It’s one thing when students react strongly against the Justice for All exhibit, including calling it a great big "lie".  I’m one to know that having been a volunteer over the past week.  It’s another thing when the student government does it, and that’s exactly what has apparently happened.

Joke about the Women’s Resource Center all you want, but according to a source within ASUA, the following letter was sent onto the "ASUA_ADMIN" listserv, which unlike the ASUA listserv appears closed to public view.  The senders’ surnames and email addresses have been removed for privacy (read: lawsuit aversion) reasons, but the removed surnames can be garnered from the WRC page on the ASUA website.

———- Forwarded message ———-
From: Carly [surname] <[email]>
Date: Jan 24, 2007 9:47 AM
Subject: Women’s Resource Center
To: ASUA_ADMIN@listserv.arizona.edu

The current misleading, lie-filled display against abortion on the UA mall is a
good reminder of the need for an active progressive feminist space on
campus—a central location where information can be disseminated, activists
can meet, and groups can collaborate on projects and programming.

Did you know that there is a Women’s Resource Center at the University of
Arizona? If not, you are certainly not alone. We are two graduate students in
the Women’s Studies Department, and have recently been confirmed as the new
Co-Directors of the WRC, which is located in the ASUA branch of the Student
Union.  Although the center hasn’t been too highly-functioning over the past
several years, we hope to transform it into a feminist, social-justice
oriented, activist hub.

SAVE THE DATE: As part of the grand re-opening for the WRC, Jennifer Baumgardner
and Amy Richards, internationally renowned authors of several books, including
__Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism and the Future__, will be speaking on
Tuesday March 20th! Details to come! To check out the biographies of these
amazing women, go to: http://www.soapboxinc.com/whoweare.html

(PROFESSORS: if you want Jen and Amy to speak in your class in the afternoon,
let us know ASAP. If you hold a Tuesday evening course, this would be a great
event to attend as a class! Please consider, and for the sake of planning,
please contact Carly at [email] to let us know!)

Because we activists are too often unaware of the activities of other
like-minded folks, we envision the Women’s Resource Center as a location to
bring folks together. Mostly, we want to collaborate with the activists that
are already doing great social justice work! For those of you already involved
in other progressive feminist organizations, we can offer you office space,
potential funding for events and outreach, and endless energy and hugs!

Furthermore, we are looking for individuals to act as coordinators for various
committees, or create other committees you see a need for. Although these would
not be paid positions, this is a great opportunity to get involved in a
leadership role, learn valuable job skills, and earn an important line on a CV
or resume.

In order to do make these changes, we need YOU! As stated, we’re looking for
individuals to volunteer and organizations to collaborate with.  Several
individuals have already expressed an interest in collaborating to create
campus and community programming in the following areas:

•       Women’s Health (sexuality, alternative health, reproductive health/rights
issues)
•       Violence Against Women (sexual assault prevention, healthy relationships,
Take Back the Night)
•       Women’s Empowerment (discussion and book groups, open mic nights)

The WRC is currently staffed:

Mondays—9:30-1:30 (Carly)
Thursdays—from 11-3 (Sara)
Fridays—11-3 (Nettie)

Although the space is obviously not staffed at all times, we can arrange for use
of the space at almost any time. Eventually, we hope to be open 40+ hours/week,
but this will require volunteers to staff the center, work on outreach, write
grants, etc. Nonetheless, Please do stop by and see us!

Professors: Do you require or would you like to incorporate a service learning
component into your classes? If so, we may be able to help connect your
students to community organizations, or will definitely be able to offer them a
meaningful service project through the WRC. If you are interested, we’d love
to chat about this further!

Lastly, there is an important new group on campus called the Reproductive Rights
Coalition. The focus of this coalition is to bring together the various campus
and community-based reproductive justice groups in order to share resources,
collaborate on events, and support one another’s work in order to have a real
impact. One of our primary objectives is working to overturn the on-campus
abortion ban. For more information on meetings, or to join or support the RRC
in any capacity, please contact Carly at [email].

Because of the obvious intersections between race, class, sexuality, gender and
social justice, we hope to work on a wide variety of issues. In other words,
All issues, personalities, and skills will be welcome and appreciated! Any
questions, any interest, or to donate massive amounts of cash , please
contact either:

Sara [surname]                              or             Carly [surname]
[email]                           [email]

Please forward this message widely; We look forward to working with you!

Carly and Sara

 

Raise your hand if this makes you more sick than the abortions photographs already do.  Expect a candidate question specifically about this incident.

