R&B Singer Marsha Ambrosius Song Far Away Dedicated To Her Gay Friend That Attempted Suicide.
I am very impressed with R&B singer Marsha Ambrosius video because she has the courage to discuss homophobia in the black community. Marsha’s new album Late Nights & Early Mornings debut at number two on the Billboard Charts two weeks ago! I am suprised BET allowed the video to be broadcast on the network. The video is beautiful, tragic, and yet so important. Well done Marsha!
Should Racist UCLA Student Be Expelled From University For Anti Asian Comments?
Wow I am stunned that UCLA has only issued a statement condemning Alexandra Wallace’s racist anti Asian comments! A statement by UCLA is not enough the university needs to take swift action and expel Alexandra Wallace for her racist anti Asian statements!
Although Alexandra has apologized it is very insincere she’s just trying to save herself.
Wallace’s comments reek of white skin privilege and entitlement. I believe UCLA has to take a stand against racism and I personally believe Alexandra Wallace must be expelled from the university. This young woman stereotypes Asian students and Asian families. The prejudice and bigotry are just disgusting! UCLA needs to set an example this young woman needs to be kicked out of university ASAP!!!
Canadian Business Magazine Interview With Zambian Author & Economist Dambisa Moyo.
Economics
Why the West is flailing
China and India are set to eclipse the western powers, and the fault lies in our 
own political and economic expediency, argues economist Dambisa Moyo.
Dambisa Moyo gave the foreign aid community fits with her first book, Dead Aid, which argued that the billions of dollars in development money wealthy countries send to developing African nations fail to reduce poverty or increase economic growth. In her new book, How the West Was Lost, she expands that critique, treating the housing bubble at the root of the recent financial crisis as just one instance of what’s been 50 years of misguided policy by the West, particularly the United States. As a result, the underlying promise of globalization — rising incomes for all — has failed to materialize, and the West finds itself in decline, being rapidly overtaken by the more agile and focused economies of China and India.
While she doesn’t say that all is lost, the Oxford–educated economist who worked at Goldman Sachs does believe the U.S. will have to fight back very hard if it is to stay on top. That will require making difficult decisions, and thinking about the long term, in a democratic environment that rewards easy choices and short–term thinking. She spoke with features editor Andrew Potter.
Canadian Business: At the start of your book, you say that the decline of the West is the story of the misallocation of resources that drive growth capital, labour and technology. At first, it sounds like you’re talking about a fairly recent problem of poor financial regulation and incentives, especially with respect to housing. But as the book goes on, you seem to be arguing that the problem is with the whole system of democratic capitalism that has built the western welfare state. Is that what you think is the root of the crisis?
Dambiso Moyo: Yes and no. I’m absolutely a supporter of democratic processes. But the democratic process with very short election cycles means an environment where policy–makers are driven to put in bad policies in the short term. You end up with not enough time to deal with the structural, long–term issues.
It’s not that the financial crisis per se is the end of the West, but rather that it is the most recent step down in what has been a catalogue of errors. If you had a longer democratic cycle — like in Brazil, where a term lasts seven years — it would be easier for the government to identify problems and put in place more structural solutions without having to face the electorate. I give the example of China because everyone is focused on it, but I am absolutely not saying get rid of democracy and move to communism. Rather, there are lots of things a government can do without having to change the political system from democratic to non–democratic. One example is Brazil; another is to implement more rewards — creating incentives for people to actually do the right thing.
Take an extreme example: we know obesity is a big issue, but we don’t want to infringe on individual rights, so maybe a government rewards people for losing weight. Or in education, you reward children for studying math or science instead of social sciences. Incentives have been eroded. And that doesn’t require becoming autocratic — just the current democratic cycle has to be de–politicized. Obama tried to do that by setting up the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, a bipartisan group to focus on health–care, information, infrastructure. But you have to strip the politics out of it.
CB: You move back and forth between worries about the relative decline of the West and concern that we are headed for an absolute decline in our living standards. I get the sense you think that a relative decline, with China and India catching up, is in itself a bad thing.
