Clipmarks | masbury's clips

Why college students drop out

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 18:31:08 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Most dropouts get overwhelmed by balancing work, school, and money. Only a quarter of college students typical live-in-the-dorms students; nearly as many have children.

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

“The conventional wisdom is that students leave school because they aren’t willing to work hard and aren’t really interested in more education,” said Jean Johnson, executive vice president of Public Agenda. “What we found was almost precisely the opposite. Most work and go to school at the same time, and most are not getting financial help from their families or the system itself.”

About 7 in 10 of the dropouts said they had no scholarship or loan aid. Among those who got degrees, only about four in 10 went without such aid.

The top reason the dropouts gave for leaving college was that it was just too hard to support themselves and go to school at the same time. Balancing work and school was a bigger barrier than finding money for tuition, they said. In fact, more than a third of the dropouts said that even if they got a grant that covered their books and tuition, it would be hard to go back to school, given their work and family commitments.

Tags: higher ed

A little fun from ProofreadNow.com: Know these words?

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 00:47:43 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: "I feel bad, not badly (unless your fingers are damaged) - blonde is a noun for females, but blond is a noun for males. It's also an adjective for males and females"

Clip Source: archives.subscribermail.com

straitjacket, not straightjacket.

subjunctive mood, not mode. Example: If I were a rich man, I wouldn't have to work so hard.

blonde is a noun for females, but blond is a noun for males. It's also an adjective for males and females.

Josef Stalin, not Joseph.

Adolf Hitler, not Adolph

bail, bale. You bail out a boat by scooping buckets of water, and you do so with a bail; you bail out of a plane in a parachute; you bail someone out of jail. You bale hay; you load a bale of paper into a printer.

gibe, jibe. To gibe means to taunt or sneer. Jibe means to agree. Dead wrong: Your story does not jive. Correct: Your story does not jibe with the facts.

A dilemma is a choice between two unattractive alternatives, not simply a problem.

Btu for British thermal unit, not BTU.

I feel bad, not badly (unless your fingers are damaged).

Tags: grammar

Researchers can't find men for porn-free control group

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 04:38:55 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: "On average, single men watch pornography three times a week for 40 minutes. Those who are in committed relationships watch it on average 1.7 times a week for 20 minutes."

Clip Source: www.eurekalert.org

Montreal, December 1, 2009 – A Université de Montréal researcher, funded by the Interdisciplinary Research Center on Family Violence and Violence Against Women, has launched a new study to examine the effects of pornography on men. "We started our research seeking men in their twenties who had never consumed pornography. We couldn't find any," says Simon Louis Lajeunesse, a postdoctoral student and professor at the School of Social Work.

The research concluded that 90 percent of pornography is consumed on the Internet, while 10 percent comes from video stores. On average, single men watch pornography three times a week for 40 minutes. Those who are in committed relationships watch it on average 1.7 times a week for 20 minutes.

"Pornography hasn't changed their perception of women or their relationship

Those who could not live out their fantasy in real life with their partner simply set aside the fantasy

and men don't want their partner to look like a porn star," says Lajeunesse

Tags: pornography

We already have rationed, socialized healthcare

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 04:08:59 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: It's rationed by ability to pay - not need - and socialized by overcharging insured patients enough to cover costs for the un-insured. "We are ... the only advanced democracy on Earth -- the only wealthy nation -- that allows (health care) hardship for millions of its people."

Clip Source: www.starnewsonline.com

Health care is already rationed and socialized

Rationing does not apply to emergency care

The patient who presents for planned, scheduled health care gets a different reception. Those needing elective heart surgery, or joint repair, for example, are filtered carefully. Care is rationed by ability to pay.

What is certain is that the hospital bill for the well-insured will be sufficiently high to cover expenses generated by poorly insured or uinsured patients.

This explains a $15 aspirin, $10,000 to $15,000 antibiotic bills, and bills for heart surgery of $250,000 or more.

We resist "socialized medicine" from the federal government while oblivious that we have embraced socialized medicine delivered -after profits - by the insurance industry.

Rationing of medical care in a non-profit system should be based on society defining what services should be provided, not on restricting care on the basis of income, as in a profit based system.

Tags: healthcare

BOA fires employee for helping customers too much

Tue, 08 Dec 2009 00:30:40 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: "There was something inherently evil about my job," the 23-year-old said

Clip Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

Jackie Ramos, Bank Of America Employee, Fired After Helping Customers (VIDEO)

Bank of America fired Jackie Ramos after she took a stand against the bank's $15 "convenience" charges and $39 over-the-limit fees so she could sleep better at night.

