bhphdallastx.com

Saturday, April 17, 2010

Journalist, counselor, painter, and US 2012 Presidential candidate Joe Schriner of Cleveland, Ohio took some time to discuss his campaign with Wikinews in an interview.

Schriner previously ran for president in 2000, 2004, and 2008, but failed to gain much traction in the races. He announced his candidacy for the 2012 race immediately following the 2008 election. Schriner refers to himself as the “Average Joe” candidate, and advocates a pro-life and pro-environmentalist platform. He has been the subject of numerous newspaper articles, and has published public policy papers exploring solutions to American issues.

Wikinews reporter William Saturn? talks with Schriner and discusses his campaign.

Thursday, February 2, 2006

In response to recent accusations that United States government employees have engaged in Wikipedia vandalism and other forms of perceived negative editing of articles, Wikipedia editors have set up a webpage listing all Wikipedia edits made through IP addresses that are allocated to the United States House of Representatives and other United States government agencies. The House IP address was briefly banned from editing Wikipedia articles in the wake of the initial controversy, but the ban was lifted on January 30 after Wikipedia administrators decided that there have been a number of valuable contributions made through the House and Senate IP addresses in addition to the controversial edits.

On January 31 and February 1, however, the U.S. House of Representatives’ common IP address, 143.231.249.141, were banned again for three hours due to vandalism. Because the IP address is shared by House staff members, it is uncertain whether or not the same person(s) responsible for the previous vandalism are also responsible for the latest.

Examples of contributions submitted through the House IP address included removing, “In 2005, he has come under scrutiny for accepting campaign contributions from embattled former house leader Tom Delay,” from the article on Thad McCotter, removing election statistics from the article on Dan Lungren, and, in the article on Marilyn Musgrave, changing the paragraph

“As a state legislator, Musgrave spent much of her time on social issues, particularly authoring bills to deny marriage rights and parental rights for gay and lesbian families. One of her final, failed bills would have made it much more difficult for same-sex parents to see their children in the hospital during an emergency. Musgrave also cast the only vote against legislation to give battered spouses paid leave from work.”

to

“As a state legislator, Musgrave spent much of her time on social issues, particularly authoring bills to protect children and the traditional definition of marriage, as well as gun owner’s rights.”

After the block from Wikipedia expired, the House of Representatives user continued to edit the article on Chris Shays. Chris Shays had co-sponsored a bill with Marty Meehan, whose staffers had previously been found to have been negatively editing Wikipedia entries, The American Civil Liberties Union said of the bill “key elements of Shays-Meehan violate the First Amendment right to free speech because the legislation contains provisions that would violate the constitutionally-protected right of the people to express their opinions about issues through broadcast advertising if they mention the name of a candidate.” All mentions of the bill were removed from the article. Also removed was a paragraph about Chris Shays raising $70,000 with House Speaker Dennis Hastert at a country club event.

Again, the IP address was blocked for an eight-hour period.

Wikipedia edits in Congress are not coming from the House of Representatives alone. An edit from the Senate in July removed references to a plagiarism scandal with Senator Joe Biden, who has informally said he may seek a Democratic nomination for president in 2008. As of February 4, 2006, the edit has not fixed by Wikipedia users.

IP addresses from the CIA, the Department of Justice, the Marines, and the Navy are listed on the site as having made several cases of vandalism. Some examples of vandalism from the Department of Justice IP ranges involve articles on TV and radio shows, a baseball player, or just complaining about their work. In addition to accusations of vandalism, there have also been accusations of government employees introducing perceived bias, political spinning, or misinformation into Wikipedia articles by adding or removing information.

These cases include articles on an Irish politician, and in the George W. Bush article, introducing accusations of Hugo Chavez being a dictator, and removing information covering the George W. Bush substance abuse controversy. In addition, a person using a Department of Justice IP address edited a page covering indicted former Republican Majority Leader Tom DeLay. The editor removed two paragraphs stating a judge ruled that Tom DeLay had broken state law by not disclosing over $600,000 of fundraising money, a quote from Tom DeLay in which he stated that it drives the Democrats crazy wondering why the Republican Party institutes pro-Israeli policy, and a subsection on controversies involving DeLay’s relatives. Edits to George W. Bush’s article were done within the span of an hour. Edits to Tom DeLay’s article were made within an hour as well, although followed by a shorter, minor second session of editing later that day.

