MetaFilter posts tagged with usa

Tell us what you think about human spaceflight

Brandon Blatcher — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 10:15:23 -0800

The Aeronautics and Space Engineering Board (ASEB), on behalf of The National Academies, is seeking input papers on human spaceflight until July 9th, 2013. You can also read the current submissions. From the website:

In addition to the many sources of focused input to this study, the Committee on Human Spaceflight recognizes the importance of reaching out to the communities interested in human exploration. This request for input papers is open to any and all interested individuals and groups wishing to submit their own ideas on the role of human spaceflight and their vision for a suggested future. In developing their papers, respondents are asked to carefully consider the following broad questions. What are the important benefits provided to the United States and other countries by human spaceflight endeavors? What are the greatest challenges to sustaining a U.S. government program in human spaceflight? What are the ramifications and what would the nation and world lose if the United States terminated NASA's human spaceflight program?

This space is the no-touching zone.

desjardins — Wed, 05 Jun 2013 17:27:51 -0800

The bizarre border between the United States and Canada (SLYT)

It's just not the same without Caaaaaptain Chaos!

zarq — Wed, 05 Jun 2013 08:41:03 -0800

There are just 2,795 miles of interstate and 31,000 highway cops between them and the all-time speed record for crossing the American continent on four wheels. Welcome to the Cannonball Baker Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash, later known as the US Express race: The Cannonball Run. From the article's sidebar: * Multimedia: The Route, Coast to Coast * Alex Ross' Final Driveplan: 31:39 Driveplan 1 Final (Merciless Assault Reprisal 00) * In Pictures: Transcontinental Speed Demons * Follow Alex Roy's Journey Using Customized Google Earth Maps * Sims Designer Had the Wright Stuff for Street Racing Way Back When * Team Polizei 144 Site * 32 Hours 7 Minutes Web Site * The Driver by Alex Roy Previously on Mefi * 2005: 31 Hours, 7 Minutes * 2007: 31 Hours, 4 Minutes

Time flies by when you're the driver of a train

jontyjago — Sat, 25 May 2013 17:39:46 -0800

You may remember the 7.5 hour documentary released in 2009 which allowed you to travel the journey between Bergen to Oslo from the comfort of your home. If your wanderlust was fired up watching that video, then you may enjoy some of the other trips you can take. Switzerland:

Zermatt to Gornergrat in Summer (50m)
Zermatt to Gornergrat in Winter Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 (30m)
Le Train de Vignes (11m)

France:

Brussels to Paris (1h24m)
Villefranche - Latour-de-Carol (narrow gauge) (2h20m)

UK:

Glasgow - Fort William (4h30m)
King's Cross to Royston (39m)

Italy:

San Remo - Genoa (2h8m)
San Remo - Cuneo (2h)

Austria:

Salzburg - Villach (2h6m)

Myanmar:

Thazi - Kalaw (4h50m)

Japan:

Yosan Line (1h16m)

USA:

Canton Junction - Providence (9m)
Shaw Air Force Base Railroad (32m)
Chicago to Saint Louis Part 1 Part 2 (40m)

Australia:

Karratha - Tom Price (5h)

New Zealand:

Christchurch - Springfield (3h20m)

Greece:

Thessaloniki to Serres (2h)

Russia:

Lake Baikal (20m)

Romania:

Timisoara Nord - Resita Nord (1h22m)

The Netherlands:

Amsterdam Centraal - Brussel Zuid (1h49m)

Portugal:

Guarda to Nelas (1h8m)

Norway: And last but not least you can enjoy the entire 9h50m trip from Trondheim to Bodo

Happy Travels!

Another Stupid Newsreel! I Hate The News.

The Whelk — Thu, 16 May 2013 13:50:10 -0800

We visited Weirdo Video back in 07 for propaganda films, but the YouTube channel has been steadily updating with yesterday's ephemera. Why not enjoy some vintage newsreels about STRIKES! SULTANS! SUEZ! SAN FRANSISCO! or some FITNESS FADS!

