Hot XXX Collection
Present
Hot Blonde Give Perfect Blowjob And Fuck
⬇️
Here is " Hot Blonde Give Perfect Blowjob And Fuck " Video
⬇️
Share*
Friday, December 18, 2020
Hot Blonde Give Perfect Blowjob And Fuck | Hot XXX Collection |
Here is " Hot Blonde Give Perfect Blowjob And Fuck " Video
Share*
Tuesday, December 15, 2020
Media literacy project concludes
A special project I’ve been spearheading this fall has introduced media literacy to Kansas City area students from Center Middle and Center High School students from Kansas City, and college students from Johnson County Community College (Overland Park, KS) and Park University (Parkville, MO).
The project culminated yesterday with a Media Literacy Summit on Zoom wherein students presented their research on media literacy and its importance. The presentations were excellent, and indicated an abundance of critical thinking that will be necessary if the students are to become sophisticated media consumers.
(https://issuu.com/peacejournalism/docs/the_misreport_digital-web) and a podcast (https://soundcloud.com/user-961623623/media-literary-podcast). Both of these products were excellent.
The project, titled, “Media Literacy for Students: Lessons from Covid-19,” included a media literacy workshop in September (Details--http://stevenyoungblood.blogspot.com/2020/09/media-literacy-seminar-launches-into.html). The project was sponsored by a Citizen Diplomacy Action Fund Rapid Response Fund/U.S. Department of State grant, given to me as an alumnus of the Fulbright program.
Dr. Jill Biden
The recent Wall Street Journal op-ed questioning Jill Biden’s use of the Dr. in front of her name has created a great deal of heat, most of it coming down on the Journal.
Rather than pile on (which would be easy), I would simply ask these peace-journalism themed questions about the op-ed:
What was the purpose of the op-ed? Was it to shame or embarrass?
Does it deepen partisan divides?
Does it offer solutions? (Though I’m not sure what the problem is).
Would this column have been written about a man?
Does this discussion divert attention from more important issues?
On the last question, my colleague Laurie Gunderson replied on Twitter that the op-ed does not divert attention from important issues since “belittling accomplishments of women is worthy of focused discussion.” I agree.
Thursday, December 10, 2020
At PeaceCon2020, my cup runneth over
Take a shot glass and pour a gallon of water into it.
This is a good summation of my last three days at the Alliance for Peacebuilding’s PeaceCon202, held this week online. The shot glass is my brain (though this is arguably a thimble), and the water the wonderful information and insights I gathered during the conference.
The final session that really caught my eye was about what comes next in peacebuilding in the U.S. Joseph Bubman, from an organization called Urban Rural Action (https://www.uraction.org/), spoke about the divides in our society, and how they are fueled by incivility, social media, partisan media, a political system that rewards extremism, and isolation from those who disagree with us. He said we must work across the divide while standing up to oppression to advance positive peace. “You can solve problems while you build relationships—they are mutually reinforcing,” he said.
Julia Roag, the president and CEO of Partners Global (https://www.partnersglobal.org/) followed up by asking, “How do you combat a war of ideas? Is it with facts?” Answering her question, she stated that facts should be accompanied with a narrative frame (and a solution) that helps to explain and contextualize the facts for any given audience.
Roag noted that the partnerships that we form also depend on framing, and thus, we must deeply understand how narratives change people’s understanding. She asked, “What is our peacebuilding narrative, and what are people already thinking about peace and peacebuilding?” This is a question I need to start asking about my peace journalism projects—What are people already thinking about the news media, and its role in creating a climate where non-violent responses to conflict are valued?
For more on framing, see https://www.frameworksinstitute.org/article/five-framing-tips-framing-for-social-change/.
Peace journalism fits nicely with Roag’s notions of framing and narratives, since PJ seeks to correct misleading (and sometimes stereotyping) narratives and replace them with counternarratives that provide a different framing, one that humanizes “them,” gives voice to the voiceless and peacebuilders, and leads societal discussions about solutions while rejecting inflammatory, divisive language.
Thanks, Alliance for Peacebuilding, for giving me so to think about. Next year, I plan to bring a bucket.