"There was something inherently evil about my job," the 23-year-old said in a YouTube video she uploaded on Nov. 27, two days after her termination.

Ramos, of Fairburn, Ga., worked as a "customer advocate," which involved calling people who fall behind on credit card payments and either encouraging them to pay or modifying their accounts. But not all customers qualify for modification programs that will help them, and Ramos grew tired of saying no after six months on the job.

"So I stopped denying people," said Ramos. "I helped people get on programs that they didn't necessarily qualify for but who definitely needed the help."

Tags: business

Wendell Potter: The Insurance Industry's Lethal Bottom Line

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 01:39:06 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: When publicly held insurance companies spend most of their premium income on medical claims, their value on Wall Street plummets. Amendments have been introduced to require them to raise the percentage of our premium payments that actually goes into health care instead of executive salaries and lobbying Congress.

Clip Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

This equation is known as the medical loss ratio (MLR), an aptly named figure that is widely seen by investors as the most important gauge of an insurance company's current and future profitability

the current Senate bill requires insurers to provide an annual rebate to each enrollee if non-claims costs exceed 20% in the group market and 25% in the individual market

Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) is now leading a group

to introduce an amendment that would go further by requiring that 90 percent of the money consumers spend on health insurance premiums go directly to health care costs

A case in point is Aetna

Three years ago, the company reported that its quarterly MLR had inched up from 77.9 percent to 79.4 percent in 12 months. On the day this was disclosed, Aetna's share price plunged 20 percent

Kaiser had a 90.6 percent MLR in 2007. Between 1993 and 2007, Medicare's MLR hasn't dropped below 97 percent.

Tags: healthcare

The President snacked on WHAT?

Wed, 02 Dec 2009 19:51:40 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Wait till the conspiracy theorists get ahold of this! (h/t ProofreadNow)

Clip Source: politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com

Pres. Obama cheers on brother-in-law at basketball game

(CNN)– President Obama took his family on an outing Saturday to the Oregon State-George Washington University basketball game in support of First Lady Michelle Obama's brother Craig Robinson.

Robinson, who coaches the Oregon State Beavers, was cheered on by the President, who snacked on popcorn, the First Lady, Sasha, Malia and the girls’ grandmother Marian Robinson.

Tags: humor, obama

Brzezinski: US demanding Afghan reform is "hypocritical"

Wed, 02 Dec 2009 19:33:07 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: "We have a financial sector that is voraciously greedy . . . an electoral system that is based largely on private donations which precipitate expectations of rewards. . . The notion of us going to the Afghans and preaching purity is comical"

Clip Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

One of the most respected foreign policy voices in Democratic circles expressed "serious reservations" with components of a U.S. troop escalation in Afghanistan during an interview on Tuesday.

For starters, he argued that if America's military efforts lack a sufficient multilateral component, "it will in fact help to feed the insurgency." Brzezinski also cautioned that it would be hypocritical and counterproductive for America to stress that Afghan President Hamid Karzai's government be purged of corruption.

"Who are we to seriously be preaching [such] a crusade?" he asked. "We have a financial sector that is voraciously greedy and exploitative, to put it mildly. We have a Congress which is not immune to special interests. And we have an electoral system that is based largely on private donations which precipitate expectations of rewards. The notion of us going to the Afghans and preaching purity is comical... I think we should just quit that stuff."

Tags: afghanistan

Slavery in Canada forgotten, until now

Tue, 01 Dec 2009 22:56:08 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: But the impact of it still remains.

Clip Source: www.race-talk.org

Slavery in Canada forgotten, until now

History is not the past, it is how we recount the past. A Past, Denied: The Invisible History of Slavery in Canada is a feature-length documentary by independent filmmaker Mike Barber. The film, which is currently in production, explores how a false sense of history—both taught in the classroom and repeated throughout our national historical narrative—impinges on the present. It examines how 200 years of institutional slavery during Canada’s formation has been kept out of Canadian classrooms, textbooks and social consciousness.

In his book Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong, historian and psychologist James Loewen explains “slavery’s twin legacies” to the present as “the social and economic inferiority it conferred upon blacks and the cultural racism it instilled in whites.”

will show the connections between the practice of slavery in the past with racial disparity, tensions, and racism in the present

Tags: race

The Neutrality of Whiteness

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 00:15:19 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Michelle Obama in a "flesh-colored" dress.

Clip Source: contexts.org

Stunning Example of the Neutrality of Whiteness

The Associated Press, a news service subscribed to by news outlets all over the world, distributed a story about the first Obama Administration State Dinner. In the story, sent in by Elisabeth R., Samantha Critchell describes Michelle Obama’s dress as “flesh-colored.” She writes:

First lady Michelle Obama chose to wear a gleaming silver-sequined, flesh-colored gown Tuesday night to the first state dinner held by her husband’s administration.