An editor using a CIA IP address is accused of vandalizing an article on the current president of Iran. Editors using Marine and Navy IP addresses based in Pensacola, Florida are accused of vandalizing an article on a rock song and on former U.S. president Bill Clinton, and accused of adding racist comments to articles on an actor and Martin Luther King, Jr., and adding comments that are perceived to criticize the men and women in the Navy reserves.

The IP addresses of the Department of Justice, the CIA, and the Navy and Marines stationed in Pensacola, Florida were found using the American Registry for Internet Numbers at the official website. Neither the government nor the Wikimedia Foundation have released an official statement.

The U.S. House of Representatives’ IP address is not the first governmental address to have been blocked after accusations of disrupting Wikipedia. The IP address belonging to a subdivision of the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Development in Alberta, Canada was blocked for three months since late 2005. An IP address belonging to the German Bundestag has been repeatedly blocked from the German Wikipedia after accusations of vandalism, including sexually explicit comments.

Sunday, January 11, 2015

Space transport services company SpaceX launched their fifth Dragon resupply vehicle to the International Space Station yesterday. The spacecraft — containing more than 2,200kg (5,000 pounds) of food, experiments, and spare parts — successfully decoupled from the launch rocket and should reach the station early tomorrow.

The launch was postponed from Tuesday because of a technical issue on the second stage of the rocket. The shipment includes replacements for cargo aboard the spaceship Cygnus, destroyed during a failed launch in October. Cygnus belonged to the rival Orbital Sciences Corporation.

SpaceX tried unsuccessfully to land the Falcon 9 delivery rocket for reuse. The rocket reached an unmanned barge in the Atlantic, but landed too hard. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said the landing “bodes well for the future, though”. The attempted salvage of the rocket was experimental, using new retractable fins. Next time they will add extra hydraulic fluid, Musk said.

The ship’s support equipment was damaged but, according to Musk, the barge is intact. Last year saw two successful SpaceX splashdowns but landing on such a small target as a ship is unique.

Thursday, November 8, 2007

India is the latest of the countries where the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) experiment has started. Children from the village of Khairat were given the opportunity to learn how to use the XO laptop. During the last year XO was distributed to children from Arahuay in Peru, Ban Samkha in Thailand, Cardal in Uruguay and Galadima in Nigeria. The OLPC team are, in their reports on the startup of the trials, delighted with how the laptop has improved access to information and ability to carry out educational activities. Thailand’s The Nation has praised the project, describing the children as “enthusiastic” and keen to attend school with their laptops.

Recent good news for the project sees Uruguay having ordered 100,000 of the machines which are to be given to children aged six to twelve. Should all go according to plan a further 300,000 machines will be purchased by 2009 to give one to every child in the country. As the first to order, Uruguay chose the OLPC XO laptop over its rival from Intel, the Classmate PC. In parallel with the delivery of the laptops network connectivity will be provided to schools involved in the project.

The remainder of this article is based on Carla G. Munroy’s Khairat Chronicle, which is available from the OLPC Wiki. Additional sources are listed at the end.

Saturday, April 17, 2021

On Thursday, Germany’s Federal Constitutional Court ruled a five-year rent freeze introduced earlier in February last year illegal due to lack of the Berlin Senate’s jurisdiction. This decision allowed rent to be increased as the Court ruling invalidated the previously introduced law which had capped the rent for about 90% of renters in the country. Protesters gathered in the capital city of Berlin with demonstrations against the ruling and against the possible increases in rent. Some demanded dispossessions of large real estate companies.

Protesters gathered in Berlin’s Neukölln and Kreuzberg districts, and reportedly thousands of people participated. The crowd reportedly walked from Hermannplatz towards Kottbusser Tor and then to Oranienplatz. Police closed several streets for the day. Organizers said 25 thousand people reportedly joined the protest, The Berlin Spectator reported.

