Whitman's Forgetfulness Hits Home in California

Nicky Diaz and Meg Whitman, courtesy Daily Beast

Now I don't live in California, but who isn't mesmerized by a rich lady running as Governor of California who claims she will be unbiased to workers because she spent USD$100 million of her own dollars on her campaign? If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Unfortunately, this fairy tale is being tarnished by the tears of Meg Whitman's former housemaid/nanny of ten years who claims Ms. Whitman dropped her completely and suddenly with the revelation her papers were not in order...after 10 years of household, personal service.

How credible will the polygraph Ms. Whitman "volunteers" to have be? Meaningless. Polygraphs are always voluntary in the U.S. That girl's tears told me more than I wanted to hear when I saw the clip on television. Her noted women's rights attorney, Gloria Allred, wouldn't support just anyone. 

If Meg Whitman is not expert enough on immigration to know the legal status of her household help, God help California. How on earth she got this issue wrong, I can't fathom.

Of course, I could be mistaken and this housemaid incident might be fake.  I am also aware that the entire issue is probably being promoted and funded by Whitman's opposition. At the same time, this is not trivial; just think of former female Supreme Court nominees denied the chance to serve because of immigration issues of their former employees.

Democrat, Republican, doesn't matter to me, but ignorance on the matter of legal immigration by any former CEO running for Governor is just shocking to me, and inexcusable. Whitman clearly must have been totally clueless and lax about legal immigration compliance at eBay when she was CEO, too. She should have had the knowledge of  immigration paperwork down pat, or at least the basic legalities.

Why is she only now making a show of cleaning up her act, when she probably doesn't really need a nanny after all, anymore at this point? With all her millions, she could have shown more class and offered the lady a pension. She also should have checked the nanny's legal status as a starter, which would have taken a minute ten years ago. Too late now.

America Invites Hostility With Immigration Laws

Here's another angle to the American immigration issue. I have a friend who gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to a major East Coast private school here after her five children attended the school. Now, however, she's not allowed into the country because she overstayed her visa. She also dropped a lot of money on real estate here, and she can't get to her properties.

To be sure, America doesn't want to be accused of giving priority of access to rich people. At the same time, in many areas of American life such as entrance to elite American prep schools, money screams. In cities, those with money get more respect (just tell me they don't) and likely in the country, too. Money is the most important determinant of the celebrated American quality of life.

The point is that a government that allows a school to accept foreign donations, shouldn't  allow that school to accept the money with one hand, and push away the donor with the other. If the money is accepted by a school, then it is a gift, to be sure; no one  disputes the  high value of my friend's gift to the school.  American laws now allow schools to accept donations by foreigners. And American society allows foreign investments in real estate without allowing access to the country. That's like taking free food for dinner  from a donor who isn't good enough to sit with you and eat it. It doesn't make sense. Something tells me America's behind the curve on immigration. Just where to draw the line is not my concern here.

If she feels angry at America, I would not find her sentiments unjustified in the least.

What Exactly Are Current Democratic Ideals?

An idea from Dean Lloyd's sermon yesterday has me thinking about the international ideals of freedom of speech and the press. Democratic ideals in employment concern freedom from gender discrimination, age-ism and size-ism, among many others. Lofty they may be, and the world has a long way to go to reach these ideals. 

This week the United Nations meets in New York to discuss the Millenium Development Goals for the year 2015 (in my previous post inspired by Melinda Gates), concerning:

1. poverty
2. education
3. gender equality
4. child mortality
5. maternal health
6. disease eradication
7. environmental sustainability and 
8. global development partnerships. 

Truly, there is something for everyone in these goals. At least one of them is sure to be a passionate concern of yours.  It's well-known that being generous through helping and giving to others makes it possible to attain happiness, that most fleeting and elusive of all human goals.  Definitely, this is the one perfectly indisputable incentive or reason to help.  By helping others achieve these goals, you will help yourself to achieve happiness. This is a related, famous phrase:

Happiness is like a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.  ~Nathaniel Hawthorne

National Cathedral's Dean Lloyd on Immigration: The New Math

http://www.american-architecture.info/USA/USA-Washington/DC-002.htm

 Today at Washington's National Cathedral, The Very Rev. Samuel T. Lloyd III gave a wonderful sermon at the beginning of this new school year, and spoke inspirational words of guidance on immigration, for example, "God will stop at nothing to bring us home..."

He has seen in American society the idea "you are what you accomplish."  Ironically, he sees "gracelessness" in action these days in the  attitudes, the firestorms of Americans toward immigrants. Yet we depend on immigrants, and we  are all ourselves descended from other countries.

Where is the spirit of God's grace, generosity and justice, he wonders. Police can arrest without warrant people who appear to be undocumented in Arizona. Where is the  compassion for children of undocumented immigrants who are being cut out of healthcare and schooling?

Dean Lloyd said we need as a nation God's New Math: a generous framework of grace to frame our conversation about this difficult matter. For if we only look out for ourselves and fend for ourselves, we will live in crisis indefinitely. We need to help one another.

The main message from God is "you are loved with a limitless, fathomless, all-embracing love."

It was a fine, indeed, an excellent sermon which I cannot do justice to in this short summary,. Listen to it in its entirety here at the National Cathedral website. Sunday services and many special events from the Cathedral are now streamed live online.  Please give generously to the Cathedral, an independent, self-sufficient institution that depends on monetary support from visitors and listeners.

