Present Tensed

Links/Articles Tagged Between February 28th and March 7th, 2009

Here are some links that I’ve tagged recently. This set is from Feb­ru­ary 28th through March 7th:

• Inves­ti­ga­tion Planned in Zim­babwe — NYTimes.com :: The sport util­ity vehi­cle car­ry­ing the Tsvan­gi­rais was side­swiped by a truck that deliv­ers American-supplied anti­retro­vi­ral drugs to treat peo­ple with AIDS, a senior Amer­i­can offi­cial said Saturday.
• BBC NEWS | Africa | Mbeki named to heal Bashir rift :: The African Union has appointed for­mer South African Pres­i­dent Thabo Mbeki to chair a com­mit­tee to inves­ti­gate human rights vio­la­tions in Darfur.
• South Africa — Refugee Camp Clos­ing — NYTimes.com :: Some 4,000 immi­grants, mostly Zim­bab­weans who braved a dan­ger­ous river cross­ing to escape their trou­bled home­land, have spent nights in the open area, hop­ing to be among those given tem­po­rary asy­lum papers.
• Rural Com­mu­nity Radio in Africa | White African ::
• For Zim­babwe, Party Is a Chance to Eat, Not Cheer — NYTimes.com :: The pres­i­dent received a strong wel­come from the atten­dees, but many had come to eat rather than to cheer. “I’ve never seen Mugabe before,” said Don­ald Mukati, 25, a teacher. “I think he’s too old. He ought to leave office to younger peo­ple with fresh ideas.”
• Design: Steelpunk House A Shrine To Ded­i­ca­tion And Chaos ::
• Iraq’s $100 bil­lion stim­u­lus for Amer­ica — Adam Chop­pin — Open Salon ::
• The Shifted Librar­ian ” Twit­ter on ALA and Some Advice ::
• badpaintingsofbarackobama.com ::
• Geof­frey R. Stone: Civil Unions in Illi­nois: One Small Step :: Indeed, the groups most vehe­mently opposed to civil unions are white Evan­gel­i­cals (29% to 67%) and those who claim that they attend church every week (36% to 57%). But reli­gion is not a sound basis for mak­ing law in a free soci­ety com­mit­ted to the sep­a­ra­tion of church and state. On the sub­ject of sep­a­ra­tion of church and state, it is worth not­ing that the Act is self-consciously titled the Reli­gious Free­dom and Civil Union Act, because it expressly states that noth­ing in the Act shall inter­fere with “the reli­gious prac­tice of any reli­gious body” or com­pel any reli­gious body “to sol­em­nize or offi­ci­ate a civil union.” That does respect the sep­a­ra­tion of church and state. What does not respect that pro­found Amer­i­can prin­ci­ple is the insis­tence of some reli­gious bod­ies on telling other reli­gious bod­ies — and the state — what they may and may not legally recognize.
• Phun — 2D physics sand­box — Home ::
• Cana­dian Oil Sands — National Geo­graphic Mag­a­zine :: Once con­sid­ered too expen­sive, as well as too dam­ag­ing to the land, exploita­tion of Alberta’s oil sands is now a gam­ble worth billions.
• From the Desk of David Pogue — Amazon’s E-Book Ser­vice — NYTimes.com ::
• Lap­tops bring lessons, maybe even peace — CNN.com :: As Tal­iban insur­gents con­tinue to crack down on girls who go to school and women who dare to teach them, Keller was awestruck by the Afghan government’s deter­mi­na­tion to edu­cate all chil­dren, even if it means find­ing tools that allow them to intel­lec­tu­ally grow in the pri­vacy of their own homes.
• BBC NEWS | Africa | Man­dela grand­son enters pol­i­tics ::
• Top News — NCTE defines writ­ing for the 21st cen­tury :: New report offers guid­ance on how to update writ­ing cur­ricu­lum to include blogs, wikis, and other forms of communication
• Facebook’s Response To Twit­ter — washingtonpost.com ::
• One in five U.S. mort­gage bor­row­ers are under­wa­ter :: About 8.31 mil­lion prop­er­ties had neg­a­tive equity at the end of 2008, up 9 per­cent from 7.63 mil­lion at the end of Sep­tem­ber, accord­ing to the study, released Wednes­day by First Amer­i­can Core­L­ogic. The per­cent­age of “under­wa­ter” bor­row­ers rose to 20 per­cent from 18 percent.
• Op-Ed Con­trib­u­tor — Will Africa Let Sudan Off the Hook? — NYTimes.com ::
• For Debt Col­lec­tors, the Dead Are a Healthy Bet — NYTimes.com :: For some rel­a­tives, pay­ing is prag­matic. The law varies from state to state, but gen­er­ally sur­vivors are not required to pay a dead relative’s bills from their own assets. In the­ory, how­ever, col­lec­tion agen­cies could go after any prop­erty inher­ited from the deceased.
• Har­vard Med­ical School in Ethics Quandary — NYTimes.com ::
• primerid­ian — rolling out UrbanStyle Weekly v.2.0 ::
• Mall wants Manilow music to drive out unruly teens ::
• Unboxed — How to Make Elec­tronic Med­ical Records a Real­ity — NYTimes.com ::
• Creepy Crawly Doll Art — What Night­mares Are Made Of ::
• BarterQuest: Barter Goods, Ser­vices and Vaca­tion Homes. Barter, Swap, Trade, Exchange ::
• Coen broth­ers’ TV ad ridicules ‘clean coal’ — chicagotribune.com :: The nation’s coal indus­try has gone on the offen­sive to per­suade Amer­i­cans that coal is part of the solu­tion, not part of the prob­lem. It has formed a trade group known as the Amer­i­can Coali­tion for Clean Coal Elec­tric­ity, spend­ing $18 mil­lion so far on tele­vi­sion spots tout­ing coal’s abun­dance and the efforts being made to clean up this fuel, a major emit­ter of the green­house gases that are chang­ing the Earth’s climate.
• Watch­men: How 9/11 Changed Watch­men :: All in all, using 9/11 as an excuse to change the end­ing of the movie doesn’t sit right with me — espe­cially since the film already shows a lit­tle girl in a dog’s mouth and plenty of gore ear­lier in the film. Why spend so much time remain­ing true to the book, only to drop the ball in the final act?
• Book Review: 23rd Cen­tury Mus­lim Cyborgs in “Buday­een Nights” :: “Blade Run­ner meets Casablanca writ­ten by Nel­son Algren” would be the Hol­ly­wood pitch for Buday­een Nights, a col­lec­tion of sto­ries by the late George Alec Effinger.

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