Tuesday, December 8, 2020
Agriculture has the potential to turn into a powerhouse of economic growth.
As India completes 73 years of Independence, agriculture has emerged as the mainstay of the economy. Serving as a much needed lifeline during the Covid-19 crisis, Indian agriculture is poised to grow by an estimated 3 per cent in 2020-21 prompting the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das to acknowledge that at a time when the economy is shrinking, agriculture remains a “beacon of hope”
The resilience that agriculture demonstrated at a time when the International Monetary Fund (IMF) had pulled down India’s growth projections for 2020-21 to 1.9 per cent clearly shows that the time has come to revitalise Indian agriculture to serve as a pivot for future economic growth. There can’t be a better time to resurrect Indian agriculture, especially when the nation is celebrating 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi who had been a strong advocate of village self-reliance.
This becomes more the need and necessity knowing that a few days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the first nationwide lockdown beginning March 25, hundreds of thousands of migrant workers with small children in tow or in their laps, and clutching their meagre household possessions, preferred to defy the lockdown and walk home travelling for hundreds of kilometres. The painful long march that the country witnessed, with some estimates pointing to more than 30 million people returning home (and some experts saying that close to 70-80 million trudged back from the cities if intra-state reverse migration was to be added) was a pointer to the failure of economic policies that had encouraged rural to urban migration.
Several studies have shown that at least 60 to 70 per cent of the migrant workers who returned to their native places are unlikely to return back to the cities, at least not in the near future. These hapless millions were essentially what I called as ‘Agricultural Refugees’ who were driven out of the villages over the past few decades because of economic policies that kept agricultural deliberately impoverished. A recent OECD study in collaboration with ICRIER, a New Delhi-based think tank, had concluded that Indian farmers suffered a cumulative loss of Rs 45-lakh crore (US$ 600 billion plus) between 2000 and 2016-17 on account of being denied their rightful income. Subsequently, the Niti Aayog itself had admitted that between 2011-12 and 2015-16 the growth in real farm incomes had prevailed at less than half a percent every year, 0.44 per cent to be exact. For the next two years, the growth in real farm income had been ‘near zero’. If farm incomes had declined or remained static for the past two decades, what else could be expected from the rural workforce, which was left with little option but to abandon farming and move to the cities looking for menial jobs as a daily wage worker?
But despite these hardships, India farmers had toiled hard to produce a bumper harvest year after year. Saddled with overflowing food stocks, reports show that the abundance of food grains came in handy to provide subsidised rations under the National Food Security Act to over 720 million people during the four months of the lockdown. In addition, free rations were made available to the needy. This was possible only because of a buoyant agriculture despite farmers continuing to be faced with a severe agrarian crisis. With less money available in the hands of farmers, a dip in rural demand had lead to a slowdown in Indian economy prior to the lockdown. After all, in a country where the agricultural workforce accounts for nearly 50 per cent of the population, the surest way to jack up the economy is to create more rural demand, which means provide farmers with decent incomes.
Even during the lockdown period, which coincided with the rabi (winter crop) harvest resulting in a crash in demand leading to farmers suffering huge losses in the case of perishables like vegetables, fruits, flowers, poultry, dairy and fisheries, the USDA estimates that India is poised to achieve a record wheat production and a near-record rice production in 2020-21. For the next kharif (monsoon) season, the sowing of summer crops has increased by 13.92 per cent over the previous year as on July 31. With rains expected to be normal, and with a much higher area brought under cultivation, the kharif harvest is also expected to be bountiful. No denying, in these depressing times, agriculture alone provides a ray of hope.
As India steps into the 74th year of Independence, the coronavirus pandemic has come as a timely reminder of the dire need to acknowledge the inherent bias and blind spots in dominant economic thinking. Treating agriculture as a laggard, the economic design that the world follows had believed in sacrificing agriculture for the sake of industrial growth. In India, in addition to keeping farm incomes deliberately low, public investments in agriculture too declined over the decades. As per RBI, public sector investment in agriculture had hovered around 0.4 per cent of the GDP between 2011-12 and 2017-18 What economic miracle could have been expected from a sector, which is the largest employer in the country, but kept starved of public funds and denied the rightful income to farmers?
