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SHERIF AWAD Iconizing the Past Page 5 RICH MONETTI
Peekskill Environmental Symposium
Page 6
CHRIS ROSTENBERG Are Pro-Choicers Indoctrinated? Page 7 John F. McMullen Complexity Page 8
By HELEN WEISMAN, Page 20 OP-ED
LANGUAGE
WEIR ONLY HUMAN
Race Baiting By BOB WEIR, Page 3
YOLO
It Is What It Is By LUKE HAMILTON, Page 4
WWW.WESTCHESTERGUARDIAN.COM
JOHN SIMON Conservative and Radical Page 8 RAYMOND IBRAHIM Nigerian “Sex Slaves” Page 11 Dr. OREN LEVIN-WALDMAN
Minimum Wage is Not a Partisan Issue Page 14 Hon. RICHARD BRODSKY Piketty-Split Page 14
rience fundraising, knowledge of what development entails and experience working with sponsors/donors; 2) Operations Manager- must have a good knowledge of computers/software/ticketing systems, duties include overseeing all box office, concessions, movie staffing, day of show lobby staffing such as Merchandise seller, bar sales. Must be familiar with POS system and willing to organize concessions. Full time plus hours. Call (203) 438-5795 and ask for Julie or Allison
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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
THE WESTcHESTER GUARDiAn THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN THE WESTcHESTER GUARDiAn
RADIO RADIO RADIO
Of Significance Of Significance
Community Section ............................................................................... 4 Community Section ............................................................................... 44 Business ................................................................................................ Business ................................................................................................ Calendar ............................................................................................... 44 Calendar ............................................................................................... 45 Charity .................................................................................................. Creative Disruption ............................................................................ 56 Charity .................................................................................................. Contest Cultural Perspective ........................................................................... 766 Contest .................................................................................................. Creative Disruption ............................................................................ Energy Issues ....................................................................................... Creative Disruption ............................................................................ Education ............................................................................................. 867 In Memoriam ....................................................................................1078 Education ............................................................................................. Fashion .................................................................................................. Medicine .............................................................................................10 Fashion .................................................................................................. 89 Fitness.................................................................................................... Najah’s Corner ...................................................................................119 Fitness.................................................................................................... Health ..................................................................................................10 Movie ....................................................................................12 Health ..................................................................................................10 HistoryReview ................................................................................................10 Music ...................................................................................................12 History ................................................................................................10 Ed Koch Movie Review ...................................................................12 Community ........................................................................................13 Ed Koch Movie Review ...................................................................12 Spoof ....................................................................................................13 Writers Collection.............................................................................14 Spoof ....................................................................................................13 Sports Scene .......................................................................................13 Books Sports Scene .......................................................................................13 Najah’s...................................................................................................16 Corner ...................................................................................13 People ..................................................................................................18 Najah’s Corner ...................................................................................13 Writers Collection.............................................................................14 Eye On...................................................................................................16 Theatre ..................................................................................18 Writers Collection.............................................................................14 Books Leaving on a Jet Plane ......................................................................19 Books ...................................................................................................16 Transportation ...................................................................................17 Government Section ............................................................................20 Transportation ...................................................................................17 Government Section ............................................................................17 Campaign Trail ..................................................................................20 Government Section ............................................................................17 Albany Correspondent ....................................................................17 Economic Development....................................................................17 Albany Correspondent Mayor Marvin’s Column..................................................................20 .................................................................18 Education ...........................................................................................21 Mayor Marvin’s Column .................................................................18 Government .......................................................................................19 The Hezitorial ....................................................................................21 Government .......................................................................................19 OpEd Section .........................................................................................23 LegalSection ....................................................................................................23 OpEd .........................................................................................23 Ed Koch Commentary.....................................................................23 People ..................................................................................................24 Ed Koch Letters toCommentary.....................................................................23 the Editor ..........................................................................24 Strategyto...............................................................................................24 Letters Editor............................................................................25 ..........................................................................24 Weir Onlythe Human OpEd Section .........................................................................................25 Weir Only Human ............................................................................25 Legal Notices ..........................................................................................26 Legal Notices ..........................................................................................26 ..........................................................................................27
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A non profit OF Performing Arts Center is seeking two job positions- 1) DirecTODY OF THE CHILD AND TO SEEK ENFORCEMENT VISITATION RIGHTS WITH THE CHILD. tor of Development- FT-must have a background in development or expeBY ORDER OF THE FAMILY COURT OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK rience fundraising, knowledge of what development entails and Feature Section.................................................................................................................................. 3 experience working with sponsors/donors; 2) Operations Manager- must have a TO THE ABOVE-NAMED RESPONDENT(S) WHO RESIDE(S) OR IS FOUND AT [specify Cultural Perspectives................................................................................................................. 20 include good knowledge of computers/software/ticketing systems, duties address(es)]: overseeing all box office, concessions, movie staffing, day of show Weir Only Human. . ...................................................................................................................... 3 lobby Westchester On the Level is usually heard from Monday to Friday, from 10 a.m. to 12 Last known addresses: TIFFANY RAY: 24staffing Garfieldsuch Street, Yonkers, NY 10701 as#3, Merchandise seller, bar sales. Must be familiar with POS Noon on the Internet: http://www.BlogTalkRadio.com/WestchesterOntheLevel. Language........................................................................................................................................ system willing to organize concessions. Call (203) Last known addresses: KENNETH THOMAS: 24 and Garfield Street, #3, Yonkers, NY 10701 Full time plus hours. 4 Because of the importance of a Federal court case438-5795 purporting corruption bribery and ask for Julie orand Allison Community Section......................................................................................................................... 4 An Order to Show Cause under Article 10 of the Family Court Act having been filed with this Court allegations, programming be suspended for the days of March 26 to 29, 2012. YonWestchester On theseeking Levelwith heard Monday to Friday, from to is modify the from placement for the above-named child. 10 a.m. to 12 Noon
Westchester On On the the Level Level with with Narog Narog and Aris Westchester and Aris Aris and
kersthe Philharmonic Orchestra Sadewhite is our scheduled Friday, Calendar......................................................................................................................................... 4 Westchester On the Level is Conductor heard fromJames Monday to Friday, from 10 a.m.guest to 12 Noon on Internet: http://www.BlogTalkRadio.com/WestchesterOntheLevel. Join YOU ARE HEREBY SUMMONED to appear before this Court at Yonkers Family Court March 30. on the Internet: by http://www.BlogTalkRadio.com/WestchesterOntheLevel. Join Cultural Perspectives................................................................................................................... 5 the conversation calling toll-free to 1-877-674-2436. Please stay on topic. located at 53that So. Broadway, Yonkers, New York, the 28th day ofon March, 2012 at 2;15 pm in the It is howeverby anticipated theto jury will conclude itsonPlease deliberation either Monthe conversation calling toll-free 1-877-674-2436. stay on topic. afternoon of said day to answer the petition and to show cause why said child should not be Richard Narog March and Hezi Aris are your that co-hosts. In thewe week beginning February 20th and ending6on Environment................................................................................................................................. day or Tuesday, 26 or regular with adjudicated to27. be aShould childbe andthe why case, you should will not beresume dealt withour in accordance the Richard Narog andhave Hezi Aris areneglected your In the week beginning February 24th,schedule we an exciting of guests. programming and announce fact on the Yonkers Tribune website.February 20th and ending6on provisions of Article 10entourage ofthat the co-hosts. Family Court Act. Make it Fun. ................................................................................................................................... February 24th, we have exciting entourage ofshow. guests. Richard Narog and Hezian Aris are co-hosts of the Every Monday is Pro-Life. special. On Monday, February 20th, Wade, participant in http:// PLEASE TAKE FURTHER NOTICE, thatKrystal you have the right toabecelebrated represented by a law.......................................................................................................................................... 7 Every Monday is special. Monday, 20th, celebrated participant in http:// yer, and ifOn the Court finds youFebruary are unableKrystal to pay forKrystal a lawyer, you haveathe right to havewho a lawyer www.TheWritersCollection.com is our guest. Wade isWade, a mother of three works fifty miles assigned by the Court. Technology/Creative Disruption. . ............................................................................................. 8 www.TheWritersCollection.com our guest. Krystal is a novel mother threeaccepted who works fifty miles from home and writes in her “spare is time.” “Wilde’s Fire,”Wade her debut hasofbeen for publication from home and writes in her “spare time.” “Wilde’s Fire,” her debut novel has been accepted for publication PLEASE TAKE FURTHER NOTICE, that if you fail to appear at the time and place Eye on .............................................................................................................................. and should be available inTheatre. 2012. Not far behind is her second novel, “Wilde’s Army.” How does she do8 it? noted in above, the Court and determine the petition as provided by law.Army.” How does she do it? and available 2012. Notwill farhear behind is her second novel, “Wilde’s Tuneshould in andbefind out. Current Commentary............................................................................................................... 10 Dated: January 30, 2012 BY ORDER OF THE COURT Tune in and find out. Co-hosts Richard Middle Narog2 and Aris will relish the1 column dissection column CLERK OF THE COURTof all things politics on Tuesday, February EastHezi Forum.................................................................................................................... 11 Co-hosts Richard andPresident Hezi ArisChuck will relish the dissection of his all things politicsfrom on Tuesday, February 21st. Yonkers CityNarog Council Lesnick will share perspective the august inner Government. . ................................................................................................................................... 13 21st. Yonkers Lesnick will share 22nd. his perspective from the august sanctum of theCity CityCouncil CouncilPresident ChambersChuck on Wednesday, February Stephen Cerrato, Esq., will inner share sanctum of the City Council Chambers on Wednesday, February 22nd. Stephen Cerrato, Esq., will share .......................................................................................................................................... 13 his political insightPolitics. on Thursday, February 23rd. Friday, February 24th has yet to be filled. It may be a propihis political onwhat Thursday, February 23rd. Friday, February 24th has yet to be filled. It mayofbeThat a propitious day toinsight sum up transpired throughout the week. A sort of BlogTalk Radio version Was Public Policy................................................................................................................................ 14 tious day toThat sumWas up what transpired throughout the week. A sort of BlogTalk Radio version of That Was The Week (TWTWTW). Message from the Mayor.......................................................................................................... 16 The Week That Was (TWTWTW). For those who cannot join us live, consider listening to the show by way of an MP3 download, or on Government................................................................................................................................ 17link For thoseWithin who cannot join us consider listening tofind the the show by wayinof MP3 that download, or on demand. 15 minutes of live, a show’s ending, you can segment ouranarchive you may demand. Within 15 minutes of a show’s ending, you can find the segment in our archive that you may link Campaign Financing................................................................................................................. 18 to using the hyperlink provided in the opening paragraph. Legal Notices, to using the hyperlink provided in the opening paragraph. Advertise Today Mayor Marvin............................................................................................................................. 18 The entire archiveLegal is available and maintained perusal. The easiest way to find a particular interview Notices, Advertise Today for your The is available and maintained forfor your perusal. The easiest way to findofa the particular interview is toentire searcharchive Google, or any other search engine, the subject matter or the name interviewee. 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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Page 3
FeatureSection WEIR ONLY HUMAN
Race Baiting
will do everything possible to destroy you if it isn’t.” The question isn’t whether or not a person is a racist; it’s whether or not their private thoughts and reckless rants should be protected under the Bill of Rights. Yet, the way the despotic system has been constructed, you dare not even try to argue the merits of free speech if that speech has been connected, however remotely, to skin color. Moreover, if you say anything that doesn’t begin with “That guy is a hateful bigot,” you’ve become suspect in the eyes of the speech police and you may not get a chance to finish your thought. To say this is a slippery slope is a gross understatement, since we’re already plummeting at full speed to the bottom of the hill.
ATM Machine for the Opportunist By BOB WEIR Once upon a time, you could say something offensive during a private conversation with friends and associates, resulting in some criticism and limited social ostracism. That was during a time when you had the free speech rights provided under the Constitution. If you expressed biased and/ or bigoted opinions on issues and people, you’d be judged by your peers and treated with the appropriate level of contempt. In addition, if you verbalized the same opinions publicly, you’d be criticized by columnists, radio and television talk show hosts and political pundits. In other words, you had the right to say it, and they had the right to chide you for it. However, they didn’t have the right to destroy your reputation, impugn your character, or rob you of your property. Not anymore! In our current state of incipient totalitarianism, free speech depends on who’s using it and who’s sitting in judgment of it. If you’re a member of a protected class of people your access to free speech in unlimited. Blacks can refer to whites as “honkies, peckerwoods, rednecks,” etc., without fear of serious reprisal. On the other hand, if a white refers to a black in any context, it becomes the subject of intense scrutiny, with the hope that it can be sufficiently distorted to portray the white as a racist. Al Sharpton, a man who has turned race-baiting into a cash cow for his own nefarious activities, sits upon a lofty throne like a wizened megalomaniac, choosing who will be deemed ineligible to exercise freedom of speech.
If Mr. Black calls Mr. White an uncivilized lowlife, Mr. White can object to such a demeaning description and simply walk away. The minor disagreement won’t be on the front page of the New York Times or recorded for mass distribution on YouTube. Conversely, if Mr. White makes the same reference to Mr. Black, Sharpton, and others of his ilk, will immediately spring into action to seek out ways to destroy the purveyor of such an utterance, its constitutionality notwithstanding. Mass media will become joyous accessories to the character assassination and public humiliation of the sinful free speech practitioner, who was led to believe that he had equal rights under the law. A typical question from the “reverend” would be: “Was he called uncivilized because he’s black?” Or, “Does his skin color make him a lowlife?” What race-hustlers have learned is that whites can be intimidated to the point in which they will be deathly afraid to criticize anything black, lest they be branded for life with the term “racist;” the most heinous crime in the world, with the possible exception of “child-molester.” Such demonization of the majority makes tyrants of the minority. Hence, if a white points out that blacks commit violent crimes way out of proportion to their percentage of the population, he will be attacked as a racist, and it won’t matter that he’s simply stating a fact. There’s no such thing as a fact if it tends to illustrate something negative about a protected group. With that in mind, the protected group category is growing ever larger. People are eagerly seeking asylum within the sacrosanct boundaries of political correctness.