Note: I’ve been consistently fighting HTML problems here, so take note if you’re comparing versions.

Update: I think that’s it for the HTML problems.  Holy crap, I’m not cutting and pasting from GMail ever again.

THIS PODCAST EPISODE IS NOT SAFE FOR CHILDREN. 

Update (7 Dec): Archive.org, the server where I host the podcasts, appears to be having problems at the moment.

How to listen:

Play episode | RSS 2.0 Feed (podcasts) | Subscribe using iTunes

WorldNetDaily columnist Jim Rutz declared in a controversial column recently that overconsumption of soy products causes males to become homosexuals, citing soy’s relatively-high estrogen content.

“Soy is feminizing,” Rutz claims “and commonly leads to a decrease in the size of the penis, sexual confusion, and homosexuality. That’s why most of the medical…blame for today’s rise in homosexuality must fall upon the rise of soy formula and other soy products.”

WorldNetDaily editor-in-chief Joseph Farah, amidst massive hate mail from leftist websites, immediately defended Rutz, and called for women to be banned from eating beef, pork, poultry, beans, and dairy, for fear that increased testosterone levels might make them homosexuals, too.

Officials at the University of Arizona complimented the study, and are planning to increase the availability of soy in on-campus food in order to facilitate an increase in diversity. In contrast, Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University has banned tofu, calling it “The Curd of Tinky Winky.”

This news report is brought to you by the Law Offices of Bob Schmuck. Did your mother feed you soy as a infant? Are you sexually confused? Recent medical research has found that your sexual confusion is not your fault, and you may be able to sue for damages. For a free consultation, call the Law Offices of Bob Schmuck at 1-800-SOY-MILK.

Editorial note: I still affirm that homosexuality is a sin just like any other sexual sin, but that doesn’t stop me from thinking Jim Rutz is stupid.

Music is "Stop Yield Go Merge (Extended Les Thorn Mix)" from Derek K. Miller of Penmachine. 

I return back to Scott Ott inspired satirical news with a podcast concerning the Tunnel of Oppression, an annual event here at the UA which seeks to "to challenge peoples’ ideas and perceptions of issues dealing with oppression."  I suspect that it may become politically charged as a result of having Proposition 107 on the ballot this year.

As such, the podcast is chock full of racial epithets, so make sure you keep the volume down (or use headphones) if you work at a liberal educational institution.  That won’t tend to muffle your laughter, though.  You’re on your own there.

Explanations of most slurs and epithets are available here, here, and here. 

Background music is Meltdown Man by Derek K. Miller of Penmachine.  Licensing is under Creative Commons Attribution 2.5.

How to listen:

Play episode | RSS 2.0 Feed (podcasts) | Subscribe with iTunes or other podcatcher

After the collapse of the Alliance of Free Blogs, I am glad to have been found by the Cactus Alliance, a growing collective of some of Arizona’s most interesting conservative and pro-life blogs.  Yes, I am stealing some of Austin Bay’s language there.

Now that we’ve won the blog war against Glenn Reynolds and the Axis of Naughty, I suggest blog war against an even more dangerous foe: Jim Pederson.  Imagine: we can lie about how Jim Pederson sticks cute puppies in blenders and drinks them, thereby causing him to lose his far-left, pro-animal rights voter base, guaranteeing a win for Jon Kyl.

The narrative could go something like this:

Hey, everyone! It’s Garrett. I hope you’re having a good week, but I have to tell you about this horrible thing I found out. See, I ran into Jim Pederson today and he was drinking what looked like some sort of smoothie. So I asked him, "Hey, Jim Pederson, what are you drinking?"

And he said, "It’s my special energy drink to keep me fit and my intellect sharp."

"Wow," I responded, "How do you make it?"

"I put a puppy in a blender!" Jim Pederson laughed and then took an extra long sip.

"You can’t put a puppy in a blender!" I said in complete horror.

"I can do whatever I want! I’m Jim Pederson!"

"You monster!"

He took another drink. "Mmmm… puppy. And, the cuter the puppy, the better the energy drink. Muh ha ha ha ha!" He then ran off, drinking his puppy.

Okay, so I stole the whole thing from IMAO.  Perhaps we could come up with some other filthy lie and go with that?  It’s not like Pederson isn’t lying through his teeth himself, right?

What do you think? 

The Wildcat has been really boring as of late.  Much petty bickering about nothing.  At least I have something to make fun of when they’re hyper-stupid.  Now I’m bored.