It is time to overhaul this outdated economic thinking. It is time not to return to the normal, but to a new normal. It is time to strengthen the rural economy by not only taking into consideration its capacities and capabilities but also to appreciate and acknowledge the socio-economic wealth of rural enterprise, its diversity and the traditional knowledge base. Although the Prime Minister has spelled out his vision of Atmanirbhar Bharat (a self-reliant India), the route to achieve this certainly passes through agriculture. Looking at the inherent strengths of Indian agriculture, and knowing the challenges that reverse migration have thrown up, only a vibrant agriculture can absorb the influx and turn it into an opportunity. It is high time mainline economists and policy makers remove their blinkered glasses, and start looking afresh at agriculture, because agriculture alone has the potential to reboot the economy for all times to come. #
Agriculture is India's Ray of Hope in Time of Crisis. Fair Observer. Dec 3, 2020. https://www.fairobserver.com/
Tuesday, December 1, 2020
As peace journalists, how do we reach election-deniers?
Many conservative media outlets continue to fuel the lie that Biden’s win is illegitimate, even though the facts to the contrary are clear.
Biden’s victory has been certified by every competitive state, while more than 30 Trump campaign legal challenges have been thrown out of court, often by conservative judges. Despite protestations to the contrary, not a shred of proof has been introduced in court that would indicate any fraud, let alone fraud on a scale that would change the outcome of the election in any state or overall.
The news media have repeated these facts ad nauseam and challenged the Trump campaign’s lies about voter fraud. While admirable, this reporting and commentary is clearly not reaching anyone who really needs to hear it. According to the New York Times, “Since the election, surveys have consistently found that about 70 percent to 80 percent of Republicans don’t buy the results. They don’t agree that Joe Biden won fair and square. They say the election was rigged. And they say enough fraud occurred to tip the outcome.” Also, an alarming 49 percent said "they expected Mr. Trump to be inaugurated on Jan. 20.” (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/30/upshot/republican-voters-election-doubts.html)
Obviously, these election-deniers have their heads buried in the Fox, Newsmax, and OANN sand.
As peace journalists, then, how do we reach our fellow citizens?
The fix won’t happen quickly, but needs to start immediately. It begins with re-imagining our politically polarized media which has so distorted information that facts, opinions, and claims have become indistinguishable. One key tenet of peace journalism is to reject ‘us vs. them’ narratives, the kind that feed polarizing media. Instead, a peace journalist would strive to serve audiences on all sides politically, and seek common ground. A good place to start would be to attempt to forge some agreed-upon facts like those mentioned previously.
Peace journalists would also turn down the rhetorical heat by rejecting inflammatory language directed at the other side. President-elect Biden has been a good role model in this regard.
Another way to reach election-deniers is with media literacy education. Media lit education would empower audiences to check facts for themselves, to critically analyze content from all media sources for bias and misinformation, and to break out of their ‘media bubbles’ and consume news from a diversity of sources across the political spectrum. Better journalism, peace journalism, could be employed to help audiences distinguish between claims and facts, to provide basic civics education that so many lack, and to give audiences the tools so that they can de-bunk conspiracy theories themselves. (To learn more, see the National Association for Media Literacy Education at https://namle.net/ .)
All the responsible, productive, bridge-building peace journalism in the world won’t make much of a difference if it echoes inside only one media bubble or if its messages get lost in a partisan maelstrom.
It’s time to dismantle our poisonous partisan media structure and empower audiences to become better, smarter news media consumers.
Thursday, November 19, 2020
Readmission To Public School After Expulsion
By Michelle Ball, California Education Attorney for Students since 1995
School expulsion is traumatizing and awful. Once the worst happens and an expulsion is imposed, do students just get automatic reentry into their local school when the time period is over? How do they return? Are there steps? The terms of the expulsion determine what will happen and precisely what the student must do to reenter their local school campus.
When a school board imposes a school expulsion, usually there are terms that a student must meet, which are outlined in a "Rehabilitation Plan." This student rehabilitation plan contains prerequisites the student must complete before the expulsion will end and the student may be returned to regular school.
