Category Archives: Uncategorized

SEC reviewing S&P handling on downgrade

Posted on August 22, 2011 by chongping.zhao

This article  relavent that  after few day which S&P downgraded  US  long term debt FROM AAA to AA+, the SEC is going to aduit the donwgrade methodology that S&P used in downgrading. The US Dept of Treasury claim that S&P has 2 trillion dollar mistake in calculation and might violate the regulation. Accroding to the  Wall street journal and Financial time,  the SEC is going has wide-range audit among S&P included insider trade: because the 2 trillion dollar mistake mighe be cause by insider trade, and S&P did be aware of it.

After downgrading,Standard and Poor’s has faced tough criticism from lawmakers, market players and the U.S. many people believe the aduit by SEC is a revenge which the federal groverment want to warm S&P.  It might be true, in 1970s  the S&P is the first member of a group who were authorized of credit rating, and it is one of the largest credit rating agency in the US. Now, S&P downgraded US long term debt, it is like if one raise a dog to keep bad stranger away, the dog bite its master. Federal governemtn obiviouse does not feel so well about this matter. 

 

Posted in Uncategorized | 94 Comments

Witness Testimony, is it right or wrong?

Posted on August 21, 2011 by chongping.zhao

http://heylady.net/2009/07/25/review-picking-cotton-by-jennifer-thompson-cannino-and-ronald-cotton/

 I Read this book Picking Cotton last semester,  Picking Cotton is the true story of how a 22-yead-old college student, Jennifer Thompson-Cannino picked Ronald Cotton out of a line-up as the man who raped her; She claimed that she had studied every detail of the suspect and confidently indentified Ronald Cotton. Cotton was convicted and spent 11 years in prison before DNA evidence showed he was innocent. Picking Cotton is told in Thompson-Cannino and Cotton’s alternating voices, starting before the trial and leading up to their eventual friendship after Cotton was released.

This book remaind me about the video, Witch Hunt, which some innocent parents have been convicted child molestation by their children`s manipulated testinoy  Witness testimony is valued as vital evidence in the court no matter how the victim make the testimony: either manipulated by DA or false memories. W automatically presume that victim are telling the true: espectially the serious criminal charges like rape and molestation. Many innocent people has been locked up because of false witness testimony.  If there were no DNA test, Ronald Cotton would be still in the prison, while other innocents, whose case are not supported by DNA test would serve their full term.Picking Cotton is a powerful reminder to me that our system of justice that results in the imprisonment of innocent people needs to be improved.

Posted in Uncategorized | 13 Comments

Moral Panic & Terrorism

Posted on August 20, 2011 by nikhil.wagh

I’m on a bit of a BBC documentary binge atm. Though this clip is an hour long, you get some of the idea after only watching the first ten minutes. This is another BBC documentary by Adam Curtis, called the Power of Fear and Nightmares.

This documentary argues how the nature of politics in the west has endured a very significant shift in incentives in the past couple of decades. Politicians in the past were focussed on progressed, achieving goals and bringing about good for the public. Now, their role is one that solely protects us from looming dangers like global terrorism and global warming. Adam Curtiss, in his documentary, argues that these dangers are grossly exaggerated if not fabricated to keep a certain ruling elite in power at the expense of spreading fear throughout a society. Politics is no longer a business of bringing about good. Instead, politicians have become managers who can control our fear and claim to know how to protect us from them.

He explains how the fear of Al-Qaeda after 9/11 was hyperbole to say the least. The American media claimed Al-Qaeda had sleeper cells in over 60 countries, including the United States. Additionally, they claimed of Al-Qaedas extensive military arsenal, their hidden bunkers inside caves, and their shadow influence within politics themselves. Adam Curtiss’ basic arguement is that the political ruling elite keep themselves in power by fabricating and emphasizing certain dangers, and claiming to have solutions to them, to spread fear to all their voters and convince them that they (the politicians) can address these problems front on.

It is probably obvious that many parallels can be drawn between this and Stuart Hall’s Moral Panic. In the same way that terrorism and Al-Qaeda’s threat was a gross exaggeration by politicians and the media, the fear of muggings in Britain was very much the same. The introduction of a new label (both “terrorism” and “muggings”) gave rise to a new fear of a particular social problem. This lead to the politics to readjust itself to address these issues and make sure they were dealt with in the appropriate manner. These new labels and the media’s responsibility for portraying them as a “new strain” of crimes/dangers lead to a dissipation of fear throughout the mass public.