Let’s hope the following events relieve me of said boredom!

• University president Robert Shelton will discuss how minorities apparently can’t make friends if there’s too many white people on campus in Gallagher Theater from noon until 12:50 tomorrow.  This won’t relieve my boredom, as I have a class I can’t skip with those exact times.

• The UA Voter Block Party is on Main Gate Square (University between Park and Euclid) starting at 5:00pm.   This is the event still known to the ASUA Calendar as the Rock the Vote Concert.  Earlier I posted and wrote a letter to the Wildcat concerning this, and ASUA President Erin Hertzog has tried to alleviate my fears both via a response letter to the Wildcat and email.  I appreciate the replies, but only my attendance and observation will be the correct measure of whether they’ve done it right.  Expect a podcast.  At minimum, I intend to grill Gabrielle Giffords on her integrity.
• There will be a gubernatorial debate in the Student Union Ballroom starting at 7:00pm on Tuesday, October 10.  Napolitano was a no show in Show Low, but I suppose college students in Tucson are easier to appease on illegal immigration and disgracing 9/11 victims than rural Arizonans are.

"Pulling a Frisch" is different from "Frisch[ing] yourself."

To Frisch: Writing something on the internet so creepy and offensive that you are forced to quit your job before getting canned.  Ex. Deb really frisched herself when she threatened that blogger’s 2 year old child with death and sexual molestation.

I think that’s what we have here, only without the threat of child molestation or murder.  Let’s hope this guy gets canned.  Here’s his boss’ contact info.

Update: I misspelled "threat" earlier.

With the huge elections brouhaha from last semester, I’ve discovered that corruption digs deeper than college student councils. 

A 14-year-old West Miami-Dade boy ran away from home last week, boarded a plane and took a startling international flight alone — to Havana, his father said Tuesday.

Alfredo Diaz, a 10th-grader at G. Holmes Braddock Senior High, cleared an American Airlines security check and boarded a Miami-to-Nassau flight on Thursday, even though the carrier requires escorts for anyone under 15.

[…] 

Alfredo may have been caught up in some typical teenage angst. He had met a special girl during a visit to Cuba this summer, his father said. And in school, he was accused of cheating to try to win the class presidency.

[…] 

Alfredo returned to Miami three days before school began and decided to run for class president, his father said. The effort soured when Alfredo was accused of voter fraud for casting votes for himself in the name of friends, his father said.

I once said that ASUA acts like a glorified high school student council.  I guess this proves it in more than one way! 

ht: Disturbingly Yellow 

Those of you who were regular readers of The O’Hara Factor back in February know I had quite the debacle with the ASUA Supreme Court last year.  This I know well; I was getting sixty hits daily on a consistent basis.  Only Deborah Frisch could ever put me over that mark, bringing one of my days to 400. 

It started with Justice Shar Bahmani, who wrote a letter to the Wildcat encouraging calm amidst the Cade Bernsen sexual harassment scandal despite that he as a justice could have ended up hearing Bernsen’s impeachment.  I didn’t get much feedback from the court itself, but I did get referrer links in my site statistics indicating that individuals from the court (their names were in the URL’s!) had emailed each other about my criticism.

That didn’t bode well for me once the Rhonda Tubbs elections code violation scandal came out.  Chief Justice Jennifer Baker in reply to my request didn’t let me in.  I was merely a blogger, not a real journalist.  I physically entered the room to see if I could still attend.  No go.  In fact, I later  determined that the trial may have violated state Open Meetings Law.  Later on, I received similar signs of internal bickering over my existence via the referrer statistics.  Tubbs won that case, but there was another case nobody informed me of the following Saturday that ended up disqualifying her candidacy.

So now we have two new justices and one promotion to chief justice.  Jennifer Baker is among the departures (which is good).  So far, the website hasn’t been updated and the term expirations dates seem inconsistent with having two new justices, so it looks like somebody quit.  We’ll have to wait and see who’s on there.  Let’s hope that the court and ASUA in general don’t exhibit this kind of corruption this year.

Flopping Aces’ report on the proposed Arizona 9/11 Memorial makes me want to puke just as much as Refuse and Resist did during the 9/11 anniversary.  And guess what?  Janet Napolitano likes it.

I hate to be politicking over this, but what say Len Munsil? 

Correction (9/21): Not proposed.  It exists.  Disgusting.

Immediately following university President Robert Shelton’s declaration of support for becoming an "Hispanic-Serving Institution," the Wildcat looks alone in its support.  Yesterday and today, letter writers blasted the plan.

