or deliberately drink them to commit suicide; the same as can be said for kitchen cleaner.
•The principal factor involved in the alarming increase in malaria are new 'green' agricultural practices.

READ MORE

BRAZIL SHOWS OIL NOT ALCOHOL IS KEY TO ENERGY INDEPENDENCE

In recent years, analysts have touted Brazil as an example the United States should follow on the path to "energy independence." Brazil's success is often attributed to its thriving ethanol market, but this is, at best, only a small part of the story. Consider:

• Brazil uses much less gasoline and diesel than the United States; while Brazil consumes 20 billion gallons of ethanol, gasoline and diesel combined each year, the United States uses 182 billion gallons a year, or over 9 times as much.
• Brazil's climate is suited to growing sugarcane, which requires half as much land as corn per gallon of ethanol produced and it provides 800 percent more energy than the fossil fuel used to make it.

While Brazil's embrace of ethanol doesn't have much to teach the United States, its policies with regard to domestic oil and gas production do provide an instructive lesson, says Burnett. In the 1980s, despite huge subsidies Brazil began experiencing ethanol shortages. As a result, it started promoting policies to boost domestic oil production. Indeed, increased production and new oil discoveries played the biggest role in liberating Brazil from dependence on foreign energy:

Brazil increased domestic crude oil production an average of more than 9 percent a year from 1980 to 2005, [9% a year for 25 years] to 1.6 million barrels of oil per day. By contrast, from 1980 to 2005, U.S. crude oil production fell about 2 percent a year or 40 percent overall.

READ MORE

NUMBERS SHOW DEREGULATION WORKS

California

Deregulation was widely blamed for causing California's power crisis, but its electricity market was never really deregulated, says Bill Peacock, director for the Center for Economic Freedom. A poorly designed set of wholesale regulations combined with retail price controls led to that market's collapse when natural gas prices skyrocketed.

The only things that have skyrocketed in Texas since full deregulation took effect in January 2007 are consumer choice and competition, says Peacock:

• The five former monopoly electric providers have lost between 53 and 78 percent of market share.
• As of December, 72 percent of residential consumers had chosen a competitive rate plan, and 80 percent had made an observable choice of providers.
• The remaining 20 percent of the market can choose a new plan at any time.

Competition in the wholesale market has led to the construction of more than $20 billion in new generation facilities in Texas since wholesale deregulation began in the 1990s. An additional $25 billion is under construction or planned.

The reliability resulting from these massive investments testifies to the success of deregulation, as Texans have been spared the rolling blackouts of California and New York, says Peacock.

READ MORE

Students push for right to concealed guns on campus

At first glance, the little black box clipped to Brian Yip's belt looks like a beeper. It's not. It's an empty handgun holster, and the University of Washington senior wants it to be visible as he walks through the Quad on campus, sits at a classroom desk or makes a trip to nearby University Way for a bite to eat. To Yip, it's a statement and a reminder that he and everyone else on the UW's three campuses aren't permitted to carry a gun -- along with students at most other college campuses in the country.

This week, thousands of students across the country like Yip are wearing empty holsters to protest concealed-weapons bans on college campuses, including a group who displayed their holsters Wednesday at the UW before a forum later in the evening. [snip]

"The UW, a state institution, should be more consistent with the state law," senior Sean Carhart said. "The rest of the state government says (this is) OK, but the UW Board of Regents says -- for some reason -- that's not good enough for here."

The Concealed Carry group has 25,000 members and counting.

READ MORE

Bill Clinton Switches to Obama

In what some Democratic Party insiders are calling a particularly ominous sign for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, former president Bill Clinton today became the latest superdelegate to switch from Sen. Clinton to her rival, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill). Sources close to the former president said that Mr. Clinton had been mulling such a defection for weeks, as early as the night of the Iowa primary (Snip) The former president said that "sometimes, at the end of a race, you have to put an old horse down," adding, "I'm not speaking metaphorically."

source