What's worse: sex or war crimes?

"I did not have sexual relations with that woman." (image from independent.co.uk)
In a Salon article by Glenn Greenwald posted earlier today, Greenwald writes about the American people and media perceiving their leaders worse if they have sex with prostitutes in comparison to committing war crimes. New York Governor Eliot Spitzer was forced to resign immediately in disgrace due to his sexual forays, while the Bush administration has defended itself from such criticism for war crimes because, they say, it is justified by existing objectives. It is an interesting concept, it seems as though sexual infidelity in leaders can equate to a loss of thousands of lives, in terms of public perception of said leader. Just looking at the past two presidential administrations, Bill Clinton was impeached and faced the threat of being removed from Office after he denied true sexual relations with staffer Monica Lewinsky. On the other hand, Bush has remained free from any real threat of impeachment, despite faulty justifications for going to war and questionable handling of it. In short, war crimes are simply in a far more gray area, since politicians can hide behind propaganda about the evil of America's enemies to justify killing so many people, while sex, once uncovered, is blunt, simple, and naked so to speak, something everyone can understand totally and get outraged by.

Wireless Internet Access At Ithaca College: Will It Make Life Easier?

Plans for the installation of high-speed wireless Internet in Ithaca College residence halls are in place for the Fall 2009 semester. The wireless connection will come as part of the new contract recently struck with Apogee, the school’s web provider.

“[The request for wireless] has been on the books for some time,” said Will Gotshall-Maxon of Information Technology Services. “It was just a question of who would do it and when.”

The eventual coming of wireless connection to on-campus residences was broken by the Ithacan earlier this month, in which people from the upper rungs of ITS and the Office of Residential Life were interviewed. They agreed the change would bring the school up to date and make the institution as a whole more marketable. Sophomore TV-R major Josh Stewart had a quite different reaction, however, unhappy the college has held off on the improvement for so long:

“It’s about time,” he said. “We’ve been one of the top ten communications schools in the country for the past, [what], ten years now? How could installing plasma screen TVs and ID card security systems be a higher priority then putting in wireless?”

Indeed, there are plasma screen TVs in every dining hall and several of the academic buildings and ID security systems are establishing themselves throughout campus, not to mention the Park School is filled with Dell computers when they require students to have Macbooks. All this may sound like grumbling, but as of now, the IC network is frustratingly behind the times when it comes to Internet access. With no wireless available in dorms and a considerable fee for anything more than basic service, several students have become fed up with IC and Apogee.

More than 500 of those paying IC students are part of a Facebook group entitled “Give Us What We Pay for Apogee!” in which students who have paid extra for Internet access band together against an Internet provider that is simply too slow. The current costs of high speed Internet at IC range from 60 dollars per semester for Bronze service to 70 for Gold, and neither follow through on their loading speeds, which for Gold is 3 megabytes per second.

“Are you sick of paying 150 dollars per year for the gold package only to receive their free dial-up speed anyway?!” it reads on the group description on Facebook. This group highlights the frustrations held by hundreds, and probably thousands of IC students who are tired of getting inconsistent connections, blackouts, and technical difficulties, especially considering the cost students pay to attend the school.

“I talk to all of my friends and they say they have free high speed, fiber optics, and everything, and here I’m stuck with basic,” said IC junior Kevin Kehoe. “If I’m paying 40 grand a year for a higher education I feel like it should be part of the cost.”

At a supposedly prestigious communications school such as this one, so much fuss over lackluster Internet connections should be nonexistent. However, with the unveiling of wireless in the dorms next fall, students like Kehoe are becoming more optimistic about their web access within their residences:

“I think it’s perfectly acceptable for students of higher education to have free high speed Internet access for research,” he said. “When you need to wait around five to ten minutes for new pages to load every time it adds into all your research time. Wireless should help.”

The wireless trend has been spreading on college campuses for quite some time now, having been installed in nearly all colleges nationwide. Several colleges already have campus-wide wireless access, such as The College of New Jersey, which has offered such services since 2006. In the last five years, wireless networking on college campuses has been the biggest communications trend, as 75 percent of schools look to expand their networks over the next two years, according to ACUTA, the Association for Information Communications Technology Professionals in Higher Education.

There is also solid evidence that wireless is becoming the new standard for Internet access across the nation for modern college students. Professionally collected data finds IC to be presently lagging behind that standard. Survey results find Ithaca College to be in the lower half of nationwide campus wireless capabilities. In an early 2006 report by ACUTA, surveyors found that 23 percent of colleges were outfitted with campus-wide wireless web access, while another 27 percent of schools reported having wireless networks that covered about half the campus. IC lied in the remaining 50 percent of schools, which were categorized by their use of wireless connection in some campus buildings or in a portion of the campus. This ACUTA report is nearly three years old at this point, and IC will remain within the bottom half of college wireless access until the school installs wireless in residence halls in the fall.