America's 10 Worst Prisons

zarq — Tue, 14 May 2013 09:15:31 -0800

"'If you can't do the time, don't do the crime.' So goes the old saying. Yet conditions in some American facilities are so obscene that they amount to a form of extrajudicial punishment." Mother Jones is profiling "America's 10 Worst Prisons." Facilities were chosen for the list based on "...three years of research, correspondence with prisoners, and interviews with reform advocates." The List 1: ADX (federal supermax: "A federal isolation facility that's "pretty close" to hell.") 2: Allan B. Polunsky Unit (Texas: "'The hardest place to do time in Texas'—and then you die.") 3: Tent City Jail (Phoenix: Feds say notorious facility has a 'pervasive culture of discriminatory bias against Latinos.') 4: Orleans Parish (Louisiana: "'A violent and dangerous institution,' says the Justice Department.") 5: LA County Jail (Los Angeles: "And you thought the Rodney King beating was bad?") 6: Pelican Bay (California: "Where a Christmas card might land you in the hole.") 7: Julia Tutwiler (Alabama: "Prisoners fear 'that it's not safe to take a shower, that it's not safe to go to sleep...that you can be manipulated into sexual favors, it's really horrific.'") 8: Reeves Country Detention Complex (Texas: "An overcrowded, understaffed lockup—with health care bad enough to spark riots.") 9: Walnut Grove Youth Correctional Facility (Mississippi: "'A picture of such horror as should be unrealized anywhere in the civilized world.'") 10: Riker's Island (New York City: "New York City lockup has a "deeply entrenched" pattern of violence by guards, lawsuit claims.") The piece will conclude tomorrow with a list of "Dishonorable Mentions." Accompanying Articles (Some are older pieces covering the same topic) * Maps: Solitary Confinement, State by State: "An exclusive review of how state prisons use isolation to discipline inmates and weed out gang members." * God's Own Warden: "If you ever find yourself inside Louisiana's Angola prison, Burl Cain will make sure you find Jesus—or regret ever crossing his path." * The Silent Treatment: "Imagine serving decades in prison for a crime your sibling framed you for. Now imagine doing it while profoundly deaf." * Solitary in Iran Nearly Broke Me. Then I Went Inside America's Prisons: "We throw thousands of men in the hole for the books they read, the company they keep, the beliefs they hold. Here's why." (Previously on Mefi) * Life in the Hole: Inside a Solitary Cell: "A guided tour of the seven-by-eleven-foot space where inmates spend 23 hours a day."

"If people were more concerned, I wouldn’t have to be there."

zarq — Mon, 06 May 2013 13:29:45 -0800

Her encampment is 'an old patio umbrella draped in a white plastic sheet secured with binder clips. It is flanked by two large boards with messages in capital letters: BAN ALL NUCLEAR WEAPONS OR HAVE A NICE DOOMSDAY and LIVE BY THE BOMB, DIE BY THE BOMB. This rudimentary shelter has been positioned outside the White House for more than three decades. It is a monument itself now, widely considered the longest-running act of political protest in the United States, and this woman, Concepcion Picciotto — Connie, as she’s known to many — is its longest-running caretaker.' Accompanying Photos: Keeping a Vigil From 1988, Toledo Magazine: A Life of Protest

Crossing the "Red Line"?

the man of twists and turns — Thu, 02 May 2013 10:45:13 -0800

Syria Options Go From Bad To Worse

As reports have surfaced of possible use of sarin gas in the Syrian civil war, calls by long-time proponents of U.S. intervention on behalf of the anti-Assad rebels have grown to a fever pitch. These same voices, both at home and abroad, have evoked the administration’s previously stated “red line” on use of chemical weapons. But even assuming that reports of WMD usage in Syria turn out to be true, the Obama Administration’s position may be far more nuanced than previously thought.

Why would the US get involved in Syria? Civilian deaths, chemical weapons use (and proliferation), and mounting refugee crisis, and unrest in Lebanon are reasons for intervention. But should it? Obama Appears At A Loss To Define The Way Forward In Syria Why Obama Doesn't Want To Intervene In Syria and Obama's Case Against The War In Syria. Sentors Graham and McCain respond: "There are many options at our disposal, including military options short of boots on the ground in Syria, that can make a positive impact on this crisis, which is destabilizing the region. The President must act now or risk squandering U.S. credibility in Syria and around the world." Is Barack Obama A Republican Realist? Various groups have attached themselves to factions in the conflict. Hezbollah announced that Syria has "real friends in the region and world" and that they support al-Assad. Opposition group the al-Nusrah Front has "merged" with Al-Qaeda In Iraq. Al-Qaeda's battle for control of Assad's chemical weapons plant - "A battle near a factory believed to be one of the Syrian regime's main chemical weapons plants shows just how close such weapons could be to falling into al-Qaeda's hands." Intervention isn't guaranteed to work. The "Libyan model" or "Malian model" for foreign military support may not be repeatable in Syria. Even With US Guns, Syria's Rebels Still Might Lose. But what might intervention look like? Drone strikes? Boots-on-the-ground? Safe havens? No-fly zones? "Decapitation strike"? Simply material support? Or are there just no good military options?