(b) The governing board shall recommend a plan of rehabilitation for the pupil at the time of the expulsion order, which may include, but not be limited to, periodic review as well as assessment at the time of review for readmission. The plan may also include recommendations for improved academic performance, tutoring, special education assessments, job training, counseling, employment, community service, or other rehabilitative programs.
(c) The governing board of each school district shall adopt rules and regulations establishing a procedure for the filing and processing of requests for readmission and the process for the required review of all expelled pupils for readmission. Upon completion of the readmission process, the governing board shall readmit the pupil, unless the governing board makes a finding that the pupil has not met the conditions of the rehabilitation plan or continues to pose a danger to campus safety or to other pupils or employees of the school district. A description of the procedure shall be made available to the pupil and the pupil’s parent or guardian at the time the expulsion order is entered.
1) Maintain passing grades or maintain above a 2.0 or other gpa (grade point average)
2) Attend school regularly, or maintain 95% (or other %) attendance
3) Therapy for some number of hours or until a certain program is completed. Parents may be able to get approval for religious/pastoral counseling to meet this requirement.
4) No breach of school rules or federal, state, or local laws
5) No additional suspensions/expulsions (broad or limited scope)
6) Community service for a certain number of hours at an approved nonprofit
7) Stay off all district properties, not coming within a certain distance
Sometimes, schools include other terms, depending on the offense, such as:
8) Drug test results must be negative
9) Student must do essay or some type of project
10) Letter from professional stating student is not a danger and/or should be readmitted.
11) Other terms as varied as the school districts
When the student's expulsion time period is nearing the end (date should be in the agreement), the student may petition for readmission. The district will require submission of actual evidence the terms in the expulsion order were met, and will make their own determination whether the student poses a danger should the student return to campus.
If readmitted, unless the expulsion agreement names the school the student can return to, the school will usually be determined at the readmission meeting. Sometimes expulsion agreements, particularly for drug sales or high level offenses, state that the student will never return to the prior school.
If a student does not meet the terms of the expulsion, the consequence is that the expulsion continues. This can mean a one semester expulsion can continue for many years, simply as the rehabilitation requirements were not met. As such, parents need to pay attention to the expulsion order and all requirements and ensure they are not neglected. Otherwise, the student may never return and can end up with a multi-year expulsion in their student records.
Best,
Michelle Ball
Education Law Attorney
LAW OFFICE OF MICHELLE BALL
717 K Street, Suite 228
Sacramento, CA 95814
Phone: 916-444-9064
Email:help@edlaw4students.com
Fax: 916-444-1209
Website, Blog, Twitter, Youtube, Facebook
Please see my disclaimer on the bottom of my blog page. This is legal information, not legal advice and no attorney-client relationship is formed by this posting. This blog may not be reproduced without permission from the author and proper attribution of authorship. This blog may not reflect the current state of the law.
Tuesday, November 17, 2020
PJ needed to set the tone for peace in Ethiopia
It is with great alarm that I view the current violent conflict in Ethiopia, where I spent the spring, 2018 semester as a State Department Senior Subject Specialist. I was based at the University of Gondar, near the Tigray region from where the conflict originates, but traveled throughout the country, including to Mekelle (also spelled Mek'ele), the capital of the Tigray region.
As a peace journalist, I am as always concerned with the news media and their coverage of the conflict. Are they accurately reflecting the situation in Ethiopia? Are they fanning the flames of conflict, or instead are they practicing peace journalism?
I called upon two of my Ethiopian colleagues to help me make sense of the media coverage. I’ve decided not to use their names, out of respect for their privacy.
First, regarding international coverage, both of my colleagues are critical of the news media. My colleague whom I’ll call Abel said, “some of the international reporting has been surprisingly incomplete and partisan. The national defense forces were engaged in respecting rule of law in the defiant Tigray Liberation Front Forces. While this was the fact many news organizations such as Al Jazeera, Foreign Policy Magazine, the BBC and The Guardian represented the event as a brink of civil war. This is totally out of context and incomplete.”
He continued, “The other dishonest news come from Reuters news agency. While the Tigrayan Liberation forces have killed more than 500 ethnic Amhara civilians in border town of May Khadra, the reporter reported as (though) they were ethnic Tigrayans and were killed the national defense force. This is totally a fake information which is aimed at disinforming the international community.”