I think these two points (the one made by the documentary, the other by Stuart Hall in ‘Moral Panic’) is that crime is not as clear cut and statistically grounded as it is portrayed. The use of labels can lead to the rise of an apparent crime, when in actuality there has not been any new crime at all. A perfect example of a by product of this mentality is the color-coded terror alert warnings (yellow, orange and red) that were on the news for years after september 11th. I lived in NYC for all of that time, and even when the terror alerts were orange or even red, nothing ever happened! It was just a tool to spread fear.

 

-Nikhil

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YOU`LL NEVER DINNER THE SAME WAY! FOOC INC

Posted on August 19, 2011 by chongping.zhao

http://www.foodincmovie.com/

Food, Inc. is a documentary about the state of the food industry within the United States. Food is cheaper and more abundant than it has ever been, we could buy one-dollar-burger from fast food restaurant while the food, espectially vegetable in the supermarket are cost far more than a burger  We have detached ourselves from how food ends up on our plates. Food is marketed to us as if it comes from a little farm with a white fence and rolling hills, but this is simply an illusion. The food actually comes from mega factory farms: It is no longer feed cattle but produce it. Our society has cheaper food but there have been more E. coli  outbreaks in the past twenty years than ever before ,and obesity and the rate of diabetes are through the roof.

It is impressive that one of the walmart  manager says “we sell what comsumer want”, if comsumers want cheap food,  the corporation would”produce” food in cheap ways, and it is true today. Although comsumer pay much less for food,  they are also paying for the hidden price tage which could cost them more.

Posted in Uncategorized | 16 Comments

Swastika Branding

Posted on August 19, 2011 by robert.rahmanian

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/nationnow/2011/08/new-mexico-hate-crime-guilty-pleas.html

Two men have been charged with branding an individual with a Swastika sign and now face up to 8 years in federal prison. Back in 2009, Paul Beebe and Jesse Sanford, decided it would be a good idea to go to New Mexico and assault a disabled man of Navajo decent. They then went ahead and used a hanger to brand the disabled man with a Swastika. At this point they have pleaded guilty and are rightfully on there way to jail.

I find this topic to be very disturbing and feel an example should be made of these guys. I have many family members and friends that are Holocaust survivors and I don’t take any Nazi activity lightly. Being of Jewish decent, and learning about the Holocaust has lead me to believe these men are monsters and branding is the least you have to worry about when there on the streets. The part that bothers me the most is that other Neo-Nazi’s and racist will look at these 2 guys as hero’s and it may be the catalyst to the next racially influenced attack. It makes me sick that there are still ignorant assholes like these guys in the world and I hope they get assaulted in jail.

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Hero turned Mobster

Posted on August 18, 2011 by ngolubin

A man that was a war hero in World War II now become a mobster that was involved in man slaughter and gang related crimes. It is not easy to tell who has deviance inside him, you can never tell until that person actually commits a crime. It’s a clear example with Sam Volpendesto, a veteran War hero that saved lives and earned several medals now will spend the rest of his life behind bars.

Due to this convicted Sam might not even be able to be buried at the Arlington National Cemetry outside of Washington D.C. for war veterans. Sam still denies any claims that he was part of any gang related activity and that he never made a dime from these crimes.

This shows the deviance can take over anybody, even a person that was brought up in the military and was taught ethic and moral judgment. But unfortunately Sam learned how to assist in murder and crime during the years of service. Wars can bring up trained killers inside of respectfully humble individuals. Its a disgrace not only for himself but also for his family that was proud of his service in WWII. Now the remaining years of his life he will look at them behind bars…just like the men he put away. As the article stated,”War service is not a license to commit crimes.” I believe that some people believe they can get away with anything if they serviced in the army, and it is not unusually because US give a lot of power to those in the forces.

 

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Punishing children

Posted on August 18, 2011 by ngolubin

After reading this article it was funny to me how the mother punished the little boy. All the little kid did was lie about misbehaving in school. I understand the mother is trying to implement the right morals and conduct on the boy but with hot sauce and a cold shower. Come on is the boy actually going to learn anything from that, I really doubt it. The boy is from Russia, your not going to teach this boy anything by squeezing hot sauce in his month and making him tell you that you lied. Coming from a Russia, you better have something better than that, that little kid is not going to learn anything. You got to come up with something better than that.