Protesters marched with posters such as “You can have our hatred, You do not get our rent. (Housing is not a commodity.)” ^{((de))German language: ?unseren hass den konnt ihr haben, unsere miete bekomm ihr nicht (wohnenist keine ware)} and “The rich should pay! (Social struggles connects [us].)” ^{((de))German language: ?die reichen sollen zahlen (soziale kämpfe verbinden)}. Some protesters brought lids of boiling of frying pans and made noise. The German word for lid is same as the one for rent cap. They reportedly chanted slogan “If you take a cover from us, we’ll come back with thousands.”.

The Social Democratic Greens and Left parties’ coalition previously introduced the rent cap through the country’s Senate in February last year, citing raising rent prices in the country. Christian Democratic Union/Christian Social Union alliance and the Free Democratic party had filed the appeal leading to the present ruling.

The overturned ruling by Berlin State Government had previously fixed the rent from February 2020 to February 2025 on its June 2019 level. A senator who was in charge of urban development, Sebastian Scheel, commented about his disappointment, and said either the federal government or any of the states now had an opportunity to create laws to control the rent.

Thursday, May 25, 2006

Lawyers for students who sued to stop the use of the California High School Exit Exam today filed a request for an expedited hearing of their case in appellate court, hoping to have the test set aside in time for graduation.

“It would be tragic if students were deprived of the once in a lifetime opportunity to graduate with their classmates due to scheduling issues in this matter,” according to the text of the appeal filed in Division Four of the First Appellate District.

Today’s filing fulfills a promise made by lead attorney Arturo Gonzalez yesterday after the State Supreme Court issued a stay of an Alameda County Superior Court judge’s order that the test not be used to determine graduation. “Our clients are disappointed in today’s 4-3 split decision of the California Supreme Court. However, this fight is not over,” Gonzalez said, “We intend to seek immediate relief in the court of appeals in San Francisco. We are hopeful that oral argument can be scheduled in time to obtain an order that would allow the Class of 2006 to graduate.”

On May 12, Alameda County Superior Court Judge Robert Freedman decided that the test was unfair and unconstitutional and issued an injunction against the use of the test. The following week, attorneys for State Superintendent of Schools Jack O’Connell, author and avid supporter of the law requiring the test, appealed Freedman’s decision directly to the State Supreme Court, asking the court to stay the effect of the injunction immediately and to over rule it. Yesterday, the court issued the stay, but send the state’s appeal down to the appellate court.

“Yesterday, the Supreme Court noted that it was “not persuaded” that the injunction was the appropriate remedy,” according to the papers filed in court today. “It stayed the injunction and remanded the case to this Court with instructions to “establish a schedule for expedited briefing and argument.”

“Plaintiffs respectfully submit that, if the schedule established by this Court does not allow for a decision on the remedy issued by the trial court before the bulk of high school graduations have taken place, then that schedule cannot be considered to be expedited,” according to the filing, “There is only one issue that needs to be decided by this Court prior to the pending high school graduations — whether, assuming Plaintiffs prevail on their constitutional claims, the injunction granted by the trial court was an appropriate remedy.”

In the filing, lawyers for Liliana Valenzuela, et al., who sued in February to have the test set aside so she and the other students involved in the case could graduate, remind the appellate court that the State Supreme Court needed only a few days to reach its decision.

“With the majority of graduations occurring in early June, Plaintiffs respectfully submit that it is a reasonable interpretation of the Supreme Court’s Order to set a hearing for this matter next week,” lawyers wrote in the filing.Cynthia O’Brien, who oversees testing at James Logan High School in Union City, expressed some exasperation over the on-again, off-again situation regarding the test. “What is happening at this time with the emotional lives of students who are in limbo is not reasonable or in their best interest” she said. “Although the exam’s intention is to create a better education environment for students (my words), it is now more about politics than the students.”

However, she’s not opposed to the test itself. “I believe that the intent of minimum proficiencies is in the right direction. We do a disservice to students who are not prepared to compete in their adult world,” she told the James Logan Courier, “I do believe that the State needs to study real alternate paths that could be pursued, such as using proficiency on STAR, a senior project demonstrating both math and English proficiency or some other pathway.”

This article is based on Appeals Court Asked for Quick Decision in Exit Exam Case by Patrick Hannigan of The James Logan Courier, which has a copyright policy compatible with our CC-BY 2.5. Specifically “Creative Commons 2.5 Share-Alike license“