My second colleague whom I’m calling Kaleb agreed. He said, “Most of international news are biased... This is not civil war. It is a military operation…I also believe that Tigrayan brothers and sisters are ill informed and highly influenced by TPLF’s (the ruling party in Tigray) propaganda and disinformation. TPLF has created a false narrative in the country that Amhara (the region bordering Tigray, which includes Gondar) is chauvinist.”
Media coverage by Ethiopian outlets is also a concern. At the local level during any conflict, peace journalism asks whether local media reports are flag waving, jingoistic propaganda (traditional war reporting), or whether they are more balanced and give local residents a chance to consider non-violent responses to conflict.
A quick perusal of several Ethiopian news sources reveals the prevalence of traditional war reporting. (Keep in mind that there are only a few sources in English, so this analysis is severely limited.) The Ethiopia News Agency (https://www.ena.et/en/), for example, uncritically parrots government information in stories titled “Inhabitants of Addis Ababa Express Support for National Defense Force,” “Ethiopians Honor Defense Force,” and “Reports, Footages Claiming Airstrike on City of Mekelle (in Tigray region) False.” Ethiopia Zare (https://ethiopiazare.com/) does the same in stories like “The Ethiopian government asked the international community to condemn TPLF.” One needn’t look beyond the lead of this story to divine its approach: “The heinous and reprehensible massacre committed against innocent civilians in Mykadra by TPLF is clearly a grave violation of the most basic norms of international law.”
The same jingoism can be found in at least one Tigrayan media outlet, Tigray Online (http://www.tigraionline.com/) in stories titled “Barbaric-Genocidal Ethnic Cleansing, Extreme Savagery, in Ethiopia,” “(Ethiopian leaders) Abiy Ahmed and Esayas Afewerki Planned and Started a Joint War against the Innocent People of Tigrai,” and “Ethiopians fleeing to Sudan describe air strikes, machete killings in Tigray.” This last story includes the quote, “They killed anyone who said they were Tigrayan. They stole our money, our cattle, and our crops from our homes and we ran with just the clothing on our backs.”
Instead of this traditional reporting, peace journalists would critically analyze propaganda, and instead seek to balance stories with reports from all sides. PJ stories would reject inflammatory language (“barbaric,” “innocent people,” “savagery,” “machete killings”) and instead use more straightforward, less anger-inducing verbiage. PJ would give a voice to everyday people impacted by the conflict, without exploiting them for partisan purposes. Peace journalists would also examine the source of the conflict, and lead societal discussions about potential solutions.
Peace journalism alone won’t end the violence in Ethiopia, but can help erect a foundation upon which peace can someday be built.
Monday, November 16, 2020
Possession of Nicotine or Tobacco As Basis For School Discipline
By Michelle Ball, California Education Attorney for Students since 1995
Talk to many in our culture today about nicotine products and the public schools and you may hear: "So what, the kid's smoking, isn't that something every teen does?" Not really, and if they do, it should not be at school or involving school. Tobacco or similar products cannot be stashed for a friend, thrown in a backpack to use later, chewed, smoked, or otherwise used at school, at school events, going to or coming from school, etc. If they are, and the student is caught, the student can be suspended or even expelled.
A pupil shall not be suspended from school or recommended for expulsion, unless the superintendent of the school district or the principal of the school in which the pupil is enrolled determines that the pupil has...
(h) Possessed or used tobacco, or products containing tobacco or nicotine products, including, but not limited to, cigarettes, cigars, miniature cigars, clove cigarettes, smokeless tobacco, snuff, chew packets, and betel*. [Education Code section 48900(h)]
This code also encompasses e-cigarettes and vape pens, and all manner of things which may fit under the "nicotine" or nicotine-like umbrella. Note the code states that the list is not exclusive "including, but not limited to..." which means it is a wide-open code and will allow a school suspension for many products not listed.
The California legislature allows students to be removed from school and their records tarnished for simple possession or use of nicotine-type products. The kid in the back of a class with that bottle full of brown liquid (spit from chew products) can be in serious trouble. Or that kid with that "cool" vape pen could have his/her college entrance chances diminished if a suspension issues.