DM: Ultimately, the world is a better place if we can float more boats. Having India, China, Brazil, South Africa all growing is good news for humanity. But when you look at the way the world is right now, based on capital, labour and productivity, China and India are going to keep growing faster than the U.S. and Europe. What we don’t know — and this is why it’s so crucial for the West to get it right — is whether [those emerging economies] will start to approach the per capita incomes of the U.S. and Europe. And the reason we don’t know that is because there are binding constraints on the availability of water, energy, arable land and minerals around the world.
The way we are going to get around these constraints is to find innovative solutions. We’re going to have nine billion people on the planet in 40 years, many of them in China and India, who are going to demand higher incomes and living standards. In order to cater to those people, the West needs to be absolutely focused on innovative solutions. I believe the U.S. and Europe could find solutions to the constraints around energy if they put their minds to it. Unfortunately, that is not what policy minds in the United States are rewarded for.
If we don’t do anything, it is a zero–sum game. And that is precisely why the Chinese have played this game brilliantly. They’ve largely hedged themselves. They are the largest trading partner of Brazil and Chile and the Australians. And they have made friends around the world in resource states, almost in anticipation of a situation where there are no innovative gains to satisfy the demands of nine billion people.
CB: The story of the decline of the U.S. has been told before — the big threat 20 years ago was Japan. While you concede that China has some internal threats, how confident are you that the Chinese are going to solve their problems and continue to challenge the West?
DM: Well, the jury is still out. But if you are asking if the Chinese are focused on their issues, the answer is yes. And that is something we are not. We have to stop looking at China and think instead of what we are doing with our own policies. Think of it this way: people talk about China converging on our standards, but it is as much that as it is the West declining to Chinese standards. And that decline has to do with allowing infrastructure to deteriorate, while education — so critical to competitiveness and innovation — is wasting away. If the West would just focus on its own problems, it wouldn’t have to worry about China.
Of course, China has some serious structural problems — a billion people whohave now seen the good life, 300 million living like westerners. China has to figure out where they’re going to get their resources. They’re trying to educate their populace, urbanize, build infrastructure. It’s possible that China could blow up. But I’m pretty sanguine that China has already seen the problems and is dealing with them.
CB: Is this only about what countries can do, or can individual corporations do something, at the strategic level, to meet these challenges?
DM: It boils down to policies, and part of the policy element is incentives. The success of the West largely stems from governments providing the correct incentives to drive innovation, infrastructure and other feats we accomplished over the past 500 years. But over the past 50 years, there has been a predilection to implement policies that actually erode the essence of western society. How do they do that? They create policies that discourage people from doing the things that westerners need.
So, if you ask, “What is China doing right?” it’s that they copied the West in building up a society of incentives. As to what CEOs should do, they need to help governments understand that the policy environment, the conditions under which we — households, businesses, individuals — decide what our actions will be, needs to incentivize people to do the right thing.
CB: At the end of the book, you run through a number of scenarios that lay out how things may play out: the status quo, China faltering, America fighting back, America going ultra–protectionist. If you’re an investor, where are you putting your money? Which scenario are you betting on?
DM: You know what? I do believe in America. If I had to do a value trade, America versus Europe, I’d bet on America. That is why I wrote this book. For me, there are only two possible reasons why policy–makers have not jumped up and said, “We’re prioritizing health care, or education, these big issues.” One is that people really don’t care about the future. They look at their lives and they think, “I’m only here for a short time. My kids? Too bad, you’re going to have to sort things out for yourselves.” But are we as humans connected intergenerationally? Do we care about the planet we are leaving our kids? I think we do.
The other problem is that policy–makers have assumed people don’t care about these issues. They therefore have not tried to explain the reality of the world. Is it because they think we’re stupid? I hope governments don’t think that. But they have chosen not to educate the population on what it should be doing. How do I know that? Because within six months of the financial crisis being tamed — and we weren’t even out of it yet — I was getting e–mails asking me if I wanted to borrow more money.