Gee, what could possibly be wrong with calling this dress “flesh-colored”?

This is what happens when white people are considered people and black people are considered a special kind of people, black people.

See our post on “flesh-colored” for these examples and more. See also this post on lotion for “normal to darker skin.”

Tags: race, white privilege

Visualizing the decline of the maritime empires, 1800-present

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 23:24:48 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Fascinating visualization! The biggies end up smaller than many of the nations that leave them behind.

Clip Source: vimeo.com

[Video]

This is mainly an experimentation with soft bodies using toxi's verlet springs.

The data refers to the evolution of the top 4 maritime empires of the XIX and XX centuries by extent. The visual emphasis is on their decline.

Tags: history

Perino: "We did not have a terrorist attack during Pres. Bush's term."

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 03:54:09 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Wow.

Clip Source: thinkprogress.org

Last night on Fox News, host Sean Hannity whined — as he usually does — about how the Obama administration doesn’t use the term “war on terror” (which is actually a good thing). Former Bush administration spokesperson and current Fox analyst Dana Perino joined in, complaining that no one is calling the massacre at Ft. Hood a terrorist attack. She then made this astonishing statement:

PERINO: They want to do all of their investigations. I don’t know. All of the thinking that goes into it. But we did not have a terrorist attack on our country during President Bush’s term. I hope they’re not looking at this politically. I do think we ought it to the American people to call it what it is.

Tags: perino, terrorism

Five fallacies necessary to think healthcare laws unconstitutional

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 00:37:30 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: See link for more detail.

Clip Source: www.fivethirtyeight.com

Where in the Constitution, sir, do you see it authorized that Congress can be involved with "health care," or fund "health care"? I am asking here about the Constitution, not any court rulings. Thank you.

This was the content, in its entirety, of an email I received last night from John Lofton, editor of TheAmericanView.com

My aim is to rebut a few of the most absurd fallacies that seem to have gained traction--primarily but not exclusively in conservative circles--about the nature of American constitutionalism. To wit:

First, there is the fallacy that anything not specifically prescribed by the Constitution is unconstitutional

Third, too few people wrapping their policy arguments in constitutional claims understand that the Founders wrote a short charter dedicated almost exclusively to the design, structure, officers and powers of the government because they wanted to avoid constitutionalizing specific policies

Fourth, the federal court system is--brace yourself now--constitutional.

Tags: healthcare, constitution

What Do Health-Care Reform, the 40-Hour Work Week, Unemployment Insurance, the Minimum Wage, Have in Common?

Sat, 28 Nov 2009 18:03:32 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: "In each case, the vast majority of political conservatives opposed them. They told us that businesses would be ruined, that the problems ... would be worse than if we left things as they were, that implementing them would make us non-competitive, ... that the good life as we know it would be gone if we were so foolish as to pass these pieces of legislation"

Clip Source: blog.sojo.net

What Do Health-Care Reform, the 40-Hour Work Week, Unemployment Insurance, the Minimum Wage, etc., Have in Common?

they were all brought to you be political progressives, they were all opposed by political conservatives, and they all are now viewed as fundamental presuppositions of a healthy society by virtually everyone. Okay, all but health-care reform

the list actually includes many, many more

—child labor laws, basic workplace safety rules, social security, Medicare, and so on

In each case, the vast majority of political conservatives opposed them. They told us that businesses would be ruined, that the problems resulting from implementing the initiatives would be worse than if we left things as they were, that implementing them would make us non-competitive, or, more generally, that the good life as we know it would be gone if we were so foolish as to pass these pieces of legislation

Tags: conservatism, healthcare

German military leader resigns over Afghanistan airstrike

Fri, 27 Nov 2009 02:54:20 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Truth and war are mutually exclusive.

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

BERLIN — The chief of staff of the German armed forces resigned Thursday over accusations that the military withheld information on a deadly airstrike in Afghanistan in September that killed civilians as well as insurgents.

Germany’s defense minister, Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, told Parliament that the chief of staff, Gen. Wolfgang Schneiderhan, as well as a senior official in the Defense Ministry, State Secretary Peter Wichert, had tendered their resignations after a German news report that information on civilian casualties had been withheld from the public and from prosecutors.

Their departures set off political tremors in Berlin and within the German military, with the opposition Social Democrats calling for a parliamentary inquiry. Other opposition groups demanded the resignation of Franz Josef Jung, the labor minister in Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government, who was the defense minister at the time of the attacks.

Tags: afghanistan