White people entitlements

There is a rather unique situation here in Hawaii with the Kamehameha Schools Bishop Estate(KSBE), recently being ordered by a Ferderal Judge to admit a 12 year old non Native Hawaiian to its school, sparking protests, even threats.

On Wednesday, U.S. Judge David Ezra ordered the school to admit Mohica-Cummings to attend the seventh-grade classes, which began yesterday.

Ezra made no ruling on whether the estate's Hawaiian preference admission system was illegal or constitutional.

Mohica-Cummings, who sued the estate to overturn its admission policy, initially was accepted, but school officials rescinded the offer on Aug. 13 after they were unable to confirm his Hawaiian ancestry.

His mother was adopted by a native Hawaiian

The controversy is the latest to hit the $6 billion Kamehameha Schools, whose admission policy gives preference to children of native Hawaiian ancestry. The schools were sued earlier this year by an unnamed non-Hawaiian boy who was denied entry due to his race.

And last year, the estate was forced to admit a non-Hawaiian student to its Maui campus after officials failed to fill all openings with Hawaiian students. The decision caused an uproar in the Hawaiian community and led the estate's trustees to reaffirm its Hawaiians-only preference.

Ezra's decision was protested by 50 members of the Kamehameha Schools ohana at the campus yesterday morning.

Myself can understand why some people are upset, he is talking the place of a native Hawaiian that would have otherwise gotten the prized slot. The school gets more that twice the applications as there are slots. Their policy on Hawaiians-only admissions is an entirely different can of worms. The school was founded in the 1887, well before Hawaii became a State, from the estate of Bernice Pauahi Bishop, decendant of King Kamehameha, is among the wealthiest endowments in the US today, and exists primarily for the benefit of native Hawaiians. Myself sees it as Affirmative Action to the nth power, If a Catholic school can give preference to Catholics, then KSBE can do the same with native Hawaiians. Now to actively exclude non-Hawaiians, well maybe that's going a bit far, but admitting a few non-Hawaiian students should be no big deal, but apparently it is.

reciprocity

Tasberry gave a permalink. Hers is a personal diary type blog, detailing her daily life and stuff. The sex talk is particularly interesting.

also Jesus' General seems to be back, still fighting the good fight, in his heterosexually own way. Also particularly interesting

Music Wars: Scene 13
In which the RIAA tries a Second Time Around

Late Monday, the Recording Industry Association of America (news - web sites), the Motion Picture Association of America, and the National Music Publishers' Association filed an appeal to a Los Angeles district court judge's decision. The court had ruled on April 25 that the operators of the Grokster and Morpheus peer-to-peer services couldn't know when users were trading copyrighted works.

As expected, the three groups have asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to overturn the decision by U.S. District Court Judge Stephen Wilson. They ask that the Grokster service and Morpheus operator StreamCast Networks be held responsible for copyright violations that occur on those P-to-P networks.

Myself wants to know if the RIAA has learned anything since the invention of the tape recorder. This is exactly the same thing. Video recorders as well. Even with examples of piracy in today's world the movie industry has not collapsed. I am hoping that music artists will, in the end get fed up with the RIAA alienating their fanbase, by telling them that they must get their music from only whom the RIAA says you can, threating thei fans with subpeonas, fines and will decide to cut the RIAA out entirely by recording their music and publishing it themselves. Because in reality everbody knows its the RIAA's pocketbook not the artist's that's being really hurt, and ultimately their very existance is in danger of becoming oblolete. And Methinks that is truly the reason for their agressive approach. The RIAA need to show that they are very much needed to defend all musicians, fighting for their rights, blah blah blah, when its becoming increasingly apparent that they must either adapt or go the way of the buggy whip.

Music Wars: Scene 12
In which the Rebels establish a new outpost Somewhere, Out there

From MSNBC via ZDNet:

Deep in the tense Jenin refugee camp in the Palestinian West Bank, a new file-swapping service is daring record labels and movie studios to turn their piracy-hunting into an international incident. Dubbed Earthstation 5, the new file-swapping network is openly flouting international copyright norms at a time when many older peer-to-peer companies are trying to establish themselves as legitimate technology companies. One of the brashest of a new generation of file-trading networks, it is serving as a new test case for the ability of high-tech security measures and international borders to preserve privacy on the Net.

snip..
On its face, Earthstation 5 appears to be at the leading edge of the movie and music industry’s next nightmare — copyright-flouting networks based in a territory without strong intellectual property laws, with security built in that protects users from scrutiny.

Hot damn but these guys are good. By using UDP Packets,as opposed to TCP,SSL and Proxy Servers, (if you don't understand these terms, don't worry the RIAA does), a new level of anonimity is gained, although not complete and total. Again one step ahead of the Empire RIAA, although the article goes on to say this may damage the more legit services like Kazaa, who are trying (it seems) to work some kind of compromise with the RIAA, The music industry would be foolish to use Earthstation as an excuse not to negotiate. Earthstation is a response to the RIAA's tactics, a real spit in you face response, with more to come, it's a losing battle. Meanwhile, construction of the Death Star continues.....

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished II

took a four day weekend off, Vacation day thursday, holiday friday, it was Admissions day (yes that's right we have a state holiday to commemorate the day Hawaii became the 50th State, call your state legislator right now), Myself highly recommends four day weekends. I got my new Macy's Visa card on Friday (see Rant below). So Myself is on my way to brunch Sunday and has to get a b-day card. While in the drugstore, Myself grabs a few other things, and heads for the checkout. Whoops, Myself is short of cash, because he needs to put $20 in the card, and Myself does not have enough. So Myself whips out my brand spanking new Macy's Visa card and swipes it through.... no go. The cashier tries it with her station. Again no go. Now the Manager comes over and calls the authorization center. After giving the info and a few yes and no answers he informs me that he was instructed to confiscate my card and turn it in. Thank you Macy's soooo very much.