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Designated a “Featured” BlogTalk Radio program, has been operating for over two years via the Internet with Co-Hosts Richard Narog and Hezi Aris every weekday, from 10 a.m. to 12 Noon. Listen to the show live or on demand. Share your perspective by calling (347) 205-9201 or by clicking onto the following hyperlinks: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/ westchesteronthelevel
If you violate someone’s right to privacy by secretly taping a conversation and disseminating it to the world, opening them to vicious defamation and misinterpretation of their actual views, you’re “protected” if the misinterpreted words had a racial context. In a recent case, a sports franchise owner was told he must sell his team, pay a $2.5 million fine and never show his face at an NBA game again. Can anyone’s personal safety and private property be protected in a country where
free speech has been turned into a public whipping post and an ATM machine for the opportunist with a cell phone? There is much more at stake here for the rights of individual Americans than this recent bimbo eruption disguised as racial inequality. Whatever happened to: “I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” Sadly, the new freedom is defined as “I’ll agree with what you say if it is consistent with liberal orthodoxy, but I
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Bob Weir is a veteran of 20 years with the New York Police Dept. (NYPD), ten of which were performed in plainclothes undercover assignments. Bob began a writing career about 12 years ago and had his first book published in 1999. Bob went on to write and publish a total of seven novels, “Murder in Black and White,” “City to Die For,” “Powers that Be,” “Ruthie’s Kids,” “Deadly to Love,” “Short Stories of Life and Death,” and “Out of Sight.” He also became a syndicated columnist under the title “Weir Only Human.”
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Page 4
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
LANGUAGE
YOLO: It Is What It Is By LUKE HAMILTON I’m not a Progressive. At all. I don’t favor censorship. I believe that the principles of free-market capitalism are so intrinsic to this world that they can even be applied to non-economic areas of social interaction. I support liberty and always will… BUT, I think it’s time we eradicate a couple of phrases from the English lexicon, permanently. Language is the barometer of a civilization’s intellect.The more creative, industrious, and intellectual a civilization is, the richer its language. Conversely, the more menial and banal the civilization becomes, its changing language becomes a reflection of that. Imagine yourself, a lonely Sherpa from the mountains of Nepal. Aside from
the occasional rich Yankee who hires you to schlep his bags from base camp to peak and back, you might not have much exposure to American culture. Now imagine that you save up your rupees for years until you can afford to buy a television with Chromecast. While you’re catching up on your favorite American television shows and sports events, what would become readily apparent is that we are a nation of idiots who all say the same things. One of the first things you’d hear is the phrase, “It is what it is.” Has there ever, in the history of the spoken word, been a more idiotic phrase than this? It conveys zero information. I don’t know one iota more than I did before I heard these words and yet this phrase is parroted far and wide. The funny thing is that whenever these wise words are spoken, the listener often nods
thoughtfully, as if contemplating some existential truth. I know that “It is what it is” is meant to suggest a zen-like stoicism in the face of adversity, but it doesn’t. It makes you sound like a dillweed and indicates you would have trouble in a mental tug-of-war with Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino from Jersey Shore. The second cultural indicator with which you would be barraged in your Sherpa-Pad is “YOLO”. It has nothing to do with the Smothers Brothers or a green Jedi Master. The acronym stands for “You Only Live Once”, and much like “It is what it is”, this phrase is legion. You’ll find it everywhere from Twitter, to clothing, to restaurants. Not only is this meme annoying, but it is likewise foolish. The same mentality which seizes YOLO as a transformational motto is the same mentality which is drawn to technological entities like SnapChat, which is a messaging application which allows you to send a temporary message that is deleted
permanently after a few seconds. The recurrent theme with these two rabidly-popular cultural phenomena is the jettisoning of inhibition. The underlying message really is, ‘The future doesn’t matter and there is nothing beyond this existence’. This is nothing new; just new packaging. The call to ignore your conscience in favor of immediate gratification is as old as dirt. It’s just been given a sheen of romantic fatalism and main-lined into the social media hivemind via #YOLO. The troubling aspect of this virulent meme is its glorification of impulsivity. Given the downward trending development of the average American teenager, the lionization of YOLO should serve both as a troubling bellwether of hazards ahead as well as a confirmation of damage already done. Generations of Americans are being deliberately stripped of the ability to recognize or utilize logic, thanks to Big Education. At the same time, rapacious ad agencies and media
moguls are filling their minds with insatiable, materialist lust. Along comes YOLO and Snapchat to offer the penultimate justification: “Not only should you rid yourself of outdated moral parameters, but it’s time to eat and drink for tomorrow we die.”
well as to a dinner at the Kittle House with the artist following the event, are available to the general public. For ticket purchase and more event information, please call Christina Makrakis at 914-232-9555, ext. 2968. Learn how to identify “Edible Invasive Plants,”during a hike at the Trailside Nature Museum at Ward Pound Ridge Reservation, Route 35, in Cross River on June 2nd at 1pm. “Holy Flying mammals. Quick, to the Batcave,” naturalist Eric Stone will teach about the bats that live at and around Muscoot Farm on Saturday, June 7th at 6pm. Hopefully, visitors will get to glimpse a bat or two as dusk falls. Speaking of comic super heroes, the Green Hornet would like this item… Hilltop Hanover Farm in Yorktown Heights is presenting “Beekeeping for Beginners,” on May 31st. Currently in its 16th season and the recipient of the Westchester County 2012 Arts Organization of the Year Award, Taconic Opera will be performing the world premiere performance and professional recording of the oratorio “Jonah” on Saturday, May 31st at 7:30pm at the Ossining United Methodist Church, and on Sunday, June 1st at 3:00pm at the White Plains Presbyterian Church.
Spring is finally in the air… The kids are back from college and high school graduation parties abound. Every time I hear the sirens go off I take stock of my children’s whereabouts and pray that the siren does not equal a car accident. Take a minute to remind your families to be smart, to slow down, to not text while driving, and to drive defensively… Those sirens seem to go off way too often… Congratulations and three cheers to three Boy Scouts from Troop 45 in Van Cortlandtville: Sachin Sanmugaraja, Christopher Callinan, and Liam Breen for having recently attained their Eagle Scout rankings. Up in Yorktown Heights, Hilltop Hanover Farm will host Farm Fest, from 10am to 4pm, on Memorial Day, May 26th; there is no truth to the rumor that Old McDonald is stopping by… Happy Memorial Day to all, please go out and support your local parade, fly the American flag and remember all those who serve to protect us and those loved ones we have lost… see you next week.
Luke Hamilton is classically-trained, Shakespearean actor from Eugene, Oregon who happens to be a liberty-loving, right- wing, Christian constitutionalist. When not penning columns for ClashDaily. com, Hamilton spends his time astride the Illinois-Wisconsin border, leading bands of liberty-starved citizens from the progres- sive gulags of Illinois to [relative] freedom. Hamilton is the creative mind/voice behind Pillar & Cloud Productions, a budding production company which resides at www. PillarCloudProductions.com. He owes all to his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, whose strength is perfected in his weakness.
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News & Notes from Northern Westchester By MARK JEFFERS President Obama made a stop in Westchester County last week using the Tappan Zee Bridge as a backdrop for a speech, there is no truth to the rumor that Mr.
Obama’s motorcade got stuck in traffic as they forgot their Easy Pass, but if so, they could have read this week’s “toll free” edition of “News & Notes,” while they waited in line. A job well done shout out to Archbishop Stepinac High School physics
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teacher Ron Tedesco on his retirement after 50 years serving as an educator; the school is naming a new physics lab in his honor. Our gossip reporter, also known as my wife, tells us that Opie, better known as Ron Howard and his wife are selling their Armonk home; it’s on the market for $27.5 million bucks. Over in Chappaqua they are holding an Open Days Program Tour in Rocky Hills. Explore the garden; it will open to the public on May 24th. Does anyone else remember the orange canvas art installation called The Gates in Central Park by Christo a few years back? Am I aging myself again? The Katonah Museum of Art will present Christo with its 2014 Himmel Award at a June 1st reception at Chappaqua Crossing Auditorium in Chappaqua, to be followed by a lecture by the artist. Christo will accept the award in honor of his legendary artistic partnership with wife Jeanne-Claude, who passed away in 2009. Their epic, often controversial, always provocative, largescale artworks have redefined the promise and potential of environmental public art. Tickets to the reception and lecture, as
Mark Jeffers resides in Bedford Hills, New York, with his wife Sarah, and three daughters, Kate, Amanda, and Claire.
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Page 5
photos using software like Illustrator and Photoshop. I am also working on a 3D animated version of each portrait”. Loay Saleh was born in Kuwait where he spent his childhood until he returned in Egypt to complete his studies in the Faculty of Applied Arts, October University. Upon graduating in 2010, he returned again to Kuwait where he is employed by an advertising agency and local publication. His father, Egyptian artist Abdel-Moeen Saleh, as well as international artist Eric Jones, whose works range from traditional paint to digital art, have influenced him. “I never lost contact with Egypt. My graduation project was a short animation entitled Al-Mowatan Masry (The Citizen Is Egyptian) where I tried to retrace the history of Egypt through different characters remembered to live in disparate eras and various localities. We revive
the pharos, the peasants, the UpperEgyptian, and the soldier, and so on. They stand individually and collectively in harmony and patriotism”, explained Saleh who is preparing an exhibition of the Egyptian icons alongside other Arab icons.
CULTURAL PERSPECTIVES
Iconizing the Past By SHERIF AWAD Egyptian visual artists live in an immersion of several influential elements derived from their cultural heritage. A few years ago, Egyptian contemporary painter Adel El-Siwi exhibited his on canvas series, My Stars, in which he revived the the revered personalities of Umm Kulthum, Farid alAtrash, Leila Murad, Tayeha Kryoka, among many other faces that harken back to the golden era of Egyptian cinema. Now, Loay Saleh, an Egyptian visual artist who uses computer technology, among other classic techniques, to visualize his concepts, is bringing the faces of the past into the present. Unlike El-Siwi who focused on A-List stars of films and music, Saleh tends to depict supporting actors who had a strong screen presence, especially those who were famous for playing the roles of the bad guy, stars such as Tawfkiq El-Dekken, Stefan Rosty,
and Zaky Rostom. With a snapshot or photo of their old films, Saleh inserts a famous tag line given expression by their
Tawfkiq El-Dekken as seen by Loay Saleh.
character in films in a manner similar to those incorporated in comic strips. Feeha feel (inside the box is an elephant) said by Tawfkiq El-Dekken’s character in the movie Ser Takkyaet El-Ikhfan (The Secret of the Invisible Hat, 1959) or Nashent Ya Falleh (You killed me, you fool!) by Stefan Rosty in Samara (1956), are some of the artworks realized so far with the intention to exhibit the entire collection soon. “I felt that film historians never gave these supporting actors what they deserved”, said Saleh. “They were strong milestones of films made during the golden age of Egyptian cinema. Producers relied on them for the success of the film, as they created a high screen tension between their characters and the main hero of the film and his love interest. El-Dekken, Rostom and others excelled not only in playing the villains, but in playing touching melodramatic roles as well. By bringing their faces and their famous sayings, I wanted to resurrect their memories and re-visualize them in contemporary style as graphical icons, colorizing their scanned
Born in Cairo, Egypt, Sherif Awad is a film / video critic and curator. He is the film editor of Egypt Today Magazine ( www. EgyptToday.com ), and the artistic director for both the Alexandria Film Festival, in Egypt, and the Arab Rotterdam Festival, in The Netherlands. He also contributes to Variety, in the United States, and is the film critic of Variety Arabia ( http://varietyarabia.com/ ), in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the Al-Masry Al-Youm Website http://www.almasryalyoum.com/ ( en/node/198132 ) and The Westchester Guardian (www.WestchesterGuardian. com ).
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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
environment
The Peekskill Middle School Environmental Club Makes the Hudson River their Oyster for Annual Symposium By RICH MONETTI The Hudson River for most people usually comes to mind as an after-thought once the bridge we navigate between New York and New Jersey, the Tappan Zee Bridge is traversed. In centuries past, though, the Hudson River was known the world over for its bounty and commercial staple that is as far from our consciousness today as the suspension bridge was in the early 19th Century. “The Hudson River was the oyster capital of the world,” according to the mock presentation made by the students of the Peekskill Middle School Environment Club in preparation for the 20th annual Wheelabrator Symposium for environmental stewardship and education. But the oyster’s disappearance amounts to more than a historical footnote for the students doing their part to restore the river to its past natural glory. Embarking earlier this month to Florida for the symposium, which centered on the theme of “Connecting to the Oceans,” the crustacean’s absence served as a fitting emblem to the club’s investigation into the affect that growing urbanization, industrialization and development has had on the Hudson River Estuary Watershed. “Oysters are a keystone species because they filter waste from the water and provide habitat for many species because of the oyster reefs,” said 7th grader Emily Lyles. In turn, the effects play out across the rest of the ecosystem. As such, the research of the 25-member club uncovered an
obvious history of over fishing, but also an almost complete indifference to sewage and factory dumping, and the most damaging, PCB release. “The Clean Water Act of 1972 began to reverse all that,” said 7th grader Akua Yeboah. Even so, the group has found that fish are still not edible 40 years later, but any worthwhile study must involve getting one’s hands dirty, and in this case, wet. The club “slooped” down to the river, a la Henry Hudson and Pete Seeger, and went in search of little creatures to make inferences as to the general health of the food webs. “We didn’t catch as much as we were hoping, however we did have one eel, several small larvae of bugs, and a few leeches, said the club’s teacher Scott Tabone. It also was a bit too cold to draw any definitive conclusions so the club worked with Hudson River Sloop Clearwater member Eli Schloss to verify what they found online. Unfortunately, what wasn’t in short supply was refuge left behind by their fellow humans – thereby providing clear proof that indifference isn’t only an inhabitant of the distant past. To that, Mya Guardino deferred her cold feet at the river to this daunting and disturbing reality. “Whenever you picked up one piece of garbage, there was always another that followed, said the 7th grader. Still, Mya did not ebb from this unkempt, unnatural tide and neither did her namesake Mya Turner. “Seeing all the trash and picking up each piece made you want to do more and more,” she lamented.