Have you checked your kids' backpack or pockets today to ensure none of these prohibited items are lurking in there? If not, the next person who may tell you they are, could be the school Principal.
Best,
Michelle Ball
Education Law Attorney
LAW OFFICE OF MICHELLE BALL
717 K Street, Suite 228
Sacramento, CA 95814
Phone: 916-444-9064
Email:help@edlaw4students.com
Fax: 916-444-1209
Website, Blog, Twitter, Youtube, Facebook
Please see my disclaimer on the bottom of my blog page. This is legal information, not legal advice and no attorney-client relationship is formed by this posting. This blog may not be reproduced without permission from the author and proper attribution of authorship. This blog may not reflect the current state of the law.
* Betel: "an Asian plant that has leaves and red nuts that act as a drug when chewed" [per the Cambridge Dictionary]
Thursday, November 12, 2020
Aren't mainline economists lazy?
Will markets give him the right price?
If making Minimum Support Price (MSP) a legal right for farmers “will spell disaster in the markets, and private players will hesitate to enter into the market,” the fundamental question that protesting farmers are asking – how will the central agricultural laws then bring farmers a higher income – remains unanswered. No one is telling where in the world have markets alone succeeded in providing farmers with higher income. Nor are mainline economists daring to point out the flaws in the market reform strategy that has relentlessly pushed small farmers out of agriculture.
Although most mainline economists, barring some honourable exceptions, and corporate activists had always treated Minimum Support price (MSP) as a barrier in price realisation for farmers and have been advocating for doing away with the monopolistic control of Agricultural Produce Market Committees (APMCs) so as to provide farmers with greater choices to market their produce, the economic rationale being suggested for dismantling a time-tested regulated marketing system falls short of any sound reasoning. To say that catering to only cereal production is ‘lazy farming’ and an outcome of ‘parochial thinking’ (as a State Bank of India research paper states) is rather unfair and speaks volumes of the inability of dominant economics to think out of the box. If Punjab farmers were indeed ‘lazy’ there is no way the State could achieve record yields of cereal crops – 51.73 quintals per hectare for wheat and 61.49 quintals per hectare for paddy – which are amongst the highest in the world.
Instead of acknowledging their stellar role, to call cereal growing farmers as ‘lazy’ actually stems from a myopic and insular thinking. As economist, Kate Raworth, author of the widely acclaimed Doughnut Economics: seven ways to think like a 21st century economist, often says that an outdated economic model of 20th century cannot be expected to address the social and ecological problems of this century, it is high time neoliberal economists start looking beyond what is prescribed in textbooks to think and act differently. In other words, it is not farmers who are lazy but instead there exists a dominant class of ‘lazy economists’ – some economists who find it convenient to simply go by ideological prescriptions without even realising that an extraordinary crisis inflicting agriculture requires extraordinary solutions that may be beyond the reach of the invisible hand of the markets.
Even in America, free markets in agriculture are actually thriving on massive federal agricultural subsidy support. According to a non-profit -- Environment Working Group (EWG) -- the US gave $ 425 billion in farm subsidies support under various heads, including crop insurance, disaster management and conservation programmes, since 1995. And yet, despite these monumental subsidies, American farmers are indebted to the tune of another $ 425 billion. This clearly shows that even the visible hand of government subsidies has failed to make markets work efficiently for farmers.
Globally, Producer Support Estimate (PSE) broadly provides a comparable estimate of budgetary as well as various forms of subsidy support to farmers. Developed by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) the PSE provides an assessment of the share of gross farm receipts at the farm gate. Accordingly, while Indian farmers receive a negative support (or in other words are actually being taxed) by roughly minus 5.7 per cent, farmers in Norway, Switzerland, Korea, Japan, China, US, EU, Canada, Brazil, Mexico, Indonesia, Philippines, Turkey, Russia, Israel, Costa Rica and Colombia are in receipt of huge subsidy support. Norway tops the chart with a phenomenally high subsidy support of (+) 60 per cent. If this index provides an idea of the extent to which agriculture is supported in the rich countries, how can mainline economists refuse to see that markets need massive subsidies to remain afloat?