The question has been, and remains: Does the U.S. have the capacity to end the violence, in any meaningful way, within the immediate future?

The conflict and the weapons of war aren't limited to Syria. Repercussions and implications extend through the region: The Syria-Iran Red Line Show Want to fix Syria? Talk to Iran Syrian Conflict Casts Long Shadow Over Iraq More Syrian Refugees Will Cause Crisis In Jordan as Jordan Weighs Syria Buffer Zone Israel Sees US Respons As Gauge for Iran. The Onion Goes To War

"I am always the last person to eat."

reenum — Wed, 01 May 2013 18:34:41 -0800

David Arenberg on being the only Jewish inmate in a state prison.

Act of Terror: arrested for filming police officers - video

nickyskye — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 11:21:01 -0800

When police carried out a routine stop-and-search of her boyfriend on the London Underground, Gemma Atkinson filmed the incident. She was detained, handcuffed and threatened with arrest. She launched a legal battle, which ended with the police settling the case in 2010. With the money from the settlement she funded the production of this animated film, which she says shows how her story and highlights police misuse of counterterrorism powers to restrict photography. Article in French. On Facebook under the title Fat Rat Films.

"Never, ever let anybody use your gender as an excuse."

zarq — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 18:55:06 -0800

"Women get flustered under fire. They're too fragile, too emotional. They lack the ferocity required to take a life. They can't handle pain. They're a distraction, a threat to cohesion, a provocative tease to close-quartered men. These are the sort of myths you hear from people who oppose the U.S. military's evolving new rules about women in combat. But for women who have already been in combat, who have earned medals fighting alongside men, the war stories they tell don't sound a thing like myths" Multi-page link to the article. Additional Feature * Women of the 101st Airborne Division: "As part of Nathaniel Penn's "Natural Born Killers"—an oral history documenting the experiences of American female soldiers on the field that marks the official lifting of the U.S. military ban on women in combat roles—in the May issue of GQ, we spoke to a group of female servicewomen currently stationed in Fort Campbell, K.Y. as they prepare for deployment to Afghanistan this spring. These soldiers were assigned to the 4th Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division roughly a year ago as part the Women in The Service Review program. The program first introduced women to historically male-held roles in combat arms battalions—an experiment, in part, to make sure that they could handle it. Mission accomplished. Here, five of them talk to us about past deployments, navigating expectations, and their changing roles in the Army."
Video * "Natural Born Killers: Battle Tested" * "Natural Born Killers: Battle Ready, Women of the 101st Airborne"

Trans 100

divabat — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 13:34:23 -0800

The Trans 100 is a list curated by We Happy Trans based on nominations of 100 key trans people breaking ground in American culture, arts, social justice, and politics. Autostraddle provides more information on the 51 trans women on the list, and Dyssonance, one of the curators of the list, talks about the deliberate focus on American trans people for this iteration as well as support for international-based lists.

Smaller Wallets, Larger Households?

The Whelk — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 09:54:43 -0800

A dozen ultraleft voluntarists arguing about shower schedules is a noise complaint; 120,000 downwardly mobile yuppies doing it out of necessity is a substratum. The material realities of declining wages, ballooning debt, and skyrocketing rents at the core of the neoliberal city have conspired to herd young people into unprecedentedly dense, poor, and precarious kinds of living arrangements. - Andrew Fogle on how the economic crisis is changing how people live together.