The Peekskill Middle School Environmental Club Thus lightening the load, 8th grader Gordon Evans extended his vision into the future. “If we do our part now, people that come after us won’t have as much to do,” he said. At the same time, the kids quickly realized that they could make an even bigger difference by bringing the river back with them to the familiar confines of social media. “We got a lot of retweets from environmental groups, and a lot of people who became aware of us through social media who want to join next year,” said 7th grader Giavonna Tiscone. Returning to the river follows, as their generation well know they should, is a far more important reciprocation that will take
place in June. Students will follow Fabien Cousteau and his team during Mission 31, a month-long research mission in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary aboard Aquarius. The only underwater marine habitat and lab in the world; the group will participate in online science sessions with a multitude of renowned scientists. But sometimes testing the waters of a new project takes even more time than one may imagine before it takes hold. “I joined last year, and at first I was a little bored, but when I realized we made an impact, it became fun,” said Dominique Schweizer. It is an evolution any educator would sign up for, and the same goes for the progress Tabone has seen his students make
as presenters. “They all have a lot more confidence,”Tabone said. A boast that amounts to a blossoming for Dominique, “It’s opened me up,” she asserted her new found voice. Nonetheless, the presentation will open with Mya Turner, who feels privileged to set the tone and showcase Peekskill in a “good way.” And after they’ve earned a grownup stay at the Holiday Inn, the young environmentalists intend to leave the way they came. “We’re going to clean our rooms just like we cleaned the river,” concluded Dominique.
doing. Mt. St. Helens has taught me that all things heal in time and Mother Nature knows more than we do. One example was Spirit Lake. The lake was at the foot of Mt. St. Helens and as a Girl Scout I camped with my troop in the park many times. The lake was so clear; we could see fish swimming deep in the water. After the mountain blew, the lake seemed to disappear; filled with molten lava the consistency of fresh cement. I remember the Forest Service thought the lake was gone along with all the wildlife and our local paper was regularly filled with articles about the devastation of the fish population. Well, guess what! Without the help of our U.S. Forest Service, the lake just moved to a different spot and the fish and wildlife came back on their own. We tend to think we can outsmart Mother Nature. Hah! When we realized we were going through twice as much
birdseed as we did last spring, we knew it was because of the squirrels. We bought squirrel proof birdfeeders. The theory is the squirrel gets on the feeder and when he/she steps on the perch his weight shuts off the door to the seeds, whereas birds don’t weigh enough to shut it. In one day this mother squirrel figured out if she stuck her arm into the open door before she put weight of the perch, her arm kept the door open enough for her other hand to reach in and pull out one seed at a time. Yesterday we decided to go to the feed store and buy a squirrel feeder and quit fighting them. There was quite a selection, but we chose one along with a 50 pound sack of pumpkin seeds and a 30 pound bag of peanuts. I’ll just have to wait and see if they will now stay away from the bird’s seed or just get fat and call all their friends in neighboring counties to join the feast. Just one more note: I have a photo
Terry took yesterday morning that shows how wrong I was thinking the deer were eating my tulips. I’m including it in case your editor can publish it. In case it doesn’t accompany this column, it’s a photo of a slug (approximately 10 ounces) who climbed up the 12” stem of one of my tulips and ate away half the flower. His weight caused the tulip to sway with the slightest breeze. While I watched, I thought of Cirque du Soleil and it made me smile at Mother Nature.
Rich Monetti has been a freelance writer since 2003. He lives in Westchester County.
MAKE IT FUN AND IT WILL GET DONE
Mother Nature Knows Best By PAM YOUNG We live 30 miles from Mt. St. Helens in the state of Washington. On May 18, 1980 she erupted. Before the momentous event, she looked just like a gigantic, yummy scoop of vanilla ice cream. Then she blew her top and ever since has looked like some enormous giant slashed the scoop in half with a colossal machete. She’s not as pretty as she used to be, but at least she no longer subliminally suggests ice cream to me. (I know since her eruption, my consumption of ice cream cones has gone way down.) Yesterday, we north westerners were buzzing with memories of her eruption. My sister and I were in Los Angeles that
Sunday after being on Regis Philbin’s television show called AM Los Angeles on the Friday before. I remember talking with Regis about the eminent possibility of our mountain erupting. She’d gone into labor on March 27 and was shaking and spewing steam almost every day. (Oh to be in labor for 22 days!) It was kind of scary living so close to her and as the earthquakes became more frequent and roadblocks were set up along the perimeter of the “red zone,” we watched, waited and wondered what would happen when she blew. 57 people were killed and some of the hair-raising stories of those who escaped that Sunday morning filled our morning newspaper yesterday. Nature is a great teacher and one of the lessons I’ve learned over and over again is that Mother Nature knows what she’s
For more from Pam Young go to www. makeitfunanditwillgetdone.com. You’ll find many musings, videos of Pam in the kitchen preparing delicious meals, videos on how to get organized, ways to lose weight and get your finances in order, all from a reformed SLOB’s point of view.
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Page 7
and misleading! The definition of “health” was not included in the main case, Roe, but concealed over in Doe, which most people have never heard of! Both cases are “of course, to be read together.” Everything in one case pertains to the other! This is another indication that the Supreme Court Justices were being disingenuous! But of course the entire undertaking is illegitimate because the Constitution makes no mention of abortion, so how can any of it be a Constitutional right?! It appears that the pro-Roe/Doe justices believed that if any abortion was to be a Constitutional right, it all had to be, because the unborn was denied all legal status until birth. There was some mention of a “compelling state interest” to protect unborn life late in the pregnancy, but this was a paper tiger meant to deceive readers into believing the trimester scheme would allow for a compromise. There was no compromise. What about recent state laws that forbid abortion after, say, the twentieth week? The Supreme Court requires such laws to have a “health” exception, rendering the laws toothless. I urge readers who don’t believe me to peruse the High Court decisions themselves. From that day to this, the media and education system have disseminated the law in Roe without explaining the loophole in Doe. It amounts to the greatest propaganda campaign of our day. The medical community is negligent, to put it mildly, in
its failure to fight the sickness in its ranks. The government is committing a crime so serious that we, arguably, do not have a true democracy, or even a civilization. In the academy, feminism, perhaps the greatest social philosophy of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, is being warped to commit crimes similar to those committed by the Third Reich, but dwarfing them. I have found that when I ask people what they believe the abortion law should be their answers largely depend on whether they understand our extreme pro-abortion law. Rarely do people support the law as it is. But people are more likely to condemn the law if I explain it to them after they have said what their desired law is. After all, prochoice is the heart of political correctness and people are reluctant to cross pro-choicers. So the proper way of approaching the issue is to ask people what they think the law should be, then to inform them of our nine-month law. I encourage educators to ask the same questions I asked “Diane” in the conversation above. Many pro-choicers are indoctrinated. When they won’t answer simple questions – questions they are capable of answering – then it becomes virtually impossible for them to free themselves from their mental prisons.
PRO-LIFE
Are Pro-Choicers Indoctrinated? By CHRIS ROSTENBERG
really is legal through all nine months, in every state, for any reason, and has been since 1973. Either by design or by accident, our law is confusing in the extreme. The Supreme Court in Roe vs. Wade made it seem as if only early abortion was legal, saying that the states, if they wished, could make late abortion illegal. They can’t. In Roe vs. Wade’s companion case, Doe vs. Bolton, the High Court squashed the states’ right to make third trimester abortions illegal. The details are important. Roe said the states could make third trimester abortion illegal unless the woman’s “life or health” was endangered. We should already be suspicious – why mention “life” if “health” is enough to get a third trimester abortion? If a woman’s life is endangered, certainly her health in endangered. Maybe the justices were trying to seem as if such late abortion were only to be legal in very rare circumstances. The Supreme Court defined “health” as “all factors, physical, emotional, psychological and familial” and included the woman’s marital status and age. Only one other doctor aside from the abortionist has to attest to the woman’s health. So, the states can prohibit late abortion, except when one of “all factors” comes to pass – in other words, the states cannot prohibit any abortion! This is dishonest
Chris Rostenberg is a freelance writer. Correspondence may be directed to ChrisRosty@gmail.com
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The following made-up conversation with a fictitious pro-choicer named Diane is based on numerous actual discussions I’ve had with real people. The dialogue is meant to expose unfortunate attitudes held by many abortion advocates. Too many pro-choicers refuse to make themselves accountable. Diane: So you are against abortion. Does that mean you think abortion should be illegal from conception? What about rape and incest? Me: Wait a minute. You can’t just pick and choose which abortions you want to defend – you have to justify all of them. What would you say if I told you President Obama supported nine-month abortion? Diane: That’s ridiculous. Me: I’m glad you agree. Diane: I mean I don’t believe you. Me: What if I told you Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton and Joseph Biden all support nine month abortion? Diane: You’re out of your mind. Me: What if I told you abortion already is legal through all nine months and pro-choicers want to keep it that way? Diane: I would tell you it’s legal so late only in rare circumstances. Me: In all circumstances. Diane: Not in this state. Me: In all fifty states. Diane: If that was the law, I would have heard of it. That law would have to have just recently been passed, and it hasn’t. Me: It became law in 1973. Diane: I’d say you were crazy. Me: If I did show you that abortion was legal through all nine months, for any reason, in all fifty states, and has been since 1973, would you oppose that law? Diane: I’d rather not say. Me: Well, if you support prenatal homicide and don’t qualify your endorsement, you are a nine-month pro-choicer, aren’t you? Diane: I’m not answering that. Me: If that was the law and you did not know it, would that prove that the media was not doing its job of informing the population about abortion? Diane: No comment. Me: Would you admit that the education system was teaching a lie if that was the law and you did not know it for all this time? Diane: No, I won’t admit that. Me: Would you admit that the medical
community was corrupt if it accepted such a policy? Diane: No. Besides, how many women get abortions so late anyway? Me: How many wrongful abortions will you tolerate before you oppose the law that allows those abortions? Diane: Only a small percentage of abortions are done so late. Me: Do we justify late killings by performing more early abortions? The point of the extreme nature of our abortion law is that it strongly suggests that the law is unconstitutional, and that those who defend it are cranks and nutjobs. They are blatant nine-month pro-choicers, unlike average Americans who support some abortion and oppose other abortion. The whole debate over prenatal homicide is different in communities where the extremism of our law is understood. “Nine-month arguments” – like saying the unborn is not a baby until birth - are more easily exposed in such environments. Imagine where the two sides in the abortion war would be if the law had always been understood by the public. Do you see what I mean? Diane: No. Me: If the Democratic Party’s plank included a commitment to defend nine month abortion, unconditionally, through the Supreme Court, would that not disqualify any Democrat who adhered to that plank? Would Republicans who accepted that extreme law also be disqualified? Diane: I wouldn’t say that. Me: The nature of our abortion law is only one simple fact regarding the abortion issue. If you didn’t know such an elementary aspect of the issue as the law, you probably would not have a good understanding of the issue, would you? Diane: I don’t agree. Me: A person who did not know the law could not understand the corruption in many of our institutions: government, media, education and the medical field, and could not grasp certain other issues related to those bodies. Such a person would have a limited understanding of the world. Too many people refuse to deal with the awful facts of prenatal homicide. Diane: Can you show me a single person who demonstrates such denial? Me: Yeah – you do. You would not answer any of my questions. Don’t expect me to illustrate dishonesty sustaining the pro-choice holocaust if you yourself are divorced from reality. The punchline is this: in fact, abortion
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THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
TECHNOLOGY / CREATIVE DISRUPTION
Complexity By JOHN F. McMULLEN In a recent Salon column, “The blockbuster era must die: How the Internet can save us from the cultural crisis it caused” (http://www.salon. com/2014/05/09/the_blockbuster_era_ must_die_how_the_internet_can_save_ us_from_the_cultural_crisis_it_caused/), Andrew Leonard describes Astra Taylor’s new book, “The People’s Platform: Taking Back Power and Culture In The Digital Age” as “something of great and lasting value.” I agree completely but my focus here is not to dwell on Leonard’s reason for his acclaim. Leonard is concerned with the content of Taylor’s arguments in the book about the failure of the Internet to live up to its promise, writing “The People’s Platform,” may be the most potent critique of Internet hype and Silicon Valley triumphalism delivered to date. By dint of her eloquent prose, thorough research and, perhaps most of all, willingness to seek nuance in the “relentlessly binary” showdown between techno-optimists and techno-skeptics, Taylor has produced something of great and lasting value. Her logic is relentless. “ It is, however, another comment by Leonard that ties more directly into my interest in Taylor’s book for the purposes of this column – “Astra Taylor’s ability to pierce through the techno-utopian claims made by the Clay Shirkys and Jeff Jarvises and Chris Andersons of the world is so compelling that I found myself repeatedly confronting a paradox as I grappled with ‘The People’s Platform.’” Leonard writes of “repeatedly confronting a paradox as I grappled…” It seems to me that, as a society, we don’t accept paradox, do not deal with complexity, and certainly do not grapple to reach thought-out conclusions. I seem to remember that in my youth (and I can certainly be corrected if I’m fantasizing) that the intellectual leaders of our political parties, such as the conservative Robert Taft and the liberal Adlai Stevenson, wrote “position papers” on public issues and that PEOPLE ACTUALLY READ THEM. I do know that, in 1964, private citizen and non-candidate Ronald Reagan gave a televised 45 or 50 minute speech in support of Barry Goldwater’s presidential candidacy and millions of people watched it and discussed it later with friends and co-workers. I know very few people who would watch a candidate, never mind a noncandidate, give a 45-minute political speech and one would never air one anyhow; the networks know that they would be deluged by telephone calls demanding “Two and a Half Men,” “American Idol” and other
mindless pap. Today, the public would have by-inlarge made up its mind – even before the party conventions. We are in a polarized country where many take their opinions from the media with whom they agree. For some, FOX-News is always right; for others, it’s MSNBC. For many, the New York Times is “the paper or record;” for others, it is a “slanted liberal mouthpiece.” The views of our other great paper, The Wall Street Journal are just as divided. How did we get this way? – there are many answers – gerrymandering; parties moving to the extreme right and left, leaving little room for compromise; polarization of the media, etc. I think, however, that the major reason is that we are too busy to deal with complexity and are willing to let others with whom we think we agree do the heaving lifting to form our opinions for us. Unfortunately, we often don’t realize that those forming the opinions may be driven by their hatred of the President or the fact that the bill-under-discussion favors their political special interest group. Still, it’s easier to abrogate our responsibility than to read the 1,000 page plus Affordable Care Act. There are, however, major issues relating to technology that will affect our lives and that of future generations. These issues require discussion and general agreement about how we wish our society to go forth. The fact that they involve both technology and the need for thoughtful discussion as well as long range planning is an immediate turnoff to people right away – but, if we are to prudently move ahead, we must make an effort. Let’s take a look at a few major current issues: Security and Surveillance: Fact – The US was viciously attacked on 9/11, Fact – In response, the President authorized surveillance and investigatory procedures that had been illegal or restricted as a result of the Church Committee. Fact – The current President, a constitutional lawyer, after planning transparency and strict adherence to law, continued the practices of the previous administration. Fact – There has not been a major attack on the United States since 9/11, a condition that the intelligence services attribute to the surveillance programs. Fact – We do not know how many, if any, attacks have been prevented by the programs – that information is classified. Fact – The revelations by Edward Snowden have made us aware of the various programs and many who knew of them before, such as the President, promise “reform.” Fact – National and Local law enforcement agencies wish to expand the use of surveillance through their use of video cameras and