Returning to India, amidst the raging farm legislation row, and despite loud claims being made that markets are more important for farmers than MSP, reports say most crops are actually selling at prices that are on an average 20 to 30 per cent below the MSP announced. Using the government’s own data, an interesting analysis by The Hindu showed that between Sept 14 and Oct 14, nearly 68 per cent of the market transactions for 10 select crops in 600 wholesale markets were at prices lower than MSP. In case of bajra, maize and soybean, in more than 95 per cent transactions the modal price was much below the MSP. Modal price is the average of the transactions that takes place during the day for a specific crop.
This is not the first time that modal price have remained below the MSP. Year after year, the story remains the same. More often than not, the modal price (despite its high sounding name) turns out to be no better than a distress price that markets dictate. With procurement largely remaining confined to wheat and paddy, where farmers get the benefit of an assured MSP, for most other crops farmers are left at the mercy of markets. If the markets were so efficient there is no reason why truckloads of paddy were to be transported all the way from Bihar, where APMC Act was set aside in 2006, to be sold in Punjab for several years now. This year too, as per media reports more than a million tonne of common grade of paddy have been brought from Bihar (and also Uttar Pradesh) at a price between Rs 1,000-1,100 and sold in Punjab at an MSP of Rs 1,868 per quintal. If MSP is the highest price paddy farmers can get, shouldn’t mainline economists acknowledge the importance and need for providing farmers with an assured price?
This clearly shows that Bihar’s 2006 experiment in ushering free markets – without first framing appropriate policies, incorporating different approaches and strategies, to address the real needs -- failed to prop up agriculture. It’s a classic case of a lost decade and a half during which time millions of economically viable livelihoods were lost. It is also a classic example of how 'lazy economists' failed to seize the opportunity to make a real difference. If only Bihar had learnt from Punjab, and laid out an extensive network for public procurement, the resulting socio-economic transformation would have been phenomenal. #
The lazy economist way. The Tribune. Nov 5, 2020. https://www.tribuneindia.com/
Filing A UC or CSU Discipline Appeal Within The College: Bases For Appeal
By Michelle Ball, California Education Attorney for Students since 1995
If an appeal must be pursued, it will all depend on the exact college policy.
In the UC and CSU college systems, overseen by the UC Board of Regents and the California State University system, respectively, one would think that discipline policies would be uniform in all colleges under one body, such as all UCs or all CSUs. Not exactly.
The UC system has a statewide policy, called PACAOS (Policies Applying to Campus Activities Organizations and Students) confirming there must be a campus discipline appeal process in place on college campuses, but what that process must include, is not defined. As such, bases for an internal appeal are set campus to campus and can vary greatly.
For CSU, the state group has Executive Order 1098 (EO 1098) which covers student discipline statewide, but which does not discuss a clear internal appeal right. Each CSU campus and their policies have to be consulted to determine what rights exist.
CSUS (California State University Sacramento), policy, for example, mentions that:
The student shall have the right of due process and appeal in matters of student discipline...
But, the appeal rights and bases are not delineated. CSUS also has an internal grievance process which allows students to appeal if they feel their rights were violated.
At University of California, Davis (UCD), the policy regarding the bases for filing a legitimate appeal with UCD state as follows:
A student... [may] file a written appeal of the decision, on one or more of the following grounds:
... An appeal may be denied, granted in whole or part, or other relief may be directed where appropriate.
The great thing about this policy, is that there are 4 potential areas for a UCD discipline appeal, including unfairness in the proceedings, a punishment that was way too harsh, and otherwise. Students may be able to overturn or reduce punishments lodging such an appeal. Nothing is mentioned in the UCD policies about increasing the punishment if a student appeals.
With UCLA, there is a different, much more restrictive policy for UCLA internal appeals:
If the Dean imposes a sanction of Deferred Suspension, Deferred Dismissal, Suspension, or Dismissal, the Student may appeal the sanction, to the Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs, on the grounds that the sanction assigned is substantially disproportionate to the severity of the violation.
This means that the appeal is not only a chance for justice and reduced punishment, but also for a harsher punishment. This is disturbing and likely stops many students from lodging an appeal.