Class-Divided Cities

psoas — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 08:03:12 -0800

Beginning with New York and wending its way through to Detroit, The Atlantic Cities has just completed a series of posts exploring geographic class divisions in a dozen cities (actually metro areas) in the U.S., with help from American Community Survey data. Geographic subdivisions are coded based on pluralities of "creative class," "service class," or "working class" employment. (Or, as in much of central Detroit, the lack of all three.) The others:

Los Angeles
Chicago
Washington, DC
Atlanta
Miami (featuring a majority farming-and-forestry neighborhood!)
Dallas
Houston
Philadelphia
Boston
San Francisco

U.S. Customs and Patriarchal Protection

jaduncan — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 10:57:54 -0800

Sexism at the border: A personal account. "For me, carrying my own condoms (in purses, wallets, camera bags; everywhere) is a routine act towards safer sex. For someone else with the power to not only deny passage but judge, moralize and intimidate, it has become enough evidence to put a woman through hell. My story has brought a number of women out of the woodwork stating that they have had similar experiences." [h/t Alex Grossman]

"I couldn't afford for Carpentersville to become Detroit"

reenum — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 17:30:45 -0800

Tom Roeser was unhappy about the decline of his town, Carpentersville, IL. So he decided to do something about it. Roeser bought some foreclosed properties, renovated them, and then rented them out for below market value.

It's just a one-time fee that you pay annually

antonymous — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 16:50:18 -0800

As the tax deadline approaches in the United States, ProPublica investigates why the promise of free and simple tax filing has yet to be fulfilled.

Grappling for survival

the man of twists and turns — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 07:33:13 -0800

Wrestling Out Of The Olympics - The Gods Must Be Crazy Mad

The whole lucrative sham of it all was exposed once again this week when the executive board of the IOC — Informal Motto: "Me Some Too, Yes?" — recommended that wrestling be dropped as an Olympic sport in the 2020 Summer Games, which are supposed to be held in Istanbul, Tokyo, or Madrid, depending on whose checks clear first, I believe. According to the board, wrestling is no longer a "core sport" in the Olympics and it will have to petition for inclusion in 2020 along with, and I am not making this up, sport climbing and wakeboarding. This is terrific. Why don't we just hold the Olympics in an REI outlet store somewhere?

Fight To Save Wrestling From Olympics Cut

The International Olympic Committee announced [February 11] at its headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland, that its executive board had voted to cut wrestling from a core group of 25 sports for the 2020 Games. That means wrestling, which has been in the modern Olympics since they started in 1896 and was part of the ancient games in Olympia, Greece, as early as 708 B.C., now must vie with seven other sports for one spot in the 2020 program.

IOC Drops Wrestling From 2020 Olympics. This has prompted a hunger strike by the Bulgarian coach and the return of two gold medals. How Wrestling Lost The Olympics Wrestling Goes For An Olympic Reversal

Meanwhile, the IOC's decision prompted an international outcry. Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a committee to protest the decision and make a presentation at the May IOC meeting in Moscow. Quietly, but just as decisively, calls to action came from unlikely allies: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, former U.S. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and novelist John Irving.

How Can Wrestling Stay In The Olympics? Let's Start With Vacations And Hookers

The American Mind

the man of twists and turns — Mon, 18 Mar 2013 07:06:54 -0800

The Historian Garry Wills Has Written Better Than Anybody Else About Modern America

The Atlantic - Benj Edwards

East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 — Fri, 15 Mar 2013 10:23:43 -0800

The Copyright Rule We Need to Repeal If We Want to Preserve Our Cultural Heritage

"As the hymn says, you can lay your burden down."

zarq — Fri, 15 Mar 2013 07:36:49 -0800

The Things They Leave Behind. "When the Vietnam Veterans Memorial opened 30 years ago, something unexpected happened: People started leaving things at the wall. One veteran has spent decades cataloging the letters, mementos, and other artifacts of loss — all 400,000 of them." (Via.) Website: The National Park Service Museum Resource Center. CSPAN Video: "Bob Sonderman, director of the Museum Resource Center, gave a tour of the football field-sized warehouse which houses roughly 2.5 million archaeological objects from National Park locations in the District of Columbia, Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia." (2/11)

The Minerva Controversy

infini — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 05:03:22 -0800

The Department of Defense recently announced the creation of the Minerva Research Initiative (PDF), also known as Project Minerva, providing as much as $75 million over five years to support social science research on areas of strategic importance to U.S. national security policy. The initiative indicates a renewal of interest in social science findings after a prolonged period of neglect, but it also prompts concerns about the appropriate relationship between university-based research programs and the state, especially when research might become a tool of not only governance but also military violence. The Social Science Research Council (SSRC) has invited prominent scholars to speak to the questions raised by Project Minerva and to address the controversy it has sparked in academic quarters.