Dream On

A dream is an answer to a question we haven't learned to ask

~Fox Mulder in The X-Files~

WE Dream in fragments. We feel good if a dream is vivid, continuous and happy. Dreams are beneficial in very many ways: they help make connections in thoughts unresolved during your waking hours; they make emotions reappear about a certain issue, and solve challenges that may have been haunting waking hours. Dream-filled sleep can provide the healing healthfulness to move forward from loss, hardship and sorrow. Dreams can warn of threats or bring to the surface important matters forgotten during conscious busy hours.

Sometimes it takes a waking reality to interpret dreams, especially concerning hope, fear and deprivation. But dreams can open up the possibilities of deeper, hidden meanings, especially if kept and thoughtfully considered over time in a journal. Many creative people assert they work better after an effective sleep.

Consider what gives you better sleep. Having an exhausting day is sure to induce sleep, dream-filled or not. For many, having a good mattress, a quiet room and nice surroundings provide the sleep hygiene they need. But it goes further than that to how healthy and comfortable the body feels, and having a pre-sleep routine helps create relaxation and peace.

Aren't dreams strange? I hope you all have happy dreams tonight. Here's a nice soporific photo of a rainbow chosen to symbolize hope of a better world tomorrow.

stuckincustoms.com

Melinda Gates On U.N.'s Millennium Development Goals

Melinda Gates has written an article in Huffington Post about "The Future We'll Make" photo campaign. The goal is to edge closer to reaching the Millennium Development Goals.

She wants

every child to get vaccinated

 Bill and Melinda Gates


They say

polio will be eradicated

and we should

promote gender equality

In her article, Melinda Gates asks that you take these four steps: download and personalize a sign, post your photo on Flickr and join the discussion.

Here are the United Nation's Millennium Development Goals:

• Goal 1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
• Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education
• Goal 3: Promote gender equality and empower women
• Goal 4: Reduce child mortality
• Goal 5: Improve maternal health
• Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases
• Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability
• Goal 8: Develop a Global Partnership for Development

Make Your Own List Of "Top Universities"

An organization called QS has published a list of "top universities" and a separate list of top Asian universities. For your information, QS stands for  "QS Quacquarelli Symonds Limited  and has a so-called Registered Office at 1 Tranley Mews, Fleet Road London, NW3 2DG UK. Anyway, Huffington Post and who knows who else has taken this list seriously enough to make a slideshow.

My own list of favorite universities would be just as valid (and free of cost) as the QS list because it's all a matter of opinion. I think the phrase "top university" has a personal flavor just as, say, choosing where to live is a personal choice. In other words, an arbitrary list of "top universities" is meaningless, silly and possibly harmful if students go to a certain university based primarily on legend.

Undergraduate universities and colleges will suit students who want the location and amenities offered, whether in cities or in rural, enclosed campuses. Graduate students tend to choose universities based on availability of courses with certain favored professors to follow chosen individual career paths. Universities that work at one time might not work at another era in one's life.

Students can do the work of thinking of what they want to get out of university and how they learn best. Anyone can make up a list of favorite universities, and there is nothing wrong with that, but the list you make for yourself from your own research is the very best one. What circumstances do you think will give you the most value for the time and money you will give to your years of education?

What I think would be more useful for parents than a list of "top universities" is to guide parents to think of what they want in a university for their children. They should look up course guides and see photos of interiors and exteriors of buildings now online. Universities are as different as cities.

What Goes Around Will Come Around

Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland
ejpress.org

The most important article I have read all week concerns the issue of civil liberties as reported to the United Nations international council on human rights. The U.N. Human Rights Council has a Universal Periodic Review process where all countries of the world assess self-compliance. The goal is to further human rights compliance around the world and the U. N. expects powerful nations to lead by example.

Concerning this year's recently submitted Review, Arizona Gov. Brewer fatuously calls America's participation in it "internationalism run amok" and "unconstitutional." She claims irrelevantly that America - in comparison to Libya - would "win in any such comparison" (not saying much, and demonstrating her personal lack of understanding of the goals of a Council representing 47 countries).

Ironically, she herself is governing at the same time with the power (and powerlessness) of a dictator from an African country (such as Libya) within her own state; she has sanctioned racial profiling without having mitigated paperwork inefficiencies that created the national immigration emergency in the first place.

Her mountain-sized sense of American entitlement has clearly ballooned out of all proportion. Why would any state governor challenge an international inquiry into human rights abuse? A sense of guilt or shame would be more appropriate considering all the human rights violations that are resulting from laws passed on her watch in her state.

The larger issue is that America's front door to speedy legal immigration has closed, and the sooner politicians wise up to a true and genuine emergency and solve the problem, the better it will be for everyone. Improving immigration administration is the higher road to travel that will ultimately satisfy the U.N. Human Rights Council.

I happen to care about American immigration and think I know what to do about it: speed up the paperwork. It's not a mystery. Americans should demand ruthless efficiency of their government as the number one priority, whether it's for visas, green cards, citizenship or passport processing.

Reporting Arizona law to UN was correct, CNN, by ACLU's C. Bhatnagar and A.S. Meetze.

Lang Lang Excels at Rimsky-Korsakov----April, 2010 San Francisco

This video shows Lang Lang unexpectedly demonstrating the Flight of the Bumblebee on an iPad.


courtesy:charissalui