Okay, so one of those letters was mine.  And the supporters probably aren’t the vocal type, either.  Let’s see what this does.

Update: Later on, one guy did post in the comments of today’s mailbag.  Perhaps he’s a good example of Tucson High Magnet School’s lack of effectiveness in civic education.  After all, we are talking about a school where teachers openly encourage students to skip school in favor of pro-illegal immigration rallies and guest speakers tell students about how "Republicans hate Latinos."

Update II: Moreover, another teacher at Tucson High opposed a 9/11 memorial there.  One particular Republican henceforth called the school a "sweatshop of liberalism." (ht: Flopping Aces)

The Wildcat reports that ASUA senators are slow at getting projects going.  No crap.

One senator who isn’t being slow is friend Steven Gerner, who tied Matthew Boepple in the initial vote tally for tenth place in last year’s election before winning by a landslide in the runoff.  Gerner has proposed a program to give students course credit for dedicated volunteer work.  Logistics are still being worked out, but I would like to add that the proposal could potentially put some students over the per-semester credit limit, though having such a workload in addition to volunteering might sway most students anyway.  Moreover, there had better be some enforcement of the students in order to make sure they aren’t just doing the motions in order to get class credit.  If they can work these things out, I think Gerner has a plan.

In the meantime, let’s hope the other senators get the ball rolling.

I also have a letter in.  I’m glad it’s published, but they did remove out all of my paragraph breaks, extend the last ASUA acronym to the full name, and remove the blog address I included (which is historical precedent for every time I’ve tried to get them to do it).

The Alliance is wondering what Glenn Reynolds read during middle school.  Let us review the facts.

• Glenn Reynolds’ latest podcast is an episode on The Politics of Food.  Among the things he and his wife Helen talked about was how food is getting too industrialized for the good of our own health.  He likes natural foods!
• Though not mentioned in the podcast, Reynolds has the tendency to drink puppies.

As I thought about this connection, I figured out that not only were we investigating his childhood literature, we could break through and find out exactly why he drinks puppies.

It took me five minutes of searching on Amazon.com to find what the culprit was.  I conclude that Glenn Reynolds’ literature teacher forced him to read, and enjoy, The Puppy Sister.

That’s right.  The Puppy Sister is further proof that the public education system is leaving young boys behind by forcing them to read stupid, girly fantasy books.  Glenn Reynolds wouldn’t have it, and found a way to use it in a boyish, scientific way.  Using scientific evidence from The Puppy Sister, the cannibal Glenn Reynolds found that eating puppies is the same thing as eating people.  Therefore, he could continue in his cannibalistic ways without getting in trouble whenever one of his classmates went missing.

Save the puppies.  Burn The Puppy Sister wherever you happen to find it.

After clicking a link on the right side of the Tucson Citizen local page, I noticed this morning that Gannett’s "Border Divide immigration debate portal" has a Jeopardy-style online quiz consisting of government-printed citizenship test flash cards.  Some of it is what you’d expect: questions about who wrote the Declaration of Independence, what the stripes of the American Flag mean, etc.

Then I started going through the 1,000-point questions just to see if I could get one wrong.  I’ll take U.S. Rights for 1,000, Alex.

Well, that’s actually kind of debatable.  Rights are important, but valuing one or the other isn’t pertinent unless you consider that without the right to bear arms, the government can easily take away the other two without redress.  Naturally, (a), not (b), is considered the correct answer in the government-printed flash cards.

Let’s move one question up: U.S. Rights for 800!

This one’s on Gannett, not the government, as the former made up the multiple-choice answers.  Way to mock the Second Amendment, you objective journalists. 

Language is a [expletive], isn’t it?

I learned something about Plan B today.  It apparently does get rid of a fertilized egg.  So much for the term "emergency contraceptive."  Thanks for the misinformation.

Moreover, a medical expert I spoke to notes that taking a week’s worth of birth control pills does the same damn thing. 

Guess what?  It’s election time again, and Iraq the Vote is at it again.  Of all the things I could possibly gripe about in the Wildcat’s article about the ASUA budget, Rock the Vote has to be the absolute worst.

Rock the Vote:

• Thinks a military draft is still in the works. (WTF?)
  
• Wants more government interference in health care.
• Capitalizes the racial terms "white" and "black".
• And more…

Regardless of whether one might agree with these positions, ASUA just took a major external political stand.  I was hoping that the higher number of conservatives would have changed things like this for the better, but I’m apparently wrong.