drones. So we have real room for debate if we are willing to demand it – “How much intrusion will we permit to provide us with security? How much security is really provided by the intrusion? What safeguards do we have that the data, pictures, etc. collected on us is narrowly used only for security. ImpactofTechnologyonourEconomy Fact – Technological power is being deployed at geometric speed and impacting every aspect of our lives. Fact – The continued expansion of Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, coupled with new systems and “apps,” social networking, and greater Internet reach continue to keep the US economically competitive and hold consumer prices down. Fact – The new technologies eliminate many more jobs than they create. Fact – Many of those displaced by new technologies – and they range from upper management to clerical and manual workers are too old, too uneducated, or, in some cases, too unintelligent for re-training for the new hi-tech jobs. Fact – The job displacement can lead to mortgage foreclosure and / or downgrading of position, leading to less buying power and greater income inequality. Fact – At some point, those presently enjoying the lower consumer prices may no longer be able to afford the lower priced items. Once again, we face the question of the type of society we wish. One political party takes a “No need to worry. Once the economy improves all will be fine – particularly if we get rid of theses social programs and much regulation” while the other says “We must change the tax code to make the rich pay its fair share and expand benefits to the needy” – Of course, neither of these are about to happen so, unless the general population gets involved, we will continue toward more and more income inequality and greater rupturing of the middle class. The Role of the Internet Masses (“The Big Data” Fodder) I’ll begin here with Astra Taylor’s own words as she describes the meaning of the transition of the World Wide Web from “Web 1.0” (Essentially a one-way communication with hosts such as the New York Times, Amazon, WalMart, and Motor Vehicles presenting the users with products to buy, information to be read, forms to be filled out, etc.) to “Web 2.0” (when users began to publish their own material – blogs, microblogs, Social Networks, wikis, etc.). She writes “Web 2.0 is not about users buying products; rather, users are the product. We are what companies like Google and Facebook sell to advertisers. Of course, social media have made a new kind of engagement possible; they have also generated a handful of enormous companies that profit off the creations and interactions of others. What is social
networking if not the commercialization of the once unprofitable art of conversation. That, in a nutshell, is Web 2.0: content is no longer king, as the digital sages like to say, connections are.” In other words, Goggle can tell Apple that x gillion people receive mail that mentions Apple – so it’s a great place to advertise – and, by the way, another x gillion searched on iPad Mini. Facebook knows how many people belong to each special interest group and can solicit advertisers accordingly. What benefit, if any, do the users get out of this arrangement? Should we be demanding some recompense for the use of our data? The Web, of course, opens up the door for more discussion than just the social networks. It brings great convenience to us – we can buy all our books from Amazon without ever leaving our house, while killing our local book stores and Borders, and buy all our music from iTunes (while killing local record stores and Tower Records). Are we going to evolve to a sedentary shop at home nation, served by a small number of major vendors while the huge mass of former retail clerks join the displaced. Even beyond the Internet and government surveillance, we are under scrutiny of data collection systems wherever we go. Every time we use a credit or debit card or a store’s advantage card, or use a toll card or order something online (including medicine), the transaction is collected and, eventually becomes part of a profile someplace. While this may seem innocuous to
some, many may not it want stored someplace that she / he ordered a sexual aid, is on medication for depression, had a citation for disorderly conduct at a concert, read many books “of a Socialist nature,” or whatever – the information might never be used or made public but we might not want it ever collected. Should people have the right to “opt-out” of any data collection? All of these points (and others as technology continues to develop) require understanding and discussion. In every case, there are benefits and negatives on every side – the relationship of technology to our daily lives is a complex one and often has economic, constitutional, philosophical, and, perhaps, moral implications. We can attempt to understand and deal with these issues – or we can just wait until the next Kodak fails, the next Edward Snowden appears, the next massive identify theft, or the denial of a job because of that high school concert incident – your choice! Creative Disruption is a continuing series examining the impact of constantly accelerating technology on the world around us. These changers normally happen under our personal radar until we find that the world as we knew it is no more. John F. McMullen is a writer, poet, college professor and radio host. Links to other writings, Podcasts, and BlogTalkRadio broadcasts at www.johnmac13.comhttp://www. johnmac13.com/.
EYE ON THEATRE
Conservative and Radical By JOHN SIMON “The City of Conversation” by Anthony Giardina looks at a prominent Washington hostess, Hester Ferris, at three stages between 1979 and 2009, or, since this is D.C., under three presidencies: Carter’s, Regan’s and Obama’s. She is an influential figure in whose Georgetown salon eminences meet, and sometimes important decisions germinate. Herself an impassioned liberal Democrat, her invitees may be of any party, like the comic Republican senator and wife from Kentucky in act one. Hester is living with Democratic senator Harris (Ferris-Harris, get the humor?), and at this party we also get her independent-minded son, Colin, back from London with girlfriend Anna Fitzgerald (his future wife), who is very eager for life lessons from Hester. Hester views Anna’s attire, especially her boots, disapprovingly, and pretty soon Anna
is made to try on one of Hester’s dresses, in which she feels awkward. Giardina writes lively conversation, and creates an interestingly recalcitrant Colin as well as Hester’s live-in sister, Jean, acting as sort of secretary, whose decent ordinariness makes Hester’s sparkle and wit feel all the brighter. Historic events, variously evaluated, and basic human problems, such as generational conflicts, jostle each other, producing both drama and humor. In due time, we also get grandson Ethan, age six, whose closeness to Hester yields controversy, which eventually focuses on the disputed nomination of Judge Brock. He is the object of Hester’s virulent hostility, as opposed to Colin and Anna’s by now Republican conservatism, by which time Ethan is 27, amusingly played the same actor as, earlier, his father, the talented Michael Simpson. No need to go into plot details. The main interest, in any case, centers on Hester,
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Conservative and Radical
Michael Simpson, Phillip James Brannon, and Beth Dixon in “The City of Conversation”.
John Aylward, Kristen Bush, Kevin O’Rourke, and Jan Maxwell in “The City of Conversation”.
Lincoln Center Theater – Mitzi E. Newhouse, 150 West 65th Street, between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue, New York, NY 10023. Tickets: By telephone – 212-239-6200 or 800-447-7400; by Internet: www.Telecharge.com . * * * * *
ropes on either stage, sometimes even briefly seated on improvised bleachers. The performers crop up all over the place. Sometimes on a balcony, sometimes in the pit, often running from one small stage to the other. There is even a high umpire’s seat for someone to perch on. Beside the principals, there is a chorus of six young women, singing and dancing and sometimes
even acting a little. At times, they even get men to dance with. And there are projections of all kinds, some even of pretentious texts. Although the words “Here lies love” appear repeatedly in the sung text, what little love there is in evidence is hardly permitted a reclining posture. David Byrne is the conceiver and wrote the seldom understandable
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Luke Niehaus and Jan Maxwell in “The City of Conversation”.
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Kristen Bush, Michael Simpson, and Jan Maxwell in “The City of Conversation”.
superbly played at all ages by Jan Maxwell, one of our finest actresses. She shines at evoking the changes wrought by time, rendering the diminution of her self-importance. It is a decline endured with gallantry, without an iota of pathos or playing for audience sympathy. There is good work also from Beth Dixon (Jean), Kevin O’Rourke (Chandler Harris), and the rest of the cast, including Luke Niehaus, more likable than many a typical child actor. John Lee Beatty’s enormously livable and lived-in-feeling set helps immeasurably, as do Catherine Zuber’s telling costumes. Doug Hughes has directed with his customary savvy, and you may, if you can avoid excessive expectation, have a pleasant evening. Photos of “The City of Conversation” by and courtesy of Stephanie Berger. The City of Conversation Venue:
“Here Lies Love” is a political show of a very different sort, and not just because it is a musical. Indeed, the music by David Byrne and Fatboy Slim may be its least noteworthy aspect. If musicals worked through decibels rather than notes, it would be a sure winner, serious competition for aerial bombardment. The auditorium, a modest-sized box, has balconies for some spectators on both long sides. At each short side, there is a stage, for either action or slide projections. The big pit in the middle features two movable platforms mainly yielding a cruciform acting area, but sometimes variously repositioned for different effects. Surrounding them, there is enough space to accommodate a larger standing audience, footing it for some 90 minutes. But they’re not allowed to stand in one place. They are frequently reshuffled by a special staff, sometimes herded behind
JONAH Winner of the 2012 Arts Organization of the Year for Westchester County
Saturday May 31, 2014
Ossining United Methodist Church
Corner of Emwilton & Route 9 Ossining, NY · 7:30pm
Sunday June 1, 2014
White Plains Presbyterian Church
39 North Broadway White Plains, NY · 3:00pm
For tickets, order online at www.taconicopera.org or call (855) 88-OPERA
This production is made possible, in part by the New York State Council on the Arts and Arts Westchester with funds from Westchester County, government, corporations, and individuals.
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Conservative and Radical Continued from page 9
lyrics (no obvious loss) with additional music by Tom Gandey and J [no period] Pardo. What matters most is the maniacal invention of the unconventional mise-en-scène, attributable mostly to Alex Timbers, the currently fashionable trendy director (also of “Rocky”), with generally unimpressive choreography by Annie-B [no period] Parson. It is all largely staging. What plot there is involves the simplified Philippine history of the Marcos couple and Aquino and his mother, with hardly a minor character but plenty of mayhem and murder. If you don’t already know the underlying events, you may be lost amid all the running around—no major deprivation from what is more gimmickry than narrative, more discotheque than theatre, more noise than melody. The main actors—Jose Llana (Marcos), Ruthie Ann Miles (Imelda), and Conrad Ricamora (Aquino)—all fit their parts,
which, however, is no more a compliment than saying that all animals fit in a stable In the end, the standees are swept up in a dance, providing the nowadays greatly overvalued audience participation. “Here Lies Love” Venue: The Public Theater, 425 Lafayette Street, New York, NY 10003. Tickets: Accomplish ticket purchase(s) via the Internet: (http://herelieslove.publictheater.org), by telephone: 212-967-7555 (between 10 a.m. and 7 p.m.), or at The Public theater Box Office (Sun & Mon: 2 – 6 p.m; Tue – Sat: 2 – 7:30 p.m.). * * * * * That is off Broadway; on Broadway we get the revival of the curious musical “Hedwig and the Angry Inch,” with book by John Cameron Mitchell, who in the original 1998 very Off staging and subsequent movie played the transsexual protagonist. This much more elaborate revival—lots of scenery by the tongue-in-cheek Julian Crouch, oodles of outrageous costumes by Arianne Phillips, and polymorphous
Neil Patrick Harris as Hedwig in “Hedwig and the Angry Inch”.
lighting by Kevin Adams—tries in some ways to emphasize, in others to neutralize, that this is essentially an old-fashioned gay show extravagantly gussied up.
It is about Hansel, an East Berlin youth, who has a semi-successful sex-change operation, leaving him with a one-inch “sexual embarrassment” (I quote Thomas Hischak). As Hedwig, he marries an American GI, who brings him to the States, then dumps him. He gets involved with a military brat, Tommy Gnosis, who steals his/her songs and likewise abandons him/her, leaving him/her “in search of a personal and sexual identity” [Hischak}. Neil Patrick Harris, the incumbent lead, is one of today’s most ubiquitous showbiz personalities, acting or directing in all media, and hosting both stage and screen shows. Here he goes beyond his openly gay persona into an almost frighteningly feminine Hedwig, and I can see why in the end he needs to show off his masculine self, which he does with the added bonus of near-nudity. The rather undistinguished ten songs have music and lyrics by Stephen Trask, and the music is performed by the four-piece “Angry Inch Band.” They sport parodic Slavic (or East Berlin) names, such as
Krzyshtoff and Skszsp, and bits of comic getup. Lena Hall, until the end in male drag, plays Yitzhak, the only other character, a bottom banana. “Gnosis,” by the way, is Greek for knowledge, but it is possible that the whole thing may be Greek to you. “Hedwig and the Angry Inch” production image by and courtesy of Joan Marcus. “Hedwig and the Angry Inch” Venue: Belasco Theater, 111 West 44th Street, between Broadway and 6th Avenue, New York, NY 10036. Tickets: Call Telecharge. com at 212-239-6200 or 800-432-7250.
insiders became oligarchs under the relatively benevolent, if sometimes inebriated, gaze of Putin’s predecessor, Boris Yeltsin. Just as the Great Depression helped pave the way for Hitler’s rise, Russia’s economic meltdown in 1998 set the stage for Putin to rise to power as the man who brought stability, and later restored a measure of economic and military muscle, for countrymen who still often yearn for a strongman. Like it or not, the only options available to the West – and especially to a Europe that believed territorial aggression was a thing of the past – are to gear up for another prolonged confrontation with Moscow or to simply concede to Putin and his backers what they want and hope for what British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain once called “peace in our time.” Chamberlain described that state of affairs when he returned to London in 1938 from the Munich conference, in which he acquiesced to Hitler’s land grab in Czechoslovakia. “Peace in our time” became World War II in less than a year. Nobody contemplates, and certainly nobody wants, an actual war with Russia – least of all the Russians, who have neither the economic nor military clout to match NATO. On the other hand, the Russians, at least as directed by Putin, know what they want and are inclined to take it if they believe they can get it at an acceptable price. Leaders in Washington and Europe continue to behave as though this is still the Yeltsin era, when hope ran high that some combination of urging and incentives could
bring Russia fully into the European fold. They continue to inflict minor economic sanctions (as Europe did yesterday) in the hope that a wrist-slap will make Putin recoil. Clearly, it won’t. There are many powerful levers to be pulled, all of which are well known in NATO’s capitals. The Russians would be appalled to have NATO troops permanently based in neighboring countries such as Poland and the Baltic states. We could accelerate the deployment of missile defense systems and make defensive weapons (including short-range missile defenses such as the Patriot) available to protect Kiev and other key centers in western Ukraine. We could accelerate development of North American energy reserves, including the Keystone XL pipeline, along with natural gas export terminals that could help displace Russian supplies, on which much of Europe relies. We could remove Russian trade preferences. We could freeze U.S. and other Western energy companies’ investments in Russia and block transfers of advanced drilling technologies. These sorts of steps, or even simply harsher economic sanctions, might actually raise the cost of territorial and political aggression to a level that Putin and his Kremlin colleagues are unwilling to pay. Most could be taken in Washington even if our European allies remain reluctant to confront Putin or compromise their own economies. We thought we won the Cold War. If
John Simon has written for over 50 years on theatre, film, literature, music and fine arts for the Hudson Review, New Leader, New Criterion, National Review, New York Magazine, Opera News, Weekly Standard, Broadway.com and Bloomberg News. He reviews books for the New York Times Book Review and Washington Post. To learn more, visit the www.JohnSimonUncensored.com website.