"The Fiery Cross guards you at nights."

zarq — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 10:20:45 -0800

In the 1920's, the Ku Klux Klan operated a resort for Christian white supremacists called Kool Koast Kamp near Rockport, TX. For just a dollar a day per family, they offered swimming and "big game fishing" in "deep blue surf," educational activities and "watermelon parties." All under the protection of a "fiery cross" and "an officer of the law, the same Christian sentiment." (Brochure pages 1, 2, 3, 4) Alternate links to images of the brochure pages: 1, 2, 3, 4

"Perhaps as dangerous as the actual Communists"

the man of twists and turns — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 12:27:21 -0800

The Homosexual Atom Bomb

Such absurd equations show how homosexuality became a floating signifier, associated with whatever political tendency one most disliked. Rather than representing a certain group of people, it represented everything that was wrong—whatever that meant. America’s Red Scare bled into its Lavender Scare; the Soviets associated homosexuality with capitalism and fascism. But empty as it was, the political use of the trope of homosexuality had a devastating effect on real people from both countries.

"Homosexuality Is Stalin's Atom Bomb to Destroy America" is on display at the Winkleman Gallery in NYC. The Lavender Scare, The Second Red Scare's Fraternal Twin Question: Why were homosexuals considered a threat to national security?

Johnson: The politicians behind the Lavender Scare asserted that homosexuals were susceptible to blackmail by enemy agents and so could be coerced into revealing government secrets. In other words, the official rationale wasn't that homosexuals were communists but that they could be used by communists. A Senate subcommittee spent months investigating this claim and came up empty-handed. They found no evidence that even a single gay or lesbian American civil servant had ever been blackmailed into revealing state secrets. The only proof they offered was the well-known case of Colonel Alfred Redl, an Austrian double agent who was exposed just before World War I. Nevertheless, the subcommittee's final report stated emphatically that homosexuals posed a threat to national security and called for their removal from all federal agencies.

The Lavender Scare, a documentary.

Naming: From Fly-fornication (ok) to ChristIsKing (not ok)

Salamandrous — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 15:03:37 -0800

Historically the United States (on a state by state basis) has given almost complete freedom to parents to name their children, both first name and surname, with results like "Fly-fornication," "Mahershalalhashbaz," "Encyclopedia Britannia," "States Rights" (who was killed in battle as an officer for the confederacy), "Trailing Arbutus Vines" and many more. (Naming Baby: The Constitutional Dimensions of Parental Naming Rights, Carlton F.W. Larson, 2011 [SSRN/PDF]). In October 2012, however, New York courts made two interesting rulings that reflect limitations on renaming, if not naming, rights, for both adults and children. Matter of Kobra: Three years after changing their eldest daughter's name to include the father's surname, "Hossain," the parents returned to court to remove Hussain from the last name of both of their daughters' names "because the neighborhood children laughed at them and made fun of them because their surname is commonly referred used by Muslims." The names they wanted to give would include the surname of neither parent. The judge found the mother's testimony about her reasons for the name change not credible and noted: "Notwithstanding the applicant's assertions that in Bangladesh, India, it customary for everyone in "a typical household" to have completely different names, both of these children are American-born citizens and have adapted, embraced and are a part of our American culture. It is certainly not common on the shores of this nation that the "typical household" members have completely different names... This court can only imagine the confusion and hardship that these children would have as they grow older and interact with other children and others if this petition were granted." Matter of Nawadiuko: A father, mother, and their two children ages 15 and 18, filed to change their last name to "ChristIsKing" (having previously sought to change their then minor son's first name to "JesusIsLord." The court refused. It ruled that it would be inappropriate to others who might then have to 'proclaim' a faith statement which they do not believe: "For instance, a calendar call in the courthouse would require the clerk to shout out "JesusIsLord ChristIsKing" or "Rejoice ChristIsKing." Other litigants would not necessarily know whether the clerk was reading the calendar or making some religious statement in violation of the separation of church and state. " The court also attempted to distinguish the name "JesusIsLord" from very common names like "Daniel," (meaning 'God is my Judge') or "Michael" ('Who is like God?"): "Just about every culture throughout history has had some concept of "God" or "gods." What petitioners are advocating is a name that is a statement that a particular person is "Lord" or is the "King." This is a position which is not only offensive to persons who are not Christians but also to those who look to God a being gender neutral and not a male figure." The court concluded that the petitioners "have a common law right to use whatever names they choose and are free to do so." It is unclear how one could assert that common law right in support of a name change at the DMV, passport office, or credit bureau. Via Divorce: New York blog