Writers get a lot of their ideas from others, and I'll have to concede that I never would have thought to tackle Seattle's techno-toilets if it weren't for a short blog written on the subject by nationally syndicated radio host and Seattle area resident Michael Medved:

The city of Seattle has committed the staggering sum of $6.6 million for three high tech public toilets for the homeless. The pricy privies, with purportedly advanced but frequently malfunctioning self-cleaning features, have already become a magnet for prostitutes and drug dealers according to a report to the city council, while attracting at least as much filth as traditional porta-potties—that would have cost the city less than one-twentieth as much to lease and maintain. Meanwhile, the Seattle Times describes city parks where human waste appears nightly on benches, just yards from the gleaming techie toilets installed with so much fanfare. The city council defends the inane program as a noble attempt to “do something” for the homeless—illustrating the folly of good intentions. In truth, any effort – public or private—that makes it easier for transients to continue sleeping on the streets, only harms these unfortunates – as well as deeply damaging the downtown neighborhoods they invade and occupy. True compassion for the homeless begins with an absolute refusal to allow them to continue living on sidewalks, in alleys, underpasses, parks or empty lots, and certainly must avoid any move at all to facilitate or prolong such urban camping.

Here's my column, which I hope measures up somewhat:

Over the years, I've noticed a decrease in one thing throughout Seattle: a free restroom.

With the rise of drug use by homeless downtown occupants and a migration of transient University District inhabitants toward Capitol Hill, many businesses have really put their foot down on making sure that only customers are able to use their restrooms.

The downtown McDonald's has even hired a security guard to stand outside its restroom.

Some of the bathrooms that have been publicly used, such as those in the Pike Place Market or Westlake Mall, have been infamous for being used by drug users. After many attempts to crack down, the Seattle City Council went a different route and instituted high-tech public restrooms that have been placed throughout Seattle.


DIFFERENCES IN PERSPECTIVE

The restrooms, which have been called everything from "pricey privies" to "space toilets," are strange-looking contraptions. If you walk by one, you can see that it opens with a sliding door, an electronic voice announcing whenever the contraption is free to use.

The city has allocated $6.6 million to these technological portable toilets, and when they were originally opened, they were met with fanfare.

A news article in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer from 2004 had the headline "At Last, Relief is in Sight as Plush Public Potties Open Downtown." The article described the bathrooms as similar to a "space ride at Disneyland."

At the time of their opening, Seattle Public Utilities (SPU) spokesperson Susan Stoltzfus said, "People will be more likely to use them because they stay clean." According to the Seattle Times, however, public benches are frequently marked by human waste, left by inhabitants who didn't seem to find much use for the portable potties set up for them.

Luigi Gephart, a homeless resident of Seattle, told The Seattle Times that he calls the bathroom a "revolving crackhouse," adding, "These are the worst bathrooms you can go to."

In a blog by nationally syndicated talk show host Michael Medved, who happens to reside in the Seattle area, he went all out against the notion that these bathrooms were anything more than another use of tax dollars or in any way helped the homeless.

Medved declared, "True compassion for the homeless begins with an absolute refusal to allow them to continue living on sidewalks, in alleys, underpasses, parks or empty lots, and certainly must avoid any move at all to facilitate or prolong such urban camping."


GETTING 'OUR MONEY'S WORTH'?

SPU spokespeople have contended that the worst problems aren't with the bathrooms themselves, but with public relations. SPU spokesperson Andy Ryan said, "The real problem we're having with [the toilets] is that there is a public perception we're not getting our money's worth."

The bathrooms are costly to remove as well, at about $500,000 each.

Whatever the city decides, they should take into account the costs and benefits over the possible benevolence their intentions may carry.

If the toilets are supposed to fix public bodily performances, why is it that, as reported in an article on the joke website Poopreport.com, there is "more poop on the streets?"

I just ended the Hugo Chavez Watch blog that I started around half a year ago. Updates were infrequent, and the people that had helped start it seemed to lose interest as fast as myself. Just as I should have expected, as soon as I end a blog dedicated to monitoring this rising Communist tyrant, more news comes in regarding Pirate Boy (my pet name for Hugo) and the Hollywood celebrities that love him.

This was taken from a Newsbusters linked transcript of Sean Penn's appearance on the Late Show with David Letterman:

LETTERMAN: But isn't he talking about nationalizing the media? That always makes me a little concerned when somebody's talking about doing that.

PENN: He's, well, you know, one of the things that's been said about him is he's shut down a television station. What happened is that since 1998 they had been encouraging the assassination of Chavez every day on that channel -- something that they would have gone to prison for here. And so he just didn't re-up that license. But meanwhile, you know, the idea that, that there's no freedom of expression, I mean the loons on Fox News are broadcast there every day.

In contrast, here is the Reporters Without Borders analysis of the closing of RCTV:

Widely condemned abroad, RCTV’s closure was much more than just an administrative measure. It was a political move without precedent in Latin America, a key element in a government takeover of the broadcast media that is part of a determined effort to control and occupy the entire public arena…

The press freedom organisation found that the decisions to close RCTV and transfer its terrestrial broadcast channel to a new public TV station, Televisora Venezolana Social (Tves), were conducted outside of all regular legal channels and in defiance of the jurisprudence established by the Organisation of American States, to which Venezuela belongs.

A picture says a thousand words.

In order to have more freedom to customize my own blog as well as to be able to gain readers through name recognition, I have started a blog on Blogspot with my name in the address. I'm going to simulcast most of my posts on both blogs, so feel free to visit either. Thank you for reading.

A powerful piece in the Utah newspaper The Daily Herald yesterday laid out a systematic assault on movements to give parents freedom to choose how their children are educated by the National Education Association. A few examples of the fundraising implemented by the NEA were laid out by author Ryan Harriman:

â In September 2000, the NEA bombarded California with $4.5 million to oppose Proposition 38, which would have created vouchers.