Governments have lost out on a great opportunity to shift people’s mindsets — to say, “Your kids are uneducated, your infrastructure is dilapidated, so let’s focus on these issues.” I believe there will come a point when people will read my book or other material and say, “Oh my god! I didn’t realize that 23% of school leavers can’t add 50 plus 2 in their heads. That’s pathetic.” If that happens, then I think America could fight back. If the others are right in believing that people understand the situation fine and they simply don’t care about their children, well, then the Chinese will have the lead. But I’m optimistic that it’s not too late for the West.
Indian Talk Show Explores Decriminalization Of Homosexuality In Indian Culture.
Here are two interesting video clips and the discussion about homosexuality in India.
The debate is about the decriminalizing of the homosexuality law which existed until the year 2009 it is no longer a criminal act.
The conversation also discussed homophobia and discrimination gays and lesbians experience in the South Asian communities.
Racism At DePaul University Six Professors Of Colour Denied Tenure!!!
Racism charged in DePaul chemistry tenure denial
Organometallics chemist and NSF CAREER awardee, Dr. Quinetta D. Shelby, has been denied tenure in the Department of Chemistry at DePaul University even after an institutional appeals committee determined that her negative departmental review was flawed. According to a note at Inside Higher Ed on Thursday:
Supporters of Quinetta Shelby released documents Wednesday suggesting bias in her tenure denial at DePaul University. Shelby is the only black faculty member in the chemistry department at the university, and while she was rejected by her department, a university appeals panel found that she was treated unfairly. Among other things, the appeals panel found that her department changed policies after the review started, refused to consider some of her publications and awards even though they met criteria that had been established, and seemed to focus on minor negative issues in otherwise positive portions of her tenure file. The “numerous procedural violations” raised significant questions of fairness, the appeals panel found, suggesting that the negative departmental recommendation be set aside.
The Rev. Dennis Holtschneider, DePaul’s president, has declined to reverse the decision.
This year, Shelby was one of a group of six persons not granted tenure at DePaul: two African Americans, two Asian-Americans, and two Latino professors. No white faculty were denied this year. Conflicting reports from Rev. Holtschneider and the faculty indicate that minority faculty tenure rates have historically been either equal to or lower than those for white faculty.
Admittedly, judging individual tenure decisions from afar can be unscientific, particularly since neither the released documents cited above or DePaul’s Department of Chemistry promotion and tenure document(s) can be accessed online.
But Shelby’s case in particular has the aroma of injustice. A diverse group of supporters – yes, even older, bespectacled and bearded white dudes (video here) – came to her side in a press conference on Wednesday noting that issues of racial bias have been going on for at least five years. The lack of higher administration action on the “numerous procedural violations” cited by the appeals panel also smells bad. Moreover, Holtschneider’s comments in the Fox Chicago interview are disappointing in that he says, “we have a committee of faculty working on that right now, so we make sure that what happened in one year at DePaul never happens again.”
How about examining why this happened in the first place before you jettison Dr. Shelby?
But, then again, Father Holtschneider is fine. DePaul trustees just granted him a six-year contract extension on November 4th.
Here’s what we can find out about Professor Shelby. She earned her BS from the University of Chicago and PhD at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. After NIH-supported postdoctoral work at Yale University, Shelby launched her independent career at Chicago State University then joined DePaul in 2004. Her early work with chemist John Hartwig resulted in a couple of nice publications with a first-author JACS paper in 2000 that has been cited more than 120 times and a second-author Journal of Organic Chemistry paper from 2002 that’s been cited more than 300 times.
It’s tough for me to count her publications since joining DePaul because I don’t know if the promotion and tenure committee gave her credit for the Acta Crystallography structure reports she’s published (three in 2009). Without them, Web of Science reveals three peer-reviewed publications since 2007 and a gap that extends back to 2003. Not knowing what the teaching-intensive DePaul University might expect from an assistant professor, I can’t really make any conclusions.