CURRENT COMMENTARY
Back to The Cold War By LARRY M. ELKIN At a dinner party in Brazil last week, another guest asked me what I thought about the Russian annexation of Crimea. I responded by observing that this is the first time since 1945 that one recognized European state has forcibly taken land from another. This development fundamentally changes the geopolitical world around us – whether we want to accept that fact or not. The West, in my view, must either respond vigorously (even though it has not yet shown it is prepared to do so), or risk living with an aggressive, expansionist, heavily armed neighbor. History has shown that the first approach can end very well, and the second very badly. Three or four of my companions, mostly Brazilian businessmen, nodded their assent. One, a factory manager who recently turned down a position in Siberia because of the distance from his elderly mother, loudly proclaimed that sanctions are unwarranted. Soon the conversation moved on to other topics. The next day, Russian President Vladimir Putin celebrated his conquest by appearing at a Victory Day celebration (officially commemorating the Soviet defeat of Nazi Germany) in Sevastopol, the Crimean port that had housed Russia’s Black Sea fleet under a lease agreement with Ukraine
until last month, when the tenant ousted the landlord. On Sunday, the day after I returned to the States, Russian-backed militants in eastern Ukraine held a plebiscite in which they claimed an overwhelming mandate to seek something, though it is unclear exactly what. In the city of Donetsk, rebel leaders reportedly called yesterday for union with Russia. Putin’s government stopped short of endorsing the call but demanded that Kiev enter into negotiations with the militants. The situation is reminiscent of Germany’s treatment of Czechoslovakia in the run-up to World War II. After British and French leaders acquiesced to his seizure of the largely German-speaking Sudetenland in 1938, Hitler sent his army into what remained of the neighboring state just a few months later. He declared the creation of a German “protectorate” of Bohemia and Moravia, while other parts of the country were seized by Hungary and Poland. The little that was left became the German-aligned Slovak State. Putin has now absorbed Crimea, sent Russian special forces into eastern Ukraine and repeatedly massed his army on Ukraine’s borders, all to keep his neighbor, or as much of it as possible, in Russia’s political and economic orbit. All of this is in direct contravention of a 1997 agreement in which Russia, along with the United States and the United Kingdom, pledged to respect and
protect Ukraine’s borders in exchange for the country’s handover of the nuclear arms that it inherited after the Soviet Union’s collapse. In Crimea and again in eastern Ukraine, one of the first measures taken under Russian influence has been to shut down outside news outlets and replace them with Kremlin-backed mouthpieces. This mirrors developments in Russia itself, where Putin has consolidated state control over the media and the Internet, as well as the courts and virtually every other organ of government power. Like the plant manager I met in Brazil, many Western business leaders want to proceed as though nothing has changed. Paper is not exactly a strategic industry, and a Western company’s investment in a Siberian mill that produces pulp for export to China is not obviously a matter of national security. But any investment, even a paper mill, in Putin’s Russia is a source of graft and power for officials who owe their positions to Putin, and thus helps strengthen his hold on power. Such investments also promise to become headaches for their Western owners should they ever need to rely on Russian courts or officials, neither of whom are constrained by the rule of law as we understand it. Whether we choose to face it or not, the Cold War is back. Some might argue that it never truly left, just as some posit that the two World Wars were one prolonged conflict with a 21-year hiatus in the middle. I think this, too, is a fair observation, because even in the optimistic decade of the 1990s, Russia was a violent, corrupt, lawless society where
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we did, it was only because we were willing to shoulder the costs and the risks of confronting Russian aggression and to forego economic opportunities in the meantime. Russia is no match for the West, either economically or militarily, but this only matters if the West is ready to draw and, more
importantly, to enforce some red lines to constrain Putin’s aggression.
Larry M. Elkin, CPA, CFP®, has provided personal financial and tax counseling to a sophisticated client base since 1986. After six years with Arthur Andersen, where he
was a senior manager for personal financial planning and family wealth planning, he founded his own firm in Hastings on Hudson, N.Y., in 1992. That firm grew steadily and became the Palisades Hudson organization, which moved to Scarsdale, N.Y., in 2002. The firm expanded to Fort Lauderdale, Fla., in 2005 and to Atlanta in 2008.
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Nigerian ‘Sex-Slaves’ Disrupt Obama Narrative on Islam By RAYMOND IBRAHIM Islamic law permits the possession of concubines, or sex slaves. This has been demonstrated countless times, including through Islamic clerics quoting Islamic scriptures, and through ordinary Muslims, past and present, acting on it. That said, Islamic sanctioned sex-slavery does not perturb the Western world simply because the powers-that-be-specifically academia, media, and government-ignore it, and all other unsavory phenomena associated with Islam, out of existence. Interesting, therefore, are the responses from the authorities-comical one might even say-when one of these everyday anecdotes actually does surface to the general public. Enter the recent abduction of nearly 300, mostly Christian, teenage schoolgirls in Nigeria at the hands of Boko Haram, yet another Islamic terrorist organization plaguing mankind. As expected, the group justified its actions in Islamic terms, with its leader declaring on video, “I abducted your girls. I will sell them on the market, by Allah….There is a market for selling humans. Allah says I should sell.” Of course, for those in the know, none of this is surprising. In March 2012, Boko Haram warned that it would do just this, declaring that it was preparing to “strike fear into the Christians of the power of Islam by kidnapping their women.” Moreover, of all the human rights abuses I catalog in Crucified Again: Exposing Islam’s New War on Christians-and these are depressingly many-Boko Haram’s has resulted in more Christians killed than in the rest of the world combined. The group has bombed or burned hundreds of Christian churches in the last several years, most when packed for service, including on Christmas Day and Easter Day, leaving countless worshippers dead or dismembered. In its bid to cleanse northern
Nigeria of all Christian presence-a repeatedly stated goal-it has threatened to poison the food eaten by Christians and stormed areas where Christians and Muslims were intermingled, singling the Christians out before slitting their throats. Go to my monthly “Muslim Persecution of Christians”series (currently 31 in all), and see the innumerable atrocities that Boko Haram has been responsible for in the last two-anda-half years-many of which make the recent Nigerian girls’ abduction pale in comparison. The real news here is that the socalled mainstream media, which generally downplays or ignores Boko Haram’s terror campaign (see here for example), actually reported on this particular atrocity, prompting both Western and Muslim authorities-who are much more accustomed to, and comfortable with, pretending these sorts of things don’t exist-to respond in awkward, hypocritical and, in a word, foolish, ways. Thus, Secretary of State John Kerry said the U.S. had been in touch with Nigeria “from day one” of the crisis. But repeated offers of U.S. assistance were ignored until Kerry got on the phone Tuesday with [Nigerian president] Jonathan amid growing international concern and outrage over the fate of the girls in the weeks since their abduction…. “I think now the complications that have
arisen have convinced everybody that there needs to be a greater effort,” Kerry said at a State Department news conference. “And it will begin immediately. I mean, literally, immediately.” “Convinced everybody”? Is Kerry referring to himself? After all, there might not have been any need for “greater effort,” the need to act “immediately. I mean, literally, immediately” had Kerry only let the Nigerian president and government do their job one year ago, when they were waging a particularly strong offensive against Boko Haram in the very same region that the schoolgirls were recently kidnapped. Back then, in May 2013, soon after Nigerian forces killed 30 Boko Haram members, Reuters reported that “U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry issued a strongly worded statement [to the Nigerian president] saying: “We are … deeply concerned by credible allegations that Nigerian security forces are committing gross human rights violations, which, in turn, only escalate the violence and fuel extremism” from Boko Haram. Perhaps this sheds more light on why “repeated offers of U.S. assistance [regarding the kidnapped girls] were ignored” by Nigeria, “until Kerry got on the phone” (whatever that
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Nigerian ‘Sex-Slaves’ Disrupt Obama Narrative on Islam Continued from page 11 means). As for Kerry’s predecessor, Hillary Clinton, who is now bemoaning the lot of the kidnapped girls in Nigeria-saying it’s “abominable, it’s criminal, it’s an act of terrorism and it really merits the fullest response possible”-when she was Secretary of State, and in a position to help offer “the fullest response possible” she repeatedly refused to designate Boko Haram as a “foreign terrorist organizations,” despite the countless atrocities it had already committed, despite the fact that it had boasted it would “strike fear into the Christians of the power of Islam by kidnapping their women,” as it just has, and despite urging from the CIA, FBI, Justice Department, and several congressmen and senators.
Just like the Obama administration has been a thorn in Egypt’s war with the Muslim Brotherhood, so too has it been a thorn in Nigeria’s war with Boko Haram
Her logic was once voiced by her husband, former U.S. president Bill Clinton. Back in February 2012, in a speech in Nigeria, Clinton declared that “inequality” and “poverty” are “what’s fueling all this stuff”-a reference to Boko Haram’s terror-and warned the government that “It is almost impossible to cure a problem based on violence with violence”-a precursor to Kerry’s May 2013 condemnation of the Nigerian government’s tough offensive against Boko Haram, which would supposedly “only escalate the violence and fuel extremism.” In short, just like the Obama administration has been a thorn in Egypt’s war with the Muslim Brotherhood, so too has it been a thorn in Nigeria’s war with Boko Haram-despite all its current handwringing and “outrage” over this latest-that is, known-atrocity. As for the “Islam”aspect of Boko Haram’s violence and Christian persecution, needless to say the Obama administration rejects it outright. Thus, after the 2012 Easter Day church bombings by Boko Haram that killed dozens of worshippers, U.S. Secretary of State for African Affairs Johnnie Carson was quick to insist that “religion is not driving extremist
violence”-or, in the aforementioned words of Bill Clinton, “inequality” and “poverty” are “what’s fueling all this stuff.” Still, because this latest kidnapping anecdote has received sufficient media attention, including in the Arab and Muslim worlds, some Muslim leaders have been forced out of their comfort zone to respond. Thus, Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayib, the Grand Sheikh of Egypt’s Al Azhar-regularly touted as the Muslim world’s most prestigious institution of Islamic learning-was quick to condemn Boko Haram’s actions of kidnapping and selling “infidel” women, saying, “these actions have no connection to the tolerant and noble teachings of Islam.” As for Egypt’s minister of endowments, Dr. Muhammad Mukhtar al-Gum’a, he too released a statement saying that “the terrorist deeds of Boko Haram have nothing to do with Islam, especially this latest deed of kidnapping girls. Instead, they are terroristic, criminal actions, and Islam is clean of them.” He then went into White House spokesperson mode, saying that poverty, economics, and the rest were the true motivators for Boko Haram’s savagery.
One can sympathize with Egypt’s state sheikhs-after all, they are busy fighting their own brand of Islam misunderstanders, the Muslim Brotherhood and their fellow ideologues, who have been abducting male Coptic Christians for ransom and females for sexual abuse, slavery, and/or conversion to Islam. Happily for these moderate clerics, few are openly challenging their assertions that Islam is clean of Boko Haram’s actions. Based on precedent, they often have no response and can become hostile. For example, some years back, when Sheikh Gamal Qutb, a one-time Grand Mufti of Al Azhar, was asked on live Arabiclanguage TV if Islam permits sex slaves, he refused to give a direct answer, preferring to prevaricate. When pressed for a clear answer by the Muslim female host, he became hostile and stormed off the set. He eventually returned, only to be implored again by the host, who said, “Ninety percent of Muslims, including myself, do not understand the issue of sex slavery in Islam and are having a hard time swallowing it,” to which he gruffly responded, “You don’t need to understand!” And there you have it. From Obama administration officials who helped empower Nigeria’s Islamic terrorists, only to wring their hands and feign outrage at their behavior, to Islamic clerics who confidently dispel
accusations against Islam, only to put their heads in the sand and hope no one calls them out-here is just a small example of what officialdom would have to deal with if the full totality of crimes committed in the name of Islam were to become common knowledge.
and years, many human and political tragedies will divert attention away from the Palestinian issue. Significantly, the Palestinians have no impact on truly important strategic issue such as nuclear proliferation or energy that might galvanize powerful states into action. Once, they were an important actor in international terrorism. This is no longer true. Nowadays, Palestinians are very dependent upon international aid. Rocking the boat by using too much violence threatens the livelihood of Palestinians receiving the Palestinian Authority’s salaries and benefits, and risks Israel’s strong retaliation. Simply put, the Palestinians have only limited international leverage and are vulnerable to Israel’s potentially harmful countermeasures. Moreover, the Palestinians have an excellent record of shooting themselves in the foot. The unity agreement between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas is the latest example of this. Whatever some experts say, Israel is not isolated in the international community. Israel is a strong country, possessing a remarkable web of international interactions. Significantly, Israel’s relations with the world are only marginally affected by its conflict with the Palestinians.