UC Berkeley (UCB) has a different appeal policy:
An appeal must be based on newly discovered evidence that was not available at the time of the hearing, significant procedural error, or upon other evidence or arguments which, for good cause, should be considered.
The UC campuses also vary largely in timelines for internal appeals and some windows are VERY short. Students need to pay close attention and act fast.
Which public 4 year college a student attends in California will determine if there may be an internal appeal right and/or the bases which the college will consider when a student tries to overturn a wrongful college suspension or expulsion. Students should check the policies and get their appeals timely submitted with proper documents and evidence supporting all potential appeal bases. If a student fails to file an internal appeal per the policies, their discipline may become final. As such, knowing the policies of the school a student is attending is key.
Best,
Michelle Ball
Education Law Attorney
LAW OFFICE OF MICHELLE BALL
717 K Street, Suite 228
Sacramento, CA 95814
Phone: 916-444-9064
Email:help@edlaw4students.com
Fax: 916-444-1209
Website, Blog, Twitter, Youtube, Facebook
Please see my disclaimer on the bottom of my blog page. This is legal information, not legal advice and no attorney-client relationship is formed by this posting. This blog may not be reproduced without permission from the author and proper attribution of authorship. This blog may not reflect the current state of the law.
Wednesday, November 4, 2020
Students:Whether you candidate won or lost,
use this election as peacebuilding opportunity
Note: I plan to email this to all of my students as soon as we have a presidential winner.
Nov. 4, 2020
Dear Peace Studies and Peace Journalism students:
Despite the divisions and angst it has generated, the presidential election nonetheless offers us the opportunity as peacebuilders to put our craft into practice. This is true regardless of which candidate you supported.
If you supported the winner, congratulations. As a peacebuilder, I would hope that you would accept the results graciously and with humility, and not celebrate by using inflammatory language that might deepen partisan, racial, and cultural divides. Further, as a supporter of the winner, I believe it is your responsibility to reach out to those who supported the other candidate to build bridges, in the parlance of peace studies and peace journalism. During these discussions, begin with listening, and with showing empathy for the emotional impact from the election results. Let them know that your vote was cast with the best intentions, for the leader and policies you feel will be most beneficial for the country, and was not a ballot cast against the supporters on the losing side.
This difficult discussion is not optional. The father of peace studies, Dr. Johan Galtung, wrote this week on Twitter that failure to conduct these demanding conversations will lead almost inevitably to violent conflict. As a “winner,” you are uniquely positioned to demonstrate your humility by initiating these discussions.
If you supported the losing candidate, I’m sorry. Keep in mind that during your life, you will assuredly win and lose some electorally. Politics are cyclical.
Even though the results seem very personal, I believe that they are not. Sure, there are obnoxious forces on both sides who do vote with malice in their heart—racists, xenophobes, homophobes, haters of Christians and rural Americans, elitists, etc. But I believe that 99% of us vote with the best intentions, not intending to personally harm anyone. Some of these good intentions arise out of ignorance and social and geographical isolation, and offer an opportunity to you as a peacemaker to educate those around you about our diverse society. This is a chance for you to build bridges as well. Begin by listening carefully, and don’t be argumentative or pedantic.
Regardless of how your candidate performed, you can harness your anger and disappointment, or energy and enthusiasm, to build peace. Begin by looking around to find the impediments to positive peace in our society. Positive peace, as theorized by Dr. Galtung, is the attitudes, institutions, and structures that create and sustain peaceful societies. Positive peace is sustainable and built upon a foundation of justice and opportunity for everyone. Make it your mission to seek out and combat impediments to positive peace, be they structural (laws, policies, procedures) or cultural (ideology, language, traditional attitudes). Your peace activism might, for example, battle sexism or racism, or seek to expand and protect religious and free speech rights. You could also monitor and call out news media that distort and fuel the divides in our society.
In short, what will you do as a peacebuilder to plant the seeds for a sustainable, lasting peace?
We can do better—better at communicating with and respecting one another, and better at fostering positive peace. We’ll never get rid of partisanship, but perhaps we as peacebuilders can help build a society where the nastiness and bitterness accompanying our elections becomes a relic of the past.
Peace,
Professor Youngblood
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)