â In September 2000 and again in January 2001, the NEA slipped $850,000 (for a total of $1.7 million) to its Michigan union in a successful campaign to oppose a voucher amendment.

â In October 2001, the NEA provided $500,000 to its New Jersey union to run a campaign that expanded and solidified the anti-voucher effort in the state.

â In December 2003, the NEA infused $469,000 into Colorado. The NEA's state unions anticipated a major legislative fight the next year and wanted to conduct a public relations campaign to build up political capital. In particular, the state unions were concerned about voucher legislation. The campaign helped the state unions defeat three voucher bills, including a special education bill.

â In February 2004, the NEA gave its Wisconsin union $300,000 to fund a grass-roots campaign to oppose legislation expanding charter schools, vouchers, tax credits, and other "choice schemes."

When I read the term "scheme" that was used by the NEA I actually had a negative physical reaction similiar to what one would experience when feces is placed in their food. Someone has to stop teacher's unions before it's too late.

Autism Speaks is a large organization benefitting those with autism spectrum disorders. They've started a YouTube account and uploaded something I never thought I'd see, a hip-hop song about autism. The artist is named Sean Delaney, and his song is focussed on those with the more severe aspects of autism.

Education is an issue politicians don't even seem to touch, and it's good to see people pushing to make it a campaign issue. The real question is whether this group thinks federal regulation is the answer or if they are going to push for schools to be accountable to parents.

From Washington Post's "On Faith" series, which has provided blogs by all manner of commentators on the subject of religion, Columbia professor Randall Balmer takes Hitchens' own fundamentalism to task:

Classic bit of left-wing nonsense gathered by Glenn Beck's assistant, Stu:

During a week where the Holocaust and homosexual-denying President of Iran paid a visit to an Ivy League campus in the biggest metropolis in the Western world, Christopher Hitchens oddly used his Slate column to talk about Al Gore's non-candidacy for President:

Apart from the awards, not only could Gore claim that he had been a fairly effective senator and a reasonably competent vice president, he could also present himself in zeitgeist terms as the candidate who was on the right side of the two great overarching questions: the climate crisis and the war in Mesopotamia. Should I add that, whether or not he really won the Electoral College in 2000, he did manage to collect the majority of the popular vote? Several people, some of them well-informed, have been saying to me that Gore will wait until the Nobel committee's announcement before he makes up his mind. Should he make up his mind to run, he could alter the entire equation.

There were a few very weird moments in the column, such as this:

Sen. Clinton may have succeeded in getting people to call her "Hillary" and to have made them feel resigned to her front-runnership, but what kind of achievement is that? Sen. Obama cannot possibly believe, and doesn't even act as if he believes, that he can be elected president of the United States next year. John Edwards is a good man who is in politics for good reasons, but there is something about his populism that doesn't quite—what's the word?—translate.

Apparently Hitch must not have watched a good share of the Democratic debates. From what I have read of him (which is quite alot), the one thing that Hitch despises the most is religious certainty. Edwards used that card, convincingly or not, in the YouTube debate where he asserted that his opposition to same-sex marriage was founded in his religious faith. That seems like a position designed to raise the ire of Christopher Hitchens.

It might be possible that Hitchens has spent the last half a year debating theology (or the lack thereof) so intensely that he hasn't properly absorbed the goings on in the presidential race. I can't blame him, one human is only so capable of paying attention to all the latest campaign news while also writing a daily column and engaging in a book tour for a New York Times bestseller.

The time has passed for Al Gore to run for president. If he had the inclination to do so, he would have at least had to have set up an Exploratory Committee by now. Fred Thompson was considered late when he announced his candidacy in Labour Day after months of getting his name out there and fundraising. Al Gore has denied any intentions of higher office, and I think we should take him at his word. If he were to run now, he wouldn't have the funds or infrastructure for a successful campaign.

H/T to Allen Estrin

 

Ahmadinejad wowed the audience at Colombia alright, but not quite in the way this "news agency" describes:

Before President Ahamadinejad's address, Colombia University Chancellor in a brief address told the audience that they would have the chance to hear Iran's stands as the Iranian President would put them forth.

He said that the Iranians are a peace loving nation, they hate war, and all types of aggression.

Referring to the technological achievements of the Iranian nation in the course of recent years, the president considered them as a sign for the Iranians' resolute will for achieving sustainable development and rapid advancement.

The audience on repeated occasion applauded Ahmadinejad when he touched on international crises.

It's hard to not be wowed when a leader of a large and ancient country answers a question about his nation's questionable treatment of homosexuals with, "In Iran we don't have homosexuals like in your country ... I don't know who's told you that we have this."

The IRNA piece reminds me in an eerie way of another bit of totalitarian propoganda, the series of shorts (which I'm not totally sure of the origin) on North Korean society and its vertically challenged leader, Kim Jong Il. The masses clapping in applause, praise of the great nation's technological achievements, it's all cut from the same cloth. And as humorous as it may sounds, it is depressingly sad when considering the people that live under these regimes.

The older man towards the end of the video articulates his points very, very well. This is a must-watch.

Wow, perhaps we were misreading Bollinger:

Columbia University president Lee Bollinger took Iran's president to task Monday, bluntly criticizing his record and saying he exhibits "the signs of a petty and cruel dictator." Bollinger told the president: "Today I feel the weight of all the civilized world yearning to express the revulsion at what you stand for."

Those are fighting words I would expect out of a Christopher Hitchens or Robert Spencer, but a university president? And to say those things right as you are introducing Ahmadinejad shows major guts.

In The Know: White House Announces 'Everything Is Great In Iraf'