The political actors most obsessed with the Palestinian issue, the Israeli political Left and the Europeans, are in decline. The Oslo process, with which the Israeli Left was associated, has failed, delegitimizing its initiators. Europe and the euro zone are facing acute problems, further reducing their limited ability to be true strategic actors. The ability of these weakened political actors to push the Palestinian issue to the top of the international agenda has become increasingly curtailed. Contemporary international circumstances could lead to further marginalization of the Palestinian issue. Israelis, like many misguided Westerners, too often succumb to counterproductive hyper-activism. Doing almost nothing might bring about better results than activating unilateral plans of all kinds. First published Israel Hayom on May 15, 2014 http://www.meforum.org/3820/ palestinian-israeli-talks-collapse
Raymond Ibrahim, author of Crucified Again:
Exposing Islam’s New War on Christians (Regnery, April, 2013) is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and an Associate Fellow at the Middle East Forum. First published by Human Events on May 15, 2014. http://www.meforum.org/3822/ nigerian-sex-slaves-disrupt-obama-narrativeon
MIDDLE EAST FORUM
Let’s Do Almost Nothing By EFRAIM INBAR Now that the IsraeliPalestinian peace negotiations have ended in failure, many suggest taking advantage of the political limbo to advance their preferred unilateral plans. The Israeli political right wing is promoting the annexation of Area C, while the left wing is advocating a “coordinated” (whatever that means) unilateral withdrawal. Government officials have spoken about the need for Israel to “do something.” Others suggest negotiating with the Quartet, instead of the Palestinians. Activism is unquestionably a trait that is admired in Israel. Zionist-rooted rhetoric such as “we have to determine our borders and destiny on our own” falls on receptive ears. However, probably the wisest course of action for Israel is a patient and cautious “wait and see” approach. Resolving the conflict is impossible, but attempting to manage it -- minimizing the suffering to both sides as well as the diplomatic costs to Israel -- is within reach.
Kerry’s initiative has indeed ended in failure. But the sky has not fallen. There is no sense of alarm or fear of a great impending crisis in the region or elsewhere in the world. Pressure on Israel to change the status quo is unlikely. Actually, it serves Israel’s interests to keep the status quo to hold on to its bargaining cards. The assumption that time is running against Israel is simply wrong. As a matter of fact, the Palestinian issue is likely to become less salient in the international arena over time. After the Kerry debacle, Washington is left counting an additional foreign policy failure, trying to digest what happened and pondering how to proceed. Its current instinct is to stay away from interventionist initiatives. The U.S., drained by two wars (Afghanistan and Iraq) and blessed with new energy finds, does not want to get dragged into further conflicts in a Middle East that seems less central to its interests. So the Obama administration may be less inclined to intervene in the intractable Israeli-Palestinian conflict than ever before. Even if the U.S. obsession about Palestinian
statehood persists for some reason, it is still better for Israel to wait and learn Washington’s next moves before devising an adequate response. Moreover, in light of America’s great importance to Israel, uncoordinated unilateral steps by Israel on the West Bank are not advisable. Israeli statements expressing a commitment to future peace negotiations, coupled with restraint in building beyond the settlement blocs, might be enough to keep America at bay and reluctant to intervene. The U.S. is also unlikely to be confronted with Arab pressure to focus on the Palestinian issue if Israel does not engage in drastic steps. The Arab world is undergoing a tremendously difficult economic and sociopolitical crisis and is busy dealing with domestic problems. Moreover, the Iranian nuclear threat continues to be the most urgent foreign policy issue, putting most Sunni states in the same strategic boat with Israel. Even the Palestinians do not take Arab lip service on their behalf seriously. In all probability, most countries of the world can also live with an unresolved Palestinian issue. There are many simmering territorial conflicts all over the world. Nowadays, Crimea and eastern Ukraine dominate the news. In the coming months
Efraim Inbar is director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, a political studies professor at Bar-Ilan University, and a fellow at the Middle East Forum.
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Page 13
GovernmentSection politics
The President Comes to Westchester and Snubs the County Executive By NANCY KING With the backdrop of the aging Tappan Zee Bridge behind him, President Barack Obama came to Westchester to ask Congress to free up funds to ameliorate an aging infrastructure. Three years ago, many of the same people in media stood on the pavement of a hot parking lot in Tarrytown, where County Executive Rob Astorino and members of a state delegation called for the replacement of the aging bridge. The bridge itself was built in the late 1940’s and was never meant to carry the 140,000 vehicles a day it does today. On a daily basis there are at least 200 DPW workers who work to maintain the bridge. With Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx in attendance, President Obama chastised Republican members of Congress that if they didn’t free up some federal monies by the end of the summer “the cupboard would be bare”. No money would mean no capital improvement projects and no job creation either. Giving a shout out to Congresswoman Nita Lowey for helping to secure funding for the initial phase of the bridge project, President Obama also thanked other Democratic elected officials in attendance for their hard work in both Washington and Albany. But with the Governor’s chair up for grabs this coming November, one individual noticeably snubbed by the President and incumbent Governor Andrew Cuomo was Westchester County Executive and Republican gubernatorial designee Rob Astorino. Astorino, who had complained earlier in the week about the delay in receiving an invitation arrived at the event with his wife Sheila only to recognize that he not only wasn’t mentioned but he didn’t have a seat either. County Executive Astorino stood in the back of the patio, unmentioned and alone. Astorino had hoped to talk with the President about HUD, affordable housing and other issues but instead, on the eve of receiving the Republican nomination for Governor of New York State, he was just another face in the crowd. Later that evening, Astorino
commented that he wasn’t snubbed by the President but by Governor Andrew Cuomo and his top aide former Deputy County Executive Larry Schwartz. Maybe so, but if this is an indication of the race that is to come it is going to get ugly real fast. Nonetheless, snubbing Astorino made both the Governor and the President look like they were playing nothing more than a game of petty politics.
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Page 14
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
PUBLIC POLICY
The Minimum Wage is Not a Partisan Issue By Dr. OREN LEVIN-WALDMAN When it comes to the minimum wage some things just never change. As it has in the past, the proposal to raise the minimum wage divides along partisan lines with Democrats supporting it and Republicans opposing it. Again, Senate Republicans demonstrated that they never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity when they blocked a vote on the measure through filibuster. It is ironic that the party that accuses the Democrats of sabotaging economic performance through heavy handed regulation and confiscatory taxation would block the only measure that truly benefits the middle class. The minimum wage should not be a partisan issue, rather it should be viewed as a measure designed to help the middle class. Contrary to the standard bromides that it will either cost jobs and that only teenagers earn the minimum wage, the
Piketty-Split
Everyone Is Ganging Up on Tom By Hon. RICHARD BRODSKY Ideas matter. As we wallow in cynicism, Karl Rove and Citizens United, we are occasionally reminded that our political culture is grounded in ideas. It’s been thin soup for a while. For decades, the left seemed bereft of an economic message other than a larger welfare state. The right, at least, offered a paradigm. It abounded in austerity/marketplace nostrums, advanced with a religious fervor and mostly wrong. It hasn’t been a good era for contending ideas about how we manage our economic affairs. Like a bolt from the blue comes Thomas Piketty and his book Capital In The Twenty-First Century. His argument
minimum wage actually has positive welfare benefits. First of all, the data on job loss is ambiguous at best. Older studies have noted that increases in the minimum wage result in lower employment studies among teenagers, but they also note that this is less so among adults. More recent studies actually show that there really have been no employment consequences due to recent increases in the minimum wage. Second of all, most minimum wage earners are not teenagers, but are adults with children. Core issues in the minimum wage tend to be obscured by a singular focus on only those earning the statutory minimum wage. We then lose sight of the fact that less important is the minimum wage itself, but what it represents. That is, it is a reference point for the low wage labor market. This is a critical point because the discussion should be on the effective minimum wage population — those earning in wage ranges around the minimum wage. This was the basis for the CBO concluding in its report a couple of months ago that at least 16 million Americans would get pay raises.
The CBO, however, most likely understated the extent to which the minimum wage would benefit the economy. Data from the Current Population Survey from 1962 to 2008 show visible benefits when income ranges starting with the statutory minimum wage are created. This data showed that when 10 such intervals were created, beginning with the minimum wage in each year, and ranging 25 percent, these 10 intervals actually constituted 70 percent of the labor market by 2008. In each year that the minimum wage increased, so too did the median wages in each of those intervals. And in years when there was no increase, median wages in each interval remained flat. That the median wages for up to 70 percent of the labor market were increasing only suggests that the minimum wage is really about the middle class. Surely, most of the political opposition to the minimum wage has to stem from the fact that employers will feel compelled to give other workers pay increases. Otherwise, why would an issue that, according to most conservatives,
only affects a fraction of the labor market, elicit such a firestorm of opposition? Are we really to believe that they care about employment? If employment were really the concern, then why don’t the same voices react strongly every time the Fed raises interest rates? That too cost jobs. Arguments about employment consequences are nothing more than cover for the real concern, which is employers may be compelled to give others pay raises too. And yet, it ought to be evident to most that workers earning more will be of greater benefit to the economy because their enhanced purchasing power enables them to demand more goods and services in the aggregate. Demand for goods and services is what drives the economy; not the creation of low-wage jobs where workers cannot support themselves and, because they cannot, society is forced to subsidize their low wages through various assistance programs and income supports. By focusing on the same minimum wage bromides which have drawn partisan
(roughly) is that income inequality is the great danger, especially when caused by inheritance, and that a global tax on wealth is the remedy. Put aside the merits and demerits of his ideas. There is plenty to question about the economic and political realities that stand in the way of adopting the Pikettian agenda. It’s the reaction of conventional left and right that is most instructive. In both cases, there is much harumphing about the label and consequences of Pikettianism. The right, sadly and predictably, play the Red card, with the American Enterprise Institute accusing him of “soft Marxism.” Fox News’ Charles Gasparino advances the intellectual argument by calling the book an “open sore.” The left is more polite but no more on point. The usually incisive Bob Kuttner of the American Prospect fears that if the beknighted working class ever finds out about Pikettnish ideas they will respond
with “passivity and resignation.” Dean Baker of the Center For Economic And Policy Research similarly fears the consequences of reading a book that will drive “many people back to their vacation homes.” (Whether this involves workingclass people with vacation homes or some wider set of participants is unclear.) Come on, boys, the trick is to know when the revolution is actually showing up. It wasn’t Ayn Rand, and it wasn’t Occupy Wall Street and it certainly wasn’t Obama. The Pikettonian uprising is the real deal. It has changed the paradigm, the structure and content of the international debate about economics and politics. The moving hand has writ and “nor all your piety nor wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line.” A great book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn, postulates that change comes when the existing existential paradigm becomes so riddled with holes that it no longer serves, and, bang, a
new one replaces it.That’s what’s happened. The Pikettolish model explains why we have moved to a level of income inequality unheard of since the French Revolution, why it’s unsustainable, and what we could do about it. The new intellectual paradigm will shortly give way to new political efforts. Goombye welfare state and Goombye supply-side economics. A paradigm shift does not mean a smooth transition to specific proposals. There are enormous political obstacles to enactment of the Picklettian solutions, as New York’s James Wetzler points out in today’s Times. But the debate has been forever transformed. Once we focus on the consequences of huge concentrations of capital, the ingenuity of human politics will address the mechanics of change, and fairly quickly. Adam Smith’s ideas led to the 19th century transformation of law and economics that created the industrial revolution.
battle lines, the Republicans have only handed the Democrats an issue that they can use in the 2014 midterm elections. And yet, if the Democrats don’t move away from their traditional presentation of the minimum wage as an anti-poverty issue and begin to couch it as a middle class issue, they too will miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. The minimum wage really should not be a partisan issue, rather it should be about shoring up the middle class and doing what is right for the economy. Oren Levin-Waldman is professor of public policy in the School for Public Affairs at Metropolitan College of New York (olevinwaldman@metropolitan.edu ) and author of several books on wage policy. They include the just published: Wage Policy, Income Distribution and Democratic Theory (http:// www.routledge.com/books/details/978041 5779715/#reviews); The Political Economy of the Living Wage: A Study of Four Cities (M.E. Sharpe 2005); and The Case of the Minimum Wage: Competing Policy Models (SUNY Press 2001). He is a researcher for the Employment Policy Research Network (EPRN), and some of his work can be found at http://www.employmentpolicy.org/people/ oren-levin-waldman.
The ideas of Marx and Jefferson gave rise to the ameliorative actions of the welfare state in the 20th century. Pikettology will give rise to... something. I spent a long time in elected office. In all that time, I saw the power of money, the venality of politics, and the limitations of government. I also saw how, in the end, the power of ideas inevitably molded the outcome of political machinations. We should be greeting Pikettism with hosannas and joy. We can again begin to sort out our affairs based on competing ideas, critiques and proposals. Politicians and intellectuals of the world, unite. You have nothing to lose but your chains. First published in the Huffington Post on May 14, 2014 Richard Brodsky is a fellow at the Demos think tank in New York City and at the Wagner School at New York University. Follow Richard Brodsky on Twitter: www. twitter.com/richardbrodsky
Localities, “Laboratories of Democracy,” and the Minimum Wage By Dr. OREN LEVIN-WALDMAN Justice Louis Brandeis once referred to states as the laboratories of democracy. The idea was that policies first tried out at the state level, after initial testing
and evaluation, might then be expanded to the federal level. In an era where more power and authority are centralized in the federal government, it is important to remember that local government serves an important and valuable function. All too often, however, we see states, and even localities stepping up to the plate only when
the federal government has failed to act. This is clearly the case with the minimum wage. Several states as of the beginning of 2014 have already either enacted a minimum wage or raised their minimum wages. We are also beginning to see more local governments take the lead on the minimum wage. In New York
State, several localities have petitioned the state legislature for permission to enact minimum wages that would be appropriate for their respective communities. New York City’s new mayor, Bill, De Blasio similarly intends to seek Albany’s permission to create a citywide minimum wage for New York City.