Funny thing is this story made Dr.Phil and now the mother is on trial. Yeah it is kinda harsh to do that to a little kid but putting somebody on trial for that, I wonder what kind of punishment the court is going to give her. You got all these lunatics on the lose in US and their worried about a mother that punishes her kid with hot sauce and a cold shower. Cold shower probably helped since his mouth was burning a bit. When this kid is going to grow up, he will definitely laugh about this. This just shows how some small deviance is taking out of proportion. I think US just tries to show how good their justice system is but it just shows how ridiculous it is.

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Cash-Strapped Port Authority

Posted on August 18, 2011 by ngolubin

I had to post about this article because it just makes me sick to think how the port authority is ripping us off. I mean every year they implement these new price hikes on tolls and buses or wherever they just try to make easy money off of the public. It really gets ridiculous more and more, port authority lacks in responsibility, quickens, and just more moral reasoning.

But every year they try to raise the prices…how does that work?? I still dont get it to this date, and all these oppositions approve their hikes…Why? It bewilders me every single time. Especially with this new hike on port authority, this one particularly doesnt affect me because I take the MTA everyday to work to school but what makes me crazy is that they paid over 86.5 million in overtime to their employees last year..and now they want a bigger spending budget and more money. Does that make any sense? Why should we honor their price hike and it is their own fault for capping the budget and paying out so much overtime to their employees. One employee made 156, 000 in overtime in one year…..does that sound reasonable. Learn how to create a better spending plan and ask for price hikes. If this price hike gets approved I just cant see how we are not being robbed. I mean how much do we have to pay for these damn bridges that have to be repaired every single year. Verrazano Bridge is already 13 dollars…I dont even go on that bridge anymore. I cant wait till it costs 20…Im going to love that day.

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“Alone Together”-Shifting Stigma

Posted on August 7, 2011 by laura.szymanski

Everyone knows about the social stigma that crying in public is shameful and embarrassing. From early childhood, we are taught when and where it is appropriate to cry. Boys have this stigma tied more closely to them than girls because it’s taught that boys should never cry. Boys are taught from society and family members, especially from their fathers that if you cry “you’re a sissy.” However, overall crying is viewed by society as a weakness and something that should be done behind closed doors.

This article talks about being “alone together” in NYC. Being “alone together” suggests social isolation in public. There are all these people around us in public but yet we all seem to create our own wall with ipods, cellphones, etc which connects us to a world outside of where we are, creating the illusion of privacy. Therefore, when we see someone crying in public we don’t reach out or say anything, we don’t break through their wall of privacy.

This article ties in with the topic of anonymity versus privacy which we spoke about in the first week of class, however, the author of this article poses the question, “Is public expression of emotions like crying shifting as a stigma and becoming more acceptable due to all of the devices we carry and essentially being “alone together?” It is more likely that we will receive news of a family members death or a break up phone call or text (not cool) and cause us to express our emotions in public. Now if we all understand this then is it more acceptable to express these emotions in public?

Since we are “alone together” and have our own private wall set up then we must feel okay about crying in our own spaces. I don’t know about you but even if I had my ipod on I would still feel weird and embarrassed crying on the subway. I guess I have internalized the stigma that comes along with crying in public. I believe that just because we are “alone together” in NYC doesn’t mean that people still aren’t watching, passing judgment and essentially stigmatizing. What do you think?

Posted in Assignment 3, Uncategorized | Tagged , , | 124 Comments

Are Athletes Untouchable?

Posted on August 2, 2011 by michael.plutchok

 Being a big sports fan and with the Jets’ recent signing of Plaxico Burress,  I couldn’t  help but to think about our discussion in class of how everyone is to follow the law but others who make the law are held to a different standard and might get off easier based on class in society and who you know.  Well in this case you would think because of his status of a super star receiver that he would get off; however it was just the opposite. Plaxico shot himself in the leg and spent 21 months in prison, he indeed was deviant by carrying a gun into a night club, however he did not harm or intend to harm anyone, sure you can argue differently depending on your opinion, but this is a case which you would think he would of got off easy because of his status. I couldn’t help but to make the link to Becker’s Outsiders, on how the differences in class and social status apply to power, which it accounts to the degree to which group can make rules for others.  The point I am trying to make is you would think he would get off easy, however the city prosecuted him to the full extent of the law, so next time you think you may be above the law or have the attitude, I know this one or that one that can get me out of this situation, I would rethink that or at least that is what the city wants us to think because of the way they made an example of the star receiver. 

 

http://articles.nydailynews.com/2008-11-29/sports/29435442_1_plaxico-burress-sources-antonio-pierce

Posted in Assignment 2, Uncategorized | Tagged , , | 15 Comments