In 2006, Dr. Shelby successfully competed for a CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation that supports her synthetic work and provides undergraduate research opportunities in chemistry for students at her former institution, an historically-black college/university (HBCU), and DePaul. The abstract from the NSF site reads as follows:
This CAREER award by the Inorganic, Bioinorganic, and Organometallic Chemistry program supports work by Professor Quinetta Shelby at DePaul University to develop palladium catalysts that promote the stereoselective allylation reaction of electrophiles with allylsilanes. The proposed research involves Pd catalysts ligated with anionic bidentate phosphine ligands. One aspect of the research plan focuses on methods to activate the reaction of allylsilanes with aldehydes and to promote the asymmetric synthesis of homoallylic alcohols, which are useful intermediates in the synthesis of natural products. The area of study is relevant to the fundamental understanding of principles that will improve catalytic systems for synthetic reactions. The aim of the education plan is to increase the number of women and persons in underrepresented minority groups who pursue careers as research scientists through activities including research internships, workshops on pursuing graduate education, networking, and mentoring. The education plan will provide experiences that allow students from DePaul University and Chicago State University, a primarily minority-serving institution, to become more confident in their ability to conduct research while they learn about academic options that are available in graduate programs.
Indeed, it seems that her work is quite consistent with the goals of the NSF CAREER program:
The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program is a Foundation-wide activity that offers the National Science Foundation’s most prestigious awards in support of the early career-development activities of those teacher-scholars who most effectively integrate research and education within the context of the mission of their organization.
Assistant Professor of Chemistry Quinetta Shelby (far left) and her student assistant Elizabeth Sisler (far right) attracted the interest of Trustee James Czech, Father Holtschneider and Trustee Connie Curran on their exploration into helping medicines work more effectively. (Photo and caption from DePaul Newsline Online, 13 July 2009).
Shelby’s research had been featured prominently by the university and she was pictured here last July with her student Elizabeth Sisler, President Holtschneider, and two university trustees. She appears to have been active in student research mentoring, both from her own grant and in DePaul’s NSF grant from the Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation program.
I’m not terribly fond of RateMyProfessors.com (no, I’m not listed there) but that’s all I have to go on for Dr. Shelby’s teaching. Out of 29 DePaul chemistry instructors rated, Shelby was rated better than the department average. She had some negative comments back in 2005 but has had very strong ratings since with a few complaints typical for any instructor teaching a tough course like organic chemistry. This 2006 comment probably explained some of the negativity:
“Shelby is one of the most driven professors I’ve ever seen. Determined to help students learn and to get better at helping them. But it’s a two way street. She’s not going to lower her standards to accom[m]odate some students. Problem: people get used to curving and think it’s sin she doesn’t. That’s her p[rer]ogative. Organic is hard but not impossible.”
So, she has high standards and expects from her students what other DePaul professors may not.
In service, I was able to find that Shelby served to write and edit the Department of Chemistry’s Catalyst newsletter as late as 2008. But, again, I don’t have much more than that.
I dunno. Something just isn’t right here. Not a peep from the student newspaper, often a place for the most frank commentary at other universities. Objectively, perhaps Shelby’s publication record was not extensive enough. But everything else seems to be in order relative to others in her department. The fact that issues of racism toward faculty are alleged to have been ongoing for five years troubles me (I can’t tell if the Fox Chicago news report was referring to racism in the department or at the university in general). DePaul is no stranger to claims of unfair bias in tenure decisions and hiring: gender last year and two denials in 2007 that led to a student hunger strike protest, plus the Thomas Klocek affair. In the current case, the biggest red flag for me is the note from Inside Higher Ed remarking that the department decision on Shelby’s tenure was compromised by procedural violations, regardless of whether race was involved.
In higher ed circles, DePaul tends to have a pretty good record with regard to student diversity and educational access. The student body is about 8.5% African American and 13% Hispanic and Latino and 35% of students are first-generation college degree-seekers. Named after St. Vincent de Paul who tended to the poor of Paris in the 1600s, the university refers to its Vincentian mission “with special concern for the deprived members of society.”
I’d welcome any comments or discussion, especially from those close to this case and particularly if Shelby supporters wish to share any of the documentation that was released earlier this week. Feel free to Gmail me at abelpharmboy.
Gayblackcanada 