For guidance, these communities and other local communities looking to adopt their own minimum wages need look no further than San Francisco and San Diego. San Francisco has had its own minimum wage for several years now. The conventional wisdom holds that states and localities enacting their own minimum
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Page 15
PUBLIC POLICY
Localities, “Laboratories of Democracy,” and the Minimum Wage wages are playing Russian roulette with their economies because firms can move across either state or local boundary lines. But economists at the University of California at Berkeley have found the San Francisco minimum not to have the economic consequences long predicted by the standard model. As of January 1st, San Francisco has the highest wage at $10.55 an hour. Moreover, there is broad support in favor of raising it to $15.00 an hour, and labor activists are poised to put it on the ballot for voters to decide the issue. In San Diego, Mayor Todd Gloria proposed a ballot initiative that would raise the minimum wage to $13.09 over three years, with the argument that entire local economy will benefit. That more communities are taking the lead on this issue at a minimum underscores the inadequacy of the federal minimum that is still $7.25. But it also demonstrates that cities are prepared to consider policies that are specifically suitable to their own needs, most notably their respective communities’ higher costs of living. This is clearly the case with both San Francisco and San Diego in a state that just raised its statewide minimum to $9.00 an hour. It also demonstrates that localities are willing to take the lead and adopt bold measures at a time similar measures stall in the halls of the U.S. Congress. For decades, the issue of the minimum wage has been mired in partisan politics where each side of
the debate couches it in terms of their own ideological biases. Conservatives typically focus on disemployment effects specifically among teenagers without considering any wider benefits to the larger economy. Meanwhile, liberals see it as an issue that helps the working poor, again neglecting to mention benefits to the broader middle class. Increasingly, economists are coming to the conclusion that the data we have on the minimum wage is ambiguous at best. This ambiguity should be a basis for policy experimentation, and localities are now taking the lead. According to data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey, the median hourly wage for full time workers in 2013 was $19.23 for both the U.S. as a whole and the state of California. Even assuming that the median wage might represent a tipping point — the point at which any minimum above would start to bite — it is probably safe to infer that a minimum wage at $15.00 an hour is still going to be below a market clearing wage, and all the more so with a $13.00 an hour wage. And yet, the benefits to local communities could be enormous. The recent report of the Congressional Budget Office made it clear that at least sixteen million American workers would get a pay raise. When we consider that those earning in wage intervals above the statutory minimum will also get a raise, it isn’t hard to see how the benefits will trickle up the
wage distribution into the broader middle class. Higher incomes will enable people to spend more, thereby increasing demand for goods and services, which can only help the economy grow. Local communities, especially the larger cities, will also benefit because, as they are on the front lines of income inequality, the minimum wage will reduce wage inequality. That is, if wages rise at a higher percentage among the bottom than among the top, wage inequality will be reduced without having to resort to confiscatory taxation. But to the extent that rising wages help shore up the middle class, it too pushes back against rising income inequality. It is good to remember that income inequality isn’t bad per se, rather it is increasing income inequality that is the problem and that it represents the shrinkage of the middle class. Local communities taking the lead on this issue only brings back to life Brandeis’s famous expression of states as laboratories of democracy. This idea certainly applied to localities, where the Framers of the Constitution believed democracy would have its fullest expression. That there have been no adverse effects in localities where borders are porous, suggests that the minimum wage is a viable policy at the national level.
the just published: Wage Policy, Income Distribution and Democratic Theory (http:// www.routledge.com/books/details/978041 5779715/#reviews); The Political Economy of the Living Wage: A Study of Four Cities (M.E. Sharpe 2005); and The Case of the Minimum Wage: Competing Policy Models
(SUNY Press 2001). He is a researcher for the Employment Policy Research Network (EPRN), and some of his work can be found at http://www.employmentpolicy.org/people/ oren-levin-waldman.
Oren Levin-Waldman is professor of public policy in the School for Public Affairs at Metropolitan College of New York (olevinwaldman@metropolitan.edu ) and author of several books on wage policy. They include
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Page 16
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
PUBLIC POLICY
Fighting Wage Theft in the Fast Food Industry By ERIC SCHNEIDERMAN On Thursday, fast-food workers around the world will stage an unprecedented protest for fair wages. They will be speaking out against income inequality -- and the world would do well to listen. Income inequality is one of the most destructive forces in the United States today. Minimum-wage workers devastated by the economic crash of 2008 have continued to languish in poverty while the subsequent recovery has sent executive compensation soaring. Nowhere is the disparity starker than in the fast-food industry, which a recent Demos report called the most unequal sector in the U.S. economy. It has some of America’s lowest-paid workers -- but its top executives make 1,200 times more than their average employees, according to Demos. Nationally, the average hourly wage for a fast-food worker is about $9 per hour, $4,500 less
than the federal government’s poverty level threshold of $23,500 for a family of four. While the industry takes in $200 billion a year, the average fast-food worker in New York City earns just $11,000 annually.
No wonder demonstrations against this gross injustice began in New York, with walkouts at 60 fast-food restaurants in November 2012. Since then, the movement has
grown into a nationwide crusade. While the federal minimum wage has been stuck at $7.25 on the federal level since 2007 and is $8 per hour here in New York, the average salary for fastfood CEOs has quadrupled since 2000. Thursday’s protest promises to be the largest yet. Workers in 150 U.S. cities will join to demonstrate in favor of increasing the minimum wage. Around
cannot wait for Congress to act -- or accept $10.10, which would still leave a family of four in poverty. They’re demanding $15 an hour -- the reason this week’s protests are taking place on the 15th of May. They are also demanding that employers respect their right to unionize without retaliation. As New York State attorney general, it is my job to ensure equal justice under law. The income inequality plaguing our country is an injustice of enormous magnitude that must be remedied. I stand firmly behind the fast-food workers’
the world, workers in 30 countries on six continents will join the call for action on equality. As the movement has grown, the nation has been forced to sit up and take notice. President Obama heard the workers’ cries and has urged an increase in the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour. But the nation’s fast-food workers
calls for a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work. While we move toward enacting new, fairer laws, however, we must also make sure that current labor protections are enforced. As the state’s chief law enforcement officer, I take that responsibility very seriously, and my office has taken strong action against employers -- including in the fast-food industry -who have stolen from their workers even the meager wages required by law. In New York, we are cracking down on fast food franchise owners who cheat their workers. In recent months, we have secured close to $1 million in
got her out, to a waiting ambulance (she is fine now), immediately grabbed hoses and gear, and went back in to fight the fire. Before they had a chance to climb up to the second story, there was a tremendous explosion upstairs that blew out windows, partly collapsed the entire structure, and knocked them to the ground. This was recently confirmed to be a backdraft (or smoke) explosion. They quickly left the building, intent on fighting the fire now from the outside. (If the female resident of that unit had not been rescued when she had been, three minutes later the explosion or the subsequent raging fire would have undoubtedly taken her life.) The explosion expelled debris so powerfully that a hunk smashed into our Hook and Ladder. I visited later
that day and saw the sizable dent in the side of the cabin - about what you would expect to see if a bowling ball was propelled against the vehicle, breaking the window and deforming the side. Should someone have been in the way of that projectile, it wouldn’t have ended well. For the next five hours, all units from our Fire Department, managed ably by Chief Martin Gunther and later by Chief Russak, fought the fire and prevented it from spreading to other units. The crews displayed their training, cooperation, cool under pressure and brave throughout the entire engagement. You have to remember one thing: each and every one of our Fire Department members are volunteers every single one of them. They are your neighbors and fellow residents. They
back pay for about 2,200 Domino’s and McDonald’s workers across the state. We must do all we can to make sure working people in New York get every penny they earn. And then, support them in their campaign to increase those earnings. America’s fast-food workers know they cannot wait for the government or industry to do the right thing and pay them a wage they can live on. These are not teenagers working a few hours a week for pocket change; these are heads of household trying to pay the bills and feed and clothe their families. That’s why they’re taking to the streets. The fast-food industry must act and increase the wages it pays. But until it does, those workers need the support of everyone who believes in fairness and justice. I stand with them in their important struggle. First published in the Huffington Post on May 15, 2014. Eric T. Schneiderman is New York State Attorney General. Follow him on Twitter: www.twitter.com/AGSchneiderman
MESSAGE FROM THE MAYOR
What You May Not Know! By Mayor PETER SWIDERSKI Many of you were aware of the dramatic fire on Wednesday, May 14, 2014, up at the St. Andrew’s condo complex when a fire began inside one of the units there that quickly led to an explosion. What you may not be aware of is the depth of heroism and commitment exhibited by our own Fire Department volunteers who put themselves in harm’s way (an understatement if there ever was one), rescued a resident from certain death, and then fought the fire successfully for hours
Chief Martin Gunther, of the Uniontown Hose Company, was first on scene shortly after a call at 8:19 in his chief vehicle. He identified the scope of the fire and called for assistance. Five men responded first to the fire, when most of us were either on our way or already at our day jobs. Captain Robert Gagliardi, firefighters Brendan Woods, Brian Woods J.P. Esposito, and Jay Aluiso were there in a matter of minutes. There was a small but smoky “active” fire in one of the units, and Chief Gunther had identified that the resident was home. Entering the condo, they heard her trapped in an elevator. They set immediately to freeing her as the apartment filled with smoke. They
have jobs and families and lives like all of us, except that on a daily basis, when that horn blasts five times and their radios come to life, they may rush off to the call, Almost always, they encounter a false alarm or something benign. But sometimes, entire unpredictably, there’s something for real, a resident stuck in an elevator while the house burns around her, billowing smoke, explosions, and then its not a false alarm but very much the real thing and they do what they are trained for, unflinchingly, and into the maw they go. If you think about it for more than a second, its astonishing and humbling. It’s enough to make you weep in pride and gratitude. Peter Swiderski is the mayor of the Village of Hastings-on-Hudson.
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Page 17
GOVERNMENT
Town of Ossining Supervisor Update State of the Town of Ossining By SUSANNE DONNELLY TOWN OF OSSINING, NY – May 16, 2014 -- What a wonderful year 2013 was for the Town of Ossining. We accomplished so much while watching every penny, and the results show it. It could never have happened without the support and hard work of every employee of the Town. Each Teamster, CSEA member, Department Head (including all who are part of our team through Intermunicipal agreements) and member of the Administration and Town Board deserve credit for this accomplishment. With everyone working together, we have brought the Town of Ossining to a place where we all can be proud. Our Fund Balance Amounts, both “unallocated” and “available for use” can be found here. For example, we plan on using the increase in fund balance for the 20 Fund (Unincorporated Area) to pay off the remainder of the “callable” Police Department Bonds over and above the $1,475,000 we received for the building.
This will result in bringing our 20 Fund balance to 2012 levels, still showing a steady increase from 2009. We will have the final spreadsheet as to how we plan to pay off all of the bonds associated with 507 North State Road (our former Police Station) as soon as we close on the bond redemption. We are alerting the bondholders of our intent to redeem the bonds, and should have the process done by the middle of June. We were able to increase the staff in the Parks Department by one full time employee in 2013 and continue that in 2014. We have kept our staff levels consistent in all of the other departments, with the exception of having one floating clerk between the Tax Receiver’s office and the Assessor’s office to replace a Deputy Tax Receiver who retired and worked only in the Tax Office. This allows us to schedule the employee in each department when it is the busiest for that department. As we move into the revaluation / reassessment of every property in the Town of Ossining, this arrangement will be especially helpful in the Assessor’s office as we work to make sure all records and exemptions are updated.
We are looking for Interns (High School or College Students) who have an interest in learning how a municipality works, while helping us learn and implement our new grant program. If you know anyone who is interested please have them send their resume to Maddi Zachacz at MZachacz@townofossining.com .
Intermunicipal Agreements
The majority of the Intermunicipal Agreements the Town of Ossining is part of are with the Village of Ossining. The Town Board and Administration believe that any IMA should be a partnership, not one party dictating the actions of another. We are in the process of reevaluating many of our IMAs, and updating others, in partnership with the Village of Ossining. Currently some of the IMAs in place are for Recreation and Parks (Supervision), Finance (including management of information technology services), Engineering, Clerk Services, Fire Protection (both Villages, Ossining and Briarcliff Manor have IMAs with the Town in this instance), Street Lighting, Yard Waste (including transfer site), Fuel, Distribution of
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Water, Shared Building Space and the Town takes care of Veteran’s Park for the Village of Ossining. These are all great examples of what the Governor is encouraging in order to control the cost of layered governments and schools in New York State. The Town and Village of Ossining have
begun meetings to discuss and update each of these IMAs, which has been a goal of the Town for years. Some of these IMAs date back to the 1990s and so much has changed! We will be updating you on the progress of these meetings, as the Town feels it is essential to keep to a constant schedule of updating, reviewing, revising, and in some instances abolishing, these IMAs as necessary. As unfortunate as it may be, some of what goes on in the effort to produce public policy ends up more political than we might hope, with misinformation being shared and a “game of telephone” that often has very high risks. However, please remember the commitment we (the Town Board and Administration)
Continued on page 18
THE ROMA BUILDING
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Page 18
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
GOVERNMENT
Town of Ossining Supervisor Update Continued from page 17
have always given to the residents business owners and employees of the Town- YOU will be involved in any
discussions and be part of the decision making process of any changes made to any department as we move forward. That said, we are in the last stages
of finalizing our RFP (Request for Proposal) for Police Services for the Unincorporated Area, which will be distributed to Westchester County, the Village of Ossining and the Village of Briarcliff Manor when complete. We look forward to the responses, will
discuss the results at our meetings, and will dedicate a Town Hall Meeting to get input from the residents and business owners on how they would like to see these services performed in the next contract.