It is certainly not guaranteed that this new plan will solve all students’ problems regarding their Internet access. Gamy Wong is a member of the Residence Hall Association, an on-campus group that made continued requests to college administrators regarding the installation of wireless services. Wong acknowledged that the new change is almost certainly not inspired by RHA though, since the change, instead, came about due to Apogee’s required stipulations in the new contract. Wong is a member of the aforementioned Facebook group as well, and he is hesitant to say he is optimistic about wireless connection:

“I think [wireless] will definitely be to our advantage,” he said. “But I think there’s new problems that’ll come out just like before that we’ll have to deal with.”

Wong is one of the many students who just aren’t sold on Apogee. And after all the inconveniences they have put students through, who can blame him? There is really no telling whether students will get quality wireless connection or more faulty Internet by a different means of connecting. Either way, everyone will find out in the fall.

Facebook: A New Way To Deal Justice?

In Australia on Tuesday, the Supreme Court ruled Facebook to be a legitimate way of serving legal papers to defendants. In the case, lawyers utilized Facebook to track down a couple that had neglected payment of a loan. The influence of Facebook continues to grow, as it is now being used as legal documentation in law, and it has been known for quite some time to be a source for sketchy pictures that cause employers to fire workers for inappropriate presentation of themselves. Facebook has shown us how willing everyone is to give out their information if they can share a medium with their friends, and it is an exceptional and entertaining networking tool. However, with all of the ways people have paid consequences for having their information available, it can seem that maybe it isn't worthwhile to make a profile in the first place. Of course, there are privacy settings, but is that really enough? No matter what, making a page is a form of self-promotion that presents the person at hand one way or another. Privacy settings don't quite equate to private property, and one has to be careful how they present themselves, and how other people make them look on their page.

Olympic Protests Still Exist, Even After Beijing

Image from media.nowpublic.net

The intense protests that plagued this summer's Beijing Olympics are not anything new, and they represent history that is sure to repeat itself soon. The Summer Games were contested by several different groups, many for various human rights violations, such as their involvement with arming the Janjaweed in Darfur, while also their refusal to allow autonomy to Tibet. The Games still went about normally, but it brought all of the country's shortcomings to light rather than show off its positives, which was certainly the government's intentions in obtaining the Games. In the 2010 Vancouver Games, which are to occur next winter, protests have already been occurring on the grounds that events will be played on Indigenous territories. Some of these have gotten out of hand and led to outright vandalism and violence. There are even potential perceived threats from al-Qaida, as Canada's involvement in Afghanistan is increasing. Here's an article I wrote last May for Buzzsaw Magazine about the significant Native protests. (Click the issue on the left in the Spring 2008 section, then it's on pages 18-19) Even then, they had been going on for quite some time.

School of Americas: Protesting A Crooked Institution

On November 21-23, the School of Americas Watch staged a protest against the SOA. The school, which is located in Fort Benning, Georgia, was established following World War II and was supposed to be a place where democracy was taught to people of Latin American nations. However, it has instead been a starting point for some of the most notorious human right violators on this side of the world, such as brutal leaders Augusto Pinochet in Chile and Manuel Noriega of Panama. An estimated 61,000 soldiers and policemen were been trained at SOA between 1946 and 2001. There were about 12,000 people on the second day of the protests, which were elaborately planned and were made in honor of all those who have died at the hands of SOA graduates, who have their education funded and provided by the U.S. government. The Ithacan covered a story on the protests earlier this month.

What Happened To The Simpsons?

"The Simpsons," the animated show which has aired well over 400 episodes since its original release on television since 1989, is still around, but definitely not better than ever. In many ways, the show has become a mere caricature of itself, maintaining the necessary, familiar elements just without the same entertainment quality of the old days. In 2003, Slate writer Chris Suellentrop compared "The Simpsons" to Pete Rose in the later days of his career: "There's still greatness there, and you get to see a home run now and then, but mostly it's a halo of reflected glory." With the show progressing through its 21st season and episodes costing about 5 million dollars to produce and ratings falling a bit each year, it seems the show may be becoming too financially cumbersome to continue airing. With its contract up at the end of this year, it seems the Simpsons may be coming to an end, at which point it will be about time.

Milk and California's Ban On Gay Marriage

The new film "Milk," documents the political life of Harvey Milk, a gay man who was elected to San Fransisco's Board of Supervisors in 1977 on his third attempt. He was shot to death in the following year by Dan White, the man who formerly held his position. White was only sentenced to seven years in jail, although he killed himself soon after release from prison. The film has received exceedingly positive reviews, depicting a time when the gay community made a significant step forward before being forced back again. In many ways, that mirrors the situation in California today, as the State Supreme Court announced that the ban on gay marriage was unconstitutional in May, although the ban was reinstated when Proposition 8 passed on Election Day. It is sad to think that California, supposedly one of the country's most progressive states, is still so conservative on its views on homosexuality.