Susanne Donnelly is supervisor of the Town of Ossining. Direct email to: sdonnelly@townofossining.com
CAMPAIGN FINANCING
Conservative Party Supports Taxpayers Opposes Public Money for Campaigns BROOKLYN, NY—The New York State Conservative Party sent the following legislative memo to all of the Members of the Legislature seeking to protect the taxpayers of New York State from the wasteful and often abused system of public financing of campaigns. The proposed bill, S.4705-C/A.4980-E, is favored by Speaker Sheldon Silver, Governor Andrew Cuomo, and the Working Families Party who believe taxpayers should pay $6 for every $1 donated. Conservatives believe New York’s citizens should be able to choose the candidates they want to support. The memo follows: Party Position: The Conservative Party staunchly opposes public monies being used to help elect any elected
official, statewide, state legislative office or as a delegate to a constitutional convention. In September 2011, Jason Farrell published a report for the Center for Competitive Politics that showed how a number of candidates and their associates, in New York City, Maine and Arizona willfully abuse the campaign finance system, exploit loopholes ensuring they can keep much of their donation money off the books, and once in office, often further abuse public funds and even find themselves under investigation for criminal conduct. The abuse of public funds is so severe and the record of corrupt practices and other misdeeds are so rampant, particularly in the city of New York (emphasis added), that such
a system cannot possibly live up to the “clean” moniker that has been assigned to it by proponents. In fact, the NYC Campaign Finance Board, in a 2003 report lamented it had come up short in its goals, and that was long before the Data and Field Services Scandal of 2009 which was four years after the CFB investigated the well documented New York’s Health and Human Services Union, 1199/SEIU, AFL-CIO involvement with Fernando Ferrer’s 2005 mayoral campaign. The full report is here. Note that in the 10 years the report covers, public funds granted to “clean elections” candidates who were investigated for abuses was $13,924,189. That amount is on the total for those investigated for abuses, not
the total amount of taxpayer dollars used to fund New York City elections. More abuses of campaign financing are being exposed; they include the use of straw donors, attempting to bribe their way on to the ballot and fraudulently increasing campaign contributions to gain grants. Public funding of campaigns only
serves candidates and does nothing to help the citizens whose money is procured by taxes. It does not level the playing field, and it certainly does not provide a benefit to New York’s citizens forced to support candidates they would not vote into office. As Unshackle Upstate notes in their position paper, a 1995 state Court of Appeals decision concluded that public funds for partisan political purposes is not supported in the New York State Constitution. As a reminder, the Conservative Party’s executive committee passed a resolution in January, 2014, to double rate any bill that contains any form of campaign financing and we urge you to vote NO on this and similar proposals. SOURCE: Conservative Party of New York State. Lear more:
MAYOR Marvin’s COLUMN GOVERNMENT
Saying, “Thank You!” By Hon. MARY C. MARVIN After enjoying a very special three generation Mother’s Day on Sunday, the whole concept and origin of the celebration piqued my interest and lead to fascinating discoveries. Throughout history, mothers have been honored as goddesses or through festivals of celebration, usually in the springtime, recognizing the rebirth of the land and the beginning of the most fertile time of year. The “modern” version of Mother’s Day is traced to 17th century England when the fourth Sunday of Lent was so named “Mothering Sunday”. Rules about fasting and penance were suspended and grown children were given
the day off from their jobs, often as tradesmen or domestics in other towns, to return home. They traditionally brought treats of sweets and wild flower bouquets to their mothers. In contrast, the early English settlers in the colonies did not approve of secular holidays and “Mothering Sunday” did not catch on. The American version of Mother’s Day was a very different animal indeed. It was born in the aftermath of the Civil War as a rallying cry for women worldwide to oppose war and fight for social justice. Julia Ward Howe, a Boston poet and author of the “Battle Hymn of the Republic”, wrote a poem in 1870 entitled, “A Mother’s Day Proclamation” with the opening line, “Arise then women of thy day” and ended with, “We, the women of
one country will be too tender of those of another country to allow our sons to be trained to injure others.” Howe was then also a well-known abolitionist who was still grieving over the losses in the Civil War and now angry at the Franco-Prussian War. She had her poem translated into many languages and spent two full years travelling the globe rallying the world’s women to rise up and unite for peace. Because of Ms. Howe, many New England communities organized Mother’s Day gatherings that were grounded in faith, feminism and protest – a far cry from Hallmark, brunch and carnations. In a parallel effort, Ann Reeves Jarvis, a West Virginian Methodist and social activist, organized Mother’s Day Work Clubs in hopes of educating poor women about health and hygiene. In homage to her work, Jarvis’ daughter, Anna, devoted much of her
adult life to have Mother’s Day declared a national holiday. On May 10, 1908, the first religious service for Mother’s Day was held in Jarvis’ home church in Grafton, West Virginia, followed by an afternoon service in her daughter’s church in Philadelphia. Anna Jarvis sent 500 carnations to the West Virginia church, thus creating a now long standing tradition of flower gifts. Finally, in 1914, President Woodrow Wilson made the holiday official by declaring the second Sunday in May, Mother’s Day. However, after seeing her day turn into a commercial goldmine, Ms. Jarvis called for a boycott of the day she inspired. Father’s Day did not have roots of peace or protest, rather one of fairness. In 1910, after listening to a Mother’s Day sermon, Sonora Dodd of Washington State asked her pastor to also honor her father who was a widow
raising six children on his own. Like Ms. Jarvis, she too spent years promoting it and sought the help of the tobacco and tie industries to advance her cause. The idea did not catch on as many objected to the demonstrated commercialization of the very popular Mother’s Day. Bills were introduced as early as 1913 to make it a national holiday but it only came to fruition in 1972 when President Nixon signed the bill declaring Father’s Day a national holiday. Approximately $20 billion is spent on Mom each year with flowers, candy, perfume and beauty services the most popular gifts. About half as much is spent on Dad with ties, gift cards and automotive accessories the most gifted items. Mother’s Day is the largest card sending holiday, the most popular day of the year to dine out and a quarter of all the flowers sold yearly are purchased
Continued on page 19
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Page 19
MAYOR Marvin’s COLUMN GOVERNMENT
Saying, “Thank You!” Continued from page 18
for Mother’s Day. Why the spending differential? The folks surveyed seem to think the holiday means more to moms than dads. As a caution for our upcoming honor to Dad, on June 15th, the surveys say he does not want that extra tie or dreaded #1
DAD t-shirt, rather dinner, a bar-b-que or a sports or amusement outing. Either day, it is an opportunity to take time out to stop and just say thank you, the nicest tradition of all. Mary C. Marvin is the mayor of the Village of Bronxville, New York. If you have a suggestion or comment, direct your perspective by e-mail to: mayor@vobny.com .
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WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
LE G A L N O T I C E S SPUD HOLDINGS LLC Articles of Org. filed NY Sec. of State (SSNY) 3/31/14 Office in Westchester Co. SSNY design. Agent of LLC upon whom process may be served. SSNY shall mail copy of process to The LLC 27 Country Club LN S Scarborough, NY 10510. Purpose: Any lawful activity.
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COWLES AVENUE LLC Articles of Org. filed NY Sec. of State (SSNY) 4/8/14 Office in Westchester Co. SSNY design. Agent of LLC upon whom process may be served. SSNY shall mail copy of process to The LLC 69 Cowles Ave. Yonkers, NY 10550. Purpose: Any lawful activity. Notice of Formation of Atikin Entertainment LLC. Art. of Org. filed Sec’y of State of NY (SSNY) on 01/22/14. Principal Office: Westchester County. SSNY has been designated as agent of the LLC upon whom process against it may be served. The name and address of the registered agent, upon which process may be served and which will receive copies of service from the SSNY, is: United States Corporation of Agents Inc., 7014 13th Avenue, Brooklyn, NY. Purpose of LLC: any lawful activity. S&G WEALTH MANAGEMENT, LLC Articles of Org. filed NY Sec. of State (SSNY) 4/14/14 Office in Westchester Co. SSNY design. Agent of LLC upon whom process may be served. SSNY shall mail copy of process to C/O Donald Giannattasio Seligson & Giannattasio, LLP 723 North Broadway White Plains, NY 10603. Purpose: Any lawful activity. BELMONT CORONEA LLC Articles of Org. filed NY Sec. of State (SSNY) 5/7/14 Office in Westchester Co. SSNY design. Agent of LLC upon whom process may be served. SSNY shall mail copy of process to The LLC 26 Belmont Ave Yonkers, NY 10704. Purpose: Any lawful activity.
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Page 20
THE WESTCHESTER GUARDIAN
Thursday, May 22, 2014
CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE
Tibetan Medicine in New York City Today By HELEN WEISMAN The Rubin Museum of Art, located at 150 West 17th Street in New York City, is from now through September 8, 2014 presenting an exhibition, Bodies in Balance: The Art of Tibetan Medicine. Tibetan medicine, at this time in history, is one of the most compre-
Medicine Buddha Bhaisajyaguru. hensive medical systems in the world. In fact, there are a number of Tibetan doctors who have been trained in Traditional Tibetan medicine living in the US today, many of whom reside here in NYC. While not accredited by the US health care system, some American doctors do teach about Tibetan medicine and have limited practices as alternative medical practitioners. They can be found by searching the web. Cultural institutions such as Shangshung Institute, or Sorig Institute also represent Tibetan medicine. Both of these institutes are located here in the US. And finally, the Rubin Museum itself has many programs throughout the duration of the Bodies in Balance exhibition in which Tibetan medical doctors participate and share their knowledge with the museum’s visitors. The show focuses on the visual representations of Tibetan medicine beginning with its earliest applications dating back to antiquity to its present place in modern societies. According to Elena Pakhoutova, the Rubin Museum’s Assistant Curator, “We intended to present Tibetan medicine through its visual history as a comprehensive tradition of medical knowledge and practice dating back to over 1,000 years which is
thriving at present and is very relevant to our 21st century visitors.” This exhibition is the first of its kind to examine the principles of Tibetan medicine through its diverse visual history. It does this by illuminating the connections between physician and artist, Buddhist ideas alongside medicine and the visual arts, and healing traditions with present-day ideas of wellbeing. Not only is Bodies in Balance an art show, it is also a hands-on exhibition. In addition to its approximately 140 paintings, manuscripts, sculptures, and works on paper and in wood and metal, there is a pulse station that teaches visitors how to feel their pulse according to Tibetan practice. This is important because pulse taking is a fundamental tool in Tibetan medicine that identifies several characteristics of our mental and physical health. The exhibition also features a multimedia installation that shows the different ways in which Tibetan medicine has thrived and been adapted in today’s world. It does this by displaying medicinal compounds and graphic cards throughout the gallery spaces. These compounds and cards help to decode complex paintings and illustrations, and provide additional details for understanding Tibetan medical concepts and the ingredients in medical compounds. For instance, my favorite part of the exhibition was not the artwork, but rather a little pamphlet with a quiz that was given out for the visitor to fill out in order to determine which of the 3 bodily forces called “nyepas”
body and characterize the individual force or forces that each of us is made of.This practice suggests that through understanding the dominant force or forces of one’s constitution it is possible to make decisions that will help the individual move toward the ideal inner balance. Diet, conduct, medicines, and external therapies are the primary methods used to lower elevated forces and help to achieve that inner balance. However, the artwork in the show itself is spectacular. Amongst the most common and beautiful murals, paintings, and statues are the depictions of the Medicine Buddha. The Medicine Buddha, an immensely popular figure in Tibet is typically shown with blue skin, holding a bowl of healing nectar in one hand, and a fruit or leaf of the cure-all remedy myrobalan plant in the other
Red Wolf-Headed Protectress.
Related to the Medicine Buddha is the treatise about his teachings known as the Four Tantras or Gyushi. Created in the 12th
Detail from an Astrological Scroll.
Great Golden Turtle.
Zombie-Riding Protectress. in the Tibetan language. These “nyepas,” phlegm, wind and bile, according to Tibetan medical knowledge, compose the human
hand. For Tibetan doctors, the Medicine Buddha is the divine source of knowledge for the classical medical text known as the “Four Tantras,” and is a model for a calm demeanor and restorative powers. These qualities are considered essential to the Tibetan healing professions.
century, it describes the interaction between the body and the mind and Buddhism’s 5 cosmological elements and 3 bodily forces. The elements consist of water, fire earth, wind, and space. As mentioned before, the 3 bodily forces, nyepas are comprised of wind, bile, and phlegm. Both elements and forces
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are included in this text and picture. The text describes basic ideas about the body’s formation, structure and functioning. It also lists a large number of diseases, symptoms, and medicinal ingredients. Specifically, it offers behavioral, dietary, and medicinal approaches to balancing the constant flux of the body’s elements and forces. In addition to the Medicine Buddha, there is a selection from hundreds of fierce figures that have the responsibility of preserving the Tibetan medical tradition. These deities were most likely invoked at a Tibetan medical institute or a monastery for empowerments and initiations of Buddhist and lay medical practitioners. There are 5 paintings out of a set of 9 in the show. They all display each fierce figure, known as a protector, riding a powerful nine-headed animal. Now, small cards made from these pictures are commonly used during these initiations. For those of you who like astrology, there is a close relationship in Tibetan medicine that is traceable to sources in the Tibetan language dating back to the 9th century. There exist texts, from this period, that offer instructions on how to calculate the daily movement of the life force, in the Tibetan language known as “la,” through different body parts. In fact, in medical institutions in Tibet, astrology and medicine are intertwined. Furthermore, consulting horoscopes and wearing amulets are pervasive in many Himalayan societies today. Their functions of protecting and maintaining health, fostering longevity, as well as avoiding life’s obstacles are acknowledged in Tibetan medical and Buddhist texts. They come with the caveat that a particular person’s karma, or accumulated actions, ultimately determine the outcome of any celestial occurrence. One important visual foundation of Tibetan astrology is the Great Golden Turtle. This turtle is viewed as being a manifestation of Manjushri, the Bodhisattva of Wisdom.This Buddhist deity is credited as being the divine source of astrological knowledge. Here we have still another example of Buddhist teachings and Tibetan medicine merging. Finally, giving an aerial view of the whole show, Pakhoutova says, “We have 25 lenders from Europe, Asia, as well as the US. Many of the objects are from our own collection. This visual variety of the exhibition is steeped in rich content which we made accessible and engaging, and will interest anyone who visits this exhibition and the museum.” Helen Weisman is a freelance science journalist living in New York City. She has taught writing at The City University of New York.